H.I. No. 4: Feedback on Feedback: Difference between revisions

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'''Brady:''' I- well I was going to amaze you and say that I have prepared notes,-
Brady: I- well I was going to amaze you and say that I have prepared notes,-


'''Grey:''' Mm-hmm?
Grey: Mm-hmm?


'''Brady:''' But it's more a case of I started to prepare notes.
Brady: But it's more a case of I started to prepare notes.


[HI theme]
[HI theme]


'''Brady:''' So, since we last spoke,-
Brady: So, since we last spoke,-


'''Grey:''' Mm-hmm.
Grey: Mm-hmm.


'''Brady:''' -much has happened.
Brady: -much has happened.


'''Grey:''' Yes!
Grey: Yes!


'''Brady:''' Much has happened, and I know we traditionally start with what I always accidently call feedback, but you call follow up-
Brady: Much has happened, and I know we traditionally start with what I always accidently call feedback, but you call follow up-


'''Grey:''' Mm-hmm.
Grey: Mm-hmm.


'''Brady:''' -and this is going to be a very exciting follow up,-
Brady: -and this is going to be a very exciting follow up,-


'''Grey:''' Oh yes?
Grey: Oh yes?


'''Brady:''' -because the podcast is now like, public and people have to listened to it.
Brady: -because the podcast is now like, public and people have to listened to it.


'''Grey:''' Yes, it is.
Grey: Yes, it is.


'''Brady:''' So it's no longer- it's no longer just you correcting yourself and flogging yourself on mistakes you've made,-
Brady: So it's no longer- it's no longer just you correcting yourself and flogging yourself on mistakes you've made,-


'''Grey:''' Hmm...
Grey: Hmm...


'''Brady:''' -you can now flog yourself for mistakes other people have found.
Brady: -you can now flog yourself for mistakes other people have found.


'''Grey:''' Mm-hmm, yes, that's true I can- I can get feedback from uh, everybody out there in the world, but yes, it is- it is public, it is out there, uh, which is a big relief to finally have it kind of out in the world instead of just, uh, a little project between the two of us. Um, so what are some of your- what are some of your notes then? Let's start out with your preparations. What have you done?
Grey: Mm-hmm, yes, that's true I can- I can get feedback from uh, everybody out there in the world, but yes, it is- it is public, it is out there, uh, which is a big relief to finally have it kind of out in the world instead of just, uh, a little project between the two of us. Um, so what are some of your- what are some of your notes then? Let's start out with your preparations. What have you done?


'''Brady:''' Well, I thought we might event- maybe talk about some of the content of the episodes, but first deal with some of the sort of general-
Brady: Well, I thought we might event- maybe talk about some of the content of the episodes, but first deal with some of the sort of general-


'''Grey:''' Mm-hmm.
Grey: Mm-hmm.


'''Brady:''' -feedback and follow up.
Brady: -feedback and follow up.


'''Grey:''' Mm-hmm.
Grey: Mm-hmm.


'''Brady:''' And I guess, I mean I guess a lot of it has just been- has- it's been really positive for a start, it's been amazing.
Brady: And I guess, I mean I guess a lot of it has just been- has- it's been really positive for a start, it's been amazing.


'''Grey:''' Mm-hmm.
Grey: Mm-hmm.


'''Brady:''' I mean it's mainly been um, you know, people saying how wonderful you are, which is fair enough. But uh...
Brady: I mean it's mainly been um, you know, people saying how wonderful you are, which is fair enough. But uh...


'''Grey:''' There are Brady fans! I have seen-
Grey: There are Brady fans! I have seen-


'''Brady:''' Yeah, yeah...
Brady: Yeah, yeah...


'''Grey:''' -I have seen in the comments Brady fans.
Grey: -I have seen in the comments Brady fans.


'''Brady:''' Yeah, there are a couple out there, but there isn't- there has been a criticism of me,-
Brady: Yeah, there are a couple out there, but there isn't- there has been a criticism of me,-


'''Grey:''' What is that?
Grey: What is that?


'''Brady:''' -and I'd like to- I'd- and I- I think it's something worth addressing,-
Brady: -and I'd like to- I'd- and I- I think it's something worth addressing,-


'''Grey:''' Mm-hmm.
Grey: Mm-hmm.


'''Brady:''' -or discussing at least.
Brady: -or discussing at least.


'''Grey:''' Mm-hmm.
Grey: Mm-hmm.


'''Brady:''' -and this was this feeling that it's basically me asking you a bunch of questions,-
Brady: -and this was this feeling that it's basically me asking you a bunch of questions,-


'''Grey:''' Mm-hmm.
Grey: Mm-hmm.


'''Brady:''' -and- and you talking a whole lot.
Brady: -and- and you talking a whole lot.


'''Grey:''' Mm-hmm.
Grey: Mm-hmm.


'''Brady:''' and I thought we should discuss that.
Brady: and I thought we should discuss that.


'''Grey:''' Oh yeah? What do you have to discuss about that? I- I'm curious from your perspective.
Grey: Oh yeah? What do you have to discuss about that? I- I'm curious from your perspective.


'''Brady:''' Well there's a few points,-
Brady: Well there's a few points,-


'''Grey:''' Yeah?
Grey: Yeah?


'''Brady:''' -the first point is I completely agree,-
Brady: -the first point is I completely agree,-


'''Grey:''' Mm-hmm.
Grey: Mm-hmm.


'''Brady:''' -it is- it is for the most part me just ask you questions, but I think that's kind of the way it should be to a large extent, and I mean you and I discussed this before we even started, the nature of whether or not, you know, I'm asking you questions and,- and how much I rabbit on myself,-
Brady: -it is- it is for the most part me just ask you questions, but I think that's kind of the way it should be to a large extent, and I mean you and I discussed this before we even started, the nature of whether or not, you know, I'm asking you questions and,- and how much I rabbit on myself,-


'''Grey:''' Mm-hmm.
Grey: Mm-hmm.


'''Brady:''' -and- and for the record, I mean, you've always- you've always said you want to hear a lot from me,-
Brady: -and- and for the record, I mean, you've always- you've always said you want to hear a lot from me,-


'''Grey:''' Mm-hmm.
Grey: Mm-hmm.


'''Brady:''' -you know, you don't just want me to ask you questions. But, I think it was always going to be that way, this plays to our strengths. This is- this is the way we are isn't it? I mean, you are like a talker, communicator-type-person, I mean you used to be a teacher for goodness sake.
Brady: -you know, you don't just want me to ask you questions. But, I think it was always going to be that way, this plays to our strengths. This is- this is the way we are isn't it? I mean, you are like a talker, communicator-type-person, I mean you used to be a teacher for goodness sake.


'''Grey:''' Yeah.
Grey: Yeah.


'''Brady:''' And I am a question-asker, you know,-
Brady: And I am a question-asker, you know,-


'''Grey:''' And-
Grey: And-


'''Brady:''' -and I'm- I'm a journalist by training, so, you put two of us in a room, one guy he has lots of things to say, and knowledge, and likes to communicate it, and another guy he likes to, like, ask questions and find things out from people,
Brady: -and I'm- I'm a journalist by training, so, you put two of us in a room, one guy he has lots of things to say, and knowledge, and likes to communicate it, and another guy he likes to, like, ask questions and find things out from people,


'''Grey:''' Mm-hmm.
Grey: Mm-hmm.


'''Brady:''' -of course it's going to- it's going to happen now isn't it?
Brady: -of course it's going to- it's going to happen now isn't it?


'''Grey:''' Yeah, I- I think you're- you're partly right, and part of the reason that- that I wanted to work with you on this is I do think that you are the best interviewer person I have ever come across. Uh, and for the- for those of you who have ever seen Brady's YouTube videos, uh, you know, he's always interviewing somebody else and he does the editing, and he often cuts out his own questioning part, but I have- I have seen it happen live a couple of times, uh, and you really work some magic with the interviews, like, that- that is just your skill. Um, but even when we're just hanging out and just talking not recording, you know, if we're just, you know, having a- a drink together or something, you're still the same way, like that- that is fundamentally your personality is to ask questions. Uh, and it's- it's funny to hear you describe me as a talker because I normally think of myself as a very quiet and reserved person because I spend most of my time not talking, but I am also completely aware that I can- I can get on a roll that is just a little too long, and so I can- I can definitely need someone to help-
Grey: Yeah, I- I think you're- you're partly right, and part of the reason that- that I wanted to work with you on this is I do think that you are the best interviewer person I have ever come across. Uh, and for the- for those of you who have ever seen Brady's YouTube videos, uh, you know, he's always interviewing somebody else and he does the editing, and he often cuts out his own questioning part, but I have- I have seen it happen live a couple of times, uh, and you really work some magic with the interviews, like, that- that is just your skill. Um, but even when we're just hanging out and just talking not recording, you know, if we're just, you know, having a- a drink together or something, you're still the same way, like that- that is fundamentally your personality is to ask questions. Uh, and it's- it's funny to hear you describe me as a talker because I normally think of myself as a very quiet and reserved person because I spend most of my time not talking, but I am also completely aware that I can- I can get on a roll that is just a little too long, and so I can- I can definitely need someone to help-


'''Brady:''' [chuckles]
Brady: [chuckles]


'''Grey:''' -guide me through the parts that are terribly uninteresting, uh...
Grey: -guide me through the parts that are terribly uninteresting, uh...


'''Brady:''' I mean, you are- you are a quiet person, and you are, like a reserved guy, that's true, but once you're with your mates and people you're friendly with, I think, you're- you're pretty comfortable talking.
Brady: I mean, you are- you are a quiet person, and you are, like a reserved guy, that's true, but once you're with your mates and people you're friendly with, I think, you're- you're pretty comfortable talking.


'''Grey:''' Yeah, then I blossom.
Grey: Yeah, then I blossom.


'''Brady:''' I did- I did read one comment in a review though that I did find funny,-
Brady: I did- I did read one comment in a review though that I did find funny,-


'''Grey:''' Yeah?
Grey: Yeah?


'''Brady:''' -where someone sort of said that they felt like I was here to ground you.
Brady: -where someone sort of said that they felt like I was here to ground you.


'''Grey:''' Yes!
Grey: Yes!


'''Brady:''' Which is-
Brady: Which is-


'''Grey:''' I saw that- I saw that same one,
Grey: I saw that- I saw that same one,


'''Brady:''' Yeah.
Brady: Yeah.


'''Grey:''' and I thought "that is exactly right", I think-
Grey: and I thought "that is exactly right", I think-


'''Brady:''' Really? I th- I- I see- I found it funny for another reason 'cause you- you must be one of the most calm, grounded people I know. Whereas I'm, you know, I'm a bit all over the place. So the idea of- the idea of me grounding you actually made me chuckle, whereas your normally sort of the calming influence in the- someone who gives me good advice and things that, so, I like the idea of meeting this calming influence all of a sudden. Anyway- anyway, that- they were the things I had to say about the, uh,-
Brady: Really? I th- I- I see- I found it funny for another reason 'cause you- you must be one of the most calm, grounded people I know. Whereas I'm, you know, I'm a bit all over the place. So the idea of- the idea of me grounding you actually made me chuckle, whereas your normally sort of the calming influence in the- someone who gives me good advice and things that, so, I like the idea of meeting this calming influence all of a sudden. Anyway- anyway, that- they were the things I had to say about the, uh,-


'''Grey:''' Mm-hmm.
Grey: Mm-hmm.


'''Brady:''' -the questioning. What have you thought? What have you- you've been obviously raging through some of the, you know, early comments and the feedback, has anything sort of, uh, caught your eye?
Brady: -the questioning. What have you thought? What have you- you've been obviously raging through some of the, you know, early comments and the feedback, has anything sort of, uh, caught your eye?


'''Grey:''' Um, yeah, I mean, its- it's been interesting. Uh, it's always really nerve racking when you have a new project, and you want to launch it out into the world and see what people think about it. Uh, and I have to say it has been a much more positive experience than I was expecting. Um, like we were doing really well in the download numbers, and uh, we're just getting a lot of positive comments, and we have a- a ton of positive reviews on iTunes, and if you want to discuss any of these episodes in particular or to leave a- a comment on one of the episodes, uh, for now we're having all of the discussion happening on my subreddit, so if you go to Reddit (R-E-D-D-I-T) dot-com, slash-R (the letter R) slash-C-G-P-Grey, there'll be a discussion thread in there for each of the episodes that we can put up. Um, and if you want to leave feedback, for now that is probably one of the best places to do so, um, I do go through that and- and read all the comments and I'm very interested to see what people- uh, what people have to say about, uh, this little project so far.
Grey: Um, yeah, I mean, its- it's been interesting. Uh, it's always really nerve racking when you have a new project, and you want to launch it out into the world and see what people think about it. Uh, and I have to say it has been a much more positive experience than I was expecting. Um, like we were doing really well in the download numbers, and uh, we're just getting a lot of positive comments, and we have a- a ton of positive reviews on iTunes, and if you want to discuss any of these episodes in particular or to leave a- a comment on one of the episodes, uh, for now we're having all of the discussion happening on my subreddit, so if you go to Reddit (R-E-D-D-I-T) dot-com, slash-R (the letter R) slash-C-G-P-Grey, there'll be a discussion thread in there for each of the episodes that we can put up. Um, and if you want to leave feedback, for now that is probably one of the best places to do so, um, I do go through that and- and read all the comments and I'm very interested to see what people- uh, what people have to say about, uh, this little project so far.


Brady 6:06
'''Brady:''' You're really interactive there too I've noticed I think I think we might talk about sort of comics and say that like can we get time but I have noticed on the separate if you're very you're very interactive it's you know with the with the people with the community as well. Yeah I think that's why the reason why I'm very happy to direct feedback because unlike You Tube unlike other places I find it really manageable to try to have conversations with a larger number of people we do have it scheduled at some point I want to talk about common systems in general so I don't want to discuss that too much right here but the short version is that it's really easy on Reddit to get a sense of what people are saying and to have feedback and interactions with a bunch of people so I think it's I think is a better place to go for now it's a good community tell you the Reddit community like it's like you know you get you get funny stuff and you get love and you get height but it's always quite smart and quite like the they seem like good people on Reddit and a lot of ways they say my blessing that my kind of people when I read the comments as opposed to comments and a lot of other social media. Yeah as with absolutely everything it always depends on the section that you're going but I would agree with you as a general statement actually that stream I read it quite narrow and I read it in the sump and it's like I should be careful what I say. Let me ask you about something else. The hello internet logo you mean. The artwork. Yeah the little the little that I know I know you sort of sent me a few ideas for hand and you know then you kind of went off and did you think I believe what happened was I said to them you didn't like them and then I used it anyway. It's I think that is actually the process that unfolded I don't like to mock what like I quite like the H.I.I. when You've gone and I'm glad because I sometimes look at you know how when you look at something. For a long time you suddenly see it differently and I certainly see that the sort of the gray lines going up into the white block to make their the high and stuff like that. I'm not too sure about the little pool you've got on. Yeah the border I might have to change but I listen to a lot of pod cast as a as I've mentioned before and I'm always aware that the artwork seems to be designed for a really big screen. But you actually look at it as like a little one centimetre by one centimetre image on your phone. So I just I was trying to go for something that was very visually immediately recognizable and sort of try to catch people's attention and I think I think that kind of works and also the dark gray color was not really used by very many pod cast so I thought I'd go with that for obvious reasons but I would say it did look good to the good when we were sort of dominating the i Tunes charts for a while and you can just see like all the little high logos all over the place for the number one podcast in various and I thought that it worked very well like that I thought it was really eye catching. Well if anyone wants to put any comments about it I'd be really interested to read it because at the moment it's you and I talking but yeah I do wonder what people think of that. So I see some some feedback sorry some follow up from episode three which was the work life balance. Yeah a light bulbs. Yes you have your four lightbulbs faces. Yeah I don't have any reflections on any anyone said anything to you about it. Well I. Just what I want to start off by saying it was really interesting listening to that when I was editing the podcast for release listening to it a second time it was really clear how we each think about work in very different ways. Do you think it came across very much to me anyway that that you were dealing much more with with kind of work in parallel with other things maybe than I am and I was thinking of work as. Chunks of time like very clearly dedicated to one task and I just I think it's interesting that whenever whenever we hear other You Tube You Tube or guys get together it's it is interesting how we're all sort of doing the same thing but each one of us does it in very different ways and I think you can hear that a little bit in the in the previous episode but I don't know how much of that might be the extent to which I was being devil's advocate at times but I think it's interesting that you say that. I don't know what to make of it I think I would just say is that I get from the Reddit thread it was it was interesting to see there's this issue with analogies and like boys and I think I said it a little bit at the beginning of a boy that analogy. There are definitely a lot of problems with that analysis. You might have to revisit it and refine it. Yeah I figure you know well you know it's productivity is probably I think we're going to come back to at some point so I don't know what had well on it. Yeah I'd like to say Tenet will be doing that for us. Yes. Well I just want to say that my wife my favorite piece of feedback came from Henry. He of the Minute Physics fame and he just sent me a little email and all it said was I think you forgot that light bulbs can be wired in parallel which is like a devastating remark to make to someone who has taught physics. Like yes I totally understand that this analogy does not work like a straight up I actually have a battery and I actually consider the light of some light bulbs. Very Henri comment there isn't that right. Yeah and a very funny thing is I'm going to just slowly embarrass him as well is later on actually just today but it was a couple days later he wrote me a much more in-depth e-mail about how the analogy also fails because I should really be thinking about it in terms of electromotive force and voltage and the resistance in the air. Individual light bulbs and so he was he was really thinking that one through to its absolute conclusion but he was here and he was doing the advanced version of what I saw many people in the in the common thread talking about which is that there are lots of problems with that analogy and I will I will I will fully I will fully admit to some of those but I still think my my core idea of the trade off still holds but what if it isn't the latest Minute Physics video that just went up in the last day or two about light bulbs. Oh I don't know how it is I think I think I don't know I think you may have inspired him I know you've been in a heap in a cave in not looking but I think his latest video is about light bulbs. Check I could be wrong. The My favorite comment in relation to you know and taking the argument to discussing the merits of the light bulb analogy was someone who pointed out that if you improve aspects of your life like a health for example that actually increases the power of emotion and that she do other things with you have a lot dogs which is something we never discussed. Yes Yes And I saw a couple comments like that and I totally agree with that. Well I was and. I think there's also something to be said that that people just have kind of intrinsically more or less powerful motors then you know other innocent ology right. Yeah and you know that's why I always look at you and you from my perspective are just this incredible You Tube work machine and I think like well I do not have the same kind of wattage output that you seem to have and but but that now the one if you can watch me work for a day you would think differently. I'm not so sure about that but but I did I did agree with those comments right that and I was sort of working towards it at the end of the podcast that at a certain level you know you can invest more into one area and then get more out in total but I do think there are situations in which that's that's very hard to do. But yeah obviously. If you're if your health is at its peak you were able to accomplish much more in all of the other areas and the reverse of course is not true as well. So yeah good Mrs C G P Great listen to the podcast. She has at this point she has listened to the first two but she has not yet listened to the third one that I want I want to listen to I know I know it's time I mentioned her in that one and I tried to prod her a little bit but I was like you know I mentioned you in the third one but she has been she's been very busy with some other projects. At this point so she was into it at some point but has not yet at this stage. Well let me tell you Mrs periodic videos are number follow ever. I'm supposed to call my much better half did listen to it for say three. We went for a drive that by coincidence coincided with the exact length of the podcast so I said let me play this. So we played it for the drive and I was as a silence throughout. I think I think the only time she spoke during it was at one point admiring Mrs Gray's patience for the patient women especially I think I think that was during the time when you were talking about how you completely blank for three days when you're putting a video that has just happened. Yes Yes And then And then amazingly it just finishes we got to the Kathak where we were going to which was nice timing so we pulled up and I said tend to her and said What do you think what do you think about that. The main thing that came across was that she said she would quite like to sit down with you and discuss a few of the items in a positive way. But you know because she's into all that stuff you're into a lot workflows and sleep patterns and things like that. But fundamentally I think she she disagreed with your faces and her best argument which she didn't really make but she didn't need to make against your argument was her herself she's just sort of fitting. And we're talking here about how you can't do all four things at once right and then I kind of I look at her and she works really hard in a really demanding job and she's like you know she's got this amazing job and she gives so much. She always every day makes time for her friends and wrings them and talks to them. She's a brilliant family person and talks to her mom and dad all the time and takes great care of me. But she's incredibly healthy and goes to the gym all the time in a personal trainer every way you can she watches what she eats and she always looks amazing and she does all these things like to the maximum and then she's just been spending an hour listening to you and I grumble about home healthy and do my job and I think I think embodiment of the argument against. So if you know me Mrs number file is the counter argument. Yeah. But maybe I will try to defend myself I will go back to the some people's engines are more powerful than others. Yeah you're not just putting a log on the bottom of a car and she's a Rolls Royce This is I think I think that might be the conclusion that we need to come to them or file as a very powerful motor compared to you. So that might very well be the case but I think I think she does want to sit down and talk to a few points. We'll arrange that sometime. OK I tell you what most of what I was able to say three way you did that you clarified this whole infringement versus theft thing when it comes to copyright I'm still that still bothers me a bit. That still bothers you. Yeah I think you're being so you're being a bit overly cautious so it's not fair to say if I could I could not disagree with you more at this point I fully understand that I can be overly present think about things like this but I'm going to very strongly disagree with you there. So if someone comes into my house. Takes my Teva a and and watches a few programs on it and then put it back later that day. Have they infringed on my T.V. or If I stole them. OK well what the person breaks into your first what they broke and entered into your house but if they didn't take any money or break anything have they just infringed into my house I don't think that's an appropriate analysis I don't think so clogs up at all I think Janet stacked the deck in your favor with that one buddy. Well well you've already you've already said that you're not good with the analogy. Anyway I did listen back to and I think our guy won this stealing from me. This stealing thieves I disagree I think. I think infringement is a word that the Internet culture needs to it needs to make happen as a as a common understood word like theft is a common understood word but I think infringing is like using the word infringing is like dressing something bad up to make it sound not as bad. Why can't we give a more emotive word why do we encourage infringing is just like it's such a delicate thing like you know you know Germany didn't infringe on Poland didn't like you know it like you don't you don't know but there's also another comparable analogy you know what I'm saying when Germany said with French It makes a terrible thing sound sound. You know somewhere in a more acceptable and I think it is acceptable or not I think we should be giving them this this delicate word when they're doing a bad thing to us as if the word unfortunate his words aren't perfectly comparable but you do also have the word piracy which is a similar kind of thing that's an emotive. I like that. But yeah it is a more motive word but that is usually piracy is talking about individuals making copies for themselves you know and so they are they're engaged in piracy which it is more emotive but it. That was my motive in a very cool kind of way. Right like pirates have a lot of social cache these days. Though I'm not sure it's really dissuading the kids you know don't you know don't be an awesome cool pirate but I'm going to I'm going to we're going to have to disagree on this I want to point I want to put the challenge out there that I want to I want a new word to describe what you call infringing that is more a motive you know it doesn't cross swords with stealing and theft which isn't his you know all right sacred anyway they will you know we'll see we'll see if people in the Reddit thread for this video can come up with a better word. So you want do you want something that just it just sounds mean I want to word to describe the the practice of other people or organizations taking content and using it for their own purposes. Yeah we'll see if we'll see someone from a comes up with something. Sorry I had to get it off my chest anymore but I think that that is the point to follow up Brady right. There's always going to be something that's sticking in your mind and this is the this is the time to discuss it now. A low internet state sponsor is audible dot com a leading provider of spoken audio information and entertainment to listen to audio books whenever and wherever you want. It's my job to recommend something interesting to you to listen to and this week that's going to be a walk in the woods by Bill Bryson. Bryson is a travel writer and this is his experience walking along the Appalachian Trail which for those of you who are unaware is a path in the woods in America that goes from Maine to Georgia and it's incredibly long and actually genuinely dangerous because it is of course nature. The thing that I like about this book is that Bryson is not like a professional adventurous guy he was a kind of normal homebody sort of person and so his experience walking along the Appalachian Trail is a lot like what I would imagine if I tried to walk along the Appalachian Trail basically kind of a disaster from. Beginning to end about a very entertaining story for other people to hear and it really is an enjoyable tale just from start to finish with him and this friend of his cats trying to do this adventure that they are both clearly not prepared for in any way. I personally had the enjoyable experience of listening to this book on a road trip. A number of years ago when I actually intersecting paths with the Appalachian Trail which I decided to get out and explore and also got briefly lost and terrified. But that's a story for another time. They're going to highly recommend this book and the copy on a bill is also read by Bill Bryson which he has a good narrating voice and as I've said in a previous spot I like it when the author reads their own thing they put a different spin on it then the professional narrator might. So if you want you can listen to a walk in the woods for free with audible all you need to do is go to audible dot com slash hello internet that's all one word and sign up for a thirty day trial by using the audible dot com slash hello internet link. That's how they know you came from us which is one of the ways we're going to figure out if this pod casting experiment is a success. So if you want to listen to it audible has it with over one hundred fifty thousand titles in virtually every genre you'll find what you're looking for get a free audio book and thirty day trial today by signing up at Audible dot com slash hello internet. That's Audible dot com slash hello internet. All one word. What's been going on what's been going on in the in your life or in my life or any it's been quite a lot has been crazy. Yeah life has been crazy for both of us for the past week and for you crazier I think because you just got back from Vietnam did you not. I did I did. And what were you what were you doing on the other side of the world. I don't know how much you know about my my dad but he was a on a on a strike as you know but know many people not many American people even seem to realize that a stray alien soldiers fought in the Vietnam War So you know. It's a sort of it was an allied force a lot of people it was really surprised and I tell them that and my father fought in the Vietnam War So I've kind of grown up you know knowing knowing this and knowing that some places have these stories. So basically the purpose of this trip was to go with him to Vietnam and travel around to some of the places where where all the stuff went down which is really interesting it's it's especially interesting for me because there are two things about my dad that are unusual in this respect. One was he did two tours of the Vietnam War and the first twelve months which I think was in one nine hundred sixty eight I thank him and then he did another eight month tour towards the end which I can't remember the year it was seventy one I come in with terrible that that on that first tour he was a dog tracker let me he was that dog that he was a dog handler and that of a tracking dog. So his war experience was quite different to a lot of other people in so far as his role was to lead this dog around sniffing and what with the over the dog doing. The dog was sniffing. Enemy forces the Cong or North Vietnamese soldiers So a typical scenario would be that would be a contact it would be a battle. And then my dad and his dog which was called Caesar would be brought in to sort of sniff and follow the retreating troops and try and reengage with them from a combat sense he had quite an unusual experience but he also had a personally very interesting experience because his relationship through the war was was more with the dogs than with other soldiers in many ways so it was a very it was a very unusual and special relationship. But also my dad went on to become a journalist and a writer and once he finished his sort of journalistic career he settled down to Russia. Books and he's written a number of books about Vietnam War and his first one of the most successful on school track at this is about him and the dog. So I'd heard some of these stories but not all of them but then I read this book which is just crammed with amazing stories that I didn't know. So suddenly I had all this you know all these stories and all the stuff that's who never seen the place up in there so that's what last week was if it was about going to going to the site of these places and of course maybe a man died quite wanted me to I took my camera along and he sort of retold a lot of these stories. And Mike that's a really good story teller. He retold a lot of the stories in the places where they happened and I wrote the camera I've written quickly will get around to editing them at some point we're going to see these videos on one of your many channels at some point yeah I'll probably just put on my life on my channel called Brady stuff which just channel where I just done. As I believe I don't read the left but I don't know for a while and this is like yet another channel of yours that I have never even heard of existing Well this is a channel where I put things I haven't got a channel lyrically there are some topics that I haven't got a channel for say so I was surprised that you don't have a dedicated Vietnam war chant for example that's not a bad idea actually maybe I like now so I don't know I'll probably pop in on their side anyway. Anyway as you know by the by I mean for me it wasn't so much about making videos it was about you know spending some time with your dad and hearing it on with my day and it's always good to put you know to visit places and really it gives you a different understanding of stuff whether it's something intense like the Vietnam War or going to the Eiffel Tower you know when you visit the real place you kind of can take on. Now I understand the geography and yet so is fundamentally different to matter how much you hear about a place when you go it's just a different experience. Yeah there's a much more human experience to be there and to and to stand in the in the. Place where something actually happened. Yeah exactly. So anyway that was that's kind of crazy but it was good fun. I'm glad I'm glad you came back alive. Yeah you described we wouldn't finish the series if I got some malaria or something right here. Yeah that is true and I was I was nervous when you tweeted that menu that had intestines and a bunch of other terrifying foods on it. Yes and I thought if I don't make them on it didn't. Yeah that's what it was it was it was rectum and I was thinking these Brady do not become terribly sick or die on this trip and I've never ate so much squid in all my life that I love this clip there. Oh yeah the thing that was really interesting that I was that it was it was really interesting to go to a place in that kind of military tourism context where I deny for lack of a better term you're on the losing side. I mean I'm in I'm in the US and Australia is in the allies withdrew from Vietnam in the North Vietnamese came down and and took took the country so to speak and you know it's now describe this country that is this communist country and the war is a great victory for them to go and to go there and be doing this ought to be taken around by to a guide when of the force that was not victorious was very interesting and and so it's a different you know we're used to going to sort of. Places where terrible things happen to ultimately you know in a victorious context I'm right and this was the opposite which was really interesting. When I thought about that but that's a good point normally normally when you're doing that like the war monuments that we know and a strain on American would tend to go to or are there. There are monuments of triumph and doing a tour where that was not the case is a different experience. Yeah I was also arranged in going to the Vietnamese museum about a penny you know. It's probably there's only so much we could talk for and in a podcast that's more about I dunno what's podcasters about this probably not about war stories. This punk is about what we want to be about. So totally count but I was glad I didn't and I did make videos there so it is about it is about filmmaking I tell you what from a filmmaker perspective it's really hard to make videos of your dad. I do know that right now. Why. Because well partly because of the way my dad is but also just because there's a different dynamic coming up you know when I'm interviewing someone or filming something. The video is them but I can take control to an extent and guide them with the questioning and if they've got a certain point they want to make or a way they want to tell the story and I don't think it's going to work. I can either delicately Shepparton with my questions or I can I can be more frank and slap them around the years and so now we need to do it like this. But my dad obviously had you know stories he wanted to tell in ways he wanted to tell them and they didn't always fit with what I thought would work in a video and all the different techniques I know Billy you on on people to get what I want just didn't work it was like he says he knows you do well is blowing off all your tricks. Now they had enough it was that I felt like I felt like there was kryptonite in the air in terms of my ability to steer the interview either way I sometimes can't it was and I must because it was my dad because it never happens with anyone else. Yeah I guess you were not in a position of authority when it is your father on the other end of the camera right. I guess that's I guess that's it I mean I don't feel that he was in authority and they are as I mean I don't have that kind of relationship with my dad but yeah that was just something different. There was and. I would stop and ask him questions and he would he would not so them or when he saw that with everyone he'd stick to his questions. Cracks on with his stories but you know maybe that's maybe maybe he didn't feel sufficiently intimidated or respectful of me as the as the filmmaker was everyone else at least has that modicum of respect for me whereas I was still just pray to him that he was going to he had a story he wanted to tell and you know I stopped the camera cut the Tom said not listening to me you have to answer this question was likened to being a politician when they have what they want to say. But anyway he is a really good storyteller he's famous for his opinions. So he still told the story well but it was a really interesting interesting thing as a filmmaker for me well how and when you when you get the videos up you know. Long time it could be a while because I'm actually jumping on another plane now and I'm going away for a month and I don't know if I'm going to be able to edit them on the road so it could be a wild eyed launched at him saying well when it whenever you get around to them mention it again we'll put them in the description for the podcast. Yeah I think today will have a description for you or will have a link to your dad's book. People want Yeah yeah it is it is actually you know it is a really good book actually and I'm not and I mean his other ones are not so much into it because there are others out just the one about him I really enjoyed anyway. So put it in people can check it out if they want to thank you thank you for that. What's been any news in your world you had a video at which is always a big do. Yeah that is really the biggest news ever. As always I felt like my whole life just narrows down the oh production in the in the first four or five days before it actually goes live and just everything everything gets postponed and so there's there is this cycle in my life where I use this this program called Omni Focus to track all of my trip. Use And maybe about fourteen days before I'm expecting a video to come out. I start delaying everything in my little program to like after when I think it's going to come out and so I'm working on the video when stuff comes up in my program and I delay delay delay delay delay and then if I'm experiencing right now and what I was doing before I was I was talking to you and suddenly there's just this monster has a number of things to do after the video comes out and so I'm just I'm sort of overwhelmed with just of a very large number of things but. But you either get a video out is the biggest deal and it was goodbye jury nullification alotta Yeah yeah it's well I have to say it's it is done successfully. And let me open up right now and it was one point two million last time I looked at. Yeah that's a someone's check so I have nothing to see there isn't that's just my hello I'm not going to say so actually as you might not be surprised I have an objective measure about the success of the videos that I used to deem whether or not they have been successful and so I take and take whatever my subscriber number at the time of release is as a starting point so let's just make the numbers easy I have about a million subscribers at this point and if I have a video that gets less than a third of that number in a week I would consider that to be just like a total abject failure. If it's more than a third to sort of equal to the number of subscribers I consider that to be kind of satisfactory and anything that gets more than the total number of subscribers that to me is like a very successful video because that means that people are really sharing it and it's like it's going to more people then have signed up to get my videos that that's. No it's for me the real crossing point is like Ken the video get more views then subscribers that I have within a week and I think it's it is it's been five days and it is just under the number of subscribers that I have now so I think this one will will limp across that threshold probably before the week because out of this to come up with a couple of your videos likely actually that the talk shows have been a little bit more T.V. Work a bit more. Is this a coincidence or is this a deliberate a deliberate thing we're seeing now they're more like notice about you know I'd like to low you won't be told and this will come out and OK so I'm fine that you picked up on that because if the answer is it is partly just a coincidence. The previous leader that I did on the CBOE effect the opposite opposite of the placebo effect. I have a demonstration in the beginning that just does not work if you know what the video is going into it so I have to not say the name of the thing in the in the title. In that case with this one it is a much more T.V. Title with a lot you won't be told and that is only half a coincidence but I came across a camera exactly where. But some study that was talking about click through rates for titles and and they were basically saying that T Z kind of titles have surprisingly large click through rates for what you might expect. And so I thought well let me just let me just try something that's a little bit different I don't think I will normally do it I just happen to have two topics that it works very well with and so I don't mind having that back to back but I do I am a fan of the straightforward title. Also because the partly does a lot of introduction for you. Like I don't necessarily have to set up as much. Yeah if the title just straight up says. Here is what we're going to talk about it is just a bit of a bit of a coincidence although I will say just as a person experienced policing this video I think in the second episode or somewhere I mentioned how I probably will not do a medical topic for a while because that put me under a lot of stress about sort of being feeling like her need to be correct. I am going to add a lot to the whole I'm not cover any time soon again if I can possibly avoid it. And it's for a slightly different reason but you. So this isn't entirely a problem with me and also my eyes make this a theme. Talking about analogies I tend to think of the law as a kind of computer code for human society. We hear all these rules and we formalize these rules about what should happen under what circumstances and here he's all the exceptions for the consequences of the laws the rule didn't work out in a particular way. But I know this is not the case when I sit down and think about it and it's partly because my my father is actually a lawyer in the States and I know through him just how much of the law depends on interpretations of what happens in the courtroom. And it's so much more situational and like it depends then you think of the law as being you know really clear. I think of it as being that way yeah. And so I cannot tell you how many rounds the script went through where I had very definitive statements that kept having to be kind of modified and qualified and toned down and changed changed a lot so I hope I will not do a lot topic again if I can possibly avoid it partly because of that like it's difficult to make definitive statements and there's a number of places in the video where I'm talking about situations. It might occur and it is like yes that might happen the majority of the time but that like there's there's always going to be a really long list of exceptions. Never mind the fact that in America the rules are different in all fifty states for how things are handled. So I was I was trying to talk about them like the most general possible case but yes it was stressful. Do not expect a lot topic anytime soon people they have even been to which I have never been to a trial in person though. You got to tell you one day we must do an episode. Notation could stories not trials up into. Yeah OK I says Court cases good fun that sounds good. That's only let let me let me do a clever clever segue here which will both follow on from what we're talking about. Promote something and lead to something I want to discuss that trick of hat trick a segue speaking of click Baity touch was a video is the video that I put out today is called the world's greatest autograph book. And it is about something that you and I went to see of course a couple of weeks ago and I want to talk about that day trip so that either I go three together you and I went to the Royal Society in London which is somewhere I've been wanting to take you for ages and then pestering me about it. We finally had the chance to go there and I didn't want you to do the the typical two and we went down into the into the vaults to see all the treasures and things. I deliberately haven't asked too much about your impression of the visit because I wanted to ask you here on the podcast. What did you think I thought it was great it was it was great to visit so I think first why don't you do your better at summarizing with the mayor. Why did you give a quick summary for people who don't know like what is the Royal Society the Royal Society. This organization that's been around since the sixteen hundreds and it was set up by Charles the Second I think I think he was the king was one of these one of these kings that sounds right. Yeah and basically it was for the sort of the scientists of the time when science was in its infancy it was kind of a club and I've been going ever since. And basically they they Alecto decide to make people fellows of the society and join the club and it's been going on for you know three hundred fifty years or something like that. And basically every year and you intake of ten or twenty people joins this club the scientists still going today and it's just got all this history that they've also been involved in you know publications they have their own journal and they have meetings and they have all these other functions it's not just a place where they go and have a cuppa tea smoke a pipe but I should let him out longer anyway. I mean there are more English fans anyway so. So this club has been going for years got all this history you know and any scientist who's anyone has been a Fellow of the Royal Society. You know all those all those guys Hawken Boyle back then all the way through to your modern greats you know Einstein was a was a fellow it was bore all the way through to Peter Higgs and people like that today. Watson and Crick there oh that will be part of this club so it's got this incredible history. The thing about the autograph book is of course anyone whose sons he becomes a fellow they all signed the same book which has been around since the start. So that's why I call it the world's greatest autograph book because everyone from Isaac Newton through to owe your modern day scientists all citing this one book which is incredible. Yes And of course any king or queen that comes to the throne is automatically the picture. It's a role society. Every famous Royal has signed as well as this amazing document anyway because of this history and basically all the paid scientists involved. Their interactions are OK and all their papers and artifacts are kept there in these votes. It's this real treasure trove of material as well and I know you love old stuff and I know you love source documents and things like that you know you don't you know what you don't want any secondary sources when you say no of course not. So I thought I'm going to get gray in there to say stuff because I know you like hanging out libraries and stuff as well. Yeah no we finally went there and I thought it was going to blow your mind. I don't know if you just think oh you have. Q What do you think use kind of oh no I think I really liked it I thought it was it was really interesting to see. So yeah when we when we went on a tour we got to go downstairs into the vault blow and basically see all of the original documents and it's almost hard to describe because it was such a great variety of things down there but if you if you imagine this huge vault and it would just have the original written letters from all of these famous scientists write to the Royal Society or from explorers who were writing in about you know what they were seeing in new places and it was almost just very overwhelming in the amount of stuff that is what I had written to. Yeah that yeah that was that that was the thing is like a letter from Isaac Newton what's he got to say from I mean you know I did I did tell my wife we came back I know it was all in this vault. But it was like shockingly casual some of the stuff that was just laying around. He was he was nice enough to give us a tour I kept saying to him like it makes me nervous like looking at all. It's stuff you know the one example you know was the death mask for Isaac Newton. So the clay I guess it was I'm not sure what the material was that they put over his face after he died you know to get a print of his face just like there on the shelf you know waiting to be knocked over by you know some clumsy idiot like me because he's wandering around and not paying attention to tell you a quick interjection here. Yeah but who's the other guy that works in the library. He spoke briefly but he doesn't want to come down as he normally is that God has to handle that mask and he's done a few times Mayfair videos and things like that and he has a recurring nightmare the time that he drops that mask and it shatters like a haunt him. Yeah and every time I ask him to pick it up like he he goes a little bit why didn't it was me you know about my dreams. So you know the only one who marries into that. Yes that was that was one of my prevailing feelings there was just like worry for all of these objects and we did we were talking about how you know some of the stuff like that mask has been digitized and they've done high resolution three D. Scans of that but there's just so many papers and documents that they don't have any other copies except the ones that are in that vault and that's it. It was very interesting and you know one of the examples that was given is is like you don't know necessarily how this stuff is going to be valuable in the future. And the example that was mentioned was talking about the have you know all these records of of the weather you know coming back for hundreds of years just sounds like the most boring thing in the whole wide world right until you know that stuff starts to matter when people are doing research for the global weather system. And now you actually want that kind of data to be ample and you can see levels from Australia from you know I mean hundreds Yeah all of the stuff that just seems just so random it's bizarre like I can't remember what was. We looked at that book. Maybe you can remind me what the deal was but it was it was a book and it had collections of drawings of a volcano that some member of the Royal Society had paid a monk to try it was because you know it wasn't it was yeah it is. Yes that's right it was. Yes And one of the members had paid this month you know in the days before photography to go outside every day and gets what the what not pursue peace look like what the volcano looks like in a plume of smoke. Yeah engine shape and things and handed to him the way it was it was like the seven hundred version of a web cam. Yeah right where the webcam takes a picture every thirty minutes but it can have a webcam you just have a monk and you pay him some money and he sends you a sketch every day and that was just you know collected in this book. So it was it was very it was really interesting to see. It was funny we went with a friend Angela from Google and I did find it funny when we were down there because I just level that out stuff and as the romance of that you and Angela who are both much more kind of digital people all you could think about was Has this been scandal. Who should scale in there somewhere. Could this be preserved electronically and whereas I was like oh that's touch this or doesn't this metaphor that it is true that is true you had your hands all over everything and I was surprised to know that it is OK to handle these materials just like with your gross monkey hands like with all their sweat all of them and dirt and it all not to worry you know you pick up these these letters from Robert Hooke that's totally fine don't worry and the originals we don't have any extra copy but we're going to let you to touch them and they prefer you to not use gloves which is the secret no one tells you. Yeah because because if you gloves you kind of lose that dexterity and touching him or like you know something or something you want to be more like a dowager which is also which is surprising. And another example of how. Things in T.V. In movies are not accurate representations of real life the one thing that was a very almost overwhelming moment was being able to see the kind of original edition of Isaac Newton's Principia Mathematica. You know the book the book that is basically the founding stone of much of modern physics. And that was that was really amazing to be able to see and to be able to actually hold in my hands and I made you take a picture of that and I knew I knew you liked that when you asked for a photo. Yeah. And honestly it was only because I saw you going around touching absolutely everything and handling stuff and like whoops almost dropped it you know. That I had I had the bravery to ask if I could hold that book and I could not believe it when I said yes you can you can hold it because to be clear Isaac Newton's seminal work and that copy it wasn't just a first edition that was his hand written copy in big sections with notes to the printer. Yeah so it's like that you know he actually sleeved over that book for who knows how long and that was the copy that got sent off to the printer you know to make the first edition so it's almost like the zeroeth edition of that book is pretty much my own so that I have to say that was that was an amazing moment. But my hope was that you know that you would say oh I could make a few videos here using all the source material or I want to see some great videos you know using using all these old documents from hundreds of years ago with some new spin on some country or some border or something we'd never realized before. Yeah I've got to say it's been it's been running in the back of my mind how to take advantage of that. So I have I have some thoughts. And I'm I'm also again like. I'm really glad to know that resource is there it's you know it's amazing to be able to see the original original stuff but it's also often it's you just you come across strange surprises when you're dealing with original materials and so I'm going to mention something slightly something slightly nerdy here but when I was in college I was really reading The Lord Of The Rings series and I thought oh let me start beginning I'm going to start with The Hobbit and by the way people if you haven't read The Hobbit yet spoiler warning coming up here so you should pause your podcast now I have my headphones off because I haven't read the whole you haven't read The Hobbit Are you kidding me. Yeah I haven't read the whole book. Are you serious. I haven't read Lord of the Rings either. Well I think less of me. I'm just surprised actually. I don't it's not that I think less of you I'm just I'm so honestly surprised that you have not read it. Do you know the basic story of The Hobbit. Yes I know the basic story. OK so I'm not going to ruin anything with the basic story and so now you're just going to have to listen to this anyway because you know this is what we're doing now. So I figured I'll start the beginning or read The Hobbit and reading The Hobbit and I had read it once as a kid and I'm going through the book Everything is totally normal until the pivotal scene between Bilbo and Gollum and it's the pivotal scene in the book where Bilbo. He sort of steals the ring from Gollum and you know makes his way out of the underneath this mountain and escapes. I did see that in the film I have seen the first film. Yeah so there's like a fight right there. Yeah. Battle which in a way it was yeah. Well there's a there's a preceding thing about it but there is a like a skirmish over the ring. OK And I'm reading the book and everything is going along totally fine and then in the book that I'm reading I was I was completely blown away because Gollum just hands over the ring. Right like no questions asked. None of this skirmish nonsense just basically straight up gives it to Bilbo and Bilbo walks away and I was so incredibly confused until I realized that my library actually had a first edition of The Hobbit and it turns out that this is a change in later editions of The Hobbit. So in fiction this is called a retcon. When the author goes back and changes something in the earlier material like a director's cap yet to make it match later on with with the following stuff. And so this is this was a case of the first the very first edition of The Hobbit. There is not this this epic struggle over the ring and in later editions there is and talking went back and changed it because he realized that it just didn't make any sense given the books that he was writing in the future. So like the original copies of things can have very interesting information but some of the trouble sometimes is like is knowing that this even exists. You know like I would never have discovered as if it just wasn't just for a total just a total accident. And so a source original materials are just just amazing. But as always libraries like knowing where to look is half the battle. Well valuable that book if it was some First Edition sitting in your local library it's one of the things I've wondered about later on like did they not realize that this was a first edition because I'm a member of a library that has a first edition of The Hobbit here and that that's like kept under lock and key. You know you can't you can't directly action as far as that bad boy not returned and take a hit on the fire. I should have if I was looking at there I think I was really just more confused about the inconsistency in the story. Derailing my whole brain. Why doesn't this match up with what I expected to be. But yes I will definitely take advantage of them when I come across something where I want I want to be able to see the original written stuff like that have a couple things in mind I don't want to say anything in particular that I know that it was. I have to say it was a it was a great trip and I'm really glad that that you were able to bring me down there and to sort of get access to this because your whole person I should say by the way as well like you know by way of thanks to the to live because the Law Society anyone can go there anyone can go there and look at any materials I mean no Anyone can go down to the vault. But anything from the vault can be brought up to. So he go there and and you know join up and go through the process. No money just like you know proof that you're a real person and not some cowboy and you want to look at some old handwritten document from Isaac Newton. They'll bring it up to you though showing that they're all they want they want people to go there and use this resource you know they want this stuff out there so if if you're ever in London or you're from London and you want to go see this stuff it's not some exclusive club. Anyone can have a look. Yeah and the library is really worth seeing as well you just it's a it's a beautiful room where they'll bring you all the materials that is deafening where thing go. Do you know what we were going to talk about some stuff today we prepared a topic and we're going to do it. We've been going out nearly an hour I think that I'm totally up for doing something that is an actual topic but it depends entirely on you. Let's turn them in the first couple of podcasting are going to allow for this no rows about this is that no this is the Internet stuff you know as long or as short as you want to be there is absolutely no limits on that and some of the pod cast you've been putting me on tape because I wasn't as much of a podcast junkie as you so I've just been listening to once you tell me to listen to what you typically go for like two hours. Yes some of them are very long and my personal favorite but sadly defunct now podcast hypercritical was legendary for coins like they have shows I'm pretty sure they had shows the top three hours because. John thank you for the star of that show. Just had interesting things to say and could say them forever. I tell you I tell you what we have to be in a future episode do a podcast about pod cast because there's a few things I want to discuss with you especially about the podcast you put me on to because I've been listening to them a lot and I've got lots of questions and comments and I want to I want to do more about it but that's not what today is. No that's not that's not exactly for today we will we're going to talk about feedback because I think I think the rough thinking was because we've been getting so much feedback in the last week. Yeah i Pod cast to take a chance to talk about feedback in general. Yeah I think I I suspect this is going to be a relatively short topic which is why I don't mind doing it now but I was just thinking about it earlier and I think my note says feedback on feedback and I think that there is there's some some things to be said here. And so I guess I mean I guess just to start it off but I was thinking about is how you know we're in this we're in this amazing world with the Internet you know and people can put stuff out there and anybody can comment on it if they want you know like an anybody can make a You Tube video tomorrow and upload it right and you can get some comments and I think it's it's a very weird situation to have feedback from people that you don't know. And how as the creator of some things you actually interpret that feedback I think is that there's a lot of of weirdness that happens here. I don't know because I'm kind of I don't actually know. I mean look at the You Tube comments for your own videos very much. I mean you're so busy making videos you probably don't have time to actually you know especially especially on a new video. So for the first I'll talk about this a bit more in a minute when when. I sort of talk to you a bit about some of Mark some of the things I've been doing lately but in general terms I would say I look at the viewer comments on the video for the first day or two days and then that starts to subside then because because I do a video almost every day or every two days and you kind of become So the favourite of my attention and you know now I have a couple of thousand videos I don't go back and read all the feedback on all of them. Yeah but for the first day or two and that's when you getting the most comics anyway I am quiet I am very much across what's being said. For better or worse and tell you what if. Yeah well I know obviously e have comments on the video and then you also run your You'll read some credits. Yeah you'd like the feedback to happen at this point. At this stage I don't pay any attention to the comments on youtube or some of the changes that they made I don't really like that format so we won't even look at all the work of just you and even look. Yeah I mean I know you know we're talking twenty fourteen in a couple months ago You Tube changed the way their comment system works. Yes they did and I was never a huge fan of the current system before. And I wouldn't necessarily say that this this this new system is worse. But for me for various reasons I just find it not really workable. And so I would say it's worse. Yeah yeah yeah. We'll have a full conversation about this at some point but but for now I I really I don't really look at the You Tube comments at all and I look entirely at the Reddit comments and that's that's what I'm interested in and why. Why do you look at the comments what do you what do you what are you looking for in them. Well it's. Interesting to me so I have it again on Reddit I have a section where I can post the videos and people can discuss them. But I'm very interested also on Reddit. When the video gets posted in other sections so people who don't necessarily subscribe to me on You Tube who have never seen one of my videos before they will comment on a video and that can be interesting to read and see like someone who's not familiar with my video style. Yeah you know what. What might they say. But what I was one of the reasons why I think the feedback on feedback thing is is interesting because it it changes at different scales. When someone starting out when they're making things for the first time on the Internet. Anonymous feedback from strangers is kind of an amazing thing. Now you know people people can just be total jerks on the Internet there's no denying that. But it is it's difficult in real life to ever get genuine honest feedback from people you know in your life. So you know you have friends and you have families and because you have social obligations to the people in those groups it's hard to get one hundred percent honest feedback from from those people in your life or has some random person who's seen whatever you've made on the Internet and who has no connection to you and isn't even using a real name. There's no reason for them to hold back. You know they they have permission to just be really straightforward in their feedback and that can be very very valuable. And I think if if you're paying attention to that kind of feedback in the right sort of way especially in the beginning you can really try it. Two direct whatever it is you're making in a more positive way. But how much should you allow yourself to be guided by faith that I mean it's the politically correct thing to say is I look at the sate back and my audience is really important and I want to make what they want and I will shape and tailor what I do to them and you know I take all their opinions on board because they're really valuable to me and to an extent that is true and only a fool will completely ignore feedback on what the audience is saying because we do this for the audience you know it's a relationship with the audience but at the same time. You've got a kind of believe in yourself as well and and your vision Otherwise you just become some diluted you know designed by committee. Piece of generic rubbish. Yeah and the example I often use in this respect is in. The number follow videos I make which of these mathematics videos often we need to write on something and for various reasons which I've outlined in a blog. Great a trial and it was very much thought out. I have people write on these pieces of brown paper with America now with the first three or four number fall videos went up they had they had a quite large audience from the start because I already had an audience from other channels so I was getting a lot of faith that crop from the stuff and overwhelmingly like you wouldn't believe all the feedback was negative about the brown paper. Really you've got to get rid of it. It's rubbish. BLOCK And trust me that was what all the comments were about and it was very strong but I really believed in using this brown paper I got such a trademark of yours now I did not imagine the number of file videos. Exactly and I feel really strongly about it for various reasons that it was a good idea and it would work and there are just two people that don't like it but they're very much in the minority now and I rarely hear anything about it but there are lots of people who really really love it. They were really into it and they have really adopted it and that was an example of something where if I was going to go with the feedback and be shaped by out of brown paper very quickly. Definitely but I was not I think I think I'm right here and I think if you are starting out and you get shaped by feedback too easily you lose your distinctiveness and you know I think I think you've got a you could look at it and take what you want from that. You can't listen to it too much. You gotta pay your own man a woman. Yeah and I wouldn't I wouldn't be arguing for follow the feedback entirely. But I agree that you're kind of foolish to not pay attention to it particularly in the beginning but I think that the brown paper one is a good example because there are there are things that you have to consider as a creator that might not be obvious to the people watching something. Yeah and I don't know if this was your thought process but I might guess that you wanted something that was distinct for a visual look or you wanted something that you're dealing with an abstract channel so that people were writing on a thing and you could see them doing it I mean was there some part of that that that's I mean there are probably six or seven raisins but that is a strong one. I want it to be sort of yeah something tactile and physical and topics that are here. Yes anything. Yeah there's definitely considerations that you have to have as as the maker of the thing that are not obvious to the audience but I think for you know for example in some of my earlier. Those There were a lot of comments about how the audio quality was just terrible. And there is no denying that like that that was entirely true. And it's funny because it was not something I was aware of when I made the first couple videos. The very first one was done just by talking straight into the laptop microphone which I just unbelievable to me today. But the comments about the audio quality were something that made me realize like I need to put some time and thought into this if I'm going to make more of these. And so it's like I just bought a cheap U.S.B. Microphone and already that makes it so much better. You know now I have a bit more professional gear but I so I think that feedback for rough edges like that can be very useful. Or yeah feedback on people's delivery so you know if you're doing something like we're doing and you're making an explanation video you want to see how many people seem confused by this in the comments. And that that's an indication that maybe this isn't this isn't going very well but I think on the flip side of it as well what's really useful when you're starting out is like positive comments. Do people actually leave comments who seem to like the thing that you're doing. And if you're getting just no positive feedback at all like that that's a that's a kind of feedback as well like you need to adjust what you're making for the world and or do something in a very different way to try to catch people's attention. But what I think is this is this is a comment that was made by Derek of Veritasium who might be listening right now I don't work if you are listening to Derek I hope you. What are you wearing this touching. He probably is wearing his tight jeans. For those of those of you who haven't seen the. He's very pretty. Definitely the prettiest of the educational You Tubers I think but he always wears low and he always with a T. Shirt of your channel when he meets you which is a class act but I met him for like a coffee and he turned up wearing a pin that has a price and then like I'm sure when he meets you you can at least see that's that's attention to data and that's why he's a successful guy. Exactly. Thank you. Yeah it was that he made a comment when we were talking once about how the value of positive feedback goes to zero as you are more and more successful. Yeah and I don't know if you think that's the case but he said that and I was like man I could not agree with him more strongly when he mentioned that to me. Yeah I mean it doesn't mean I want no I want you know who want to start leaving positive feedback but I mean yeah I mean you look at you kind of preaching to the choir. You know after a while in terms of you know people watching are watching because they like what you're doing. Yes And it's it's very interesting it just it just as a little bit of a phenomenon that you have if you get just like lots and lots and lots of positive comments it sound it does sound weird but after a while if you if you have tons of them. They're not necessarily valuable right these are these are like in aggregate right individually they are but what can you draw from that is very hard to say. Like there's not necessarily anything actionable in that. Right whereas negative comments may still contain information for something that you can change or that you can improve upon. And also the thing is that you know negative comments are the ones that just really stick with you sometimes you know especially if there is a kernel of truth the kernel of truth to them. Of course that's that's that's the thing isn't it. Yeah. There was a see if I can find it for the description but there was a little web comic that I saw once where it showed like a guy at work and he's surrounded by all these little speech bubbles of people saying really nice things about him this twenty nice things and there's one negative thing and then the second panel is him after work at dinnertime and the one negative comment is still crystal clear but all the positive ones are sort of faded away slightly and then the final panel is him you know it's at nighttime when he can't get to sleep and the only thing that remains is that negative comment and all the positive ones are sort of disappeared and I think that that's partly like what ISN'T was engaged in a statement like positive feedback trends to zero that like the negative stuff really sticks with you especially if it if it has some kernel of truth and you know that can be can be very very hard to deal with sometimes. Have you ever had a negative comment. Stu sticks with you now. People Yeah I mean people can people can leave comments that really do kind of stick with you but I thought what she would want and I asked a person a question and I also don't want to encourage people to go and give you a hard time but yeah what sort of area of criticism will stick with the more than others will say you know I don't like the sound of your voice or your argument is poor or not you must be very ugly. I thought what what what are the ones that stick with you. I think I think there's a kind of come in that I do see on videos especially when I'm away like if it's on a section on Reddit for example where people don't know who I am. I would say that the one that I'm OK talking about that I see the most is people will say that I found really condescending in the videos and that that always gets me because like why am I like my whole point is to not be condescending I come. I'm sort of assuming. That the person watching this video might not know very much about this topic and I want to I want to try to be friendly about that and that is something that I do think about when I'm recording the actual audio for the video is to try to get takes where I'm not I'm not like being an authority talking down to a person especially because very often like I knew almost nothing about this topic five weeks earlier and so I come. I am by no means an authority you know I've just done a whole bunch of research but I'm very sensitive to coming off as condescending to people who might not have watched a whole bunch of my videos. So that's a kind of negative comment that I do you see repeatedly that I'm aware of it kind of sticks with me and does affect how I how I how I work a little bit. I mean you're always going to have that problem because if you tell people a lot of clever information that they didn't know before very very quickly which is what you do. It makes you appear very intelligent and knowledgeable and that immediately puts you in a position where people will feel that you're being condescending. You're not and I know you get around in all those other ways but you're always going to be always going to struggle with. Yeah I am like lucky if someone goes on a quiz show and I happen to know all the answers like well OK then I will be up some people I think now and feel really negatively towards them. I mean yeah sorry I just happen to know the answers and I said to him quickly. Yes but I but that's I totally agree with that but it is something I'm very sensitive towards about yet thinking of ways to minimize that in the videos in various ways. Yeah but I was just like I have a couple of other little little thoughts here and there is you know who's a frank is yeah. Yes I met Frank. They'd come over to his room and they Frank for for those who may not be aware is sort of the the father of the modern Internet blog. You know the the scene a video where there's a person's face talking at a camera very quickly and they do jump cuts like they Frank was the guy who started that back in the day he sort of I think the green brother he's a real hero of the grammar of this. Yeah yeah he used to do this amazing thing called the show which is so old now in internet terms but it was just amazing and then he disappeared mysteriously for a number of years and has recently come back on You Tube but he did a video which I'll try to find for the description where he was talking about comments on videos on You Tube and he made an excellent point which I thought was it was interesting which is that of course the only people who comment are the people who have a strong reaction to the video or whatever it is you've made. In one way or another by people who really liked it or really hated it pretty much by definition the people who watch a video and were kind of met they're probably not going to leave a comment. Yeah. And so I had I had not really thought about that but it's an interesting point that feedback on anything that you put on the Internet is is going to be intrinsically biased in two completely opposing directions. Yeah you know people who love it and people who hate it and I think this is you can also see this just in in any kind of Web site that has a five star rankings where almost all the reviews are either five stars or their one star and there's almost no three star reviews because who is the person leaving the three star review. Yeah and I like you know I kind of liked it and I didn't like the change in life for that. There are a lot yeah. Break the day you got it and you want to. That's exactly kind of like that but I think I'll spend twenty minutes writing a review of this thing that's kind of like whatever nobody does that nobody at those I think this is interesting to keep in mind whenever you're looking over feedback of anything that you thought that means that's interesting you should bring that up I mean I guess there is there is one respect where I know I have to. I hadn't thought of this before actually but there is a respect in which I have to follow a feedback or interesting way and to analyze it more than you and that is the respect in which most of my videos have a third party in them who is often someone maybe not used to the kind of exposure you get on these You Tube videos. Yes And of course they read the same back and I I then have to cancel them in some way. Yes So that that whole thing about you know the silent majority is something I'm always forced to bring up with people when they've read two or three of those elements that are very harsh and withstand that speech bubble for days I have to tell them you know a million people have watched this video. You know some of them didn't like it but yeah that's that's like twenty people out of a million and there's a whole bunch that did like it and so but in general that that is the biggest problem of comments from a liberal is that is those third parties who are honest and who are always almost volunteers and not the sort of people that put themselves out there for criticism. They're doing me a favor they're doing the viewers a favor by lending their expertise and knowledge and suddenly they're exposed to this this harsh world and you know I can accept I can accept that myself if someone wants to say that I'm a terrible filmmaker or a bad person or have a big nose. This sort of rubbish I have to accept that I know if I've chosen I've chosen this world but these other people I don't think I've chosen to the same degree and I feel quite protective of them. Yeah and it's it has just very recently reached a tipping point for me when I'm no I'm no longer willing to accept it. And particularly with the new comment system and a few other things that have been going on like it's just become it's become very vicious towards these volunteers and you know so you know I can accept if someone says I disagree with your argument Oh I think you made a factual mistake or if they start saying things that are personally offensive or racist or you know or sexual. Against these volunteers and I can't police you know I can't police it all because there are so many videos. I've just had enough and so just recently I'm experimenting with having the comments to approval which is a huge road for my back I remember when I met the guys that eat Sesame Street You Tube videos they do the same thing because of this they got together on those sites I don't know but I'm very aware that schools use my videos too. Yeah I don't want to talk comment to be some racist attack against the person who's in the video. So I've been experimenting with approving them and it takes me loads of time and I'm not particularly censors in terms of you know if someone doesn't like the video. Like Tico prove that if I like the video ticket if they but if that thing abusive you know I don't have it anymore because it's also some of these people in the videos you know have a rating and they've become scared to read comments. Yeah because of you know their site. Now I won't even look at the comments now it's too hurtful and I don't want that to happen I want them to go into the comments so they can enjoy the praise or they can look at the constructive criticism and think about it. I've always really provided the comment section under my videos as a place where the debate goes on you know you can be it can be vigorous debate but you know a healthy place and I like the people in the videos to go and they tell you and at least read some of them actually engage with it and write comments to you but at least read it and be part of it. So those people writing the comments don't feel like they're talking to the void but it got to a point where that just wasn't feasible anymore. So I've had to of gone down this approval route as an experiment for now and I've never been able to go to the people in my videos and say don't worry don't worry don't be scared of coming into the comments any more if someone writes something that is horrific. I'll try to you know I'll try to stop. Yes and some and you know I know we live in a world where free speech is greatly valued and I greatly value free speech as well but they can go and do their free speech somewhere else free not on. A video one page that I've created and I'm given the administration right page for various reasons and you know if I want to if I want to have their free speech and say something vicious and horrible about some poor academic who's volunteered their time to go into a new home page I don't write for the audience that I have come to the same video that we've created. Yeah I mean I would guess you know this is a function of audience size. Yes right and so I obviously like as as your videos have grown more popular and you have more people subscribed. You can do nothing but expect the average comment quality to go down. It's like a mathematical function. You're almost guaranteed that that is going to be the case that as you widen the pool the discussion quality drops and you know when like you say when you bring in some third party who is not necessarily used to that it can be a very upsetting experience and I do think that you know these for you Do you know don't read the comments is not is not is not bad advice and it's partly because the barrier to commenting is much lower. You know here it is it is easier. And yeah it just you know I don't know about you approving the comments because my my only guess is that is your as your channel continues to grow that fundamental underlying math is not going to be any different care. Right and like you or maybe it's just handleable now but anymore it's not it's not. I mean OK I need to work on some different solutions on their own. Yeah there are filters and things you can put in place but it's just a temporary experiment. I figure out how to protect these people I care about and the thing the thing that is is the tricky thing with feedback. Because his advice for anybody who makes up on the internet this is this is vices like probably the best advice that I can give about negative feedback and particularly aggressively negative feedback but also sometimes the most hard to find hard to follow through with it is just do not engage. Right you have you have nothing to gain from engaging with extremely negative commenters but it is also just so so hard not to do and I yeah I know I don't want to go into any details I said I ran into. Or a very negative commenter on Reddit recently who who doesn't like me for personal reasons you know doesn't know me but like you know just me and the man you just want to respond but I literally had to sit there and think like I do not engage do not engage you have nothing to gain from this example using your time but it is it is very frustrating and I can see sometimes on the Internet that like with little conversations unfold or people wonder like oh why hasn't this prominent person responded about this particular particular talk on them and it's like because the correct answer is do not engage like you just can't win in writing never in a land war in Asia. Yeah exactly. Yes and like negative and or crazy comments are like a land war in Asia like not you're not going to win on this one right there is no there is there's no way there's no way to come out. Yeah I mean there are lots of reasons to not engage like. One is you know it just validates someone who you shouldn't really be validating. Yeah but also I like the stranger. They there are lots of people in your life who are important he should get your time or your lot pokes or whatever you want to give them and there are people who you shouldn't and they're also they don't know they don't know you they don't have anything about you and you've just got to remember they're strangers. That's why I always get told so they're Whether they're saying they're saying you're great and you make the best videos in the world or they're saying you're terrible and your rubbish and they hate your guts. Both of those people they don't know and they're not that great you're not you're not as good as they say and then you're not bad as bad as they say and who's got a script. What you doing and doing what you enjoy. Yeah yeah both of those both of those both those comments are definitely true that you are if you're not as as often or as terrible as people say but it is it is so hard not to really read the comments sometimes but you know I do I do value feedback and hearing what people have to say yes you know sort of in particular circumstances and that's why I use Reddit so heavily for me that works really well and you know you really need to say it is a really good thing about a job that we get we get the level of faith that we like a lot of people who do jobs and no one ever tells them anything whether they like what they're doing it or not what they're doing and we are lucky here winching because it comes with a it comes with a sting in the tail. But overall overall I quite like to say one other thing about comics that just popped into my head. Drives me crazy. Tell me Brady and that is inevitably. Things will come up in a video like say stay the course up something that kind of needs something that needs addressing or something that someone's noticed and there is nothing you could do to stop people commenting on that. If if you like to clarify something with an annotation or you write something in the description or you write a bunch of comments in the comment section yourself to say look I realize that this isn't clear or something you used to have hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people pointed out as if no one else pointed it out like they were saying and written and it does make me wonder what percentage of people who write comments even glance at the video description or see other people's comments before they write something and not even be a mistake. It might be what is the piece of music you used that you'd want to comment about it and everyone else will say oh he's used this piece of music and you put it in everything. You can tell people he could be in the video and into the video in big bold letters and used to have hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people writing what was the music or do you realize this is wrong or something. You're wondering who these people are but I know that I have done OK. I have definitely sometimes left a comment on something only seconds later to see that it was in the description or something and just feel like a total idiot. I would never I would never. I probably do all the time and I would be reluctant to write a comment to put something into writing until I've checked. Yet it's not available. Maybe maybe you're not as reactionary as something to let the keyboard fly like a but it was the right you told me three seconds later. OK I was looking at that as a as a final thing here right. I'm looking at our our feedback on our own podcast and our star ratings follow exactly what I was saying before. Yeah so what we have at this point. Two hundred ninety five five star rating. Wow that sounds impressive It does sound but I don't have any sense of how now you know I like that because I have no idea what that is but that's a number two and if I have five siblings and then we have three one starvation. And even just looking at that right it's like and we have No three star ratings and five four star ratings but you know the only ones I want to read what the three stuff so that's what I want I want to be I don't know what they said that is exactly like I'm looking at this at like your mind you cannot help but like my mind is totally drawn immediately to three one star ratings like what did that person have to say and it's well you booking a holiday look at some amazing resort in the most days and it has ten thousand five star reviews. One one star review. Yes and you read the one star review and the service was terrible and there are facts and you have a lot more going there is no way I'm going to that was up to thousands of people who said it was the most wonderful place in the brain. Oh I almost forgot to mention the four records and I think the thing that got me started about this whole topic I forget until the very end. But going back to what you were saying the beginning how you have to trust your own judgment about something you know I was looking at the comments for this pod cast and this happened to be on You Tube to see what everybody had to say and the favorite thing that I came across was two comments one that was right after another and so it's this is on on You Tube in the first one is from a guy called Talk this. And he complains. Here is his suggestion is that he doesn't like the podcast because we don't let the conversation flow naturally and you know where we're sticking strictly to our theme for this round of feedback he doesn't like it because we're stupid to stick with sticking to the theme of today's episode mediately after the user called unpronounceable and he has the exact reverse feedback right. He doesn't like it because we're just talking about whatever and you should really have some kind of centralizing seem right to focus the discussion. And this is this is the kind of thing that can just drive you crazy on the internet is but I love it I love it that there are literally one right after the other. Feedback going in just completely opposite direction on the screen grabs when that happens I collect some comments I discuss this actually but I collect some comments for various reasons one of the main reasons is I often go and give talks to people each even having having a nice collection of comments good and bad is you know quite good for powerpoint presentations but whenever I see two side by side like that I like. Keep them as little like little twin primes or something then I fiddled a little treasures when two people say exact opposite things back to back but I find that happens a lot when I do the polarizing videos like something different like song something of that and you get this is the best video I've ever seen on the Internet followed by this is the worst piece of trash. Yes and I should die. Either of those pairs it is great and so we have we have one of those for the excellence it involves It is both too structured and not structured enough which is why you have to you have to make decisions and what are we headed we fix that what do we do now. Well well here here's what I'm going to do right now. And this is also there's also a cunning plan I have left this to last for a very reason so we have a bunch of reviews from different countries around the world. And so here is a list of places where we have gotten reviews. It's Argentina Australia Austria Belgium Canada Denmark Finland Germany Greece Ireland Mexico the Netherlands Norway Poland Saudi Arabia Sweden Switzerland the United Kingdom and the United States. So what I would like is to get more different countries. This is this to me is like poking on the right like you gotta catch em all. I would love to eventually at some point have a review from every one of the countries where this pod cast can be heard if you're hearing if you're hearing the sound of my voice right now and if you like this pod cast which if you have listened this long you must like this podcast. And if you are listening this long and you don't like this podcast I'm very worried but I'm going to assume anybody who has listened this long. By definition has to be enjoying this broadcast and you are from one of the places that I have not mentioned. I would really like you to go lever of UN i Tunes even if it's a one star. I'm assuming the people who have listened long are going to leave positive reviews. As I say I should have put a review in when I was in Vietnam. You should have yes I guess I'm not sure how that works. That's OK anyway but yeah just out there. Gray has spoken. So what if I want to see if we can collect all and I can't afford to I can't just tally up how many countries there are and of course my own video on the number of countries media is ambiguous anyway you know but there are a bunch of places so if you can hear my voice and you are not or you are in a place that was not mentioned I would love it if you have to review and maybe next time I'll follow up and see how many additional places we have gotten since that last time but I will say I think this is been long enough my friend I think I feel like I didn't ask enough questions and I expected much out I'll do more questions next time. I know it's going to be chatty but you know what people will complain. Both ways will get me back that people loved it and the people didn't like it and I guess we'll just have to make some judgments about that. I see a lot of talk again. Bye bye.
you're really interactive there, too. I've noticed I think I'm thinking we might talk about sort of comments and feedback later when we get time. But I have noticed on the subreddit, you're very, you're very interactive. It's a, you know, with the, with the people with the community,
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Grey 6:19
as well. Yeah, I do. That's one of the reasons why I'm very happy to direct feedback to read it. Because unlike YouTube, and unlike other places, I find it really manageable to try to have conversations with a larger number of people. We do have it scheduled at some point, I want to talk about comments systems in general. So I don't want to discuss that too much right here. But the short version is that it's really easy on Reddit to get a sense of what people are saying and to have feedback and interactions with a bunch of people. So I think it's, I think is the best place to go for now.

Brady 6:53
It's a good community to the Reddit community. Like it's like, you know, you'll get you'll get funny stuff and you'll get love and your Hate but it's always quite smart and quite a quite like the they seem like good people on Reddit in a lot of ways. They seem like less than that my kind of people when I read the comments there, as opposed to comments and a lot of other social media.

Unknown Speaker 7:13
Yeah, it's as, as with absolutely everything it always depends on the section that you're going but I would agree with you as a general statement. Actually, that's true. My Reddit, my I'm quite narrow and my Reddit in the subreddit security So yeah, I should be careful what I say.

Brady 7:28
Let me ask you about something else. The Hello internet logo.

Grey 7:32
You mean the artwork?

Brady 7:34
Yeah, the little, the little, little h I, I know. I know. You sort of sent me a few ideas beforehand and you know, then you kind of just went off and did your thing.

Grey 7:43
I believe what happened was I said to them, you didn't like them and then I used it anyway. I think that is actually the process by which that unfolded.

Brady 7:52
I quite like I quite like the HCI when you've gone with and I'm quiet because I sometimes look at it. You know when you look at something from For a long time, you suddenly see it differently. And I suddenly see the the, the sort of the gray lines going up into the white blocker to make the the high and stuff like that. I'm not too sure about that little border you've got,

Grey 8:12
yeah, the border I might have to change. But I listened to a lot of podcasts, as I mentioned before. And I'm always aware that the artwork seems to be designed for really big screen. But you actually look at it as like a little one centimeter by one centimeter image on your phone. So I just, I was trying to go for something that was very visually immediately recognizable and sort of try to catch people's attention. And I think I think that kind of works. And also, the dark gray color was not really used by very many podcasts. So I thought I'd go with that, for obvious reasons. But absolutely, it did look good. It did look good when we were sort of dominating the iTunes charts for a while and you could just see like, all these little high logos all over the place for the number one podcast in various countries. And I thought that it worked very Well like that I thought it was really eye catching.

Brady 9:02
Well, if anyone wants to put any comments about it, I'd be really interested to read it because at the moment, it's just you and I talking but yeah, I do wonder what people think about it. So feed some some feedback. Sorry, some follow up from Episode Three. Which was the work life balance for light bulbs. Yes. Your feet, your four light bulbs. faces. Yeah. Have you had any reflections on it? Any anyone said anything to you about it?

Grey 9:30
Well, I just wanted I want to start off by saying it was really interesting listening to that when I was editing the podcast for release. listening to it a second time it was really clear how we each think about work in very different ways. Do you think it came across very much to me anyway, but that you are dealing much more with with kind of work in parallel with other things maybe than I am and I was thinking of work is like chunks of time, like very clearly dedicated to one task. And I just I think it's interesting, you know, whenever, whenever we are other YouTube's youtuber guys get together. It's It is interesting how we are all sort of doing the same thing. But each one of us does it in very different ways. And I think you can hear that a little bit in the in the previous episode.

Brady 10:24
But I don't know how much of that might be the extent to which I was being devil's advocate at times. But I think it's interesting that you say that. I don't know what to make of that.

Grey 10:35
The other thing I would just say is that, again, from the Reddit thread, it was it was interesting to see, there's this issue with analogies and like, boy, and I think I said it a little bit at the beginning. But boy, that analogy. There are definitely a lot of problems with that analogy, right.

Brady 10:52
You might have to revisit it. Yeah. refine it.

Grey 10:56
Yeah, I figure you know, well, you know, productivity is probably a thing. We're going to come back to at some point. So I don't really want heads well on it.

Brady 11:02
Yeah, like in Episode 10, it will be doing like the eight light bulbs.

Grey 11:06
Yes. But I just want to say that my, my, my favorite piece of feedback came from Henry, he of the minutephysics fame. And he just sent me a little email. And all it said was, I think you forgot that light bulbs can be wired in parallel, which is like a devastating remark to make to someone who has taught physics. It's like, Yes, I totally understand that this analogy does not work for like a straight up. I actually have a battery and I actually light up some light bulbs.

Brady 11:38
That is a very Henry comment now, isn't it?

Grey 11:41
Yeah. And and the very Only thing is I'm going now just to fully embarrass him as well is later on actually was just today, but it was it was a couple days later, he wrote me a much more in depth email about how the analogy also fails because I should really be thinking about it in terms of electromotive force and the voltage and the resistance in the end. Individual light bulbs. And so he was he was really thinking that went through to its absolute conclusion. Yeah, yeah. But But he was no he was doing the advanced version of what I saw many people in the in the comment thread talking about, which is that there are lots of problems with that analogy, and I will, I will fully, I will fully admit to some of those that I still think my my core idea of the trade off still holds, but like

Brady 12:25
I said, Isn't the latest minutephysics video that just went up in the last day or two about light bulbs?

Grey 12:30
Oh, I don't know. It is embarrassing. I don't know.

Brady 12:33
I think he may have inspired him. I know you've been you've been in a cave and not looking. But I think his latest video is about light bulbs, I have to check that I could be wrong.

Unknown Speaker 12:41
The

Brady 12:42
my favorite comment in relation to you know, and picking the argument or discussing the the merits of the light bulb analogy was someone who pointed out that if you improve aspects of your life, like your health, for example, that actually increases the power of you motor that you do other things with your other light bulbs, which is something we never discussed.

Grey 13:04
Yes, yes. And I saw a couple comments like that. And I, I totally agree with that as well. Right. It was interesting. And and I think there was also something to be said that, that people just have kind of intrinsically more or less powerful motors than each other in this analogy, right. Yeah. And, you know, it's, that's why I always look at you, and you, from my perspective, are just this incredible YouTube work machine. And I think like, boy, I do not have the same kind of wattage output that you seem to have. And, but

Brady 13:36
but that one, if you came and watch me work for a day, you would think differently.

Grey 13:40
I'm not so sure about that. But But I did. I did agree with those comments, right that and I was sort of working towards it at the end of the podcast that at a certain level, you know, you can invest more into one area and then get more out in total. But I do think there are situations in which that's that's very hard to do. But yeah, obviously If your if your health is at its peak, you are able to accomplish much more and all of the other areas. And and the reverse of course is is not true as well. So yeah, did Mrs. CGP Grey listened to the podcast? She has at this point, she has listened to the first two. But she has not yet listened to the third one. See, that's the one I want her

Unknown Speaker 14:21
to listen to.

Grey 14:22
I know, I know. I mentioned her in that one. And I tried to prod her a little bit, but I was like, Oh, you know, I mentioned you in the third one. But she has been she's been very busy with some other projects at this point. So she will listen to it at some point but has not yet at this stage.

Brady 14:35
Well, let me tell you, Mrs. Periodic Videos or number file or whatever I'm supposed to call my much better half. did listen to Episode Three. We went for a drive that by coincidence coincided with the exact length of the podcast. So I said, let me play this. So we played it for the drive. I was at a silence throughout. I think the I think the only time She spoke during it was, at one point, admiring Mrs. Graves, patients put a patient with us. But she, I think that was during the time when you were talking about how you completely blank her for three days when you're putting a video out. has just happened. Yeah, yeah. Yes. But and then and then amazingly, it just finishes we got to the car park where we were going to which was nice timing. And so we pulled up and I sort of turned to her and said, What do you think? What do you think about that? The main thing that came across was that she she would quite like to sit down with you and discuss a few of the items in a positive way. But you know, because she's into all that stuff. You're into, like workflows and sleep patterns and things like that. But fundamentally, I think she she disagreed with your thesis. And her best argument, which she didn't really make, but she didn't need to make against your argument was her herself. She's She's just sort of sitting And, and we're talking here about how you can't do all four things at once, right? And then I kind of I look at her and she works really hard in a really demanding job. And she's like me, you know, she's got this amazing job. And she gives so much that she always every day makes time for her friends and rings them and talks to them. She's a brilliant family person and talks to her mom and dad all the time and takes great care of me. She's incredibly healthy and goes to the gym all the time and a personal trainer every week, and she watches what she eats and she always looks amazing. And she does all these things like to the maximum and then she's just been spending an hour listening to you and I grumble about her or I can't eat healthy and do my job. And I think I think she embodiment of the argument against us. So

Grey 16:57
Mistake number five is the counter argument. Yeah, maybe I will just try to defend myself. I will go back to the some people's engines are more powerful than others.

Brady 17:07
Yeah, you and I just puttering along on these on these out bomb of a car and she's a Rolls Royce

Grey 17:12
This is that i think i think that might be the conclusion that we need to come to is that Mrs. Number file has a very powerful motor compared to the two of us. So that might that might very well be the case.

Brady 17:24
I think I think she does want to sit down and talk through a few points. So we'll, we'll arrange that sometime.

Grey 17:29
Oh, good. Okay.

Brady 17:30
I tell you what else bothered me was in Episode Three, where you did that. you clarify this whole infringement versus theft thing when it comes to copyright. I'm still that still bothers me a bit to that still bothers you. I just think you're being so like you're being a bit overly cautious. Who it's not 50 it's

Grey 17:49
it's exiting. I could not disagree with you more at this point. I I fully understand that I can be overly pedantic about things like this, but I am going to very strongly disagree with you there.

Brady 17:58
So if someone comes into my house takes my TV and, and watches a few programs on it and then puts it back later that day. Have they infringed on my TV? Or have they stolen it?

Grey 18:11
Wait, wait, what the person breaks into your? Well, first of all, they broken and entered into your house.

Brady 18:17
But if they didn't take any money or break anything, have they just infringed into my house?

Grey 18:21
I don't think that's an appropriate analogy. I don't think this lines up at all. I think you're trying to stack the deck in your favor with that one, buddy. Well, well,

Brady 18:30
you've already you've already said that you're not good with the analogy. So anyway, I just listened back to it and I think Gangwon this stealing from you? They're stealing the thieves.

Unknown Speaker 18:42
I just I disagree. I think I think infringement is a word that that the internet culture needs to needs to make happen. As a common, understood word like theft is a common understood word.

Brady 18:56
I think infringing is like you Using the word infringing is like dressing something bad up to make it sound not as bad. Why can't we give it a more emotive word? Why do we in because infringing is just like, it's such like a delicate thing? Like, you know, you know, Germany didn't infringe on Poland did it? Like, you know, like, you don't you don't know.

Grey 19:18
But that is also another comparable analogy.

Brady 19:20
Yeah, what I'm saying infringe, it makes a terrible thing, sound, sound, you know, somewhere near more acceptable, and I don't think it is acceptable, and I don't think we should be giving them this, this delicate word when they're doing a bad thing to us.

Grey 19:35
As we say the word the Unfortunately, these words aren't perfectly comparable, but you do also have the word piracy, which is a similar,

Brady 19:42
that's a fantasy. That's an emotive. I like that. But

Grey 19:45
yeah, it is a more emotive word, but that is usually piracy is talking about individuals making copies for themselves. You know, and so they are they're engaged in piracy, which is more emotive but it is almost more motive in a very cool kind of way. Right? Like, yeah, it's true. Pirates have a lot of social cachet these days. So,

Brady 20:08
I'm not sure it's really dissuading the kids. You know, all right. Don't Don't be an awesome cool pirate. But yeah, I'm gonna, I'm gonna we're gonna have to disagree on this. I want to put I want to put the challenge out there, though. I want to I want a new word to describe what you call infringing. Yeah, that is more emotive, but you know, it doesn't cross swords with stealing and theft, which you think is, you know, all right, sacred anyway.

Grey 20:35
You know, we'll, we'll see. We'll see if people in the Reddit thread for this video can come up with a better word. So you want you want something that just it just sounds mean. Yeah,

Brady 20:43
I want a word to describe the practice of other people or organizations taking content and using it for their own purposes.

Grey 20:54
I will see if we'll see something when someone comes up with something.

Brady 20:58
Sorry, I just had to get it off my chest anymore.

Unknown Speaker 21:01
That that is the point to follow up Brady, right. There's always going to be something that sticking in your mind and and this is the this is the time to discuss it. Yeah.

Grey 21:11
Hello internets today's sponsor is audible.com, a leading provider of spoken audio information and entertainment, listen to audiobooks whenever and wherever you want. It's my job to recommend something interesting to you to listen to. And this week that's going to be a walk in the woods by Bill Bryson. Bryson is a travel writer and this is his experience walking along the Appalachian Trail, which for those of you who are unaware is a path in the woods in America that goes from Maine to Georgia, and it's incredibly long and actually genuinely dangerous because it is, of course, nature. The thing that I like about this book is that Bill Bryson is not like a professional adventurous guy. He's a kind of normal homebody sort of person. And so his experience walking along the Appalachian Trail is a lot like what I would imagine if I tried to walk along the Appalachian Trail, basically kind of a disaster from being beginning to end but a very entertaining story for other people to hear. And it really is an enjoyable tale just from start to finish with him and this friend of his cats trying to do this adventure that they are both clearly not prepared for in any way. I personally had the enjoyable experience of listening to this book on a road trip a number of years ago and actually intersecting paths with the Appalachian Trail which I decided to get out and explore and also got briefly lost and terrified on but that's a story for another time. So I'm going to highly recommend this book and the copy on Audible is also read by Bill Bryson which he has a good narrating voice and as I've said in a previous spot, I like it when the author reads their own thing, they put a different spin on it, then the professional narrator might. So if you want you can listen to a walk in the woods for free with audible. All you need to do is go to audible.com slash Hello internet. That's all one word and sign up for a 30 day trial by using the audible.com slash Hello internet link. That's how they know you came from us which is One of the ways we're going to figure out if this podcasting experiment is a success, so if you want to listen to it, audible has it with over 150,000 titles and virtually every genre you'll find what you're looking for. Get a free audiobook and 30 day trial today by signing up@audible.com slash Hello internet. That's audible.com slash Hello, internet all one word.

Brady 23:20
What's been going on? What's been going on in your life or in my life or any? It's been great. Life has been crazy.

Grey 23:27
Yeah, life has been crazy for both of us for the past week. And for you crazier, I think because you just got back from Vietnam. Did you not? I did. I did. And what were you What were you doing on the other side of the world?

Brady 23:40
I don't know how much you know about my, my dad. But he was a I'm Australian. As you know, but not many people. Not many American people even seem to realize that Australian soldiers fought in the Vietnam War. So you know, This was sort of it was an Allied Force a lot of people that was really surprised when I tell them that and my father fought in the Vietnam War. So I've kind of grown up, you know, knowing, knowing this and knowing bits and pieces of his stories. So basically, the purpose of this trip was to go with him to Vietnam and travel around to some of the places where, where all the stuff went down, which was really interesting. It's, it's especially interesting for me, because there are two things about my dad that are unusual in this respect. One was, he did two tours of the Vietnam War. And the first one was 12 months, which I think was in 1968, I think. And then he did another eight month tour towards the end, which I can't remember the year was 71. I can't remember the year which is terrible. But that on that first tour, he was a dog tracker, weapon. He wasn't a dog, but he was a dog handler and have a tracking dog. So his war experience was quite different. into a lot of other people in so far as his role was to lead this dog around sniffing

Grey 25:07
and what with the with the dog doing,

Brady 25:09
the dog was sniffing enemy forces, Vietcong or North Vietnamese soldiers. So say a typical scenario would be there would be a contact, it would be a battle. And then my dad and his dog, which was called Caesar, would be brought in, to sort of sniff and follow the retreating troops, and try and, you know, re engage with them from a combat sense, he had quite an unusual experience. But he also had a personally very interesting experience because his relationship through the war was was more with a dog than with other soldiers in many ways. So it was a very, it was a very unusual and special relationship. But also, my dad went on to become a journalist and a writer. And once he finished his sort of journalistic career, he settled down to writing Books and he's written a number of books about the Vietnam War. And his first one and most successful one was called trackers is about him and the dog. So a lot of I'd heard some of these stories, but not all of them. But then I read this book, which is just crammed with amazing stories that I didn't know. So that suddenly I had all this, you know, all these stories and all this stuff that I'd never seen the place I've been there. So that's what last week was about, it was about going to going to the site of these places. And of course, maybe me and dad quite wanted me to I took my camera along. And he sort of retold a lot of these stories, and might have a really good storyteller. He retold a lot of these stories in the places where they happened and I wrote the camera over it and hopefully we'll get around to editing editing them at some point.

Unknown Speaker 26:45
There's Are we going to see these videos on one of your many channels at some point? Yeah, I'll probably just put it on my on my channel called brailey stuff, which is a channel where I just dump stuff. Unbelievably there.

Grey 26:58
I don't mean to laugh, but like I've known you for a while. And this is like yet another channel of yours that I have never even heard of existing.

Brady 27:04
Well, this this is a channel where I put things that haven't got a channel, unbelievably, there are some topics that I haven't got a channel for so.

Grey 27:12
So I was surprised that you don't have a dedicated Vietnam War channel, for example,

Brady 27:16
that's not a bad idea. Actually, maybe I'll like now, so I don't know, I'll probably pop them on there. So anyway, anyway, it's you know, by the by, I mean, for me, it wasn't so much about making videos. It was about, you know,

Grey 27:28
spending some time with your dad and hearing Thomas.

Brady 27:32
And, and it's always good to put, you know, to visit places and really, it gives you a different understanding of stuff, whether it's something intense, like the Vietnam War, or going to the Eiffel Tower, you know, when you visit to the real place, you kind of can think oh, yeah, now I understand the geography and

Grey 27:49
yeah, though, is fundamentally different. No matter how much you hear about a place when you go, it's just a different experience. Yeah, it's a much more human experience to be there and to and to stand in the in the Wear something actually happened.

Brady 28:01
Yeah, exactly. So. So anyway, that was that was kind of crazy, but it was good fun.

Grey 28:07
I'm glad I'm glad you came back alive.

Brady 28:09
Yeah, you were just worried we wouldn't finish the podcast series if I got some malaria or something, right? Yeah,

Unknown Speaker 28:14
yeah, that's exactly true. And I was I was nervous when you tweeted that menu that had intestines and a bunch of other terrifying foods on it. Yes. And I thought I don't miss them on it didn't Yeah, that's what it was. It was it was rectum and I was thinking, please Brady. Do not become terribly sick or die on this trip. If a man would be terribly inconvenient but imagine max even say I've never eaten so much squid and all my life. They had they love their squid there. Oh, yeah. The other thing that was really interesting, though,

Brady 28:45
was that it was it was really interesting to go to a place in that kind of military tourism context. Where I don't know for lack of a better term, you're on the losing side. I mean, I mean, I mean, the US and Australians and the Allies withdrew from Vietnam and the North Vietnamese came down and, and took took the country, so to speak. And, you know, it's, it's now this this country that is this communist country, and the war is a great victory for them. And to go there and be doing the sites and be taken around by a tour guide, when of the force that was not victorious was very interesting and, and sort of a different, you know, we're used to going to sort of places where terrible things happen, but ultimately, you know, in a victorious context, right, and this was the opposite, which was really interesting, huh.

Grey 29:40
I wouldn't have thought about that. But that that's a good point. Normally, normally when you're doing like the war monuments that we know, and Australia or America we tend to go to are there there are monuments of triumph. And doing a tour where that was not the case is a different experience.

Brady 30:00
Yeah, I was also really interesting going to the Vietnamese museum about of any age, you know, it's probably there's only so much we can talk about a bit now unfortunate in a, in a podcast that's more about. I don't know what this podcast is about. But it's probably not about war stories if

Grey 30:17
this podcast is about what we wanted to be about So, so a Vietnam totally counts that I was

Brady 30:21
dating now and I didn't and I did make videos there. So it is about it is about filmmaking. I tell you what, from a filmmaker YouTube perspective, it's really hard to make videos of your dad. I tell you that right now. Why? Because partly because of the way my dad is, but also just because there's a different dynamic. I mean, you know, when I'm interviewing someone or filming something in the video is them but I can take control to an extent and guide them with the questioning and if they've got a certain point they want to make or away they want to tell the story, and I don't think it's going to work. I can either delicately Shepherd them with my questions or I can can be more Frank and slap them around the years and say now Now we need to do it like this. But my dad obviously had, you know, stories he wants to tell him ways he wanted to tell them and they didn't always fit with what I thought would work in a video. And all the different techniques I normally use on on people to get what I want. Just didn't work. It was like

Grey 31:21
he's just he knows you do. Well, he's blowing off all your linguistic tricks.

Brady 31:25
I don't know. I don't know if it was but yeah, I felt like I felt like there was kryptonite in the air. And in terms of my ability to steer the interview either way. I sometimes can. It was an eye It must be because it was my dad because it never happens with anyone else.

Grey 31:43
Yeah, I guess you were not in a position of authority when it is your father on the other end of the camera.

Brady 31:47
Right. I guess that's it. I guess that's it. I mean, I don't feel that he was in authority over me either, though. I mean, I don't have that kind of relationship with my dad. But yeah, there was just something different. There was and I would stop and ask him questions. And he would he wouldn't answer them or debate when he's like that with everyone. He just ignores questions and cracks on with his stories. But maybe that's it, maybe, maybe he didn't feel sufficiently intimidated or respectful of me as the, as the filmmaker was everyone else at least has that modicum of respect for me. Whereas I was still just Brady to him. And he was gonna he had a story he wanted to tell. And, you know, I had stopped the camera a couple of times said Dad, not listening to me. You have to answer this question. It was like interviewing a politician. And they just have when they have what they want to say. But anyway, he is a really good storyteller. He's like, famous for his ripping. Yeah. And so he still told the story well, but it was a really interesting, interesting thing as a filmmaker for me.

Grey 32:47
Well, how are you going to get those videos out? Yeah, long time.

Brady 32:51
It could be a while because I'm actually jumping on another plane now and I'm going away for a month. And I don't know if I'm gonna be able to edit them. The road so it could be a while, but I'd like to do them so

Grey 33:03
well, whenever whenever you get around to them mentioned it again, we'll put them in the description for the podcast. Yeah, yeah. Good today we'll have a description for you or we'll have a link to your dad's book if people want

Brady 33:15
Yeah, yeah, it's it is it is actually a, you know, is a really good book. Actually, I'm, I'm not paying. I mean, his other ones I'm not so much into because they're about other soldiers. But the one about him. I really enjoyed anyway. There we go.

Grey 33:28
So I'll put it in. People can check it out if they want. Cool. Thank you. Thank you.

Brady 33:31
What about you? What's been any news in your world? You had a video out which is always a big deal.

Grey 33:35
Yeah, that is really the biggest news ever, is always It always feels like my whole life just narrows down to the video production in the in the four or five days before it actually goes live and just everything. Everything gets postponed. And so there's there is this cycle in my life. where, you know, I use this, this program called OmniFocus to track all of my today And maybe about 14 days before I'm expecting a video to come out, I start delaying everything in my little program to like after when I think it's going to come out. And so I'm working on the video and stuff comes up in my program and I delay delay, delay, delay delay. And then I'm kind of experiencing right now and what I was doing before I was I was talking to you and suddenly there's just this monster is number of things to do after the video comes out. And so I'm just I'm sort of overwhelmed with just a very large number of things but but yeah, the getting the video out is is the biggest deal and it was good back jury nullification.

Brady 34:38
I liked it.

Grey 34:39
Yeah, yeah, it's well, I have to say it's, it is done successfully. And actually, let me let me open up right now and

Brady 34:49
it was 1.2 million last time I looked at it. Yeah, that's this I want to check so I saw nothing for you. There isn't that's just

Grey 34:54
No, I know. This is what I was gonna say. So I actually as you might not be surprised. I have an objective A measure about the success of the videos that I used to deem whether or not they have been successful. And so I take, take whatever my subscriber number at the time of release is as the starting point. So let's just let's just make the numbers easy. I have about a million subscribers at this point. And if I have a video that gets less than a third of that number, in a week, I would consider that to be just like a total abject failure. If it's more than a third, to sort of equal to the number of subscribers I consider that to be kind of satisfactory. And anything that gets more than the total number of subscribers, that to me is like a very successful video because that means like, people are really sharing it and like it's going to more people than have signed up to get my videos. So that that's Always for me, the real crossing point is like, can the video get more views than subscribers that I have within a week? And I think it's it is, it's been five days and it is just under the number of subscribers that I have now. So I think this one will, will limp across that threshold probably before the week. We close out.

Brady 36:21
I've noticed a couple of a couple of your videos lately actually. The the titles have been a little bit more Tz like a bit more. Is this. Is this a coincidence? Or is this a deliberate deliberate thing we're seeing now they're a bit more like What's this about? You know, like, the law you won't be told and this will hurt and

Grey 36:41
Okay, so it's fine that you picked up on that because? If the answer is that is partly just a coincidence. The the previous video that I did on the no CBOE effect, the opposite opposite of the placebo effect. I have a demonstration in the beginning that just does not work. If you Know what the video is going into it. So I have to not say the name of the thing in the in the title. In that case with this one yeah, it isn't much more Tz title with the law you won't be told. And that is only half a coincidence, but I came across remember exactly where but some study that was talking about click through rates for titles and and they were basically saying that Tz kind of titles have surprisingly large click through rates for what you might expect. And so I thought, Oh, let me just let me just try something that's a little bit different. I don't think I will normally do it. I just happened to have two topics that it worked very well with. And so I didn't mind having that back to back. But I do I am a fan of the straightforward title. Also, because that partly does a lot of introduction for you. Like I don't necessarily have to set up as much. Yeah, if the title just straight up says Here's what we're going to talk about. So it is just a bit of a bit of a coincidence. Although I will say just as a personal experience releasing this video, I think in the second episode or somewhere I mentioned how I probably will not do a medical topic for a while. Because that put me under a lot of stress about sort of being feeling like I really need to be correct. I am going to add a lot of topics that I will not cover anytime soon again, if I can possibly avoid it. And it's for a slightly different reason. But you. So this is entirely a problem with me and also my as make this a theme, talking about analogies. I tend to think of the law as a kind of computer code for human society. Right? We hear all these rules and we formalize these rules about what should happen under what circumstances. And here here's all the exceptions for the consequences. If the laws are the rules didn't work out in a particular way. But No, this is not the case when I sit down and think about it, and it's partly because my, my father is actually a lawyer in the States. And I know through him just how much of the law depends on interpretations of what happens in the courtroom. And it's so much more situational and like, oh, it depends, then you think of the law as being, you know, really clear, or at least I think of it as being that way. Yeah. And so I cannot tell you how many rounds this script went through where I had very definitive statements that kept having to be kind of modified and qualified and toned down and changed, changed a lot. So I will not do a lot topic again, if I can possibly avoid it. Partly because of that, like it's it's difficult to make definitive statements and there's a number of places in the video where I'm talking about situations that might occur and it is like yes, that might happen the majority of the time but that like there's there's always going to be a really long list of exceptions. Nevermind the fact that in America The rules are different in all 50 states for how things are handled. Right so I was trying to talk about them like the most general possible case. But yes, that was dreadful. Do not expect a lot topic anytime soon. People have a bit Have you ever been to a trial? I have never been to a trial in person. Now.

Brady 40:31
You got to tell you what one day we must do an episode. I'll tell you some good stories about trials I've been to. Yeah. Okay. Ice cold cases. good fun. That sounds good. Let's see. Let me let me let me do a clever, clever segue here. Okay, which will which will both follow on from what we're talking about? promote something and lead to something I wanted to discuss.

Grey 40:53
Patrick Patrick trick of segway.

Brady 40:56
Yeah. Speaking of click Beatty titles for videos. The video that I put up today is called the world's greatest autograph book. And it is about something that you and I went to see, of course, a couple of weeks ago. And I want to talk about that day trip. So I got all three together. You and I went to the Royal Society. Yeah, in London, which is somewhere I've been wanting to take you for ages and been pestering you about it. We finally had the chance to go there. And I didn't want you to do the the typical tour we went down into the, into the vaults to see all the treasures and things I deliberately haven't asked you much about your impression of the visit because I wanted to ask you here on the podcast. What did you think? I I thought it was great. It was it was great to visit. So I think first Why don't you because you're better at summarizing this the main right Why don't you give a quick summary for people who don't know like what is the Royal Society the Royal Society This organization that's been around since the 1600s. And it was set up by Charles the second, I think, I think he was the it was one of these, one of these kings, the founder. Yeah. And basically, it was for sort of the scientists of the time when science was in its infancy. It was kind of like their club. They've been going ever since. And basically, they, they elect or decide to make people fellows of this society and join the club. And this has been going on for, you know, 350 years or something like that. And basically, every year and a new intake of 10 or 20 people joins this club of Uber scientists still going today. And it's just got all this history. They've also been involved in, you know, publications, they have their own journal, and they have meetings and they have all these other functions. It's not just a place where they go and have a cup of tea and smoke a pipe but I should came out wrong but anyway, I meant that no more English sense. Anyway. So, success club it's been going for years got all this history, you know, any any scientist who's anyone has been a Fellow of the Royal Society, Isaac Newton you know all those all those guys who can boil back then all the way through to your modern greats you know Einstein was a was a fellow Niels Bohr all the way through to Peter Higgs and people like that today, Watson and Crick. They're all they've all been part of this club that's got this incredible history. The thing about the autographed book is of course, anyone who signs who becomes a fellow they all signed the same book, which has been around since the start. So this is why I call it the world's greatest autograph book because it's got everyone from Isaac Newton through to all your modern day scientists all signing this one book which is incredible. Yes, and of course any king or queen that comes to the throne is automatically the patron The role of society so every famous royal has signed as well. It's this amazing document. But anyway, because of this history, and basically, all the peep scientists involve their interactions are all kept and all their papers and artifacts are kept there in these vaults. It's this it's this real treasure trove of of material as well. And I know you love our stuff and I know you love source documents and things like that you know, you don't you don't want you don't want any secondary sources when you CGP Grey now of course the set so I thought I've got to get gray in there to see all this stuff. Because I know you like hanging out in libraries and stuff as well. Yeah, we finally went there. And I thought it was going to blow your mind. And I don't know if you were just being calm. Or you were walking about it. What did you What did you think you just kind of?

Grey 44:53
Oh, no, I think I really liked it. I thought it was it was really interesting to see. So yeah, when we when we We went on a tour, that we got to go downstairs into the vault blow, and basically see all of the original documents. And it's almost hard to describe because there was such a great variety of things down there. But if you imagine this huge vault, and it would just have the original written letters from all of these famous scientists, to the Royal Society, or from explorers who were writing in about, you know, what they were seeing in new places. And it was almost just very overwhelming in the amount of stuff

Brady 45:38
that is handwritten too, isn't it?

Unknown Speaker 45:39
Yeah, that Yeah, that was that. That was the thing is

Brady 45:42
a letter from Isaac Newton. Oh, what's he got to say from it? Yeah,

Grey 45:45
I did. I did tell my wife we came back I know it was all in this vault. But it was like shockingly casual. Some of the stuff that was just laying around August he was nice enough to give us a tour. I kept saying to him like it makes me nervous. like looking at all the stuff. You know, the the one example, you know was the death mask for Isaac Newton. So the clay I guess it was I'm not sure what the material was that they put over his face after he died, you know to get a print of his face. Oh, it's just like there on the shelf, you know, waiting to be knocked over by you know some clumsy idiot like me who's wandering around and not paying attention.

Brady 46:22
I'll tell you this quick quick, quick interjection here Rupert, who's the other guy that works in the library who you spoke to briefly, but he was the one that came down with this. He normally is the guy that has to handle that mask, and he's done it a few times for me for videos and things like that. And he has a recurring nightmare over time. He drops that mask and it shatters like haunts him. Yeah. And every time I asked him to pick it up, like he he goes a little bit white and tells me you know about my dream, don't you see? So you're not the only one who worries about that?

Grey 46:50
Yes, that was that was that was one of my prevailing feelings there was just like, worry for all of these objects. And we did. We were Talking about how, you know, some of the stuff like like that mask has been digitized. You know, they've done high resolution 3d scans with that. But there's just so many papers and documents that they, they don't have any other copies, except the ones that are in that vault. And it's it. You know, it was very interesting. And, you know, one of the examples that was given is, is like, you don't know necessarily how this stuff is going to be valuable in the future. And the example that was mentioned was talking about the have, you know, all these records of the weather, you know, coming back for hundreds of years, which just sounds like the most boring thing in the whole wide world, right? until, you know, that stuff starts to matter when people are doing, you know, research for the global weather system. And now you actually want that kind of data to be available. And you've got

Brady 47:49
sea levels from Australia from you know, 1800 and,

Grey 47:51
yeah, all of this stuff that just seems just so random. It's so bizarre. Like I can't even remember what was We looked at that book. Maybe you can remind me what what the deal was, but it was it was a book and it had collections of drawings of a volcano, that some member of the Royal Society had paid a monk to go.

Brady 48:13
It was. It was serious. Yes,

Grey 48:15
that's right. It was yes. And one of the members had paid this monk you know, in the days before photography, to go outside every day and sketch What the What Mount Vesuvius looked like what the volcano look like, Yeah, not the

Brady 48:27
plume of smoke out, changing shape and things

Unknown Speaker 48:30
attended to him, as he said, like it was it was like the 1700s version of a webcam. Yeah, right where the webcam takes a picture every 30 minutes, but you can't have a webcam, you just have a monk and you pay him some money and he sends you a sketch every day. And and that was just, you know, collected in this book. So it was it was very, it was really interesting to see.

Brady 48:52
It was funny we went with, with our friend Angela from Google, and I did find it funny when we were down there because I just love all that old stuff and the romance of it, but you and Angela who are both much more kind of digital people, all you could think about was has this been scanned or who should scan this and where Could this be preserved electronically? And whereas I was like, oh, let's touch this or doesn't this smell?

Grey 49:15
That is true. That is true. You had your hands all over everything. And, you know, again, I was surprised to know that it's it is okay to handle these materials just like with your gross monkey hands, like with all their sweat on them and like in dirt, and they're like, Oh, no, don't worry, you know, you pick up these these letters from Robert Hooke. That's totally fine don't worry and their originals we don't have any extra copy but we're going to let you just touch them. And they prefer you to not use gloves which is the secret no one tells you

Brady 49:46
Yeah, cuz because if your gloves you kind of lose that that dexterity and that touch and you're more likely to drop something or rip something.

Grey 49:54
Yeah, you end up being more likely damaged, which is also which is surprising. And another example of how they In TV and movies are not accurate representations of real life. The one thing that was a very almost overwhelming moment was being able to see the kind of original edition of Isaac Newton's Principia Mathematica, you know, the book, the book that is basically the founding stone of much of modern physics. And that was that was really amazing to be able to see and to be able to actually hold in my hands and I made you take a picture of that now I knew you liked that when you asked for a photo. Yeah. And And honestly, it was only because I saw you going around touching absolutely everything and handling stuff and like whoops, almost dropped it, you know, that I had I had the the bravery to ask if I could hold that book. And I could not believe it when they said yes, you can. You can hold it. Because to be clear, is Isaac, Isaac Newton's seminal work and that copy? It wasn't just a first edition. That was his hand written copy in big sections with notes to the printer. Yeah, so it's like that, like, you know, he actually slaved over that book for who knows how long. And that was the copy that got sent off to the printer, you know, to make the first edition. So it's almost like the zeroeth edition of that book is pretty cool. So I have to say that was that was an amazing moment.

Brady 51:28
But no, I just, my hope was that, you know, that you would say, Oh, I could make a few videos here using all this source material. Like, I want to see some CGP Grey videos, you know, using using all these old documents from hundreds of years ago with some new spin on some country or some border or something we'd never realized before.

Grey 51:48
Yeah, I've got to say it's been it's been running in the back of my mind how to take advantage of that. So I have I have some thoughts and i'm i'm also again, like, I I'm really glad to know that that resource is there. It's it's amazing to be able to see the original original stuff. But it's also often it's you just you come across strange surprises when you're dealing with original materials. And so I'm going to mention something slightly, something slightly nerdy here. But when I was in college, I was rereading the Lord of the Rings series. And I thought, let me start the beginning. I'm going to start with the Hobbit. And by the way, people if you haven't read the hobbit yet, spoiler warning coming up here. So you should pause your podcast now.

Brady 52:38
Take my headphones off, because I haven't read the whole book.

Grey 52:40
You haven't read the hobbit? Are you kidding me?

Unknown Speaker 52:42
Yeah, I haven't read The Hobbit. Are you serious? I haven't read Lord of the Rings either.

Brady 52:49
Well, I think less of me.

Grey 52:51
I'm just surprised actually, I don't think it's not that I think less of you. I'm just I'm just honestly surprised that you you have not read it. Do you know the basic story of The Hobbit.

Brady 53:00
Yes, I know the basic story.

Grey 53:01
Okay, so I'm not going to ruin anything with the basic story then So, and you're just gonna have to listen to this anyway. Because Yeah, this is what we're doing now. So I figured I'll start the beginning. I'll read The Hobbit, and I'm reading The Hobbit and I had read it once as a kid, and I'm going through the book and everything is totally normal until the pivotal scene between Bilbo and Gollum. And the pivotal scene in the book where Bilbo he sort of steals the ring from Gollum and you know, makes his way out of the underneath this mountain and escapes. I did say that in the film. I have seen the first film Yeah, so there's like a fight right? There's there Yeah,

Brady 53:41
it's a battle of wits in a way it was.

Grey 53:43
Yeah, well, there's that there's a preceding thing about it, but there's there is a like a skirmish over the ring. Okay. And I'm reading the book, and everything is going along totally fine. And then in the book that I'm reading, I was I was completely blown away because Gollum, just hands over the ring. Right, like no questions asked none of this skirmish nonsense. Just basically straight up gives it to Bilbo and Bilbo walks away. And I was so incredibly confused until I realized that my library actually had a first edition of The Hobbit. And it turns out that this is a change in later editions of The Hobbit. So in, in fiction, this is called a redcon. When the author goes back and changes something in the earlier material, like a director's cut, yeah, to make it match later on with with the following stuff, okay. And so this is this was a case of the first the very first edition of The Hobbit, there is not this, this epic struggle over the ring. And in later editions there is and Tolkien went back and changed it, because he realized that it just didn't make any sense given the books that he was writing in the future. So so like, original copies of things can have very interesting information, but some of the trouble sometimes it's like Knowing that this even exists, like I would never have discovered this if it just wasn't just for a total, just a total accident. And so yeah, source original materials are just just amazing. But as as always with libraries like knowing where to look is half the battle

Brady 55:15
was the valuable that book if it was some first edition sitting in your local library,

Grey 55:20
it's one of the things I've wondered about later on. Like, did they not realize that this was the first edition because I'm, I'm a member of a library that has a first edition of The Hobbit here. And that that's like kept under lock and key. You know, you can't you can't directly actually,

Brady 55:33
you should have borrowed that bad boy and not returned it and take a hit on the phone.

Grey 55:37
If I should have if I was looking through. I think I was really just more confused about the inconsistencies in the story. De railing my whole brain. Why doesn't this match up with what I expected to be? Yeah. But yeah, so I will definitely take advantage of them. When I come across something where I want, I want to be able to see the original, original, something like that. I have a couple things in mind. I don't want to miss anything in particular man. It was an IT WAS A I have to say, it was a it was a great trip. And I'm really glad that, that you were able to

Brady 56:06
bring me down there and to sort of get access to this because your whole person, I should say, by the way, as well, like, you know, by way of thanks to the library guys are our society, anyone can go there. Anyone can go there and look at any materials. I mean, not anyone can go down to the vote, but anything from the vote can be brought up to you. So if you go there and and, you know, join up and go through the process, no matter you just like, you know, prove that you're a real person and not some cowboy. And you want to look at some old handwritten document from Isaac Newton, they'll bring it up to you though, shout out to that. They're all they want. They want people to go there and use this resource. You know, they want this stuff out there. So if, if you're ever in London, or you're from London, and you want to go see this stuff, it's not some exclusive club, anyone can go and have a look.

Grey 56:54
Yeah, and the library is really worth seeing as well. It's just it's a it's a beautiful room, where they'll bring You author materials. So yeah, it is definitely worth seeing. Cool

Brady 57:06
Do you know what we were going to talk about some stuff today we prepared a topic. Are we going to do it? We think a lot nearly an hour.

Grey 57:15
I think that I'm totally up for doing something that is an actual topic, but it depends entirely on you.

Brady 57:20
Let's do it man. Let's do I mean the first couple of podcasts have been like an hour long but there's no rules about this is there

Grey 57:27
now this is the internet stuff can be as long or as short as you want it to be. There's absolutely no limits on this

Brady 57:33
and some of the podcasts you've been putting me on tape because I wasn't as much of a podcast junkie as you so I've just been listening to once you tell me to listen to they typically go for like two hours.

Grey 57:44
Yeah, some of them are very long and my personal favorite but sadly defunct now podcast hypercritical was legendary for co it like they'd have shows I'm pretty sure they had shows the top three hours in because genzler accused of the star of that show just had interesting things to say and could say them forever. Like you can

Brady 58:05
tell you why I tell you what we have to in a future episode, do a podcast about podcast because there's a few things I want to discuss with you, especially about the podcast. You've put me on too, because I've been listening to them a lot. And I've got lots of questions and comments, and I want to I want to do more about it. But that's not for today, is it?

Grey 58:22
No, that's not that's not exactly for it. today.

Brady 58:24
We will we're going to talk about feedback. Because I think I think the rough thinking was because we've been getting so much feedback in the last week. Yeah, podcast would be a good chance to to talk about feedback in general.

Grey 58:38
Yeah, I think I suspect this is going to be a relatively short topic, which is why I don't mind doing it now. But I was I was just thinking about it earlier. And I think they're my note says feedback on feedback. And I think that there's there's some some things to be said here. And so I guess I mean, I guess just to start it off, what I was Thinking about is how, you know, because we're in this, we're in this amazing world with the internet, you know, and people can put stuff out there. And anybody can comment on it if they want, you know, like anybody can make a YouTube video tomorrow and upload it right, and you can get some comments. And I think it's, it's a very weird situation to have feedback from people that you don't know. And how, as the creator of something to actually interpret that feedback. I think there's a lot of weirdness that happens here. I don't know. I mean, cuz I'm kind of, I don't actually know. I mean, like, do you look at the YouTube comments for your own videos very much. I mean, you're so busy making videos, you probably don't have time to actually, you

Brady 59:51
know, especially especially on a new video. So for the first I'll talk about this a bit more in a minute. When when I sort of talked to you a bit about some of some of things I've been doing lately, but, but in general terms, I would say I look at the viewer comments on a YouTube video for the first day or two days, and then that starts to subside then because because I do a video almost every day or every two days, a new video kind of usurps it and that becomes so the focus of my attention. And you know, now I have a couple of thousand videos, I don't go back and read all the feedback on all of them. Yeah. But for the first day or two, and that's when you're getting the most comments. Anyway. I am quiet. I am very much across what's being said for better or worse.

Unknown Speaker 1:00:41
And what about you?

Grey 1:00:44
Yeah, well,

Brady 1:00:45
I know obviously, you have comments and your video and then you also run your, your Reddit subreddit. Yeah, you'd like the feedback to happen.

Grey 1:00:53
Yeah, that's exactly it at this point. At this stage, I don't pay any attention to the comments on YouTube. Some of the changes that they made I don't really like that format.

Brady 1:01:02
To what you won't even look at it at all. Okay, just you won't even look.

Grey 1:01:05
Yeah, I mean, I you know, we're talking now in 2014. And a couple months ago, YouTube changed the the way their comment system works. Yes, they did. And I was never a huge fan of the comment system before. And I wouldn't necessarily say that this this, this new system is worse. But for me for various reasons, I just find it not really workable. And so

Brady 1:01:35
I would say it's worse but yeah,

Grey 1:01:37
yeah, yeah, we will have a full conversation about this at some point. But But for now, I really I don't really look at the YouTube comments at all. And I look entirely at the Reddit comments and that's, that's what I'm interested in. And why

Brady 1:01:53
why do you look at the comments what what do you what do you looking for in them?

Grey 1:01:57
Well, what's what's interesting to me. So I have a again on Reddit, I have a section where I can post the videos and people can discuss them. But I'm very interested also on Reddit when the video gets posted in other sections, so people who don't necessarily subscribe to me on youtube who who've never seen one of my videos before, they will comment on a video. And that can be interesting to read and see like someone who's not familiar with my video style. Yeah, you know, what, what might they say? But what I was one of the reasons why I think the feedback on feedback thing is interesting because it it changes at different scales when someone's starting out when they're making things for the first time on the internet. Anonymous feedback from strangers is kind of an amazing thing. Now, you know, people can just be like total jerks on the internet. There's no denying that but It is. It's difficult in real life to ever get genuine, honest feedback from people you know, in your life. So you know, you have friends and you have families. And because you have social obligations to the people in those groups, it's hard to get 100% honest feedback from from those people in your life. Yeah. Whereas some random person who's seen whatever you've made on the internet, and who has no connection to you, and isn't even using a real name, there's no reason for them to hold back. You know, they, they have permission to just be really straightforward and their feedback and yeah, that can be very, very valuable. And I think if you're paying attention to that kind of feedback in the right sort of way, especially in the beginning, you can really try to to direct whatever it is you're making in a more positive way,

Brady 1:04:05
how much should you allow yourself to be guided by feedback? I mean, I, it's the politically correct thing to say is, I look at the feedback and my audience is really important. And I want to make what they want, and I will shape and tailor what I do to them. And, you know, I take all their opinions on board because they're really valuable to me. And to an extent, that is true, and only a full will completely ignore feedback on what the audience is saying, because we do this for the audience. You know, it's a relationship with the audience. But at the same time, you've got to kind of Believe in yourself as well and and your vision otherwise you just become some diluted, you know, designed by committee. Piece of generic Rubbish. Yeah. And and the example I often use in this respect is in the number five videos I make, which are these mathematics videos, often we need to write on something. And for various reasons, which I've outlined in the blog in great detail, and it was very much thought out, I have people write on these pieces of brown paper with a marker. Now, with the first three or four, number five videos went up, they they had a quite a large audience from the start, because I already had an audience from other channels. So I was getting a lot of feedback right from the start. And overwhelmingly, like you wouldn't believe all the feedback was negative about the brown paper. Really, you've got to get rid of it. It's rubbish. like and trust me that was what all the comments were about, and it was very strong, but I really believed in using this brown paper.

Grey 1:05:56
I guess it's such a trademark of yours now and not imagine the number five videos without Exactly.

Brady 1:06:00
And I felt really strongly about it for various reasons that it was a good idea and it would work. And there are still people that don't like it. But they're very much in the minority now, and I rarely hear anything about it. But there are lots of people who really, really love it. They're really into it. And they, they've really adopted it. And that was an example of something where if I was going to go with the feedback and be shaped by it, I would have ditched that brown paper very quickly. Definitely. But I was like,

Unknown Speaker 1:06:28
No, I think

Brady 1:06:30
I think I'm right here. And I think if you are starting out and you get shaped by feedback too easily, you lose your distinctiveness. And, you know, I think I think you've got it, you can look at it and take what you want from it. But you can't listen to it too much. You got to be your own man or woman.

Grey 1:06:51
Yeah. And yeah, I wouldn't I wouldn't be arguing for follow the feedback entirely. But I agree with you that you're kind of foolish to not pay attention to it, particularly in the beginning. But I think that brown paper one is a good example. Because there there are things that you have to consider as a creator, that might not be obvious to the people watching something. Yeah, and I don't know if this was your thought process, but I might guess that you wanted something that was distinct for a visual look, or you wanted something that you're dealing with an abstract channel so that people were writing on a thing, and you could see them doing it. I mean, was that some part of the that's it that that's, I mean, there are probably six or seven reasons, but that is a strong one. I want it to be sort of, yeah, something tactile and physical. Want topics that are here? Yeah. So they're nice. Yeah, there's definitely considerations that you have to have as the maker of the thing that are not obvious to the audience. But I think for, you know, for example, in some of my earlier views, videos there were a lot of comments about how the audio quality was just terrible and there is no denying that like that that was entirely true. And it's funny because it was not something I was aware of when I made the first couple videos the very first one was done just by talking straight into the laptop microphone which I just unbelievable to me today. But the the comments about the audio quality was something that made me realize like, Oh, I need to put some time and thought into this if I'm going to make more of these. And so I like I just bought a cheap USB microphone and already that makes it so much better. You know, now I have a bit more professional gear. But so I think like feedback for rough edges like that can be very useful or, yeah, feedback on on people's delivery. So, you know, if you're doing something like we're doing and you're making an explanation video, you want to see how many people seem confused by This in the comments, and that that's an indication that maybe this isn't this isn't going very well. But I think on the flip side of it as well, what's really useful when you're starting out is like positive comments. Do people actually leave comments who seemed to like the thing that you're doing? And if you're getting just no positive feedback at all like that, that's a that's a kind of feedback as well. Like you need to adjust what you're making for the world. And or do something in a very different way to try to catch people's attention. But what I think is, this is a this is a comment that was made to be by Derek of veritasium. Who might be listening right now. Hi, Derek. If you are listening, hey, Derek.

Brady 1:09:51
I hope you I hope, what t shirt are you wearing? Derek? Are you wearing those tight jeans? Derek?

Grey 1:09:55
He probably is wearing his tight jeans. Yeah. For those of those of you who haven't seen that He's very pretty. He's definitely the prettiest of the educational youtubers i think

Brady 1:10:06
but he always wears like and he always wears the T shirt of your channel when he meets you. Which is a class act but I met him for like a coffee and like he turned out wearing a periodic videos, that is very prophetic. And then like I'm sure when he makes you turn up nice CGP Grey shirt. And that's, that's that's attention to detail. You know,

Unknown Speaker 1:10:24
it is anyway, that's why he's a successful guy. Exactly.

Grey 1:10:30
Yeah, what it was, is that he he made a comment. We were talking once about how the value of positive feedback goes to zero. As you are more and more successful. Yeah. And I don't know if you think that's the case, but he said that and it was like, man, I could not agree with him more strongly when he mentioned that to me.

Brady 1:10:50
Yeah, I mean, it doesn't mean I want no one you know, everyone to stop leaving positive feedback. But I mean, yeah, I mean, you look at you kind of preaching to the choir, right. You After a while in terms of, you know, people watching or watching because they like what you're doing.

Grey 1:11:06
Yeah. And it's it's a, it's very interesting it just just as a little bit of a phenomenon that you have, if you get lots and lots and lots of positive comments, it sounds it does sound weird, but after a while, if you if you have tons of them, they're not necessarily valuable, right? these are these are, like in aggregate, right? individually they are but like, what can you draw from that? It's very hard to say like, there's not necessarily anything actionable in that, right? Whereas negative comments may still contain information for something that you can change or that you can improve upon. And also, the thing is that, you know, negative comments are the ones that just really stick with you sometimes, you know, especially if there is a kernel of truth, a kernel of truth to them.

Brady 1:11:56
course that's that's the that's the thing, isn't it?

Grey 1:11:59
Yeah. There was, uh, I'll see if I can find it for the description. But there was a little web comic that I saw once where it showed like a guy at work. And he's surrounded by all these little speech bubbles of people saying really nice things about him. There's 20 nice things, and there's one negative thing. And then the second panel is him after work at dinnertime. And the one negative comment is still crystal clear, but all the positive ones have sort of faded away of slightly. And then the final panel is him, you know, it's at nighttime and you can't get to sleep. And the only thing that remains is that negative comments, and all the positive ones have sort of disappeared. And I think that that's partly like what is it was engaged in a statement like positive feedback turns to zero. That like the negative stuff really sticks with you, especially if it if it has some kernel of truth. And you know, that that can be it can be very, very hard to deal with. Sometimes

Brady 1:12:49
Have you ever had like a negative comment that still sticks with you now?

Grey 1:12:55
People Yeah, I mean, people can people can leave comments that really do kind of stick with you.

Brady 1:13:03
But what what would I want to ask you to personally question I also don't want to encourage people to go and give you a hard time. But yeah, what sort of area of criticism will stick with you more than others? Will it be, you know, I don't like the sound of your voice or your argument is poor or you sound like you must be very ugly. But what are the ones that stick with you?

Grey 1:13:29
I think I think there's a kind of common that I do see on on videos, especially when I'm aware like if it's on a section on Reddit, for example, where people don't know who I am that I would say the one that I'm okay talking about that I see the most is people will say that I sound really condescending in the videos. And that that always gets me because like, why am I like, my whole point is to not be condescending, like I'm I'm sort of assuming that the person watching this video might not know very much about this topic. And I want to, I want to try to be friendly about that. And that is something that I do think about when I'm recording the actual audio for the video is to try to get takes where I'm not. I'm not like being an authority talking down to person. Especially because very often, like, I knew almost nothing about this topic five weeks earlier. And so like I'm by no means an authority. And I've just done a whole bunch of research, but I'm very sensitive to coming off as condescending to people who might not have watched a whole bunch of my videos. So that's a kind of negative comment that I do see repeatedly that I'm aware of and kind of sticks with me

Brady 1:14:47
and does affect how I how I work a little bit. I mean, you're always going to have that problem because if you tell people a lot of clever information that they didn't know before Very, very quickly, which is what you do. It makes you appear very intelligent and knowledgeable. And that immediately puts you in a position where you where people will feel that you're being condescending, you're not. And I know you get around it in all those other ways, but you're always gonna, you're always going to struggle with that. Yeah, it's like, like, if someone goes on a quiz show and they happen to know all the answers, like, Well, okay, they know all the answers and people gonna think oh, aren't they know and feel really negatively towards them? I mean, yeah, sorry. I just happen to know the answers. And I've set them quickly.

Grey 1:15:35
Yeah. But But I, but that's, I totally agree with that. But it is something that I'm very sensitive towards about. Yeah, thinking of ways to minimize that in the videos in various ways. Yeah. But what I was gonna say is just like I have a couple of other little, little thoughts here and there's Gina who's a Frank is

Brady 1:15:59
Yeah, I met I met today Frank VidCon. Oh, did you

Grey 1:16:05
say Frank for those who may not be aware is sort of the, the father of the modern internet vlog. You know the Have you seen a video where there's a person's face talking at a camera very quickly and they do jump cuts. Like say Frank was the guy who started that back in the day. He's the green brother.

Brady 1:16:23
He's a real hero of the green brothers.

Grey 1:16:24
Yeah, yeah, he used to do this amazing thing called the show, which is so old now in internet terms, but it was just amazing. And then he disappeared mysteriously for a number of years and has recently come back on YouTube. But he did a video which I'll try to find for the description where he was talking about comments on videos on YouTube. And he made an excellent point, which I thought was it was interesting, which is that of course the only people who comment are the people who have a strong reaction to the video or whatever it is you've made in one way or another, right people who really liked it, or really hated it. But pretty much by definition, the people who watch the video and we're kind of met, they're probably not going to leave a comment. Yeah. And so I had, I had not really thought about that. But it's an interesting point that feedback on anything that you put on the internet is, is going to be intrinsically biased in two completely opposing directions. Yeah, you know, people who love it and people who hate it. And I think this is you can also see this just in in any kind of website that has five star rankings where almost all the reviews are either five stars or their one star. And there's almost no three star review. Yeah. Because who is the person leaving the three star review? Yeah, and I, like, kind of liked it.

Brady 1:17:58
change your life for the better Yeah, broke the day you got it. You wanna?

Grey 1:18:02
That's exactly it. It's like, Oh, I kind of liked it. But I think I'll spend 20 minutes writing a review this thing that's kind of like whatever, like nobody does that does that nobody?

Brady 1:18:12
So I think that's just interesting to keep in mind whenever you're looking over feedback of anything that you I mean, that's interesting you bring that up. I mean, I guess there is there is one respect where I, I have to, I hadn't thought of this before, actually. But there is a respect in which I have to follow feedback or interestingly, and you analyze it more than you. And that is the respect in which most of my videos have a third party in them. Who is often someone maybe not used to the kind of exposure you get on these YouTube videos. Yes. And of course, they read the feedback. And I I then have to counsel them in some way. Yes. So that that whole thing about, you know, you're the silent majority It is something I'm always forced to bring up with people when they've read two or three of those comments that are very harsh and will stay in that speech bubble for days. I have to tell them, you know, a million people have watched this video. You know, some of them didn't like it. But yeah, that's that's like 20 people out of a million. And there's a whole bunch that did like it and so but in general, that's, that is the biggest problem of comments for me is that is those third parties who are often who are always almost volunteers. And not the sort of people that put themselves out there for criticism. They're doing me a favor. They're doing the viewers a favor, by lending their expertise and, and knowledge. And suddenly they're exposed to this this harsh world. And you know, I can accept, I can accept that myself. If someone wants to say that I'm a terrible filmmaker or a bad person or have a big nose. So I'm rubbish. I have to accept that I know I've chosen. I've chosen this world, but these other people, I don't think they've chosen it to the same degree. And I feel quite protective of them. Yeah. And it's, it has just very recently reached a tipping point for me, where I'm no, I'm no longer willing to accept it. And particularly with the new comment system and a few other things that have been going on, like it's just become

this become very vicious towards these volunteers. And, you know, so, you know, I can accept if someone says, I disagree with your argument, or I think you made a factual mistake or if they start saying things that are personally offensive or racist, or, you know, or sexual against these volunteers, and I can't police it, you know, I can't police it all because there are so many videos I've just had enough. And so just recently I've I'm experimenting with having the comments to approval, which is a huge rod for my back. I remember when I met with the guys that did the Sesame Street YouTube videos, they do the same thing. Because obviously, lots of kids are on those sites and I'm very aware that schools use my videos to the I don't want the top comment to be some racist attack against the person who's in the video. So I've been experimenting with approving them, and it takes me loads of time. And I'm not particularly sensors in terms of you know, if someone doesn't like the video, like, I'll just take I'll prove that. If they liked the video, I'll check it if they but if they being abusive, you know, I can't have it anymore. Because it also some of these people in the videos, you know, I'm reading it and they've become scared to read the comments. Yeah, because of you know, they're saying Now I won't even look at the comments now it's too hurtful. And I don't want that to happen. I want them to go into the comments so they can enjoy the praise, or they can look at the constructive criticism and think about it. And, you know, I've always really prided the comments section under my videos as a place where debate goes on, you know, it can be it can be vigorous debate, but, you know, a healthy place, and I like the people in the videos to go in there too. And at least read it. Some of them actually engage with it and write comments too, but at least read it and, and be part of it. So those people writing the comments don't feel like they're talking to the void. But it got to a point where that just wasn't feasible anymore. So I've had to, I've gone down this approval route as an experiment for now. And I've never been able to go to the people in my videos and say, Don't worry, don't worry, don't be scared of going into the comments anymore. If someone writes something that is hurt rific I'll try to you know, I'll try to stop. Yes. And if some and, you know, I know we live in a world where free speech is greatly valued, and I greatly value free speech as well, but they can go and do their free speech somewhere else free, not on a video and page that I've created, you know? Yeah. And I'm giving the administration rights that page for various reasons. And you know, if they want to, if they want to have their free speech and say something vicious and horrible about some poor academic who's volunteered their time, go and do it on your own page. Don't don't don't ride the audience that have come to see a video that we've created.

Grey 1:23:40
Yeah, I mean, I would guess, you know, this is this is a function of audience size. Yes. Right. And so obviously, like as as your videos have gotten more popular, and you have more people subscribed, you can do nothing but expect the average comment quality to go down. It's like It's like a mathematical function like you're almost guaranteed that that is going to be the case that as you widen the pool the discussion quality drops. And you know, when like you say when you bring in some third party who is not necessarily used to that it can be a very upsetting experience and I do think that you know, at least for for YouTube, you know, don't read the comments is not is not is not bad advice and it's partly because the barrier to commenting is much lower you know, so it is it is easier and yeah, it just you're I don't know about you approving the comments because my my only guess is that is your as your channel continues to grow. That fundamental underlying math is not going to be any different. Yeah, right. And like your maybe it's just handleable now, but anyway, It's not it's not I

Brady 1:25:01
mean, okay, I need to work on some different solutions. And there are Yeah, there are filters and things you can put in place, but it's just a temporary experiment while I figure out how to protect these people I care about.

Grey 1:25:12
And and the thing, the thing that is the tricky thing with feedback was to get his advice for anybody who makes up on the internet. This is this is advice, like, probably the best advice that I can give about negative feedback, and particularly aggressively negative feedback, but also sometimes the most hard to hard to follow through with it is just do not engage, right you have you have nothing to gain from engaging with extremely negative commenters. But it is also just so, so hard not to do. And I yeah, I don't want to go into any details about what you said like I ran into A very negative commenter on Reddit recently who doesn't like me for personal reasons, you know, doesn't know me but like, you know just hates me. And like, Man, you just want to respond but I literally had to sit there and think like do not engage do not engaged right you have nothing to gain from this except losing your time. But it is it is very frustrating and and i i can see sometimes on the internet that like little little conversations unfold where people will wonder like, oh, why hasn't this prominent person responded about this particular this particular attack on them? And it's like, because the correct answer is do not engage like you just you can't win fighting never start a land war in Asia. Yeah, yeah, that's exactly yeah,

Brady 1:26:47
that's what I say about it.

Grey 1:26:48
Yeah, yeah. And and like negative and or crazy comments are like a land war in Asia right like, oh, you're not you're not gonna win on this one. Right. There's there's there's no way There's no way to come out.

Brady 1:27:01
Yeah, I mean, there are there are lots of reasons to not engage like. One is, you know, it just validates someone who you shouldn't really be validating. Yeah. And but also, like, there's there a stranger. And they, there are lots of people in your life who are important, who should get your time or your light bulbs or whatever you want to give them. But, and there are people who you shouldn't. And they're also they don't know, they don't know you. They don't know anything about you. And you've just got to remember, they're strangers. That's what I always get told. So, whether they're saying whether they're saying you're great and you make the best videos in the world, or they're saying you're terrible, and you're rubbish, and they hate your guts, both of those people they don't know and are not that great. You're not you're not as good as they say, and you're not bad. It's bad as they say, and you just gotta just keep doing What you doing doing what you enjoy?

Grey 1:28:01
Yeah, yeah, both of those both of those. Both those comments are definitely true that you are not as awesome or as terrible as people say. But it is it is so hard not to read, read the comments sometimes but you know, I do I do value feedback and hearing what people have to say, yes, you know, sort of in particular circumstances and that's why I use Reddit so heavily. For me that works really well and it's a really to see

Brady 1:28:29
is a really good thing about a job that we get. We get the level of feedback we do, like a lot of people do jobs and no one ever tells them anything about whether they like what they're doing or don't like what they're doing. And we are lucky and we'll sit here winching because it comes with a It comes with a sting in the tail. But overall, overall, I quite like it. I will say one other thing about comments though that just popped into my head. Yeah, drives me crazy. Tell me Brady and that that is inevitably Things will come up in a video like, say, a mistake or something that kind of needs, something that needs addressing or something that someone's noticed. And you There is nothing you could do to stop people commenting on that. If, if you like, clarify something with an annotation, will you write something in the description, or you write a bunch of comments in the comment section yourself to say, look, I realized that this isn't clear or something, you will still have hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people pointed out as if no one else has pointed it out. Like they just saying it and written it. And it does make me wonder what percentage of people who write comments, even glance at the video description, or the other people's comments before they write something? It might even be a mistake. It might be what is the piece of music you used, that you wrote a comment about and everyone else will say Oh, he's used this piece of music and you put it when you do everything you You can tell that people, it could be in the video burned into the video in big bold letters. And you still have hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people writing. What was the music? Or do you realize this is wrong or something?

Grey 1:30:12
You're wondering who these people are, but I know that I have done this myself. I have definitely sometimes left a comment on something. Only seconds later to see that it was in the description or something. I just feel like a total idiot.

Brady 1:30:26
I would never I would never. I probably do it all the time. But I would be reluctant to write a comment and put something into writing until I've checked.

Grey 1:30:34
Yeah, that it's not available. Maybe, maybe maybe you're not as reactionary as the internet. Right. Let the keyboard fly like Hey, buddy, what's this? Like? All right. You told me three seconds later. Okay. I was just looking as a as a final thing here. Right. I'm looking at our our feedback on our own podcast and our star ratings follow exactly. What I was saying before Yeah, so we have at this point 295 five star ratings.

Brady 1:31:07
Wow, that sounds impressive.

Grey 1:31:09
It does sound I don't have any sense of how now I you know, I like that I have no idea what that but that's an opportunity five five star ratings. And then we have three one star and even just looking at that, right, it's like we have no three star ratings and five four star ratings

Brady 1:31:29
but do you know the only ones I want to read or what the three star ones? That's what I want to read. I want to know what they said.

Grey 1:31:37
That is exactly yeah, right. Like I'm looking at this and like your mind you cannot help it but like my mind is totally drawn immediately to those three one star ratings like what did that person have to say? And

Brady 1:31:53
it's like when you're booking a holiday like it's some amazing resort in the Maldives and it has 10,005 star reviews and One star review. Yeah. And you read the one star review. And they say the service was terrible, terrible. And there were rats. And you're like, Well, I'm not going there. There's no way I'm going to that resort. Thousands of people who were yeah said it was the most wonderful place they've ever been.

Grey 1:32:13
Oh, I almost forgot. I almost got I just want to mention this before we before we sign off. This is the thing that the thing that got me started about this whole topic, I forget until the absolute very end. But going back to what you were saying the beginning how you have to trust your own judgment about something. I was looking at the comments for this podcast, and this happened to be on YouTube. So I was curious to see what everybody had to say. And the favorite thing that I came across was two comments, one that was right after another. And so it's this is on on YouTube, and the first one is from a guy called toxis. And he complains his or I should say his suggestion is that he doesn't like the podcast because we don't let the conversation flow naturally. And you know, we're still strictly to our theme, what's his feedback? He doesn't like it. Because we're student to strictly sticking to the theme. Well, he would love today's episode. Yeah. Immediately after, there's a user called unpronounceable. And he has the exact reverse feedback, right? He doesn't like it, because we're just talking about whatever. And you should really have some kind of centralizing theme, right to focus the discussion. And this is, this is the kind of thing that can just drive you crazy on the internet is, is but I love it. I love it that they're literally one right after the other feedback going in just completely opposite direction. I'm a little screengrabs. When that happens,

Brady 1:33:39
I collect some comments. I didn't discuss this actually, but I collect some comments for various reasons. One of the main reasons is I often go and give talks to people about YouTube and having a having a nice collection of comments could embed is, you know, quite good for PowerPoint presentations. But whenever I see two side by side like that, I like to Keep them as little like little twin primes or something. They're nice little little treasures. When two people say exact opposite things back to back, you'll find that happens a lot when I do the polarizing videos like something different, like a song or something like that. Yeah, you get this is the best video I've ever seen on the internet. Followed by this is the worst piece of trash.

Grey 1:34:21
You're saying. Yeah, should die. Yeah, those, those pairs are just great. And so we have we have one of those for this one. Excellent. It is. It is both too structured, and not structured enough. Which is why you have to you have to make decisions about what do we how do we fix that? What do we do now? Well, well, here's what I'm going to do right now some and this is also this is also kind of plan I have left us this to last for a very reason. Right? So we have a bunch of reviews from different countries around the world. And so here's the list of places where we have gotten reviews. It's Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Mexico, the Netherlands. Norway, Poland, Saudi Arabia, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States. So what I would like, is to get more different countries. I this is This to me is like, Pokemon, right? Like you got to catch them all. I would love to eventually, at some point, have a review from every one of the countries. Yeah, where this podcast can be heard. So if you're hearing if you're hearing the sound of my voice right now, and if you like this podcast, which if you have listened this long, you must like this podcast. And if you are listening this long and you don't like this podcast, I'm very worried. But I'm going to assume anybody who has listened this long, by definition has to be enjoying this podcast. And you are from one of the places that I have not mentioned, I would really like you to go leave a review in iTunes,

Brady 1:35:52
even if it's a one star.

Grey 1:35:55
I'm assuming that people who have listened this long are going to leave positive reviews

Brady 1:36:00
I should have put a review in when I was in Vietnam.

Unknown Speaker 1:36:04
You should have Yes, I guess I'm not sure how that works. That's okay. Okay. But anyway, just out there.

Brady 1:36:09
Great has spoken.

Grey 1:36:11
So I want to see, I want to see if we can collect all and I can't. Unfortunately, I can't just tally up how many countries there are. And of course, my own video on the number of countries means it's ambiguous anyway. But there are a bunch of places. So if you can hear my voice and you were not, or you are in a place that was not mentioned, I would love it if you left a review. And maybe next time, I'll follow up and see how many additional places we have gotten since that last time. But I'm gonna say I think this has been long enough, my friend,

Brady 1:36:38
I think other I feel like I didn't ask enough questions, and I spoke too much. But I'll, I'll do more questions next time.

Grey 1:36:45
No, it's good. It will be chatting. But you know what people will complain both ways, will get feedback that people loved it and feedback that people didn't like it. And I guess we'll just have to make some judgments about that. See you later. All right, talk again. Bye bye.


==Episode List==
==Episode List==

Revision as of 01:29, 11 May 2022

"Feedback on Feedback"
Hello Internet episode
{{#widget:YouTube|id=ieHQCXiXREM|height=188|width=336}}
Episode 4 on the podcast YouTube channel
Episode no.4
Presented by
Original release dateFebruary 18, 2014 (2014-02-18)
Running time1:36:59
SponsorsAudible
Episode chronology
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List of Hello Internet episodes

"H.I. #4: Feedback on Feedback" is the fourth episode of Hello Internet, released on February 18, 2014.[1]

Official Description

Grey & Brady talk about the show going live and the nature of feedback.

Show Notes

Other

Fan Art
Flowchart
Summary
Transcript

Brady: I- well I was going to amaze you and say that I have prepared notes,-

Grey: Mm-hmm?

Brady: But it's more a case of I started to prepare notes.

[HI theme]

Brady: So, since we last spoke,-

Grey: Mm-hmm.

Brady: -much has happened.

Grey: Yes!

Brady: Much has happened, and I know we traditionally start with what I always accidently call feedback, but you call follow up-

Grey: Mm-hmm.

Brady: -and this is going to be a very exciting follow up,-

Grey: Oh yes?

Brady: -because the podcast is now like, public and people have to listened to it.

Grey: Yes, it is.

Brady: So it's no longer- it's no longer just you correcting yourself and flogging yourself on mistakes you've made,-

Grey: Hmm...

Brady: -you can now flog yourself for mistakes other people have found.

Grey: Mm-hmm, yes, that's true I can- I can get feedback from uh, everybody out there in the world, but yes, it is- it is public, it is out there, uh, which is a big relief to finally have it kind of out in the world instead of just, uh, a little project between the two of us. Um, so what are some of your- what are some of your notes then? Let's start out with your preparations. What have you done?

Brady: Well, I thought we might event- maybe talk about some of the content of the episodes, but first deal with some of the sort of general-

Grey: Mm-hmm.

Brady: -feedback and follow up.

Grey: Mm-hmm.

Brady: And I guess, I mean I guess a lot of it has just been- has- it's been really positive for a start, it's been amazing.

Grey: Mm-hmm.

Brady: I mean it's mainly been um, you know, people saying how wonderful you are, which is fair enough. But uh...

Grey: There are Brady fans! I have seen-

Brady: Yeah, yeah...

Grey: -I have seen in the comments Brady fans.

Brady: Yeah, there are a couple out there, but there isn't- there has been a criticism of me,-

Grey: What is that?

Brady: -and I'd like to- I'd- and I- I think it's something worth addressing,-

Grey: Mm-hmm.

Brady: -or discussing at least.

Grey: Mm-hmm.

Brady: -and this was this feeling that it's basically me asking you a bunch of questions,-

Grey: Mm-hmm.

Brady: -and- and you talking a whole lot.

Grey: Mm-hmm.

Brady: and I thought we should discuss that.

Grey: Oh yeah? What do you have to discuss about that? I- I'm curious from your perspective.

Brady: Well there's a few points,-

Grey: Yeah?

Brady: -the first point is I completely agree,-

Grey: Mm-hmm.

Brady: -it is- it is for the most part me just ask you questions, but I think that's kind of the way it should be to a large extent, and I mean you and I discussed this before we even started, the nature of whether or not, you know, I'm asking you questions and,- and how much I rabbit on myself,-

Grey: Mm-hmm.

Brady: -and- and for the record, I mean, you've always- you've always said you want to hear a lot from me,-

Grey: Mm-hmm.

Brady: -you know, you don't just want me to ask you questions. But, I think it was always going to be that way, this plays to our strengths. This is- this is the way we are isn't it? I mean, you are like a talker, communicator-type-person, I mean you used to be a teacher for goodness sake.

Grey: Yeah.

Brady: And I am a question-asker, you know,-

Grey: And-

Brady: -and I'm- I'm a journalist by training, so, you put two of us in a room, one guy he has lots of things to say, and knowledge, and likes to communicate it, and another guy he likes to, like, ask questions and find things out from people,

Grey: Mm-hmm.

Brady: -of course it's going to- it's going to happen now isn't it?

Grey: Yeah, I- I think you're- you're partly right, and part of the reason that- that I wanted to work with you on this is I do think that you are the best interviewer person I have ever come across. Uh, and for the- for those of you who have ever seen Brady's YouTube videos, uh, you know, he's always interviewing somebody else and he does the editing, and he often cuts out his own questioning part, but I have- I have seen it happen live a couple of times, uh, and you really work some magic with the interviews, like, that- that is just your skill. Um, but even when we're just hanging out and just talking not recording, you know, if we're just, you know, having a- a drink together or something, you're still the same way, like that- that is fundamentally your personality is to ask questions. Uh, and it's- it's funny to hear you describe me as a talker because I normally think of myself as a very quiet and reserved person because I spend most of my time not talking, but I am also completely aware that I can- I can get on a roll that is just a little too long, and so I can- I can definitely need someone to help-

Brady: [chuckles]

Grey: -guide me through the parts that are terribly uninteresting, uh...

Brady: I mean, you are- you are a quiet person, and you are, like a reserved guy, that's true, but once you're with your mates and people you're friendly with, I think, you're- you're pretty comfortable talking.

Grey: Yeah, then I blossom.

Brady: I did- I did read one comment in a review though that I did find funny,-

Grey: Yeah?

Brady: -where someone sort of said that they felt like I was here to ground you.

Grey: Yes!

Brady: Which is-

Grey: I saw that- I saw that same one,

Brady: Yeah.

Grey: and I thought "that is exactly right", I think-

Brady: Really? I th- I- I see- I found it funny for another reason 'cause you- you must be one of the most calm, grounded people I know. Whereas I'm, you know, I'm a bit all over the place. So the idea of- the idea of me grounding you actually made me chuckle, whereas your normally sort of the calming influence in the- someone who gives me good advice and things that, so, I like the idea of meeting this calming influence all of a sudden. Anyway- anyway, that- they were the things I had to say about the, uh,-

Grey: Mm-hmm.

Brady: -the questioning. What have you thought? What have you- you've been obviously raging through some of the, you know, early comments and the feedback, has anything sort of, uh, caught your eye?

Grey: Um, yeah, I mean, its- it's been interesting. Uh, it's always really nerve racking when you have a new project, and you want to launch it out into the world and see what people think about it. Uh, and I have to say it has been a much more positive experience than I was expecting. Um, like we were doing really well in the download numbers, and uh, we're just getting a lot of positive comments, and we have a- a ton of positive reviews on iTunes, and if you want to discuss any of these episodes in particular or to leave a- a comment on one of the episodes, uh, for now we're having all of the discussion happening on my subreddit, so if you go to Reddit (R-E-D-D-I-T) dot-com, slash-R (the letter R) slash-C-G-P-Grey, there'll be a discussion thread in there for each of the episodes that we can put up. Um, and if you want to leave feedback, for now that is probably one of the best places to do so, um, I do go through that and- and read all the comments and I'm very interested to see what people- uh, what people have to say about, uh, this little project so far.

Brady 6:06 you're really interactive there, too. I've noticed I think I'm thinking we might talk about sort of comments and feedback later when we get time. But I have noticed on the subreddit, you're very, you're very interactive. It's a, you know, with the, with the people with the community,

Grey 6:19 as well. Yeah, I do. That's one of the reasons why I'm very happy to direct feedback to read it. Because unlike YouTube, and unlike other places, I find it really manageable to try to have conversations with a larger number of people. We do have it scheduled at some point, I want to talk about comments systems in general. So I don't want to discuss that too much right here. But the short version is that it's really easy on Reddit to get a sense of what people are saying and to have feedback and interactions with a bunch of people. So I think it's, I think is the best place to go for now.

Brady 6:53 It's a good community to the Reddit community. Like it's like, you know, you'll get you'll get funny stuff and you'll get love and your Hate but it's always quite smart and quite a quite like the they seem like good people on Reddit in a lot of ways. They seem like less than that my kind of people when I read the comments there, as opposed to comments and a lot of other social media.

Unknown Speaker 7:13 Yeah, it's as, as with absolutely everything it always depends on the section that you're going but I would agree with you as a general statement. Actually, that's true. My Reddit, my I'm quite narrow and my Reddit in the subreddit security So yeah, I should be careful what I say.

Brady 7:28 Let me ask you about something else. The Hello internet logo.

Grey 7:32 You mean the artwork?

Brady 7:34 Yeah, the little, the little, little h I, I know. I know. You sort of sent me a few ideas beforehand and you know, then you kind of just went off and did your thing.

Grey 7:43 I believe what happened was I said to them, you didn't like them and then I used it anyway. I think that is actually the process by which that unfolded.

Brady 7:52 I quite like I quite like the HCI when you've gone with and I'm quiet because I sometimes look at it. You know when you look at something from For a long time, you suddenly see it differently. And I suddenly see the the, the sort of the gray lines going up into the white blocker to make the the high and stuff like that. I'm not too sure about that little border you've got,

Grey 8:12 yeah, the border I might have to change. But I listened to a lot of podcasts, as I mentioned before. And I'm always aware that the artwork seems to be designed for really big screen. But you actually look at it as like a little one centimeter by one centimeter image on your phone. So I just, I was trying to go for something that was very visually immediately recognizable and sort of try to catch people's attention. And I think I think that kind of works. And also, the dark gray color was not really used by very many podcasts. So I thought I'd go with that, for obvious reasons. But absolutely, it did look good. It did look good when we were sort of dominating the iTunes charts for a while and you could just see like, all these little high logos all over the place for the number one podcast in various countries. And I thought that it worked very Well like that I thought it was really eye catching.

Brady 9:02 Well, if anyone wants to put any comments about it, I'd be really interested to read it because at the moment, it's just you and I talking but yeah, I do wonder what people think about it. So feed some some feedback. Sorry, some follow up from Episode Three. Which was the work life balance for light bulbs. Yes. Your feet, your four light bulbs. faces. Yeah. Have you had any reflections on it? Any anyone said anything to you about it?

Grey 9:30 Well, I just wanted I want to start off by saying it was really interesting listening to that when I was editing the podcast for release. listening to it a second time it was really clear how we each think about work in very different ways. Do you think it came across very much to me anyway, but that you are dealing much more with with kind of work in parallel with other things maybe than I am and I was thinking of work is like chunks of time, like very clearly dedicated to one task. And I just I think it's interesting, you know, whenever, whenever we are other YouTube's youtuber guys get together. It's It is interesting how we are all sort of doing the same thing. But each one of us does it in very different ways. And I think you can hear that a little bit in the in the previous episode.

Brady 10:24 But I don't know how much of that might be the extent to which I was being devil's advocate at times. But I think it's interesting that you say that. I don't know what to make of that.

Grey 10:35 The other thing I would just say is that, again, from the Reddit thread, it was it was interesting to see, there's this issue with analogies and like, boy, and I think I said it a little bit at the beginning. But boy, that analogy. There are definitely a lot of problems with that analogy, right.

Brady 10:52 You might have to revisit it. Yeah. refine it.

Grey 10:56 Yeah, I figure you know, well, you know, productivity is probably a thing. We're going to come back to at some point. So I don't really want heads well on it.

Brady 11:02 Yeah, like in Episode 10, it will be doing like the eight light bulbs.

Grey 11:06 Yes. But I just want to say that my, my, my favorite piece of feedback came from Henry, he of the minutephysics fame. And he just sent me a little email. And all it said was, I think you forgot that light bulbs can be wired in parallel, which is like a devastating remark to make to someone who has taught physics. It's like, Yes, I totally understand that this analogy does not work for like a straight up. I actually have a battery and I actually light up some light bulbs.

Brady 11:38 That is a very Henry comment now, isn't it?

Grey 11:41 Yeah. And and the very Only thing is I'm going now just to fully embarrass him as well is later on actually was just today, but it was it was a couple days later, he wrote me a much more in depth email about how the analogy also fails because I should really be thinking about it in terms of electromotive force and the voltage and the resistance in the end. Individual light bulbs. And so he was he was really thinking that went through to its absolute conclusion. Yeah, yeah. But But he was no he was doing the advanced version of what I saw many people in the in the comment thread talking about, which is that there are lots of problems with that analogy, and I will, I will fully, I will fully admit to some of those that I still think my my core idea of the trade off still holds, but like

Brady 12:25 I said, Isn't the latest minutephysics video that just went up in the last day or two about light bulbs?

Grey 12:30 Oh, I don't know. It is embarrassing. I don't know.

Brady 12:33 I think he may have inspired him. I know you've been you've been in a cave and not looking. But I think his latest video is about light bulbs, I have to check that I could be wrong.

Unknown Speaker 12:41 The

Brady 12:42 my favorite comment in relation to you know, and picking the argument or discussing the the merits of the light bulb analogy was someone who pointed out that if you improve aspects of your life, like your health, for example, that actually increases the power of you motor that you do other things with your other light bulbs, which is something we never discussed.

Grey 13:04 Yes, yes. And I saw a couple comments like that. And I, I totally agree with that as well. Right. It was interesting. And and I think there was also something to be said that, that people just have kind of intrinsically more or less powerful motors than each other in this analogy, right. Yeah. And, you know, it's, that's why I always look at you, and you, from my perspective, are just this incredible YouTube work machine. And I think like, boy, I do not have the same kind of wattage output that you seem to have. And, but

Brady 13:36 but that one, if you came and watch me work for a day, you would think differently.

Grey 13:40 I'm not so sure about that. But But I did. I did agree with those comments, right that and I was sort of working towards it at the end of the podcast that at a certain level, you know, you can invest more into one area and then get more out in total. But I do think there are situations in which that's that's very hard to do. But yeah, obviously If your if your health is at its peak, you are able to accomplish much more and all of the other areas. And and the reverse of course is is not true as well. So yeah, did Mrs. CGP Grey listened to the podcast? She has at this point, she has listened to the first two. But she has not yet listened to the third one. See, that's the one I want her

Unknown Speaker 14:21 to listen to.

Grey 14:22 I know, I know. I mentioned her in that one. And I tried to prod her a little bit, but I was like, Oh, you know, I mentioned you in the third one. But she has been she's been very busy with some other projects at this point. So she will listen to it at some point but has not yet at this stage.

Brady 14:35 Well, let me tell you, Mrs. Periodic Videos or number file or whatever I'm supposed to call my much better half. did listen to Episode Three. We went for a drive that by coincidence coincided with the exact length of the podcast. So I said, let me play this. So we played it for the drive. I was at a silence throughout. I think the I think the only time She spoke during it was, at one point, admiring Mrs. Graves, patients put a patient with us. But she, I think that was during the time when you were talking about how you completely blank her for three days when you're putting a video out. has just happened. Yeah, yeah. Yes. But and then and then amazingly, it just finishes we got to the car park where we were going to which was nice timing. And so we pulled up and I sort of turned to her and said, What do you think? What do you think about that? The main thing that came across was that she she would quite like to sit down with you and discuss a few of the items in a positive way. But you know, because she's into all that stuff. You're into, like workflows and sleep patterns and things like that. But fundamentally, I think she she disagreed with your thesis. And her best argument, which she didn't really make, but she didn't need to make against your argument was her herself. She's She's just sort of sitting And, and we're talking here about how you can't do all four things at once, right? And then I kind of I look at her and she works really hard in a really demanding job. And she's like me, you know, she's got this amazing job. And she gives so much that she always every day makes time for her friends and rings them and talks to them. She's a brilliant family person and talks to her mom and dad all the time and takes great care of me. She's incredibly healthy and goes to the gym all the time and a personal trainer every week, and she watches what she eats and she always looks amazing. And she does all these things like to the maximum and then she's just been spending an hour listening to you and I grumble about her or I can't eat healthy and do my job. And I think I think she embodiment of the argument against us. So

Grey 16:57 Mistake number five is the counter argument. Yeah, maybe I will just try to defend myself. I will go back to the some people's engines are more powerful than others.

Brady 17:07 Yeah, you and I just puttering along on these on these out bomb of a car and she's a Rolls Royce

Grey 17:12 This is that i think i think that might be the conclusion that we need to come to is that Mrs. Number file has a very powerful motor compared to the two of us. So that might that might very well be the case.

Brady 17:24 I think I think she does want to sit down and talk through a few points. So we'll, we'll arrange that sometime.

Grey 17:29 Oh, good. Okay.

Brady 17:30 I tell you what else bothered me was in Episode Three, where you did that. you clarify this whole infringement versus theft thing when it comes to copyright. I'm still that still bothers me a bit to that still bothers you. I just think you're being so like you're being a bit overly cautious. Who it's not 50 it's

Grey 17:49 it's exiting. I could not disagree with you more at this point. I I fully understand that I can be overly pedantic about things like this, but I am going to very strongly disagree with you there.

Brady 17:58 So if someone comes into my house takes my TV and, and watches a few programs on it and then puts it back later that day. Have they infringed on my TV? Or have they stolen it?

Grey 18:11 Wait, wait, what the person breaks into your? Well, first of all, they broken and entered into your house.

Brady 18:17 But if they didn't take any money or break anything, have they just infringed into my house?

Grey 18:21 I don't think that's an appropriate analogy. I don't think this lines up at all. I think you're trying to stack the deck in your favor with that one, buddy. Well, well,

Brady 18:30 you've already you've already said that you're not good with the analogy. So anyway, I just listened back to it and I think Gangwon this stealing from you? They're stealing the thieves.

Unknown Speaker 18:42 I just I disagree. I think I think infringement is a word that that the internet culture needs to needs to make happen. As a common, understood word like theft is a common understood word.

Brady 18:56 I think infringing is like you Using the word infringing is like dressing something bad up to make it sound not as bad. Why can't we give it a more emotive word? Why do we in because infringing is just like, it's such like a delicate thing? Like, you know, you know, Germany didn't infringe on Poland did it? Like, you know, like, you don't you don't know.

Grey 19:18 But that is also another comparable analogy.

Brady 19:20 Yeah, what I'm saying infringe, it makes a terrible thing, sound, sound, you know, somewhere near more acceptable, and I don't think it is acceptable, and I don't think we should be giving them this, this delicate word when they're doing a bad thing to us.

Grey 19:35 As we say the word the Unfortunately, these words aren't perfectly comparable, but you do also have the word piracy, which is a similar,

Brady 19:42 that's a fantasy. That's an emotive. I like that. But

Grey 19:45 yeah, it is a more emotive word, but that is usually piracy is talking about individuals making copies for themselves. You know, and so they are they're engaged in piracy, which is more emotive but it is almost more motive in a very cool kind of way. Right? Like, yeah, it's true. Pirates have a lot of social cachet these days. So,

Brady 20:08 I'm not sure it's really dissuading the kids. You know, all right. Don't Don't be an awesome cool pirate. But yeah, I'm gonna, I'm gonna we're gonna have to disagree on this. I want to put I want to put the challenge out there, though. I want to I want a new word to describe what you call infringing. Yeah, that is more emotive, but you know, it doesn't cross swords with stealing and theft, which you think is, you know, all right, sacred anyway.

Grey 20:35 You know, we'll, we'll see. We'll see if people in the Reddit thread for this video can come up with a better word. So you want you want something that just it just sounds mean. Yeah,

Brady 20:43 I want a word to describe the practice of other people or organizations taking content and using it for their own purposes.

Grey 20:54 I will see if we'll see something when someone comes up with something.

Brady 20:58 Sorry, I just had to get it off my chest anymore.

Unknown Speaker 21:01 That that is the point to follow up Brady, right. There's always going to be something that sticking in your mind and and this is the this is the time to discuss it. Yeah.

Grey 21:11 Hello internets today's sponsor is audible.com, a leading provider of spoken audio information and entertainment, listen to audiobooks whenever and wherever you want. It's my job to recommend something interesting to you to listen to. And this week that's going to be a walk in the woods by Bill Bryson. Bryson is a travel writer and this is his experience walking along the Appalachian Trail, which for those of you who are unaware is a path in the woods in America that goes from Maine to Georgia, and it's incredibly long and actually genuinely dangerous because it is, of course, nature. The thing that I like about this book is that Bill Bryson is not like a professional adventurous guy. He's a kind of normal homebody sort of person. And so his experience walking along the Appalachian Trail is a lot like what I would imagine if I tried to walk along the Appalachian Trail, basically kind of a disaster from being beginning to end but a very entertaining story for other people to hear. And it really is an enjoyable tale just from start to finish with him and this friend of his cats trying to do this adventure that they are both clearly not prepared for in any way. I personally had the enjoyable experience of listening to this book on a road trip a number of years ago and actually intersecting paths with the Appalachian Trail which I decided to get out and explore and also got briefly lost and terrified on but that's a story for another time. So I'm going to highly recommend this book and the copy on Audible is also read by Bill Bryson which he has a good narrating voice and as I've said in a previous spot, I like it when the author reads their own thing, they put a different spin on it, then the professional narrator might. So if you want you can listen to a walk in the woods for free with audible. All you need to do is go to audible.com slash Hello internet. That's all one word and sign up for a 30 day trial by using the audible.com slash Hello internet link. That's how they know you came from us which is One of the ways we're going to figure out if this podcasting experiment is a success, so if you want to listen to it, audible has it with over 150,000 titles and virtually every genre you'll find what you're looking for. Get a free audiobook and 30 day trial today by signing up@audible.com slash Hello internet. That's audible.com slash Hello, internet all one word.

Brady 23:20 What's been going on? What's been going on in your life or in my life or any? It's been great. Life has been crazy.

Grey 23:27 Yeah, life has been crazy for both of us for the past week. And for you crazier, I think because you just got back from Vietnam. Did you not? I did. I did. And what were you What were you doing on the other side of the world?

Brady 23:40 I don't know how much you know about my, my dad. But he was a I'm Australian. As you know, but not many people. Not many American people even seem to realize that Australian soldiers fought in the Vietnam War. So you know, This was sort of it was an Allied Force a lot of people that was really surprised when I tell them that and my father fought in the Vietnam War. So I've kind of grown up, you know, knowing, knowing this and knowing bits and pieces of his stories. So basically, the purpose of this trip was to go with him to Vietnam and travel around to some of the places where, where all the stuff went down, which was really interesting. It's, it's especially interesting for me, because there are two things about my dad that are unusual in this respect. One was, he did two tours of the Vietnam War. And the first one was 12 months, which I think was in 1968, I think. And then he did another eight month tour towards the end, which I can't remember the year was 71. I can't remember the year which is terrible. But that on that first tour, he was a dog tracker, weapon. He wasn't a dog, but he was a dog handler and have a tracking dog. So his war experience was quite different. into a lot of other people in so far as his role was to lead this dog around sniffing

Grey 25:07 and what with the with the dog doing,

Brady 25:09 the dog was sniffing enemy forces, Vietcong or North Vietnamese soldiers. So say a typical scenario would be there would be a contact, it would be a battle. And then my dad and his dog, which was called Caesar, would be brought in, to sort of sniff and follow the retreating troops, and try and, you know, re engage with them from a combat sense, he had quite an unusual experience. But he also had a personally very interesting experience because his relationship through the war was was more with a dog than with other soldiers in many ways. So it was a very, it was a very unusual and special relationship. But also, my dad went on to become a journalist and a writer. And once he finished his sort of journalistic career, he settled down to writing Books and he's written a number of books about the Vietnam War. And his first one and most successful one was called trackers is about him and the dog. So a lot of I'd heard some of these stories, but not all of them. But then I read this book, which is just crammed with amazing stories that I didn't know. So that suddenly I had all this, you know, all these stories and all this stuff that I'd never seen the place I've been there. So that's what last week was about, it was about going to going to the site of these places. And of course, maybe me and dad quite wanted me to I took my camera along. And he sort of retold a lot of these stories, and might have a really good storyteller. He retold a lot of these stories in the places where they happened and I wrote the camera over it and hopefully we'll get around to editing editing them at some point.

Unknown Speaker 26:45 There's Are we going to see these videos on one of your many channels at some point? Yeah, I'll probably just put it on my on my channel called brailey stuff, which is a channel where I just dump stuff. Unbelievably there.

Grey 26:58 I don't mean to laugh, but like I've known you for a while. And this is like yet another channel of yours that I have never even heard of existing.

Brady 27:04 Well, this this is a channel where I put things that haven't got a channel, unbelievably, there are some topics that I haven't got a channel for so.

Grey 27:12 So I was surprised that you don't have a dedicated Vietnam War channel, for example,

Brady 27:16 that's not a bad idea. Actually, maybe I'll like now, so I don't know, I'll probably pop them on there. So anyway, anyway, it's you know, by the by, I mean, for me, it wasn't so much about making videos. It was about, you know,

Grey 27:28 spending some time with your dad and hearing Thomas.

Brady 27:32 And, and it's always good to put, you know, to visit places and really, it gives you a different understanding of stuff, whether it's something intense, like the Vietnam War, or going to the Eiffel Tower, you know, when you visit to the real place, you kind of can think oh, yeah, now I understand the geography and

Grey 27:49 yeah, though, is fundamentally different. No matter how much you hear about a place when you go, it's just a different experience. Yeah, it's a much more human experience to be there and to and to stand in the in the Wear something actually happened.

Brady 28:01 Yeah, exactly. So. So anyway, that was that was kind of crazy, but it was good fun.

Grey 28:07 I'm glad I'm glad you came back alive.

Brady 28:09 Yeah, you were just worried we wouldn't finish the podcast series if I got some malaria or something, right? Yeah,

Unknown Speaker 28:14 yeah, that's exactly true. And I was I was nervous when you tweeted that menu that had intestines and a bunch of other terrifying foods on it. Yes. And I thought I don't miss them on it didn't Yeah, that's what it was. It was it was rectum and I was thinking, please Brady. Do not become terribly sick or die on this trip. If a man would be terribly inconvenient but imagine max even say I've never eaten so much squid and all my life. They had they love their squid there. Oh, yeah. The other thing that was really interesting, though,

Brady 28:45 was that it was it was really interesting to go to a place in that kind of military tourism context. Where I don't know for lack of a better term, you're on the losing side. I mean, I mean, I mean, the US and Australians and the Allies withdrew from Vietnam and the North Vietnamese came down and, and took took the country, so to speak. And, you know, it's, it's now this this country that is this communist country, and the war is a great victory for them. And to go there and be doing the sites and be taken around by a tour guide, when of the force that was not victorious was very interesting and, and sort of a different, you know, we're used to going to sort of places where terrible things happen, but ultimately, you know, in a victorious context, right, and this was the opposite, which was really interesting, huh.

Grey 29:40 I wouldn't have thought about that. But that that's a good point. Normally, normally when you're doing like the war monuments that we know, and Australia or America we tend to go to are there there are monuments of triumph. And doing a tour where that was not the case is a different experience.

Brady 30:00 Yeah, I was also really interesting going to the Vietnamese museum about of any age, you know, it's probably there's only so much we can talk about a bit now unfortunate in a, in a podcast that's more about. I don't know what this podcast is about. But it's probably not about war stories if

Grey 30:17 this podcast is about what we wanted to be about So, so a Vietnam totally counts that I was

Brady 30:21 dating now and I didn't and I did make videos there. So it is about it is about filmmaking. I tell you what, from a filmmaker YouTube perspective, it's really hard to make videos of your dad. I tell you that right now. Why? Because partly because of the way my dad is, but also just because there's a different dynamic. I mean, you know, when I'm interviewing someone or filming something in the video is them but I can take control to an extent and guide them with the questioning and if they've got a certain point they want to make or away they want to tell the story, and I don't think it's going to work. I can either delicately Shepherd them with my questions or I can can be more Frank and slap them around the years and say now Now we need to do it like this. But my dad obviously had, you know, stories he wants to tell him ways he wanted to tell them and they didn't always fit with what I thought would work in a video. And all the different techniques I normally use on on people to get what I want. Just didn't work. It was like

Grey 31:21 he's just he knows you do. Well, he's blowing off all your linguistic tricks.

Brady 31:25 I don't know. I don't know if it was but yeah, I felt like I felt like there was kryptonite in the air. And in terms of my ability to steer the interview either way. I sometimes can. It was an eye It must be because it was my dad because it never happens with anyone else.

Grey 31:43 Yeah, I guess you were not in a position of authority when it is your father on the other end of the camera.

Brady 31:47 Right. I guess that's it. I guess that's it. I mean, I don't feel that he was in authority over me either, though. I mean, I don't have that kind of relationship with my dad. But yeah, there was just something different. There was and I would stop and ask him questions. And he would he wouldn't answer them or debate when he's like that with everyone. He just ignores questions and cracks on with his stories. But maybe that's it, maybe, maybe he didn't feel sufficiently intimidated or respectful of me as the, as the filmmaker was everyone else at least has that modicum of respect for me. Whereas I was still just Brady to him. And he was gonna he had a story he wanted to tell. And, you know, I had stopped the camera a couple of times said Dad, not listening to me. You have to answer this question. It was like interviewing a politician. And they just have when they have what they want to say. But anyway, he is a really good storyteller. He's like, famous for his ripping. Yeah. And so he still told the story well, but it was a really interesting, interesting thing as a filmmaker for me.

Grey 32:47 Well, how are you going to get those videos out? Yeah, long time.

Brady 32:51 It could be a while because I'm actually jumping on another plane now and I'm going away for a month. And I don't know if I'm gonna be able to edit them. The road so it could be a while, but I'd like to do them so

Grey 33:03 well, whenever whenever you get around to them mentioned it again, we'll put them in the description for the podcast. Yeah, yeah. Good today we'll have a description for you or we'll have a link to your dad's book if people want

Brady 33:15 Yeah, yeah, it's it is it is actually a, you know, is a really good book. Actually, I'm, I'm not paying. I mean, his other ones I'm not so much into because they're about other soldiers. But the one about him. I really enjoyed anyway. There we go.

Grey 33:28 So I'll put it in. People can check it out if they want. Cool. Thank you. Thank you.

Brady 33:31 What about you? What's been any news in your world? You had a video out which is always a big deal.

Grey 33:35 Yeah, that is really the biggest news ever, is always It always feels like my whole life just narrows down to the video production in the in the four or five days before it actually goes live and just everything. Everything gets postponed. And so there's there is this cycle in my life. where, you know, I use this, this program called OmniFocus to track all of my today And maybe about 14 days before I'm expecting a video to come out, I start delaying everything in my little program to like after when I think it's going to come out. And so I'm working on the video and stuff comes up in my program and I delay delay, delay, delay delay. And then I'm kind of experiencing right now and what I was doing before I was I was talking to you and suddenly there's just this monster is number of things to do after the video comes out. And so I'm just I'm sort of overwhelmed with just a very large number of things but but yeah, the getting the video out is is the biggest deal and it was good back jury nullification.

Brady 34:38 I liked it.

Grey 34:39 Yeah, yeah, it's well, I have to say it's, it is done successfully. And actually, let me let me open up right now and

Brady 34:49 it was 1.2 million last time I looked at it. Yeah, that's this I want to check so I saw nothing for you. There isn't that's just

Grey 34:54 No, I know. This is what I was gonna say. So I actually as you might not be surprised. I have an objective A measure about the success of the videos that I used to deem whether or not they have been successful. And so I take, take whatever my subscriber number at the time of release is as the starting point. So let's just let's just make the numbers easy. I have about a million subscribers at this point. And if I have a video that gets less than a third of that number, in a week, I would consider that to be just like a total abject failure. If it's more than a third, to sort of equal to the number of subscribers I consider that to be kind of satisfactory. And anything that gets more than the total number of subscribers, that to me is like a very successful video because that means like, people are really sharing it and like it's going to more people than have signed up to get my videos. So that that's Always for me, the real crossing point is like, can the video get more views than subscribers that I have within a week? And I think it's it is, it's been five days and it is just under the number of subscribers that I have now. So I think this one will, will limp across that threshold probably before the week. We close out.

Brady 36:21 I've noticed a couple of a couple of your videos lately actually. The the titles have been a little bit more Tz like a bit more. Is this. Is this a coincidence? Or is this a deliberate deliberate thing we're seeing now they're a bit more like What's this about? You know, like, the law you won't be told and this will hurt and

Grey 36:41 Okay, so it's fine that you picked up on that because? If the answer is that is partly just a coincidence. The the previous video that I did on the no CBOE effect, the opposite opposite of the placebo effect. I have a demonstration in the beginning that just does not work. If you Know what the video is going into it. So I have to not say the name of the thing in the in the title. In that case with this one yeah, it isn't much more Tz title with the law you won't be told. And that is only half a coincidence, but I came across remember exactly where but some study that was talking about click through rates for titles and and they were basically saying that Tz kind of titles have surprisingly large click through rates for what you might expect. And so I thought, Oh, let me just let me just try something that's a little bit different. I don't think I will normally do it. I just happened to have two topics that it worked very well with. And so I didn't mind having that back to back. But I do I am a fan of the straightforward title. Also, because that partly does a lot of introduction for you. Like I don't necessarily have to set up as much. Yeah, if the title just straight up says Here's what we're going to talk about. So it is just a bit of a bit of a coincidence. Although I will say just as a personal experience releasing this video, I think in the second episode or somewhere I mentioned how I probably will not do a medical topic for a while. Because that put me under a lot of stress about sort of being feeling like I really need to be correct. I am going to add a lot of topics that I will not cover anytime soon again, if I can possibly avoid it. And it's for a slightly different reason. But you. So this is entirely a problem with me and also my as make this a theme, talking about analogies. I tend to think of the law as a kind of computer code for human society. Right? We hear all these rules and we formalize these rules about what should happen under what circumstances. And here here's all the exceptions for the consequences. If the laws are the rules didn't work out in a particular way. But No, this is not the case when I sit down and think about it, and it's partly because my, my father is actually a lawyer in the States. And I know through him just how much of the law depends on interpretations of what happens in the courtroom. And it's so much more situational and like, oh, it depends, then you think of the law as being, you know, really clear, or at least I think of it as being that way. Yeah. And so I cannot tell you how many rounds this script went through where I had very definitive statements that kept having to be kind of modified and qualified and toned down and changed, changed a lot. So I will not do a lot topic again, if I can possibly avoid it. Partly because of that, like it's it's difficult to make definitive statements and there's a number of places in the video where I'm talking about situations that might occur and it is like yes, that might happen the majority of the time but that like there's there's always going to be a really long list of exceptions. Nevermind the fact that in America The rules are different in all 50 states for how things are handled. Right so I was trying to talk about them like the most general possible case. But yes, that was dreadful. Do not expect a lot topic anytime soon. People have a bit Have you ever been to a trial? I have never been to a trial in person. Now.

Brady 40:31 You got to tell you what one day we must do an episode. I'll tell you some good stories about trials I've been to. Yeah. Okay. Ice cold cases. good fun. That sounds good. Let's see. Let me let me let me do a clever, clever segue here. Okay, which will which will both follow on from what we're talking about? promote something and lead to something I wanted to discuss.

Grey 40:53 Patrick Patrick trick of segway.

Brady 40:56 Yeah. Speaking of click Beatty titles for videos. The video that I put up today is called the world's greatest autograph book. And it is about something that you and I went to see, of course, a couple of weeks ago. And I want to talk about that day trip. So I got all three together. You and I went to the Royal Society. Yeah, in London, which is somewhere I've been wanting to take you for ages and been pestering you about it. We finally had the chance to go there. And I didn't want you to do the the typical tour we went down into the, into the vaults to see all the treasures and things I deliberately haven't asked you much about your impression of the visit because I wanted to ask you here on the podcast. What did you think? I I thought it was great. It was it was great to visit. So I think first Why don't you because you're better at summarizing this the main right Why don't you give a quick summary for people who don't know like what is the Royal Society the Royal Society This organization that's been around since the 1600s. And it was set up by Charles the second, I think, I think he was the it was one of these, one of these kings, the founder. Yeah. And basically, it was for sort of the scientists of the time when science was in its infancy. It was kind of like their club. They've been going ever since. And basically, they, they elect or decide to make people fellows of this society and join the club. And this has been going on for, you know, 350 years or something like that. And basically, every year and a new intake of 10 or 20 people joins this club of Uber scientists still going today. And it's just got all this history. They've also been involved in, you know, publications, they have their own journal, and they have meetings and they have all these other functions. It's not just a place where they go and have a cup of tea and smoke a pipe but I should came out wrong but anyway, I meant that no more English sense. Anyway. So, success club it's been going for years got all this history, you know, any any scientist who's anyone has been a Fellow of the Royal Society, Isaac Newton you know all those all those guys who can boil back then all the way through to your modern greats you know Einstein was a was a fellow Niels Bohr all the way through to Peter Higgs and people like that today, Watson and Crick. They're all they've all been part of this club that's got this incredible history. The thing about the autographed book is of course, anyone who signs who becomes a fellow they all signed the same book, which has been around since the start. So this is why I call it the world's greatest autograph book because it's got everyone from Isaac Newton through to all your modern day scientists all signing this one book which is incredible. Yes, and of course any king or queen that comes to the throne is automatically the patron The role of society so every famous royal has signed as well. It's this amazing document. But anyway, because of this history, and basically, all the peep scientists involve their interactions are all kept and all their papers and artifacts are kept there in these vaults. It's this it's this real treasure trove of of material as well. And I know you love our stuff and I know you love source documents and things like that you know, you don't you don't want you don't want any secondary sources when you CGP Grey now of course the set so I thought I've got to get gray in there to see all this stuff. Because I know you like hanging out in libraries and stuff as well. Yeah, we finally went there. And I thought it was going to blow your mind. And I don't know if you were just being calm. Or you were walking about it. What did you What did you think you just kind of?

Grey 44:53 Oh, no, I think I really liked it. I thought it was it was really interesting to see. So yeah, when we when we We went on a tour, that we got to go downstairs into the vault blow, and basically see all of the original documents. And it's almost hard to describe because there was such a great variety of things down there. But if you imagine this huge vault, and it would just have the original written letters from all of these famous scientists, to the Royal Society, or from explorers who were writing in about, you know, what they were seeing in new places. And it was almost just very overwhelming in the amount of stuff

Brady 45:38 that is handwritten too, isn't it?

Unknown Speaker 45:39 Yeah, that Yeah, that was that. That was the thing is

Brady 45:42 a letter from Isaac Newton. Oh, what's he got to say from it? Yeah,

Grey 45:45 I did. I did tell my wife we came back I know it was all in this vault. But it was like shockingly casual. Some of the stuff that was just laying around August he was nice enough to give us a tour. I kept saying to him like it makes me nervous. like looking at all the stuff. You know, the the one example, you know was the death mask for Isaac Newton. So the clay I guess it was I'm not sure what the material was that they put over his face after he died, you know to get a print of his face. Oh, it's just like there on the shelf, you know, waiting to be knocked over by you know some clumsy idiot like me who's wandering around and not paying attention.

Brady 46:22 I'll tell you this quick quick, quick interjection here Rupert, who's the other guy that works in the library who you spoke to briefly, but he was the one that came down with this. He normally is the guy that has to handle that mask, and he's done it a few times for me for videos and things like that. And he has a recurring nightmare over time. He drops that mask and it shatters like haunts him. Yeah. And every time I asked him to pick it up, like he he goes a little bit white and tells me you know about my dream, don't you see? So you're not the only one who worries about that?

Grey 46:50 Yes, that was that was that was one of my prevailing feelings there was just like, worry for all of these objects. And we did. We were Talking about how, you know, some of the stuff like like that mask has been digitized. You know, they've done high resolution 3d scans with that. But there's just so many papers and documents that they, they don't have any other copies, except the ones that are in that vault. And it's it. You know, it was very interesting. And, you know, one of the examples that was given is, is like, you don't know necessarily how this stuff is going to be valuable in the future. And the example that was mentioned was talking about the have, you know, all these records of the weather, you know, coming back for hundreds of years, which just sounds like the most boring thing in the whole wide world, right? until, you know, that stuff starts to matter when people are doing, you know, research for the global weather system. And now you actually want that kind of data to be available. And you've got

Brady 47:49 sea levels from Australia from you know, 1800 and,

Grey 47:51 yeah, all of this stuff that just seems just so random. It's so bizarre. Like I can't even remember what was We looked at that book. Maybe you can remind me what what the deal was, but it was it was a book and it had collections of drawings of a volcano, that some member of the Royal Society had paid a monk to go.

Brady 48:13 It was. It was serious. Yes,

Grey 48:15 that's right. It was yes. And one of the members had paid this monk you know, in the days before photography, to go outside every day and sketch What the What Mount Vesuvius looked like what the volcano look like, Yeah, not the

Brady 48:27 plume of smoke out, changing shape and things

Unknown Speaker 48:30 attended to him, as he said, like it was it was like the 1700s version of a webcam. Yeah, right where the webcam takes a picture every 30 minutes, but you can't have a webcam, you just have a monk and you pay him some money and he sends you a sketch every day. And and that was just, you know, collected in this book. So it was it was very, it was really interesting to see.

Brady 48:52 It was funny we went with, with our friend Angela from Google, and I did find it funny when we were down there because I just love all that old stuff and the romance of it, but you and Angela who are both much more kind of digital people, all you could think about was has this been scanned or who should scan this and where Could this be preserved electronically? And whereas I was like, oh, let's touch this or doesn't this smell?

Grey 49:15 That is true. That is true. You had your hands all over everything. And, you know, again, I was surprised to know that it's it is okay to handle these materials just like with your gross monkey hands, like with all their sweat on them and like in dirt, and they're like, Oh, no, don't worry, you know, you pick up these these letters from Robert Hooke. That's totally fine don't worry and their originals we don't have any extra copy but we're going to let you just touch them. And they prefer you to not use gloves which is the secret no one tells you

Brady 49:46 Yeah, cuz because if your gloves you kind of lose that that dexterity and that touch and you're more likely to drop something or rip something.

Grey 49:54 Yeah, you end up being more likely damaged, which is also which is surprising. And another example of how they In TV and movies are not accurate representations of real life. The one thing that was a very almost overwhelming moment was being able to see the kind of original edition of Isaac Newton's Principia Mathematica, you know, the book, the book that is basically the founding stone of much of modern physics. And that was that was really amazing to be able to see and to be able to actually hold in my hands and I made you take a picture of that now I knew you liked that when you asked for a photo. Yeah. And And honestly, it was only because I saw you going around touching absolutely everything and handling stuff and like whoops, almost dropped it, you know, that I had I had the the bravery to ask if I could hold that book. And I could not believe it when they said yes, you can. You can hold it. Because to be clear, is Isaac, Isaac Newton's seminal work and that copy? It wasn't just a first edition. That was his hand written copy in big sections with notes to the printer. Yeah, so it's like that, like, you know, he actually slaved over that book for who knows how long. And that was the copy that got sent off to the printer, you know, to make the first edition. So it's almost like the zeroeth edition of that book is pretty cool. So I have to say that was that was an amazing moment.

Brady 51:28 But no, I just, my hope was that, you know, that you would say, Oh, I could make a few videos here using all this source material. Like, I want to see some CGP Grey videos, you know, using using all these old documents from hundreds of years ago with some new spin on some country or some border or something we'd never realized before.

Grey 51:48 Yeah, I've got to say it's been it's been running in the back of my mind how to take advantage of that. So I have I have some thoughts and i'm i'm also again, like, I I'm really glad to know that that resource is there. It's it's amazing to be able to see the original original stuff. But it's also often it's you just you come across strange surprises when you're dealing with original materials. And so I'm going to mention something slightly, something slightly nerdy here. But when I was in college, I was rereading the Lord of the Rings series. And I thought, let me start the beginning. I'm going to start with the Hobbit. And by the way, people if you haven't read the hobbit yet, spoiler warning coming up here. So you should pause your podcast now.

Brady 52:38 Take my headphones off, because I haven't read the whole book.

Grey 52:40 You haven't read the hobbit? Are you kidding me?

Unknown Speaker 52:42 Yeah, I haven't read The Hobbit. Are you serious? I haven't read Lord of the Rings either.

Brady 52:49 Well, I think less of me.

Grey 52:51 I'm just surprised actually, I don't think it's not that I think less of you. I'm just I'm just honestly surprised that you you have not read it. Do you know the basic story of The Hobbit.

Brady 53:00 Yes, I know the basic story.

Grey 53:01 Okay, so I'm not going to ruin anything with the basic story then So, and you're just gonna have to listen to this anyway. Because Yeah, this is what we're doing now. So I figured I'll start the beginning. I'll read The Hobbit, and I'm reading The Hobbit and I had read it once as a kid, and I'm going through the book and everything is totally normal until the pivotal scene between Bilbo and Gollum. And the pivotal scene in the book where Bilbo he sort of steals the ring from Gollum and you know, makes his way out of the underneath this mountain and escapes. I did say that in the film. I have seen the first film Yeah, so there's like a fight right? There's there Yeah,

Brady 53:41 it's a battle of wits in a way it was.

Grey 53:43 Yeah, well, there's that there's a preceding thing about it, but there's there is a like a skirmish over the ring. Okay. And I'm reading the book, and everything is going along totally fine. And then in the book that I'm reading, I was I was completely blown away because Gollum, just hands over the ring. Right, like no questions asked none of this skirmish nonsense. Just basically straight up gives it to Bilbo and Bilbo walks away. And I was so incredibly confused until I realized that my library actually had a first edition of The Hobbit. And it turns out that this is a change in later editions of The Hobbit. So in, in fiction, this is called a redcon. When the author goes back and changes something in the earlier material, like a director's cut, yeah, to make it match later on with with the following stuff, okay. And so this is this was a case of the first the very first edition of The Hobbit, there is not this, this epic struggle over the ring. And in later editions there is and Tolkien went back and changed it, because he realized that it just didn't make any sense given the books that he was writing in the future. So so like, original copies of things can have very interesting information, but some of the trouble sometimes it's like Knowing that this even exists, like I would never have discovered this if it just wasn't just for a total, just a total accident. And so yeah, source original materials are just just amazing. But as as always with libraries like knowing where to look is half the battle

Brady 55:15 was the valuable that book if it was some first edition sitting in your local library,

Grey 55:20 it's one of the things I've wondered about later on. Like, did they not realize that this was the first edition because I'm, I'm a member of a library that has a first edition of The Hobbit here. And that that's like kept under lock and key. You know, you can't you can't directly actually,

Brady 55:33 you should have borrowed that bad boy and not returned it and take a hit on the phone.

Grey 55:37 If I should have if I was looking through. I think I was really just more confused about the inconsistencies in the story. De railing my whole brain. Why doesn't this match up with what I expected to be? Yeah. But yeah, so I will definitely take advantage of them. When I come across something where I want, I want to be able to see the original, original, something like that. I have a couple things in mind. I don't want to miss anything in particular man. It was an IT WAS A I have to say, it was a it was a great trip. And I'm really glad that, that you were able to

Brady 56:06 bring me down there and to sort of get access to this because your whole person, I should say, by the way, as well, like, you know, by way of thanks to the library guys are our society, anyone can go there. Anyone can go there and look at any materials. I mean, not anyone can go down to the vote, but anything from the vote can be brought up to you. So if you go there and and, you know, join up and go through the process, no matter you just like, you know, prove that you're a real person and not some cowboy. And you want to look at some old handwritten document from Isaac Newton, they'll bring it up to you though, shout out to that. They're all they want. They want people to go there and use this resource. You know, they want this stuff out there. So if, if you're ever in London, or you're from London, and you want to go see this stuff, it's not some exclusive club, anyone can go and have a look.

Grey 56:54 Yeah, and the library is really worth seeing as well. It's just it's a it's a beautiful room, where they'll bring You author materials. So yeah, it is definitely worth seeing. Cool

Brady 57:06 Do you know what we were going to talk about some stuff today we prepared a topic. Are we going to do it? We think a lot nearly an hour.

Grey 57:15 I think that I'm totally up for doing something that is an actual topic, but it depends entirely on you.

Brady 57:20 Let's do it man. Let's do I mean the first couple of podcasts have been like an hour long but there's no rules about this is there

Grey 57:27 now this is the internet stuff can be as long or as short as you want it to be. There's absolutely no limits on this

Brady 57:33 and some of the podcasts you've been putting me on tape because I wasn't as much of a podcast junkie as you so I've just been listening to once you tell me to listen to they typically go for like two hours.

Grey 57:44 Yeah, some of them are very long and my personal favorite but sadly defunct now podcast hypercritical was legendary for co it like they'd have shows I'm pretty sure they had shows the top three hours in because genzler accused of the star of that show just had interesting things to say and could say them forever. Like you can

Brady 58:05 tell you why I tell you what we have to in a future episode, do a podcast about podcast because there's a few things I want to discuss with you, especially about the podcast. You've put me on too, because I've been listening to them a lot. And I've got lots of questions and comments, and I want to I want to do more about it. But that's not for today, is it?

Grey 58:22 No, that's not that's not exactly for it. today.

Brady 58:24 We will we're going to talk about feedback. Because I think I think the rough thinking was because we've been getting so much feedback in the last week. Yeah, podcast would be a good chance to to talk about feedback in general.

Grey 58:38 Yeah, I think I suspect this is going to be a relatively short topic, which is why I don't mind doing it now. But I was I was just thinking about it earlier. And I think they're my note says feedback on feedback. And I think that there's there's some some things to be said here. And so I guess I mean, I guess just to start it off, what I was Thinking about is how, you know, because we're in this, we're in this amazing world with the internet, you know, and people can put stuff out there. And anybody can comment on it if they want, you know, like anybody can make a YouTube video tomorrow and upload it right, and you can get some comments. And I think it's, it's a very weird situation to have feedback from people that you don't know. And how, as the creator of something to actually interpret that feedback. I think there's a lot of weirdness that happens here. I don't know. I mean, cuz I'm kind of, I don't actually know. I mean, like, do you look at the YouTube comments for your own videos very much. I mean, you're so busy making videos, you probably don't have time to actually, you

Brady 59:51 know, especially especially on a new video. So for the first I'll talk about this a bit more in a minute. When when I sort of talked to you a bit about some of some of things I've been doing lately, but, but in general terms, I would say I look at the viewer comments on a YouTube video for the first day or two days, and then that starts to subside then because because I do a video almost every day or every two days, a new video kind of usurps it and that becomes so the focus of my attention. And you know, now I have a couple of thousand videos, I don't go back and read all the feedback on all of them. Yeah. But for the first day or two, and that's when you're getting the most comments. Anyway. I am quiet. I am very much across what's being said for better or worse.

Unknown Speaker 1:00:41 And what about you?

Grey 1:00:44 Yeah, well,

Brady 1:00:45 I know obviously, you have comments and your video and then you also run your, your Reddit subreddit. Yeah, you'd like the feedback to happen.

Grey 1:00:53 Yeah, that's exactly it at this point. At this stage, I don't pay any attention to the comments on YouTube. Some of the changes that they made I don't really like that format.

Brady 1:01:02 To what you won't even look at it at all. Okay, just you won't even look.

Grey 1:01:05 Yeah, I mean, I you know, we're talking now in 2014. And a couple months ago, YouTube changed the the way their comment system works. Yes, they did. And I was never a huge fan of the comment system before. And I wouldn't necessarily say that this this, this new system is worse. But for me for various reasons, I just find it not really workable. And so

Brady 1:01:35 I would say it's worse but yeah,

Grey 1:01:37 yeah, yeah, we will have a full conversation about this at some point. But But for now, I really I don't really look at the YouTube comments at all. And I look entirely at the Reddit comments and that's, that's what I'm interested in. And why

Brady 1:01:53 why do you look at the comments what what do you what do you looking for in them?

Grey 1:01:57 Well, what's what's interesting to me. So I have a again on Reddit, I have a section where I can post the videos and people can discuss them. But I'm very interested also on Reddit when the video gets posted in other sections, so people who don't necessarily subscribe to me on youtube who who've never seen one of my videos before, they will comment on a video. And that can be interesting to read and see like someone who's not familiar with my video style. Yeah, you know, what, what might they say? But what I was one of the reasons why I think the feedback on feedback thing is interesting because it it changes at different scales when someone's starting out when they're making things for the first time on the internet. Anonymous feedback from strangers is kind of an amazing thing. Now, you know, people can just be like total jerks on the internet. There's no denying that but It is. It's difficult in real life to ever get genuine, honest feedback from people you know, in your life. So you know, you have friends and you have families. And because you have social obligations to the people in those groups, it's hard to get 100% honest feedback from from those people in your life. Yeah. Whereas some random person who's seen whatever you've made on the internet, and who has no connection to you, and isn't even using a real name, there's no reason for them to hold back. You know, they, they have permission to just be really straightforward and their feedback and yeah, that can be very, very valuable. And I think if you're paying attention to that kind of feedback in the right sort of way, especially in the beginning, you can really try to to direct whatever it is you're making in a more positive way,

Brady 1:04:05 how much should you allow yourself to be guided by feedback? I mean, I, it's the politically correct thing to say is, I look at the feedback and my audience is really important. And I want to make what they want, and I will shape and tailor what I do to them. And, you know, I take all their opinions on board because they're really valuable to me. And to an extent, that is true, and only a full will completely ignore feedback on what the audience is saying, because we do this for the audience. You know, it's a relationship with the audience. But at the same time, you've got to kind of Believe in yourself as well and and your vision otherwise you just become some diluted, you know, designed by committee. Piece of generic Rubbish. Yeah. And and the example I often use in this respect is in the number five videos I make, which are these mathematics videos, often we need to write on something. And for various reasons, which I've outlined in the blog in great detail, and it was very much thought out, I have people write on these pieces of brown paper with a marker. Now, with the first three or four, number five videos went up, they they had a quite a large audience from the start, because I already had an audience from other channels. So I was getting a lot of feedback right from the start. And overwhelmingly, like you wouldn't believe all the feedback was negative about the brown paper. Really, you've got to get rid of it. It's rubbish. like and trust me that was what all the comments were about, and it was very strong, but I really believed in using this brown paper.

Grey 1:05:56 I guess it's such a trademark of yours now and not imagine the number five videos without Exactly.

Brady 1:06:00 And I felt really strongly about it for various reasons that it was a good idea and it would work. And there are still people that don't like it. But they're very much in the minority now, and I rarely hear anything about it. But there are lots of people who really, really love it. They're really into it. And they, they've really adopted it. And that was an example of something where if I was going to go with the feedback and be shaped by it, I would have ditched that brown paper very quickly. Definitely. But I was like,

Unknown Speaker 1:06:28 No, I think

Brady 1:06:30 I think I'm right here. And I think if you are starting out and you get shaped by feedback too easily, you lose your distinctiveness. And, you know, I think I think you've got it, you can look at it and take what you want from it. But you can't listen to it too much. You got to be your own man or woman.

Grey 1:06:51 Yeah. And yeah, I wouldn't I wouldn't be arguing for follow the feedback entirely. But I agree with you that you're kind of foolish to not pay attention to it, particularly in the beginning. But I think that brown paper one is a good example. Because there there are things that you have to consider as a creator, that might not be obvious to the people watching something. Yeah, and I don't know if this was your thought process, but I might guess that you wanted something that was distinct for a visual look, or you wanted something that you're dealing with an abstract channel so that people were writing on a thing, and you could see them doing it. I mean, was that some part of the that's it that that's, I mean, there are probably six or seven reasons, but that is a strong one. I want it to be sort of, yeah, something tactile and physical. Want topics that are here? Yeah. So they're nice. Yeah, there's definitely considerations that you have to have as the maker of the thing that are not obvious to the audience. But I think for, you know, for example, in some of my earlier views, videos there were a lot of comments about how the audio quality was just terrible and there is no denying that like that that was entirely true. And it's funny because it was not something I was aware of when I made the first couple videos the very first one was done just by talking straight into the laptop microphone which I just unbelievable to me today. But the the comments about the audio quality was something that made me realize like, Oh, I need to put some time and thought into this if I'm going to make more of these. And so I like I just bought a cheap USB microphone and already that makes it so much better. You know, now I have a bit more professional gear. But so I think like feedback for rough edges like that can be very useful or, yeah, feedback on on people's delivery. So, you know, if you're doing something like we're doing and you're making an explanation video, you want to see how many people seem confused by This in the comments, and that that's an indication that maybe this isn't this isn't going very well. But I think on the flip side of it as well, what's really useful when you're starting out is like positive comments. Do people actually leave comments who seemed to like the thing that you're doing? And if you're getting just no positive feedback at all like that, that's a that's a kind of feedback as well. Like you need to adjust what you're making for the world. And or do something in a very different way to try to catch people's attention. But what I think is, this is a this is a comment that was made to be by Derek of veritasium. Who might be listening right now. Hi, Derek. If you are listening, hey, Derek.

Brady 1:09:51 I hope you I hope, what t shirt are you wearing? Derek? Are you wearing those tight jeans? Derek?

Grey 1:09:55 He probably is wearing his tight jeans. Yeah. For those of those of you who haven't seen that He's very pretty. He's definitely the prettiest of the educational youtubers i think

Brady 1:10:06 but he always wears like and he always wears the T shirt of your channel when he meets you. Which is a class act but I met him for like a coffee and like he turned out wearing a periodic videos, that is very prophetic. And then like I'm sure when he makes you turn up nice CGP Grey shirt. And that's, that's that's attention to detail. You know,

Unknown Speaker 1:10:24 it is anyway, that's why he's a successful guy. Exactly.

Grey 1:10:30 Yeah, what it was, is that he he made a comment. We were talking once about how the value of positive feedback goes to zero. As you are more and more successful. Yeah. And I don't know if you think that's the case, but he said that and it was like, man, I could not agree with him more strongly when he mentioned that to me.

Brady 1:10:50 Yeah, I mean, it doesn't mean I want no one you know, everyone to stop leaving positive feedback. But I mean, yeah, I mean, you look at you kind of preaching to the choir, right. You After a while in terms of, you know, people watching or watching because they like what you're doing.

Grey 1:11:06 Yeah. And it's it's a, it's very interesting it just just as a little bit of a phenomenon that you have, if you get lots and lots and lots of positive comments, it sounds it does sound weird, but after a while, if you if you have tons of them, they're not necessarily valuable, right? these are these are, like in aggregate, right? individually they are but like, what can you draw from that? It's very hard to say like, there's not necessarily anything actionable in that, right? Whereas negative comments may still contain information for something that you can change or that you can improve upon. And also, the thing is that, you know, negative comments are the ones that just really stick with you sometimes, you know, especially if there is a kernel of truth, a kernel of truth to them.

Brady 1:11:56 course that's that's the that's the thing, isn't it?

Grey 1:11:59 Yeah. There was, uh, I'll see if I can find it for the description. But there was a little web comic that I saw once where it showed like a guy at work. And he's surrounded by all these little speech bubbles of people saying really nice things about him. There's 20 nice things, and there's one negative thing. And then the second panel is him after work at dinnertime. And the one negative comment is still crystal clear, but all the positive ones have sort of faded away of slightly. And then the final panel is him, you know, it's at nighttime and you can't get to sleep. And the only thing that remains is that negative comments, and all the positive ones have sort of disappeared. And I think that that's partly like what is it was engaged in a statement like positive feedback turns to zero. That like the negative stuff really sticks with you, especially if it if it has some kernel of truth. And you know, that that can be it can be very, very hard to deal with. Sometimes

Brady 1:12:49 Have you ever had like a negative comment that still sticks with you now?

Grey 1:12:55 People Yeah, I mean, people can people can leave comments that really do kind of stick with you.

Brady 1:13:03 But what what would I want to ask you to personally question I also don't want to encourage people to go and give you a hard time. But yeah, what sort of area of criticism will stick with you more than others? Will it be, you know, I don't like the sound of your voice or your argument is poor or you sound like you must be very ugly. But what are the ones that stick with you?

Grey 1:13:29 I think I think there's a kind of common that I do see on on videos, especially when I'm aware like if it's on a section on Reddit, for example, where people don't know who I am that I would say the one that I'm okay talking about that I see the most is people will say that I sound really condescending in the videos. And that that always gets me because like, why am I like, my whole point is to not be condescending, like I'm I'm sort of assuming that the person watching this video might not know very much about this topic. And I want to, I want to try to be friendly about that. And that is something that I do think about when I'm recording the actual audio for the video is to try to get takes where I'm not. I'm not like being an authority talking down to person. Especially because very often, like, I knew almost nothing about this topic five weeks earlier. And so like I'm by no means an authority. And I've just done a whole bunch of research, but I'm very sensitive to coming off as condescending to people who might not have watched a whole bunch of my videos. So that's a kind of negative comment that I do see repeatedly that I'm aware of and kind of sticks with me

Brady 1:14:47 and does affect how I how I work a little bit. I mean, you're always going to have that problem because if you tell people a lot of clever information that they didn't know before Very, very quickly, which is what you do. It makes you appear very intelligent and knowledgeable. And that immediately puts you in a position where you where people will feel that you're being condescending, you're not. And I know you get around it in all those other ways, but you're always gonna, you're always going to struggle with that. Yeah, it's like, like, if someone goes on a quiz show and they happen to know all the answers, like, Well, okay, they know all the answers and people gonna think oh, aren't they know and feel really negatively towards them? I mean, yeah, sorry. I just happen to know the answers. And I've set them quickly.

Grey 1:15:35 Yeah. But But I, but that's, I totally agree with that. But it is something that I'm very sensitive towards about. Yeah, thinking of ways to minimize that in the videos in various ways. Yeah. But what I was gonna say is just like I have a couple of other little, little thoughts here and there's Gina who's a Frank is

Brady 1:15:59 Yeah, I met I met today Frank VidCon. Oh, did you

Grey 1:16:05 say Frank for those who may not be aware is sort of the, the father of the modern internet vlog. You know the Have you seen a video where there's a person's face talking at a camera very quickly and they do jump cuts. Like say Frank was the guy who started that back in the day. He's the green brother.

Brady 1:16:23 He's a real hero of the green brothers.

Grey 1:16:24 Yeah, yeah, he used to do this amazing thing called the show, which is so old now in internet terms, but it was just amazing. And then he disappeared mysteriously for a number of years and has recently come back on YouTube. But he did a video which I'll try to find for the description where he was talking about comments on videos on YouTube. And he made an excellent point, which I thought was it was interesting, which is that of course the only people who comment are the people who have a strong reaction to the video or whatever it is you've made in one way or another, right people who really liked it, or really hated it. But pretty much by definition, the people who watch the video and we're kind of met, they're probably not going to leave a comment. Yeah. And so I had, I had not really thought about that. But it's an interesting point that feedback on anything that you put on the internet is, is going to be intrinsically biased in two completely opposing directions. Yeah, you know, people who love it and people who hate it. And I think this is you can also see this just in in any kind of website that has five star rankings where almost all the reviews are either five stars or their one star. And there's almost no three star review. Yeah. Because who is the person leaving the three star review? Yeah, and I, like, kind of liked it.

Brady 1:17:58 change your life for the better Yeah, broke the day you got it. You wanna?

Grey 1:18:02 That's exactly it. It's like, Oh, I kind of liked it. But I think I'll spend 20 minutes writing a review this thing that's kind of like whatever, like nobody does that does that nobody?

Brady 1:18:12 So I think that's just interesting to keep in mind whenever you're looking over feedback of anything that you I mean, that's interesting you bring that up. I mean, I guess there is there is one respect where I, I have to, I hadn't thought of this before, actually. But there is a respect in which I have to follow feedback or interestingly, and you analyze it more than you. And that is the respect in which most of my videos have a third party in them. Who is often someone maybe not used to the kind of exposure you get on these YouTube videos. Yes. And of course, they read the feedback. And I I then have to counsel them in some way. Yes. So that that whole thing about, you know, you're the silent majority It is something I'm always forced to bring up with people when they've read two or three of those comments that are very harsh and will stay in that speech bubble for days. I have to tell them, you know, a million people have watched this video. You know, some of them didn't like it. But yeah, that's that's like 20 people out of a million. And there's a whole bunch that did like it and so but in general, that's, that is the biggest problem of comments for me is that is those third parties who are often who are always almost volunteers. And not the sort of people that put themselves out there for criticism. They're doing me a favor. They're doing the viewers a favor, by lending their expertise and, and knowledge. And suddenly they're exposed to this this harsh world. And you know, I can accept, I can accept that myself. If someone wants to say that I'm a terrible filmmaker or a bad person or have a big nose. So I'm rubbish. I have to accept that I know I've chosen. I've chosen this world, but these other people, I don't think they've chosen it to the same degree. And I feel quite protective of them. Yeah. And it's, it has just very recently reached a tipping point for me, where I'm no, I'm no longer willing to accept it. And particularly with the new comment system and a few other things that have been going on, like it's just become

this become very vicious towards these volunteers. And, you know, so, you know, I can accept if someone says, I disagree with your argument, or I think you made a factual mistake or if they start saying things that are personally offensive or racist, or, you know, or sexual against these volunteers, and I can't police it, you know, I can't police it all because there are so many videos I've just had enough. And so just recently I've I'm experimenting with having the comments to approval, which is a huge rod for my back. I remember when I met with the guys that did the Sesame Street YouTube videos, they do the same thing. Because obviously, lots of kids are on those sites and I'm very aware that schools use my videos to the I don't want the top comment to be some racist attack against the person who's in the video. So I've been experimenting with approving them, and it takes me loads of time. And I'm not particularly sensors in terms of you know, if someone doesn't like the video, like, I'll just take I'll prove that. If they liked the video, I'll check it if they but if they being abusive, you know, I can't have it anymore. Because it also some of these people in the videos, you know, I'm reading it and they've become scared to read the comments. Yeah, because of you know, they're saying Now I won't even look at the comments now it's too hurtful. And I don't want that to happen. I want them to go into the comments so they can enjoy the praise, or they can look at the constructive criticism and think about it. And, you know, I've always really prided the comments section under my videos as a place where debate goes on, you know, it can be it can be vigorous debate, but, you know, a healthy place, and I like the people in the videos to go in there too. And at least read it. Some of them actually engage with it and write comments too, but at least read it and, and be part of it. So those people writing the comments don't feel like they're talking to the void. But it got to a point where that just wasn't feasible anymore. So I've had to, I've gone down this approval route as an experiment for now. And I've never been able to go to the people in my videos and say, Don't worry, don't worry, don't be scared of going into the comments anymore. If someone writes something that is hurt rific I'll try to you know, I'll try to stop. Yes. And if some and, you know, I know we live in a world where free speech is greatly valued, and I greatly value free speech as well, but they can go and do their free speech somewhere else free, not on a video and page that I've created, you know? Yeah. And I'm giving the administration rights that page for various reasons. And you know, if they want to, if they want to have their free speech and say something vicious and horrible about some poor academic who's volunteered their time, go and do it on your own page. Don't don't don't ride the audience that have come to see a video that we've created.

Grey 1:23:40 Yeah, I mean, I would guess, you know, this is this is a function of audience size. Yes. Right. And so obviously, like as as your videos have gotten more popular, and you have more people subscribed, you can do nothing but expect the average comment quality to go down. It's like It's like a mathematical function like you're almost guaranteed that that is going to be the case that as you widen the pool the discussion quality drops. And you know, when like you say when you bring in some third party who is not necessarily used to that it can be a very upsetting experience and I do think that you know, at least for for YouTube, you know, don't read the comments is not is not is not bad advice and it's partly because the barrier to commenting is much lower you know, so it is it is easier and yeah, it just you're I don't know about you approving the comments because my my only guess is that is your as your channel continues to grow. That fundamental underlying math is not going to be any different. Yeah, right. And like your maybe it's just handleable now, but anyway, It's not it's not I

Brady 1:25:01 mean, okay, I need to work on some different solutions. And there are Yeah, there are filters and things you can put in place, but it's just a temporary experiment while I figure out how to protect these people I care about.

Grey 1:25:12 And and the thing, the thing that is the tricky thing with feedback was to get his advice for anybody who makes up on the internet. This is this is advice, like, probably the best advice that I can give about negative feedback, and particularly aggressively negative feedback, but also sometimes the most hard to hard to follow through with it is just do not engage, right you have you have nothing to gain from engaging with extremely negative commenters. But it is also just so, so hard not to do. And I yeah, I don't want to go into any details about what you said like I ran into A very negative commenter on Reddit recently who doesn't like me for personal reasons, you know, doesn't know me but like, you know just hates me. And like, Man, you just want to respond but I literally had to sit there and think like do not engage do not engaged right you have nothing to gain from this except losing your time. But it is it is very frustrating and and i i can see sometimes on the internet that like little little conversations unfold where people will wonder like, oh, why hasn't this prominent person responded about this particular this particular attack on them? And it's like, because the correct answer is do not engage like you just you can't win fighting never start a land war in Asia. Yeah, yeah, that's exactly yeah,

Brady 1:26:47 that's what I say about it.

Grey 1:26:48 Yeah, yeah. And and like negative and or crazy comments are like a land war in Asia right like, oh, you're not you're not gonna win on this one. Right. There's there's there's no way There's no way to come out.

Brady 1:27:01 Yeah, I mean, there are there are lots of reasons to not engage like. One is, you know, it just validates someone who you shouldn't really be validating. Yeah. And but also, like, there's there a stranger. And they, there are lots of people in your life who are important, who should get your time or your light bulbs or whatever you want to give them. But, and there are people who you shouldn't. And they're also they don't know, they don't know you. They don't know anything about you. And you've just got to remember, they're strangers. That's what I always get told. So, whether they're saying whether they're saying you're great and you make the best videos in the world, or they're saying you're terrible, and you're rubbish, and they hate your guts, both of those people they don't know and are not that great. You're not you're not as good as they say, and you're not bad. It's bad as they say, and you just gotta just keep doing What you doing doing what you enjoy?

Grey 1:28:01 Yeah, yeah, both of those both of those. Both those comments are definitely true that you are not as awesome or as terrible as people say. But it is it is so hard not to read, read the comments sometimes but you know, I do I do value feedback and hearing what people have to say, yes, you know, sort of in particular circumstances and that's why I use Reddit so heavily. For me that works really well and it's a really to see

Brady 1:28:29 is a really good thing about a job that we get. We get the level of feedback we do, like a lot of people do jobs and no one ever tells them anything about whether they like what they're doing or don't like what they're doing. And we are lucky and we'll sit here winching because it comes with a It comes with a sting in the tail. But overall, overall, I quite like it. I will say one other thing about comments though that just popped into my head. Yeah, drives me crazy. Tell me Brady and that that is inevitably Things will come up in a video like, say, a mistake or something that kind of needs, something that needs addressing or something that someone's noticed. And you There is nothing you could do to stop people commenting on that. If, if you like, clarify something with an annotation, will you write something in the description, or you write a bunch of comments in the comment section yourself to say, look, I realized that this isn't clear or something, you will still have hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people pointed out as if no one else has pointed it out. Like they just saying it and written it. And it does make me wonder what percentage of people who write comments, even glance at the video description, or the other people's comments before they write something? It might even be a mistake. It might be what is the piece of music you used, that you wrote a comment about and everyone else will say Oh, he's used this piece of music and you put it when you do everything you You can tell that people, it could be in the video burned into the video in big bold letters. And you still have hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people writing. What was the music? Or do you realize this is wrong or something?

Grey 1:30:12 You're wondering who these people are, but I know that I have done this myself. I have definitely sometimes left a comment on something. Only seconds later to see that it was in the description or something. I just feel like a total idiot.

Brady 1:30:26 I would never I would never. I probably do it all the time. But I would be reluctant to write a comment and put something into writing until I've checked.

Grey 1:30:34 Yeah, that it's not available. Maybe, maybe maybe you're not as reactionary as the internet. Right. Let the keyboard fly like Hey, buddy, what's this? Like? All right. You told me three seconds later. Okay. I was just looking as a as a final thing here. Right. I'm looking at our our feedback on our own podcast and our star ratings follow exactly. What I was saying before Yeah, so we have at this point 295 five star ratings.

Brady 1:31:07 Wow, that sounds impressive.

Grey 1:31:09 It does sound I don't have any sense of how now I you know, I like that I have no idea what that but that's an opportunity five five star ratings. And then we have three one star and even just looking at that, right, it's like we have no three star ratings and five four star ratings

Brady 1:31:29 but do you know the only ones I want to read or what the three star ones? That's what I want to read. I want to know what they said.

Grey 1:31:37 That is exactly yeah, right. Like I'm looking at this and like your mind you cannot help it but like my mind is totally drawn immediately to those three one star ratings like what did that person have to say? And

Brady 1:31:53 it's like when you're booking a holiday like it's some amazing resort in the Maldives and it has 10,005 star reviews and One star review. Yeah. And you read the one star review. And they say the service was terrible, terrible. And there were rats. And you're like, Well, I'm not going there. There's no way I'm going to that resort. Thousands of people who were yeah said it was the most wonderful place they've ever been.

Grey 1:32:13 Oh, I almost forgot. I almost got I just want to mention this before we before we sign off. This is the thing that the thing that got me started about this whole topic, I forget until the absolute very end. But going back to what you were saying the beginning how you have to trust your own judgment about something. I was looking at the comments for this podcast, and this happened to be on YouTube. So I was curious to see what everybody had to say. And the favorite thing that I came across was two comments, one that was right after another. And so it's this is on on YouTube, and the first one is from a guy called toxis. And he complains his or I should say his suggestion is that he doesn't like the podcast because we don't let the conversation flow naturally. And you know, we're still strictly to our theme, what's his feedback? He doesn't like it. Because we're student to strictly sticking to the theme. Well, he would love today's episode. Yeah. Immediately after, there's a user called unpronounceable. And he has the exact reverse feedback, right? He doesn't like it, because we're just talking about whatever. And you should really have some kind of centralizing theme, right to focus the discussion. And this is, this is the kind of thing that can just drive you crazy on the internet is, is but I love it. I love it that they're literally one right after the other feedback going in just completely opposite direction. I'm a little screengrabs. When that happens,

Brady 1:33:39 I collect some comments. I didn't discuss this actually, but I collect some comments for various reasons. One of the main reasons is I often go and give talks to people about YouTube and having a having a nice collection of comments could embed is, you know, quite good for PowerPoint presentations. But whenever I see two side by side like that, I like to Keep them as little like little twin primes or something. They're nice little little treasures. When two people say exact opposite things back to back, you'll find that happens a lot when I do the polarizing videos like something different, like a song or something like that. Yeah, you get this is the best video I've ever seen on the internet. Followed by this is the worst piece of trash.

Grey 1:34:21 You're saying. Yeah, should die. Yeah, those, those pairs are just great. And so we have we have one of those for this one. Excellent. It is. It is both too structured, and not structured enough. Which is why you have to you have to make decisions about what do we how do we fix that? What do we do now? Well, well, here's what I'm going to do right now some and this is also this is also kind of plan I have left us this to last for a very reason. Right? So we have a bunch of reviews from different countries around the world. And so here's the list of places where we have gotten reviews. It's Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Mexico, the Netherlands. Norway, Poland, Saudi Arabia, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States. So what I would like, is to get more different countries. I this is This to me is like, Pokemon, right? Like you got to catch them all. I would love to eventually, at some point, have a review from every one of the countries. Yeah, where this podcast can be heard. So if you're hearing if you're hearing the sound of my voice right now, and if you like this podcast, which if you have listened this long, you must like this podcast. And if you are listening this long and you don't like this podcast, I'm very worried. But I'm going to assume anybody who has listened this long, by definition has to be enjoying this podcast. And you are from one of the places that I have not mentioned, I would really like you to go leave a review in iTunes,

Brady 1:35:52 even if it's a one star.

Grey 1:35:55 I'm assuming that people who have listened this long are going to leave positive reviews

Brady 1:36:00 I should have put a review in when I was in Vietnam.

Unknown Speaker 1:36:04 You should have Yes, I guess I'm not sure how that works. That's okay. Okay. But anyway, just out there.

Brady 1:36:09 Great has spoken.

Grey 1:36:11 So I want to see, I want to see if we can collect all and I can't. Unfortunately, I can't just tally up how many countries there are. And of course, my own video on the number of countries means it's ambiguous anyway. But there are a bunch of places. So if you can hear my voice and you were not, or you are in a place that was not mentioned, I would love it if you left a review. And maybe next time, I'll follow up and see how many additional places we have gotten since that last time. But I'm gonna say I think this has been long enough, my friend,

Brady 1:36:38 I think other I feel like I didn't ask enough questions, and I spoke too much. But I'll, I'll do more questions next time.

Grey 1:36:45 No, it's good. It will be chatting. But you know what people will complain both ways, will get feedback that people loved it and feedback that people didn't like it. And I guess we'll just have to make some judgments about that. See you later. All right, talk again. Bye bye.

Episode List

References

  1. ↑ "H.I. #4: Feedback on Feedback". Hello Internet. Hello Internet. Retrieved 27 September 2017. 
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