Hello Internet - H.I. #94: Video of Meaninglessness

Episode Date: December 22, 2017

Grey and Brady discuss: Mr Chomper's parallel universe, Hello Internet medals of honor and the Tims in general, Brady in Australia and everything you might imagine that involves, childrearing in our connected world, all the things one could know about Santa Claus, hot towels on planes, and YouTube Rewind. Sponsors: Backblaze: Online backup for your business - 15 day free trial Videoblocks: Get all the stock images, video, and audio you can imagine for $149 Squarespace: start building your website today with a free fourteen day trial and 10% off first purchase Listeners like YOU on Patreon Show Notes: Discuss this episode on the reddit Adorable Audrey on Instagram Blondi HI Medal of Honor Derby cordoned-off Christmas tree Pierson's Puppeteers Sir Martyn thanks the Tims HI Hoodie HI Hoodies at The Oval Test cricket Don Bradman's Duck Adelaide Oval Brady meets Tims at the Mighty Black Stump Black Stump hotstoppers Mighty Black Stump vs Telstra House Santa Clause Does Santa Exist?: A Philosophical Investigation YouTube Rewind 2017 Emma Blackery: YouTube Rewind The Truth Mile of Pi

So, Gray, do you know how I know you've changed? How do you know that I've changed? Well, moments before we started this call, I received a message from you, which was a video of you picking up a Mr. Chomper's dog poo. Yeah, as requested. As requested. And I was like, I was looking at that going, he's changed. And then the FaceTime call happens, up you pop on my screen, and there you are cuddling Mr. Chompers. Mr. Chompers is in the house right now. Sadly, I can't have him here

while I'm recording because the chomping sounds would overwhelm everything. He's really into his chew bones. It would literally be just the background of the entire podcast. And you think people wouldn't like that? I think it would be distracting. I think that people wouldn't like that. So he's currently in the other room being looked after by my wife. And he's a very sleepy dog because he had a huge walk through the park today. So he's chilling out right now in the next room. I have to say I'm impressed by Mr. Jumper's cuteness. I would say he's approaching 80 to 90% of Audrey cuteness. Oh, wow.

Okay. Is that how you measure dog cuteness? You know, only asymptotically approach one Audrey for cuteness? Is that how that works? Yeah. It can't ever actually be reached, but you know. But dogs can get closer and closer to one Audrey of cuteness. He's pretty cute.

He may lose a bit of that as he gets a bit bigger, but he's still quite a sight. Yeah, he's adorable. But they do grow up so fast. No, not if you've got an Audrey. It's true. She does not change in size, but they de-puppy so fast. That's true. I look into his little Mr. Chomper's face, and even just over the weeks that I've known him, I can see that he's getting a little bit more jowly in his face, right? Where it's like, oh, your puppy face is becoming just a

bit more jowly as you get older. He's still super adorable. I think the same thing about you sometimes. I think we all get more jowly as we age. It's like, well, you're getting a squeeze now, little guy. Like that's what's happening, right? A little squeeze, maybe a little kiss on the head. It's nothing but pure affection for Mr. Chompers. You put your mouth on him. Yeah. Wouldn't you kiss a dog, Brady? Not on the mouth, obviously, because that's fucking disgusting when people do that. That is vile, right? That is absolutely vile. And I have to say, as cute as Mr. Chompers is, he would be quite high on the list of dogs I would not want to kiss on the mouth. There's one of these things where it's a bit like having a baby where they do like a gross thing and

you feel like the parents are always like, oh, but it's my baby, so it's less gross. Mr. Chompers does have this habit of sneezing right into my face. And sometimes I can sense that it's coming like a split second before it's about to happen. you can see like he's he's like a snouty dog with a huge mouth when he sneezes right in your face it is so gross it's really gross it is not a light delicate sneeze it's disgusting but no a little a little kiss on the top of the head for mr chomper's yeah that's perfectly fine that's nice but like people who do dog kisses on the mouth disgusting sharing ice cream with a dog gross right don't do Don't do that. That's revolting. You got any more Mr. Chomper stories to share? What's been going on? What's the latest?

Well, I mean, here's the thing, Brady. You said I have changed. I don't think I have changed at all. I'm still the same person. But I do feel like I've fallen into an alternate universe version of London because we've been training Mr. Chompers to be better at walking. Walking, not his strongest suit. Right. He can be very stubborn and just sort of sits there. But he's gotten much better.

And in the past 10 days, we can now take him on real little walks. Like, well, we're walking through the park and he's coming along and he's doing great. But now this means we're in our local park and there are neighborhood dogs here. Well, Mr. Chompers is one of them. Yeah, Mr. Chompers is totally one of the neighborhood dogs. And there's a thing that which I think I've mentioned before,

I think is fantastic, which is in London and I think almost every single park, dogs are just allowed off the leashes, which is fantastic. I think it's the way that it should be. Dogs just can like run wild and crazy in the park. And this actually, going to some of the themes of the show, I think is a perfect case where things are more safe when they seem less safe. Like, so by having all of the dogs off of the leashes, they're just fine. Like they're just running around doing what they want and they don't really interact with people. And there is a way that dogs, when they're on leashes,

the very fact that they're on a leash can sort of agitate them into more aggressive behavior. So I think it's better for everybody when the dogs are off the leashes and they're just like running around. I agree with that. The sort of the natural order of things can be done. Whereas if they're on a leash as well, you know, dogs can't run and move in the ways that they need to in sort of dog world. And it's also like, like when we're sort of training Mr. Chompers about how to be polite in his interactions with other dogs, like because he's still a little bit too young, we are keeping him on the leash, but it's very clear to see that there's a way in which like,

if we don't notice that a dog is coming and he sort of jumps, that the tugging of the leash will like amp him up. Whereas if you just have him sit down and sort of put him into sitting position, then he's very calm and everything's fine. But it's like, the leash can aggravate some dog behavior. But anyway, all of this is to say, when you're in the park, and dogs are not on leashes, and this is just the way they are, dogs, they don't care at all about humans, right? They're too busy doing their own dog affairs. You know, they're up to whatever they are up to. And in the years that I have lived in London and the years that my wife and I have walked through the local park, we can count on one hand the number of times a dog has come up to us to say hello. And almost always it has been a little puppy dog, right? But now that we are

walking a little puppy dog, all the dogs come up to us, right? So it's like I am getting to meet all of the neighborhood dogs. And it feels like I have this subjective feeling like there are 10 times as many dogs in the city as there ever have been. Of course, the number hasn't changed, but I'm just supremely aware of all of them. And it's like everywhere I go, I'm walking little Mr. Chompers and like, oh, and we're meeting all of these other dogs. It's like, oh, hello, how are you? Right. And you like find out the dog's name and doing little chit chats with them. So it's like, I live in a completely different city when I go out walking with Mr. Chompers. It is a

city that is filled with dogs who want to interact in a way that they just never did before. So it's like a whole new world for me. I bet you're like me too, where you just, the humans are almost filled with dogs who want to interact in a way that they just never did before. So it's like a whole new world for me. I bet you're like me too, where you just, the humans almost don't exist to you. I always have conversations with my wife and she'll be like, oh, did you see, you know, Jenny at the park? And I'm like, Jenny, who the heck's Jenny? And she'll be, you know, the one with the white dog with the fluffy tail. Oh yeah, I know that dog. Yeah. Yeah. I had no idea who the person is. It's all like dogs with like just a human attached that you're vaguely aware of. It's like the human is

just the metadata for the dog that you can interrogate. What's the dog's name? How old is it? Everything. And like, okay, you've given me the information I need. Let's get back to the dogs. 100%. And what I absolutely love is that it seems like everybody has this agreed upon social convention. So you're exchanging dog names, but no joke in the last week, I probably met a hundred dogs, right? How many of those humans have told me their name? Zero, right? How many of those humans do I want to know their name? Zero, right? How many of those humans have I told my name to? Zero. How many of those humans have we had a little conversation about, oh, what do you do for work, right?

None of them. It is the best human interaction that there can possibly be. Yeah. And talking about the dogs, I find myself genuinely interested in every one of these conversations where we're talking about like their dog's funny little habits with whatever this thing is. Or like we're meeting some dog, like what's his favorite toy? How does he do things?

How long has he been in the park? Who are his doggy friends, right? Like Mr. Chompers got invited to a doggy Christmas party and was like, oh, this is fantastic, right? Like everything is great here. So I'm absolutely 100% enjoying this alternate universe London where I get to meet dogs. And I also feel really bad because I'm terrible at remembering human names. But now I feel like I walk through the park and I know all the dogs'

names, right? Like I recognize every single one of them. Like, oh, I know who that dog is, right? I've met that dog a few times before. It's just such a funny, different experience that has completely changed a local environment for us. We have an extra weird scenario where we have a dog walker who sometimes walks Audrey and Lulu when we're away or we're too busy and things like that. And that person walks lots of dogs and goes to lots of other different places around where we live. So Audrey and Lulu know all these other dogs that we don't know and meet all these other people that we don't know. And sometimes we'll be out walking and we'll come across someone and a dog who we've never met before. And we'll go to introduce ourselves, but they will already know

everything and the dogs will be wagging their tails. And the owners will say, oh yeah, we know Audrey and Lulu. Like, you know, we've met them loads of times. And my wife and I are like, oh, okay. We're like the pariahs that no one knows, but our dogs are like famous. I am in that position though, right? Because Mr. Chompers is not my dog. And twice now, I've had someone else recognize, they go, oh, that's Mr. Chompers, right? And so these dogs have already met at some point, right? When I haven't been around. And it's a very funny situation. I'm not quite sure how to describe my relationship to Mr. Chompers. It's like, we are some neighbors who talked our way into looking

after this adorable puppy. I haven't quite figured out like, what is the condensed way to describe this situation? You're an unpaid professional dog carer. That's essentially what it is, right? Yeah. It is funny sometimes to run into the professional dog walkers, who will have a pack of like 10 dogs. And sometimes some of them will know Mr. Chompers there'll be a little a little stop and a little talk and it does through the course of the conversation i can see the other person realizes like okay so you're just walking somebody else's dog for free you're you're a scab yeah exactly like you're undercutting the market here you jerk like what are you what are you doing like let me get that straight this is not your dog

you're just walking him for free like yep that's what i'm doing okay i have a question for you there brady and i'm curious to answer this question because i have a feeling like maybe this is the thing i'm going to run into more in london when you talk about the human as dispensing the metadata that is related to the dog. How often does the human tell you the dog's Instagram account? I'm about to be shamed here. I can feel it. Because I have been known to mention Audrey's Instagram account. Right, right. No, Audrey does have an Instagram account, but I'm not trying to shame you. I'm just, I guess because your dog does have an Instagram account. How many times has somebody

ever mentioned to you first? It's never come the other way. No one's ever told me that, but I'm not in London, which is a bit more posy, you know, I'm in a less posy place. So it's a lot less likely that a dog will have an Instagram account where I live than where you live. So I'm the flash git whose dog has an Instagram account and a Facebook page. But it's never come the other way for me. And to be fair, you are like an internet person who makes a living at this. So for you, the additional marginal effort to be running an Instagram account for your dog is not

as high as it would be for somebody else who isn't making a living on the internet all day long doing this stuff anyway. Thank you. I legitimately do give you a total pass on this. Adorable Audrey, by the way. Adorable underscore Audrey. Go and check it out. How many followers does she have on Instagram? On Instagram? That's a good question. My wife actually runs the Instagram account. Oh, does she? Which annoys her no end because people always leave comments saying, nice one, Brady.

I run the Facebook page. Okay, that's the division of labor here. She has 5,000 followers. Okay, all right. So she's not mega. Apparently, it's 10,000 before people will even consider doing brand deals with you. So she's a long way from even getting brand deals on Instagram. She's not an influencer because I was recently with some Instagram influencers and they told me 10,000 is when you can start to be

considered an influencer on Instagram. Let's put a pin in that and come back to that because I want to return to this idea of Instagram influencers. But in the meantime, this is a thing that did catch me completely off guard because it doesn't happen a ton, but it happens enough. I feel like I'm getting a sense in advance when I'm meeting a dog that I'm going to be told an Instagram account. Yeah. I feel like there's a type of person who has a dog Instagram account. Thanks. account yeah i feel like there's a type of person who has a dog instagram account thanks and you are far outside of that realm but it does catch me off guard because i'll meet a dog and the owner will say something like oh yes hi this is princess anastasia she has 9 000 followers on instagram

it's like item number two like like they're canvassing for the dog in the park. I never really expected this. Like in retrospect, I guess it makes sense. But I find it funny that there is a significant enough like social media presence for dogs in the local park in London. For some reason, I cannot quite get over that. And I'm not sure how to react to it. For some reason, I cannot quite get over that. And I'm not sure how to react to it. But without a doubt, I think it is very much biased towards fancier looking dogs. Dogs that look fancy and fluffy, they are way more likely to have Instagram accounts. I have yet to meet a Rottweiler with an Instagram account. But I have met a significant number of fluffy or beautiful purebred dogs with Instagram accounts.

Well, that's to be expected, isn't it? I mean, maybe they're just the ones that are successful on Instagram. So that's why their owners are out there plugging their dogs. Does Mr. Chompers have an Instagram? I don't know if he has a real life Instagram. I don't think he does. I haven't asked. There could be a whole other aspect to Mr. Chompers' life you don't know about. Well, I mean, but there are many aspects to Mr. Chomper's life that I don't know about. Mr. Chomper's life, I wonder from his perspective, what is it like? Because he spends... God, you're turning into a proper dog person.

I'm on holiday and I'm just thinking, what are Audrey and Lulu doing right now? What do they think of their holiday home? How do they see things? How do they think? I always wonder how dogs think. I would pay a considerable amount of money just to be able to read my dog's minds. I just want to know what they think. Drives me crazy that I'll never know. And I know they're animals and I know animals are animals and they don't think like us, but I just wish I knew more about their brains. Okay. People say that thing, right?

Oh, it's an animal is an animal and like don't anthropomorphize the animals. And it's like, I get where you're coming from, but I really do think that dogs are an exception to this. There is no species that has co-evolved with humans over a longer period of time that has also co-evolved in a way that is beneficial to the survival of both of the species. Like I think if any creature is able to think like humans, like dogs have to be at the top of that list, aside from the things that are basically like genetically us. So I'm perfectly fine with anthropomorphizing the dog and thinking that the dog has things in its head that we could recognize as feelings or emotional states. I hope that's true.

Like a thing that has happened with Mr. Chompers is that he's gotten... Stop laughing, Brady. You're that guy. You're like me. I don't know what you mean, I'm that guy. I'm like you. We're having a podcast here. We need to talk about things. And I want to talk about Mr. Chompers. I hope you mean, I'm that guy. I'm like you. We're having a podcast here. We need to talk about things.

And I want to talk about Mr. Chompers. I hope you're really comfortable in that seat. Because I can talk about Mr. Chompers for all day long. It feels like you already have. Oh, that hurts, Brady. That hurts real deep. I'm loving it. I'm loving it.

We've got to organize a Mr. Chompers Audrey play date. We do. We do have to organize that. I doompers Audrey play date. We do. We do have to organize that. I do actually have people taking planes to visit me and they're making sure that they're scheduling it on Mr. Chompers days because people want to meet Mr. Chompers. They're like, oh, it's great to come and see you, but I want to make sure I'm there on a Chompers day. I don't want to come on a non-Chompers day. That's no good. You're clearly a more sociable creature when Mr. Chompers is involved. We've established that already.

You're far more chatty and personable. Again, it's the positive mood buffs from dogs. That's what's happening. I think it's the love. Yeah, it's the love. Who doesn't love doggies? Everybody loves doggies. Except monsters, as we've established before.

Monsters don't love dogs. I think even monsters love dogs a little bit. Hitler had a dog. I'm sure he loved that dog. He did. What was it called? Was it called Susie, his dog? It had some funny name. I think it was Blondie. Blondie, that's it. I feel like this is like a pub trivia question. I think it was Blondie. I don't know. Okay. In my head,

I'm just assuming it was a German shepherd. I have no idea. It might've been like a Yorkie poo. I don't know if those existed at the time, but I think Hitler probably had a meaner looking dog. Blondie has her own Wikipedia page. Oh, is it Blondie? Was I right about that? You were right, but just Blondie with an I on the end. It does it like it was a German shepherd. It was a German shepherd. Blondie with an I. Oh God, that's embarrassing, Adolf. It was a gift as a puppy. Hitler was reportedly very fond of Blondie, keeping her by his side and allowing her to sleep in his bed

in the bunker oh see i don't agree with that i don't agree with that behavior you shouldn't let the dog in your bed yeah oh that's the other thing like that i wanted to mention here which i find myself doing this thing which is becoming very judgmental of the way other people interact with the dogs right it's like 100 percent this parental kind of thing of like oh i don't think you've you've raised your dog very well or like oh you think you're a dog person but you're not really a dog person you don't know how i can just i can see what you and your wife are like you're these people who think they're like the authority on like dog rearing and like it's your way or the highway no i don't agree with that at all like there are many different ways to do it but i just think there's like i'll give an example it's just that all the other ways are wrong no no

no it's not that at all i'm gonna back this up right i'm gonna bring up the thing which is like the slightly controversial thing which is again, again, Cesar Millan. This is the TV dog training guy for people who don't know who he is. Yeah, sorry. He's a TV dog training guy. Yeah. Now, when you say like it's our way or it's nothing, I think I really disagree with that because like what we haven't done with Mr. Chompers, hardly at all as things like tricks, right? Teaching him to sit, teaching him to lay down, doing that kind of stuff, right?

That's a very particular kind of training that he's still a little young for anyway. And like, there are a bunch of different ways that you can try to do that. They're all based off of positive reinforcement. But like, there are very many ways that you can do stuff. When I'm talking about like a judgmental thing, what I mean is, and what I think is like, the Cesar Millan kind of controversy is this idea about, like, what is your emotional state when you're interacting with a dog? Like, that's the thing that he tries to convey with his methods of dogs. Like he's never really talking about how to get your dog to roll over, right?

Or how to do specific behaviors. He's talking about like this meta thing about how do you interact with a dog? And I think that's just a really, really key skill that some people have and some people don't. I'll give you an example. Like what am I judgmental about? Mr. Chompers was out in the park and this little kid came up to Mr. Chompers, this adorable tiny tot.

She came up to Mr. Chompers and she wanted to interact with him. And we said, okay, right? Because we're socializing him. And she was great because she looked at us. She looked at us, the owners, from her perspective of the dog and said, is he a biting dog? Right?

Like, oh, kid, I love you already. Right? You have the concept that some little dogs are going to be biting dogs. Right? Like, you're so far ahead. And so I'm looking at this kid and like, okay, great. I like you already, kid. And she said, oh, yeah, so go ahead.

You can interact with Mr. Chompers. And I was also looking at her because she was covered head to toe in an adorable kid puffy snow outfit that obstructed her movement. Like she had immunity to accidental piercing damage. Like there is no way that even if Mr. Chompers were to bite that he would do any damage to this kid. And he's gotten a million times better about this. So he doesn't bite very much at all. And so like Mr. Chompers and this little kid, they had a nice little interaction, right? She was squealing with joy and playing around like, oh, great,

this is perfect. And then we walk on, not five minutes later, we run into a guy who's like, oh, can I interact with Mr. Chompers? And he does the thing, which some people who own dogs do the thing where when they interact with the dog, they're like riling the dog up. There's like a play style where you're making the dog more excited, which then brings out bad behaviors in the dog. And so this guy was wearing gloves and he immediately starts like kind of roughhousing with Mr. Chomper's head. And so I can see like Mr. Chompers is getting excited. And then Mr. Chompers grabs onto the glove and the guy starts playing like a fun tug of war game now with Mr. Chompers. And it's like, and then he starts growling. It's like, oh no, dude, like that's the thing that I mean that I'm judgmental about is like this very clear thing about bringing the energy up or bringing the

energy down. And it's like, hey, buddy, we met like a two and a half year old kid who was a million times better with dogs than you two seconds ago. Like you just don't know how to do it. And then sure enough, he's talking about like he owns a dog and his dog is a total terror. And all I'm thinking of is like, of course your dog's a total terror. Like if you're interacting with this dog this way, like you must be doing this with your dog at home. So like you're the fault here, not the dog. I'm basically making like a parental complaint about people who don't know how to handle dogs. But like, that's a very, very separate thing from how do you have a show winning dog who can do a bunch of great tricks like on command, like that's not the skill that I'm talking about.

I'm just talking about a more general skill that I think is super important, but that I can see a bunch of people who have dogs, they just don't think about. They amp up dogs when they don't mean to. Anyway, this is me being a big Mr. Chomper's parent. Do you know how Blondie died? I have no idea how Blondie died. They tested a cyanide capsule that Hitler thought might not work properly on the dog. So they gave a cyanide capsule to the dog and killed it of poisoning. And then apparently Hitler became inconsolable after he ordered the dog be given the cyanide pill. Well, I don't think Hitler was in a proper state of mind. I don't think you would have approved of Hitler's dog rearing skills there,

giving cyanide pills to the dog. No, two thumbs down. Two thumbs down to Hitler dog raising skill, that's for sure. This episode of Hello Internet is brought to you by Backblaze. Now, you've heard me talk about Backblaze before. It's the unlimited backup program for Mac and PC that, if you're listening, you're crazy to not have installed on your computer. You've heard this from me before. But what I haven't talked about before is that Backblaze is not just for individuals. Backblaze is also for businesses.

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backblaze.com slash hellointernetbiz. And if you're not a business, if you are just an individual who needs your data backed up, which is every one of you listening who doesn't have Backblaze installed, then just still use the regular URL backblaze.com slash hellointernet. And there you will get a 15 day trial. Thanks to Backblaze for supporting the show. And thanks to backblaze.com slash hellointernet. And there you will get a 15 day trial. Thanks to Backblaze for supporting the show. And thanks to Backblaze for protecting everyone's data, whether it be individuals or businesses. So I got a bit of feedback from previous episodes, a few little tidbits to deal with. Can I first just say, let me do this one first, because this is something that's been a long time in the making. Hello Internet Medals of Honor now exist. They have been struck.

There's a few of them here in my office. There's a few more in my famous storage unit. The first one or two are about to be engraved. News will follow in due course, but I just want people to know because a few people, including my co-host, I think have been a bit sceptical about whether I'd get them made. No, I've never expressed scepticism about this, Brady. Well, they're there. They're done. I posted a picture to our Patreon quite a while ago. So patrons probably have already seen a picture of the medal, but we'll share some more pictures soon in due course. But I just wanted it to be out there. I want people to know. You wanted to get it on the record that this is a real thing.

I want it on the record, but I don't want people to try and win them. These things are just given out as they're given and don't try and do anything stupid to win one. I don't want someone standing on top of the Burj Khalifa on one leg doing a base jump with a hello internet flag and they attempt to win one. And we're not going to reward stupidity or rash activities. It's an organic thing. I feel like it's a bit of a mixed message though, to have them exist. I agree, Gray. It is a mixed message. But one thing I've found over the course of watching Timage unfold is that wonderful things happen every week that warms our hearts. But I also think sometimes people like don't have like a filter.

Like they don't step outside themselves and think, should I even be doing this? Like, is this like a bad thing or a creepy thing or inappropriate? I think people sometimes get a bit lost in the moment and don't step outside themselves and think about what they're doing. And I don't want the existence of medals to exacerbate this problem. It's interesting, though, because it hadn't really crossed my mind until this moment. But I mean, this is not a thing just with our show, it's a thing that happens anytime a group starts to form some identity is a question of like, what are the actions that are acceptable within that identity? And yeah, you're right. I think there are people who can sometimes

think they're doing something that's interesting and it's like, oh no, that's a terrible idea, man. But I don't think there's any effective way really to express that ahead of time. Yeah, I guess. Yeah. Other than to say something that is pointless, and that is sometimes stop and think about what you're doing. Right. And think about what this would look like to other people. Yeah. Always with that kind of stuff. The problem is the people who would stop and think about what does this look like from the outside are not the people who would do those things, right?

It's like a Dunning-Kruger effect for actions in this way right so like of course the people who do things that are unacceptable are not the people who wonder if an activity is acceptable yeah i know but i guess so what you're saying here really is there is not going to be an escalating hierarchy of spectacle that these medals would be awarded for it's It's more like whimsy and good feeling is what we're going for here. They're not something that should be sought and there's not like a bar that you must exceed to get one. In fact, doing too much will probably exclude you from ever receiving one because it will make me like, it'll just freak me out a bit. That is a thing that is hard to express is the like when you do too much it becomes really uncomfortable yeah it's like nope nope i

can't reward this action no anyway i'm very glad that they're in existence and uh we'll be updating the audience as time goes on yeah we will i have a quick link for you, Brady, which is going under the heading in my mind of the expansion of no fun zones. The headline on this BBC news article you've sent me says, Derby cordoned off Christmas tree, an embarrassment. This excites me a bit because this is from the area of England that I used to cover when I worked at the BBC. So I could have been the person writing this article back in the day. Oh, yeah. It could have been your byline on this article. Well, there is no byline on it, but yeah, I could have written that.

Maybe a machine wrote it. I just want to put this in the show notes because someone passed this along to me. And it's a picture of this Christmas tree that is like the saddest looking Christmas tree in the world. Not because the Christmas tree isn't magnificent, but because, as the headline says, it's cordoned off by two concentric rings of gates to keep people away from the Christmas tree out of concerns about safety. In case it falls on someone or something. Yeah, in case it falls at someone, right? And the official statement from the council is that the barriers are there to enable people to view the tree at a safe distance. The tree looks like it's in prison.

Who at the meeting was like, we're going to have some Christmas cheer. Okay, but we need to have some barriers around the tree for imagined safety. And then on top of that, our statement is going to be about how the barriers enable people to view the tree at a safe distance. Like without the barriers, people being able to view the tree at a safe distance wouldn't be possible. That the barriers are simply enabling this thing to occur. It's just awful. And it just made me sad. And I think it's an example of a no fun zone elsewhere in the world. It's like, we're going to take a place and make sure like, oh,

Christmas fun in the town center. No, there's no fun that's going to happen here. You're going to view a tree at an appropriate distance and you're going to like it. It's pretty terrible. It looks pretty terrible. It's not a good look. Yeah, it's very sad. So no fun zones spreading across the world. It's funny because I think of you sometimes as a person who would like safety. You know, you're like a cautious guy. I know what you're saying. And it's like there's a science fiction series called Ringworld and had an alien species called the, I think it was Pearson's Puppeteers.

But the recurring thing about these aliens, which I just loved, was the whole species evolved from herd animals, from prey animals. And so they were obsessed with safety. And the interiors of all their spaceships had no sharp corners, right? Like in case they were falling, like they wanted to make sure they fell on a safe rounded corner. And it's like, I had a lot of sympathy for those aliens. Like, yeah, you know, why not be safe? The thing that bothers me is what I view this as, as like a kind of fake safety. I'm all in favor of more safety, right? The sooner we can get humans off the road, that's great.

The sooner we can stop people throwing coins into airplanes, that's even better. I'm all for real safety. But this kind of like keep people away from a Christmas tree safety is a thing that drives me crazy. That's like security theater at the airport. It's no real benefit, and I think it causes real harm. And it causes real harm in the name of a thing that I do want more of. So I think that's why this stuff hits me particularly hard and in a very frustrating way. It's giving safety a bad name. It is frustrating way. It's giving safety a bad name.

It is, Brady. It is giving safety a bad name. That's exactly right. Having just dissed the Tims a minute ago, can I now take a moment to thank them immensely for taking up the call to arms from the last episode and subscribing to my Periodic Videos YouTube channel so that we could reach a million subscribers before Sir Martin's birthday. Yeah, congratulations on that. Well, congratulations to the Tims who helped push us over the top. Really appreciate it. And we did get there before the professor's birthday. So that made him really happy. I just wanted to also point out, some of you may have seen, if you follow you know twittery stuff and all that I posted a picture of the professor holding a piece of paper saying

you know periodic table of videos 1 million thanks Tim's and he's like you know he printed it out and he's holding it up in one of those weird pictures that people post where they like you know hold a message to prove that the message is from them. Can I just say, I had absolutely nothing to do with this. I didn't know he was doing it. I didn't ask him to do it. He just emailed me and said, oh, look, I made this picture. So, you know, that was truly from his heart. But the interesting thing to me was, how did he know? Like he saw the spike in subscribers and I said, oh, I mentioned it on the podcast. And he was like, oh, like oh that's great thank you but how did he know what tims were so i spoke to him on the phone today and he told me that he received a birthday

card from someone i can't remember the person's name and it said dear professor happy birthday from whatever the person's name was and then they put in brackets i'm a tim and then they put in brackets, I'm a Tim. And then they wrote a few sentences underneath explaining what a Tim was on his birthday card. You know, we listen to, you know, Tims are what we call people who listen to the podcast and things like that. That's a very thorough Tim message. It was. And that's how the professor knew what a Tim was and what gave him the idea to make this thank you picture. Martin then asked me, why are they called Tims? I find that one of the more difficult

questions to answer about my work. Why people who listen to Hello Internet called Tims. Like, I know the answer, but it's just really hard to explain in a pithy way that makes sense. There's no pithy way about it. I think it's one of my favorite examples of an internet community selecting its own name. Like this is a thing that very much happened on its own. And a little bit of pulling back the curtain here was when this first started, I was not a fan of the audience having a particular name. I put on record before, like, I don't really necessarily like the ideas of internet communities and the names. Like, this is a thing that I once tried to do on my YouTube channel and then immediately regretted and never referenced again. And so

there's a period of time on the show where I was really trying to talk around the concept of Tim's or not encourage this at all. But it became so clear that this is a thing that the community was just embracing and loving. It eventually completely changed my mind on it because like this is so clearly something that everybody loves and it's fun. Like I'm just, I'm changing my mind on this and I'm going along with it.

But it's like, it is really a thing that took off on its own, especially at the beginning, zero encouragement on my part. The community did pick this for themselves. I agree. But yeah, so congratulations to Periodic Videos for reaching 1 million. What are you going to do with yet another golden play button? That's a good question. Where's it going? I mean, my thinking was I was always going to give it to

the chemistry department at the University of Nottingham, but I kind of like the idea of having one because I haven't got my number file one. You don't have any of the gold ones in your house? This is only my second gold. I've got a boatload of silvers. Yeah, I know you have a boatload of silvers, but in my head, I still feel like you have, if not a boatload, a bucket load of gold play buttons. This is only the second. Computer file should get one soon. Okay. So yeah, you quickly are approaching a bucket load of gold play buttons.

I wouldn't say that. But anyway, I don't know. I'll see what happens. We'll see what happens. Did I tell you about my trade? 60 Symbols won like a medal from the Institute of Physics. And it was a really cool medal. And like we won it as a group.

And after the night when we got given the medal, it was just taken home by someone at the university. And I don't know, I just, I'd never won anything for physics. And I really liked the medal. And I quite liked the idea of having it in my office. But you know, I didn't have any more right to say I should have it in my office than they did. But what I did have was the 60 symbol silver button. So I was able to go into the university a few weeks later with the silver button and like try and come up with a trade. And it was really like those complicated baseball trades where you trade two players and an amount of money and all this sort of stuff. Like we were coming up with the trade, like you can have the silver button and I'll have

the medal, but you can have the certificate that came with the medal. We were coming up with this whole elaborate deal over who got what, just because I wanted this medal. Right. You're trying to money ball your way to getting this medal in your office. That's what's happening. But it was a real negotiation. And the professor I was negotiating with said, oh, I don't think I can make this decision on my own and called in like another professor. And it was like this big conversation. It was quite fun actually.

Did you get it in the end? Is it in your office right now? I did get the medal. Like it's still joint custody, like everything is. But I'm the one who gets to look at it. And I do look at it. I quite like it. It's a nice medal.

It's that Kelvin medal. Oh, right. Right. Of course. Yeah. That's right. That's right. All the medals in Brady's office. If you make stuff like videos or podcasts or pretty much anything else,

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Go to VideoBlocks.com slash hello internet. That's a free trial. You can't ask for more than that. Videoblocks, all one word, dot com slash hello internet. There's also a link in the show notes. Our thanks to them for supporting this podcast. So you're back from Australia, Brady, just a couple of days ago, right? I'm just recently back, yes. I went over for various reasons to do with work and to do with family and friends. But the main reason and the main thing I was going over for, the main impetus was because I wanted to watch the Ashes test match between Australia and England at the Adelaide Oval, which I was very excited about.

Question. I'm sorry to do this right from the start only one question okay i know the ashes the ashes of a burnt up wicket yeah that the two countries trade back and forth that they whoever wins they hold on to the ashes there's a small little urn with the ashes of a piece of cricket equipment from back in the day yes this is correct right when you say test match though that makes it sound like it it's not the actual matches for the ashes it's a preparation for the ashes no that's not what it means okay what because like the test match just threw me that sounds like it's uh testing in my head reads as like the semifinals for the Ashes.

Like, I'm just a bit confused by what that word means. No, I think test in this context, you should think of as a test of your skill. Okay. A test of how good you are. There are different forms of cricket that can be played that have different durations and have slightly different rules. But the pinnacle of the game, the ultimate form of cricket is considered this five-day game, which is called a test match. And the contest for the Ashes, they play five consecutive test matches in different cities. And whoever wins the most

of those test matches will be the winner. So as we speak now, which will be out of date by the time this is published, the first two test matches were won by winner. So as we speak now, which will be out of date by the time this is published, the first two Test matches were won by Australia. So Australia is leading the series 2-0. If they win the third one, does it just stop because they get three out of five? No, they will have won the series, but they will continue playing the other two Test matches. Test matches are so important and significant that the fact that they are kind of dead rubbers doesn't mean you wouldn't play them. There's still a lot of kudos and a lot of interest. It's not like baseball, like at the World Series, where they'll just not play the other games. A test match is a big deal. But what can possibly be the big deal in a game when we already know who's going to get the ashes?

I don't understand. Like what happens? Winning a test match is still a very prestigious thing. And it's also very important to the players. It is less interesting. I'll grant you that. There is less at stake. There are literally no ashes at stake. The ashes will no longer be at stake if the series has already been decided. This is true.

But there is a big difference between winning a series 5-0 or 3-2. A 5-0 whitewash is very rare and something that people have a lot of interest in. Players still have to aggregate their stats, their batting averages or whatever. This is also a very important thing in cricket. And if you watch the second most recent Numberphile video that I made over in Australia, it is all about a really interesting story to do with cricket averages and statistics. In fact, I would like you to watch that video. It was the first cricket video I've ever made. And it's supposed to, I hope, be kind of understandable in some way to a non-cricket fan so they can come away from it and think, okay, I get why that's a big deal to you, even though I don't understand your silly sport.

You want me to be your test subject for the person who knows nothing about cricket? Well, I mean, it's too late for that. I've already released released it but i would like you to watch it i'd be curious to hear what you think of it but i feel like i know a lot about cricket i know about the ashes yeah uh i know about the running back and forth you know nothing i don't know i don't know anything i'm sorry i was just trying to like i know what it looks like on TV. Oh God, I've got nothing. I can't even fake it. I'm so sorry. Another thing I would dearly love to talk about with you, but I can't because you just have so little knowledge and little interest, is the new Adelaide Oval. It's such a big deal in Adelaide because Adelaide was famous for having

this really old fashioned cricket ground. Okay. This is like a new stadium. Is that what you're talking about? Basically, they've replaced this old fashioned quaint ground that was famous the world over for its beauty and looking like it was from another time with this new super space age, modern stadium. Right. Forgettable, sounds like. Well, it's been very good for Adelaide. Adelaide people love it and they love talking about it. And all they want to talk about is how much do you love Adelaide Oval? So, and they kept asking me, oh, Brady, this is your first time at Adelaide Oval. What do you think of it?

Isn't it magnificent? And you can imagine me being, you know, a bit of a traditionalist. I quite like the old one and I'm sad it's gone because I don't benefit week on week from having this great stadium. I just feel sad about the lovely old one that's gone. Whereas the people who live in Adelaide really benefit from having such a magnificent stadium. So they like it. It was a big talking point throughout my whole holiday.

Did the old one look good on TV? Like, could you tell it was the Adelaide Oval? Yes. The old one was really distinctive. And it was like a place people dreamed of going to watch cricket one day. Like every cricket fan in the world would say, I would love to go to the Adelaide Oval one day and watch a game of cricket. And now it is like lots of other really good modern stadiums. Yeah. It just looks like a modern stadium. Like it doesn't look like anything in particular.

You can't say that to Adelaide people, that they will have a series of comebacks to that. Okay. I'm talking to you, Adelaide people, right now. Your oval looks like a totally forgettable stadium. There you go. Enjoy that. You're going to hear lots of things about scoreboards and churches now, but anyway. Oh boy, I can't wait. I can't wait to set up a new mute filter on Twitter. If you Google old Adelaide oval, if you look carefully, you might notice a certain building in the background as well. Oh, yes. Yes. I can see a certain building in the background of that photo.

We'll come to that in a minute though. Okay. I didn't imagine that you took a trip to Australia and we're not going to hear about a certain building, but we'll get to that in a second. In that 2006 picture you just sent me, that white part on the right is new. The part on the left is the old part yeah okay i asked about it looking does it look distinctive on tv because i think that's the trade-off here right is yeah a thing that looks distinctive on television is actually like a real advantage to any place and like this is one of those things it's hard to pin down what exactly is the value of that. But having something that is iconic, is valuable to all of the people who don't live in

the place. Yeah. But the problem is what they've created now, even I have to concede is such a great amenity for the people of Adelaide. It's right next to the city centre. It now holds, you know, three times more people. It's really modern and easy to use. Because it's so big, they can now play Australian football in the stadium, which they couldn't before, which Adelaide people love. So now you can play Australian football right near the city centre instead of out in a distant location. So it's brilliant for the people of Adelaide.

It was the right decision. Good on you for having such a good, useful stadium. They've preserved some aspects of what was special about Adelaide Oval before. Not as many as Adelaide people think. They no longer have that thing that you'll see on TV though, and your heart will ache and you'll say, I need to go to that place one day. It's no longer really distinctive. And I'm sad to lose that, but hey, I'm just some guy who lives in England who maybe goes there once every few years. I'm more on your side than you might expect with this, because I think that this is a kind of saming of the world. It's like, oh, yeah, of course, like the new one is much better.

It's better because it's removed a bunch of distinct features and it's gone for the features that are the things that would in any city make a stadium better. And those number of things are not infinite in all directions. There's a subset of things that it's always going to make sense like, oh, here's what you would want for a perfect stadium in a city that all of the locals would agree is a perfect stadium. And that goes for just about anything. But I do think there is some intangible loss by not having something that is iconic for a particular location. But it doesn't change the fact that were I to live in Adelaide and were I to love cricket, I too would almost certainly be wanting a much better stadium for me to actually go to every time I watch cricket. Anyway, I did meet a few Tims at the Adelaide Oval,

two of whom were wearing Hello Internet hoodies, which was quite nice. So the new Hello Internet hoodies are making their way out into the world. They are. They are. They've made it all the way to Adelaide. Met a few people at the game, which was nice. Did a few selfies. Got me a lot of street credibility with my friends I was at the cricket with when people were coming up and having a photo taken with me. They were like, oh, wow, we didn't realize you were such a big deal. That's fantastic. That's fantastic. I didn't think about that. But so you feel like you're going back home and you're a big man on campus here. Like, oh yeah, I'm returning to Adelaide and everybody loves me. But I was with a big group of like 10 guys and I didn't know many of them.

And I was just some dude. So we were just sitting watching the cricket and stuff. So then when people came up and said hello and were having pictures with me, they suddenly looked at me in a new way. They were like, what do you do, man? What do you actually do? And that's when it gets complicated. And what's a Tim? Here we go again. Do you run through the whole story in that scenario?

I'm endlessly fascinated by this. Do you? I don't. No, I just brush it off as quickly as possible. So another interesting thing that happened around the cricket though, was there's a lot of English people go because English cricket fans are big travelers. So wherever England are playing cricket, you will find lots of English fans. So I was out and about in town a few times and at restaurants and cafes and things like that when the cricket wasn't on and a few

times i was talking to people and they would say you know what's going on and that and i'd say oh i've come for the cricket i'm enjoying the cricket and because like england were not doing well at certain stages they would say to me oh don't worry i think things will get better for you guys maybe later and i realized everyone i spoke to thought i was english and all my friends were saying yeah you're saying really english now i'm not i'm not here. I'm here for Australia. They're like, oh, we all thought you were an England fan. You sound really English. Well, I mean, before I say anything, how do you feel about that, Brady? Because I think this is a complicated question for you. I just don't think I sound English. I'm not like upset by it. If it happens, it happens. Or if

it's happened, it's happened. And it doesn't doesn't change my heart if you cut me i still bleed green and gold australia right but it does surprise me because over here people will say oh i thought you might be from australia when they talk to me so over here i stand australian so i'm obviously just in some middle ground obviously and you know some hybrid is your ear well trained enough to talk to me and think i sound like an englishman or an aussie i'll put it this way you have a very brady accent you sound to me like a brady you don't need to tread carefully here there's no no it's not that i'm trying to tread carefully it's just i think it's an interesting thing because one thing that i notice is if i am talking to people who listen to the show, like, let's say that they're not

careful listeners, overwhelmingly, people think that you are British. I would say almost exclusively, if they don't know particular facts about you, they just assume that you are British. And I think that your accent, the Australian-ness of your accent has been greatly softened by your time over here. I'm not surprised that what happens is when you go back to Australia, people think that you are English. Like when I used to teach English kids all day, I had this same effect when I went to America and I went to places where people didn't know me. There is no way an English person would confuse me for being an English person. But an American person was just hearing something that's different. And so then assuming

foreignness. And I think that's what's happening to you. It's not like you sound like the queen, but they're hearing something that's different. So they're assuming that you're not Australian. And then the closest thing that you map onto is sounding English. I think that's what's happening. Yeah. I mean, I have no doubt certain little things have changed, but I would have thought not enough that an Australian would say, oh, look, he's an English guy. But I hear what you're saying. It makes sense when you describe it that way. There's just slight little things that are throwing them. And therefore, they're just saying, must be a pom. That must just be some English accent I've never heard before from, you know, the northeast of England. I just think humans are extraordinarily

sensitive to in-group markers. And so I think that's what's happening. Like you just say some things a little bit different, and then it immediately marks you as like out group member so where is the place that this person is from i think that's all that's happening there okay so one of the things i did while i was over there was i took one of my bags of hello internet hot stoppers and i found my way to that mighty building the grenfell center, the mighty Black Stump. And I walked in and in like the lobby atrium, there's a cafe, which is recently under new management I learned. And the new manager has changed the name of the cafe to Black Stump Espresso, which I think also is vindication for anyone who says no one ever calls that building the Black Stump Espresso, which I think also is vindication for anyone who says, no one ever calls that building the Black Stump. Because sometimes I hear that, like people say,

oh, I spoke to my friend from Adelaide and I've never heard of the Black Stump or it's not called the Black Stump. So vindication, I say. You know what's going to happen, Brady, though, is that people are going to start saying, I think you're just confusing it with the coffee place that's inside that building. Anyway, I went up to the owner. It was just before opening time. And I said, look, I know this is going to sound a bit weird, but I told him my story. And I said, would he be willing to stock at no charge to him,

Hello Internet Hot Stoppers and be the sole stockist of Hello Internet Hot Stoppers? Because first of all, I said, oh, can I see your coffee cups and the plastic lids you put on and i checked that they fit and everything and they did and i said here you go do you want to do it and he was like all right so i said you don't have to leave them out you can just have them hidden behind the counter but if any socially awkward nerdy person ever comes up and says hi do you have any hot stoppers i love the whole premise of this right because it's not oh leave them out for promotional purposes it's people will come and ask for the secret thing it's a secret club i know it was brilliant so anyway i was there he was like he was on top guy. So if you go to the Black Stump Espresso Cafe at the bottom of the Grenfell Center,

the Mighty Black Stump in Adelaide, and order a coffee and then give them a little wink and say, can I have a Hello Internet hot stopper? They should pull one out from a secret drawer behind the counter and give you one in your drink. So anyway, while I was there, I decided to tweet. I said, I'm at the Mighty Black Stump. I've got hot stoppers. If you want to come and say hello and get one, now's your chance. I don't even know why I did it. I didn't think, I thought maybe one person might turn up, but over the next sort of half hour or so, various breathless Tims came bursting into the lobby thinking they'd missed me.

And then like, oh, there you are. And then there's that obvious awkwardness where no one really quite knows what to say. Right. But I said to them, if you want, I'd already lost my hot stoppers. I'd given them to the guy. So I said, if you actually want a hot stopper, you've got to go and buy a drink. But they did. And we ended up sitting around.

There was like a nice settle. There's a few sofas and a table. And I ended up sitting, hanging out with a bunch of tims while we sipped our hot drinks all using our own hello internet hot stoppers the funny thing was they were all tims but over half of them were named matt go figure there was just a lot of there was just a lot of mats but they're all tims as well you're so good to the fans br Brady. You're so good to them. It was good fun. It was fun. They'd all come rushing in from wherever they were.

Some of them were just next door, so they were like, oh, just go and say hello. But other ones had been on a bus and then run through town to get there. So it was really nice. This is like you created a little Hello Internet flash mob is what you did. I did. I think the guy running the cafe when I gave him the things thought maybe i was like some kind of fantasist or something and he was just humoring me so when all these people started he was humoring you right there was one funny incident though the next day because i tweeted this and you can see pictures and i tweeted that you could get these hot stoppers now and so over the next day or two people started arriving and

getting their hot stoppers. And obviously what happened was the guy behind the counter, like as a joke, gave a hot stopper to someone and sort of winked at them and said, oh, you're lucky you got the last one. So that person then tweeted saying, warning everyone, they've run out. I just got the last one. And that created like all these people like, oh no, I can't believe they they're gone and someone went like an hour or two later and the guy opened the drawer and gave him another one so then he was like correcting it and saying it was a false alarm everyone they've still got hot stoppers they haven't run out and this tim confronted the guy and said i just read on twitter that you said it was the last one but you've got a whole drawer

full of them and he was like oh i was just Like, I don't think he realized the power he's wielding. You don't understand the forces you're messing with here, buddy. You don't joke about running out of hot stoppers. So last I heard, they still have some. So don't believe any fake news about hot stoppers that you may see on the internet. Like, go yourself and find out. You can't trust anything you read on the internet. Man, I love that. I love love that i don't think i could convince a coffee shop to take hot stoppers from me i don't think i'm that charming i don't think i would have the social skills to pull that off i think i was helped by the fact it's quite a small operation like i if i walked into starbucks but the fact it was just a couple of guys and one of

the guys there was the owner and they haven't been in business very long. And I think maybe I made it sound like they would get extra business as a result of it. But you know, he was just like, whatever. It's no skin off my nose. They don't have their own hot stoppers. So. Right. You're providing a service. We did exchange details. I said, if you ever run out, give me a call. I was going to say, every time you fly to Adelaide, you need to bring boxes of hot stoppers with you. It might get a bit that way, but anyway. Part of me thinks I should expand this and find out who else wants to stock them. But part of me likes the idea there's just one place in the world you can do it, and it's the foot of the Marty Black stamp.

There's something magical about that. There is something magical about that. There's also, at least for the first time, there's something magical about you having delivered them in person. Yeah. Like we were discussing previously, these hot stoppers, I just feel like they are hot stoppers of whimsy. And this is whimsical. I'm in 100% improvement of this.

Like, this is really great. All right. I have started sending them out to a few random patrons as well. And I'm just going to do that occasionally when it pops into my head so if you are like a patreon person and you've supplied the address then one day you may just get a hot stopper unexpectedly but it's not going to be like there's not lots of them it's just a it is as gray likes to say they are hot stoppers of whimsy and that again will also be just a whimsical thing that occasionally happens one of these days i might have to travel to adelaide and get a coffee

there with a i tell you what hot stopper i do think i do think we need to start a campaign for the south australian tourism commission to fly you and i out for a hello internet south australian tour oh yeah because clearly clearly i'm not going to get you to fly to australia unless like you know it's a really nice trip. So I think the South Australian Tourism Commission has to pick up the slack here. Imagine that. We could do a podcast from the Adelaide Oval, from the Black Stump.

I'd take you out into the outback, take you to a cricket match, take you to Glenelg, do all the wine areas up in the Adelaide Hills. I'd show you all the places where I went to school, where I was born, show you all my childhood homes. Now this is turning really bad. It's like, oh, maybe it's mildly interesting, but then if it turns into like a trip down Brady memory lane, I don't know.

Great. Everywhere we went. See that road there? I once bought a hamburger there. It would be like an in-person photograph album. Like, here's all of the pictures of me when I was a kid. Like, oh, no. It would take a lot of willpower for me not to bore you.

But you would also see some cool stuff. Right. And you'd get to see the Black Stump in real life. And it's pretty impressive. Right. I can't believe I forgot to tell you the most important thing oh my god what is it what is it so it turns out a friend of mine works in the tallest building in adelaide westpac building and her office floor has a magnificent view of the mighty black stump and the rival building,

the Telstra building. And this view from the office, a few hundred meters away, pretty much puts you at the same level of the two of them. I'm going to send you a picture. I took a photo out the window of the mighty Black Stump and this rival building that you know I don't like. Right. So this is the best picture I've seen yet of the Mighty Black Stump and the Telstra building. Okay, so we're looking at the Mighty Black Stump. And this Telstra house, which is technically taller, according to the internet, by like one metre. Clearly the Mighty Black St stump is a bigger building

even if you find technical reasons for aerial aside obviously if you include the aerial the mighty black stump is way bigger there is like this plant area on top of both which the black stump seems to have a bigger one brady i i you know you know i really appreciate you as a podcasting co-host. I really do. I love your enthusiasm for very many things. I think this photograph is not as much of a slam dunk as you think it is. I can see where the argument comes from with that top brow of the Telstra building. I'm not even talking about the top brow.

I'm not talking about any of this. This is a picture of two buildings from like an unclear angle i can't just give it to you as like this is amazing proof that the mighty black stump is bigger like pictures from unknown angles are how they pulled off all of the scale tricks in the lord of the rings right so like i don't know where this photograph is taken from i can't take this as proof that you you seem so certain that it is so i'm not saying it's conclusive but i think it helps me it certainly looks in your favor in the photo i will give you that i will grant you that you'll have to take my word from it but those two buildings are pretty much the same distance away from me there now i'm wondering i still feel like i want i want some Tim to arrange like a laser reading from space on these two buildings.

That's what I'm looking for here. The funny thing is that photo is taken from an architect's office. Like I knocked on the door and said, do you mind if I come in and take a picture at your window? Because I'm really interested in those two buildings over there. And they were like, yeah, okay. And they had all like blueprints out, which was really cool. So they look at these two buildings every day. And I said, I'm really interested in the Gren buildings over there. And they were like, yeah, okay. And they had all like blueprints out, which was really cool. So they look at these two buildings every day. And I said, I'm really interested in the Grenfell Centre.

I didn't call it the Mighty Black Stump because I thought it might confuse them. I said, I'm really interested in the Grenfell Centre. And they said, which one's that? And I'm like, what do you mean, which one's that? The black building there. And they go, oh, yeah, that black building. We just always call that black building over there.

And they didn't even know anything about it. They't know it was called the mighty black stump they oh and i was like you're architects it's appalling it's appalling that other people don't know what you know absolutely appalling they're architects in adelaide with a window that looks out over these buildings you'd think they'd know like adelaide buildings once again evidence actually lining up in favor of the building not being nearly as historic or as impressive as you think it is um but sure yeah let's keep going keep going all right i've never denied that my affection for the mighty black stump is born of like my era but still what's the tallest build you'd think architects would know the four or five tallest buildings in town. I am never one to over-assume how much people know about anything.

As long as they know how to architect the buildings they're architecting, I'm happy with that. How good is that picture I took, though? Isn't that a magnificent picture? It is a very magnificent picture, Brady. I do have to say that the Mighty Black Stump looks pretty great. It looks like a building black hole on the skyline there. It is. It's really nice. It looks like it's painted venter black in that one one day i'll go maybe intentionally on my own tweet the south australian tourist commission if you want to

organize a hello internet trip we'd do a live show and everything gray imagine that maybe we could do a live show at the adelaide oval it holds 60 000 people so it should hold those seven or eight tims right yeah brady once again underestimating the hello internet audience but i met the six or seven that turned up to the black stuff yeah yeah they're the ones who i think we can bank on turning up if we have a live show yeah we can bank on that what i think we definitely cannot bank on is a live Hello Internet being remotely interesting to watch. Especially, I like this in my mind's eye, the setting is the Adelaide Oval is, of course, packed to the brim. And you and I are just sitting at a little table in the center with two microphones in front of us.

It would look just like a test match. They'd have the Mexican wave going and all sorts. Oh, they'd get well into it. I'd make sure it was a spectacle. There you go, Brady. You start making promises. So, Gray, while I was back in Australiaia i caught up with lots of my friends lots of them have children so it's always a chance for me to sort of dip into the world of

parenting and things like that and find out latest trends what it's like to be a parent my friends children are getting like that little bit older and i have to say i mean i'll probably sound really stupid to people who like have kids and that but in the last sort of three or four years i didn't realize how much parenting has changed and how much of an issue smartphones and technology and connectivity is like it has escalated to a point that I didn't expect. And I'll give you like a cute example. And then I'll give you like a more extreme example that struck with me. Just before you do, I just want to say like, I'm genuinely curious to hear about this because I have my little conversational go-tos.

But one of mine when talking to parents is I find this endlessly interesting to ask parents, how do they manage the digital lives of their children? Like, I think that this is such an issue in the modern world. And this is not about screen time. Screen time was a problem when you and I were kids, you know, too much time on the TV or videos or computers or the Atari. This is not about screen time. This is about connectivity. My parents had to simply worry that I was sinking 140 hours a week into total annihilation, right? That's like, that was their concern. Okay, you turned out.

Fantastic. Exactly, exactly. So a fun example first was the issue of Santa Claus, the much loved and legendary character who I won't go into too much detail about because I'm now very aware that my nephew listens to Hello Internet and he's six years old. But also, were you just about to explain who Santa Claus is to the audience? That I think we can assume listeners know. No, but there are certain aspects of Santa Claus. Listeners know about Santa to whatever level they know. All right. Well, anyway, I was talking to one of my friends about the extent to which his daughter knew about Santa Claus. Right. Because she was at an age where, you know, I think she would still be enjoying Santa Claus to his fullest legendariness.

Right. Of course. And I said, oh, yeah, like, you know, what does she know? How are you playing that that game and he said oh she googled it she was having doubts and she just googled it so she found out about the working conditions for the elves that's that's a real shame all the facts all the santa facts that need to be known and like you know we found out about it through like you know stories in the schoolyard now it's just hmm what is the case here three or four taps of a keyboard oh okay there you go but you know

what i then did i googled it yeah i like i am googling santa claus yeah no google does santa claus exist and when you do that it's really hard to come to any conclusive answer. If I was a little kid and I Googled that, I think I would be more confused than I was to start with. I think you could read the Wikipedia article about Santa Claus and come away with no definitive answer on the existence question. At least when I Google it, the number one result for me is a link that takes you to an Amazon page for a book that is called, Does Santa Exist? A Philosophical Investigation, which sounds like maybe a little bit beyond most of the kids who are probably Googling, does Santa exist? And I can see that it's like, oh, okay. Then some kid orders it on their Kindle and starts reading and

finds it a very confusing subject. So at first, when my friend told me, you know, she Googled it, I was thinking, oh, that would have just ruined it in seconds. But now I'm thinking, I'm impressed she actually arrived at any conclusion after doing that. Yeah, what I'm curious, I wanted to see the Wikipedia introductory sentence. And I like this. I like this sentence. And I like this. I like this sentence. Santa Claus, also known as St. Nicholas, St. Nick, Kris Kringle, Father Christmas, or simply Santa, is a legendary figure originating in Western Christian culture who is said to bring gifts to the homes of well-behaved or good children on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day. So I like that. A legendary figure.

That's good. That's good. Anyway, let's not get too bogged down with the philosophy and the existence of Santa Claus. Because I want to talk about the more interesting aspect of this. And this was another friend of mine whose child was a little bit older, but not that old. And I was at the pub with him. We're having a drink and his phone goes off and it's his child saying, dad, I've done my homework. I've been really good today. Can I have my apps? And he was in a good mood and he was having a drink with his old pal,

Brady. And he said, oh, what the heck? Texted her back and said, because I'm here with Brady and because you've been a good girl, yes. And he opened up this app on his phone called Our Pact. And basically what that is, is it gives him total control over his child's apps on her phone. So he has the whole list of all the apps, what times she can use it. So she can use Facebook between 5.15 and 5.30, like to find fine grain details. And when the app is not allowed, it just doesn't appear on her phone. She hasn't got it.

Can control everything about her phone use. He can put time limits on things. So she can have like, you know, 15 minutes of Instagram a day and it's up to her how she decides to use it and how to ration it. He can then allow the apps anytime he chooses, like he did when he was with me. He can shut them down anytime he chooses if he wants to, like if he thinks he needs to for disciplinary reasons. And it was this incredible amount of control, which makes sense to me. It makes sense. There's something about it that's striking me as a little bit Black Mirror-ish.

The child's digital world appears and disappears at the press of a button on the other end. Yeah, he said that. He said they'll just vanish from her screen. It's a very sign of the times, isn't it? I think it's kind of necessary, but I was saying, oh, this is amazing. But then the other amazing thing was like, you know, his kids are smart and they understand technology. And this is not enough. There's like a whole arms war that goes on between you trying to control your children's access to the internet and stuff like that and their desire to get that access right even when they're not supposed to have it and he was you know telling stories of

you know borrowing your friend's phone or having different accounts and all these sorts of things just like normal kid stuff that you and i would do. But if you're a parent, so he has to be really, really across the technology to be able to police his children's use of the technology and all the new innovations that come about and all the different things that happen, he has to know on top of all the other things he has to know in his life. And it was making my head spin, all the stuff that was going on know i won't go into all the details but like it was it was crazy and i was thinking gosh being a parent now wow things are so different yeah it is really different and you know what he's not worried about what like kidnappers or people abducting your children while they're at the park because they don't want to go out. Like they want to stay in and do things online. And when they actually meet up with people who they're friends with online, like their best

Instagram friends who they're messaging nonstop, they completely shut down and they're really shy and don't even want to talk to them. Like, oh, I don't want to talk to them in person. They just want to be at home talking to everyone on social media. That last part is the part that I think is really interesting. You know, obviously precursors to this conversation, like you and I are people without children. We're going to talk about child raising. Joyce invites a lot of comments.

But even with my wife and I, like we sometimes have discussions about like, how would we hypothetically raise a child under different circumstances? Because like, it's an interesting couple conversation to have. And even though like my whole life is technology, I have always been on the side of, I would severely limit my child's access to technology for as long as was practically possible. Now, of course, before all the parents chime in,

like, I'm just talking about like, how do things work in an ideal land? Right? Like, yeah, I know why it happens happens but i find there's something kind of upsetting about seeing like a very very barely not baby kid using an ipad there's something that to me just i don't think that's good for a little kid like i think a little kid should be interacting with the world but that's just like my personal feeling. It's like, I would want to hold back the existence of screens from my child as long as is possible. And then when you can't hold that back anymore, I would still want to try to limit it as much as possible. That's so interesting to hear you say that and surprising to me. You seem like the one who is very much like says, hey, you know, all the world's moving online. That's where we're going to live our lives now. You're a big advocate of education being taken over by technology. Like, it seems

like you're just putting off the inevitable. Well, let's skip this because I want to get to the second part of this for now, which is what has thrown a wrinkle into a whole bunch of my previous thoughts, which don't necessarily make a lot of sense right now. But what I think the real problem for parents is, is like, okay, so I had this theoretical plan of I'd want to try to limit screen time for my kid. But what I can see happening with the people I know who have children who start approaching middle school age is that this question is out of your hands, and it's out of your hands largely because of things like social media. And so if you are the parent who wants to clamp down on your child's social media use,

you're really forcing your child into like a weird social pariah role. Definitely. That like everything that is happening socially with these kids is happening online. And I think that there is a real way in which the parenting options are constrained by the decisions that other parents have made. And I think like, even if you wanted to be a parent who was trying to limit their kids' social media influence. I think it's a real, you're damned if you do, and you're damned if you don't. It's not an option. I sort of said, what about just taking a phone away altogether or just banning it? And it's like, you can't do that. You may as well be the kid going to school in a potato sack and you would just become ostracized.

It would make their life worse. So it's such a difficult situation. Yeah, like it's an interesting thing to see happen and obviously become much more of a concern. And like, it's something I'm really glad that when I was teaching, I missed out on. Like I left teaching just as this was becoming a thing. I'm very glad that like I missed all of that. But I have real deep sympathies for people trying to raise kids now because just like i have a real gut

feeling that there's something that might not be good for a baby's brain to be interacting with an ipad all the time i really have a suspicion that like i don't think social media is necessarily great for lots of adults and i think it's probably worse for teenagers and preteens. Like, I think everything about social media is bad enough if you're an adult. And I really just don't think people should learn how to socialize through Facebook. Like, I can hardly imagine a worse way that young people should try to learn how to socialize. There's the part of me which is like, okay, well, having your kid learn how to socialize through Facebook is bad.

I don't think it's a good thing to do. But guess what? Totally cutting your kid off from how everybody in their social group is socializing is also terrible. There is no winning in this scenario. Like you have to let your kid participate in a thing that I don't think is good because if you don't let them participate in it, like they might as well be that weird homeschooled kid who never talks to other children. That's what's happening here. It's so surprising hearing you talk that way.

Like, cause you know, I guess I sort of have an impression of you that you're this guy who's like oh you know in 30 years we're all just going to be jacked into the matrix and a plug in the back of our head and never talk to another human anyway and live all virtually and you know you can't stop progress you know technology is good hearing you kind of go a little bit old school there and say you know we should all be holding hands and playing pass the parcel. Well, it's nice. Now you make me want to take back all my words when you say that, Brady. But you are right on those aspects of it. You cannot fight technological change. And on the whole, I think technological change is good. I don't change these two opinions here.

But I just, in particular, and people have heard it, you know, over the length of this podcast, like, I have become much more cautious and concerned about certain parts of the internet. And then when you start talking about people who are learning how to interact with people, like, I don't think it's good. And also just like, to put a pin in it, I don't think the way that the school says, like, remove the existence of social media from the world. Like, I don't think the way that schools are organized are good ways for kids to learn how to interact with other human beings. But adding on said is a thing that I have heard from a surprising number of people that their children seem to not want to or have a hard time interacting with other children in person, or like they prefer to interact in a way that is through text messages so that the kids have time to think

about how they want to say things. I find that concerning. I just don't know what can be done about it because I think even for adults, that can be a hard thing. And it's something in my own life I've been aware of, of like how much of my relationship maintenance with other human beings is done through text messages. And I have been finding myself thinking over the past maybe half a year or so, like, are there ways I could escalate these interactions to voice? Because I think voice is higher bandwidth in some ways over text. But of course, not really, because the reason that everybody's interacting with text is because it is more convenient and it is more easy to do so. And so like you're trying to move uphill in a way that people just don't want.

Or like everybody feels that weird anxiety when like the phone is ringing and you just assume that it's some kind of problem or emergency if it's a person that you haven't heard from in a while. So I don't know what parents should do. I always find it interesting to ask parents, what are they doing with their kids and their digital lives at all different stages? Because I think it's, it's a really hard situation in a way that it just, it just didn't used to be. I also find it interesting because I think it could have, I don't know if this is going to be a little bit

overblown, but I really do think like maybe it will have a real impact on how society operates in the future. If you have a generation of kids who grew up with Instagram in school with a kind of super hyper optimized popularity competitiveness competition. Yeah, I think that's one of the bigger problems. There is also the whole that we're not talking about but you can imagine all the things that go into it how it's changing a lot of sex and sexualization things like the way that young people relate to each other and sort of find their way through that aspect of life seems to be really at a precipice they're really amped

up like you know the expectations that people now have of how relationships work and those sort of early stages it's like it's hard to keep a lid on that now because of the access to all the stuff they have and and what that's doing it's kind of scary you know it's a loss of control yeah like we've all had birds and the bees talks and you know we all know how we sort of found our way through that aspect of life. But the conversations that I'm hearing about now that parents are having are more along the lines of, look, I know you've seen this. I know you've looked at that and I know what you think these things are like. That's not what it's like. You

need to pull back from what you think those things are like. Like I imagine for you and I as kids, a lot of it was, you it was you were being told stuff and finding stuff out and you were wide-eyed and going, oh, gosh, I had no idea. And you were kind of learning what things would lead to. Now it's kind of kids are seeing quite extreme things that aren't particularly realistic and parents are having to say, the birds and the bees talk now is not this is how it works. It's more like that stuff that you've seen, that's not how it works. It's more like

this. Yeah. I actually think that that is a subset of the general problem that I'm concerned about, which is with all kinds of things, the internet can have a tendency to push you towards more extreme versions of things. Like the can have a tendency to push you towards more extreme versions of things. Like the way recommendation algorithms work, you click on a thing and then the recommendations are different ways you can take that thing to the more extreme version. And you can just start going down real rabbit holes. That covers every aspect of a thing that a person might be interested in, right? It's like yeah we can be talking about the birds and the bees or we can be talking about politics or we can be arguing about any of the the bazillion things there can be a flame war about on the internet there's like

these bias cliffs that are all around you that you can find yourself sliding down unintentionally and we struggle enough with it as adults yet alone like kids yeah like that's what i think is is the real thing that i've become sensitized to like i think maybe it was two years ago like i took a break from twitter for a while and i feel like that was one of the best things i ever did because it changed something in my mind about the way i interact with this stuff but i also feel like it's it's sensitized me to this in a way. And I have this feeling like as a grown adult, who is a person who does a very good job of managing his own life, like I'm a self-employed person, I have to manage all of this kind of stuff. Like,

I think I'm above average in self-management skills. I think that's a fair statement. Yeah, like, yeah, that is a fair statement, right? But it's like, I can feel the internet trying to pull me in ways that I can resist or that I'm aware of. But I think this stuff can really catch you off guard if you don't know it's coming. Actually, going back to our conversation about universal paperclips, I had this experience years ago of the first time I ran into a game that was sort of like universal paperclips but I didn't know what this thing was like I didn't have any experience with these kind of games that are there to just hook you and I got hooked really deep on a game that I realized

like I'm not having any fun but I can't stop thinking about this game and why am I playing it and like I'm not actually enjoying this experience. And that was like, oh, I have my eyes open to, this is a kind of trap that exists on the internet. Like you've, you've wandered off the path in Mordor and like, and now you found yourself in this cul-de-sac that you didn't know,

but I'm a rational adult who can work my way out of that and then recognize what this thing is. And so I just worry that like when you're eight, you don't have the skills or the ability to recognize this and then recognize what this thing is. And so I just worry that when you're eight, you don't have the skills or the ability to recognize this. And then also throw in the fact that you're in the horrible, horrible pressure cooker situation, which is school, which might not, even if you are the best kid in the world, allow you to work your way out of that. I think there's just traps everywhere. Good luck, parents.

Yeah. Good luck, parents. Yeah, good luck, parents. You have all of my sympathy points. Aren't you glad Mr. Chompers doesn't have a smartphone? Yeah, I just hope he doesn't have an Instagram account. Hello, listeners. I'm betting a lot of you have some ideas about how to raise children in the technological world. Ideas that after listening to the two of us talk about them,

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Yeah. Okay. What do you think about hot towels on planes? I find it a strange thing.'s the weirdest thing ever I can never say no to it although I never really I then just kind of don't know what to do with it I like dab my face and wipe my hands and then I've just got this cold wet thing for the next three or four minutes that I can't wait to get rid of and can't figure out how to get rid of because they won't come and take it soon enough are they really useful do you take them I take. I'm laughing because I just had an experience when I recently flew to

America where they're passing out the hot towels. And I was for some reason really cognizant of them. And I was looking around and I noticed that everybody used them to wipe their hands. And I always use them on my face. And I had this little moment of like, have I been doing this wrong my whole life? Is this not for my face? I thought use them on my face. And I had this little moment of like, have I been doing this wrong my whole life? Is this not for my face? I thought this was for my face. Everyone's laughing at you. Yeah, like I didn't know, right?

They're all making fun of me on social media behind my back, right? They're all going, oh, there's an idiot who's using this hot towel to wipe his face. What a moron. You look around, everyone's wiping their butts. You've got it all over your face. Yeah, it's like, I don't understand.

It seems like from another time they didn't realise that you don't do this anymore. I think this is 100% a weird anachronism that has stuck around as a- Like Bloody Marys. Who drinks Bloody Marys? And yet everyone on planes always orders a Bloody Mary. Is that what people order on planes? I always find the alcohol on planes weird. I don't know why there's like bars on planes.

It seems like a strange environment, but maybe it's like to calm people down. I don find the alcohol on planes weird i don't know why there's like bars on it seems like a strange environment but maybe it's like to calm people down but i don't drink alcohol on planes but when you talk to other people it seems like the serving of alcohol is the main use of planes to some people like beyond the fact they can fly even they're like oh you're going on a you know oh you're gonna have lots of drinks and you're gonna drink and everyone drinks on planes i never drink on planes yeah no but but bloody mary's is like a to drink and everyone drinks on planes. I never drink on planes. But Bloody Marys is like a plane drink. And I don't understand that either. I'm sure people will tell me some reason. I don't drink on planes. I don't eat on planes. I always tell the flight attendant, like, I'm not taking any of your food. There's no food service here. But I can't say no to hot

towels. It's on the little tongs. I guess I have to accept this. It's a strange thing. I'd be quite happy to do away with the hot towels on planes and replace- Like, just give me like a chocolate or something, maybe. I don't know, but- I don't know. I feel like I would miss the hot towel. I feel like it's part of the weird ritual. It just seems like a waste of weight and time and space.

And I don't know. I keep taking them. I wipe my face with them. Well, thank God you wipe your face with them so that we know, you know, like I'm not alone in this activity. No i do the face i don't know i think they're going to be around for a long time i don't think they're going anywhere the hot towels on planes speaking of hot towels and things that are like weird and why do you still do them why does youtube do this rewind video every year and then people like look forward to it like it's a new

star wars movie or something there seems to be to be some section of the internet that gets quite hyped about this YouTube Rewind video and who's going to be in it. And I can't think of anything I have less interest in. Yeah. YouTube Rewind. It's a strange beast. Have you watched this year's? Have you watched it?

Yeah, the 2017 version came out, what is like a week and a half ago. Is it any good? Oh, have you not watched it no why would i watch it okay well i was talking to a few people in my life about this and i realized a very funny thing which is that okay so youtube rewind for anyone who doesn't know is this like like summary cameo video mess thing of stuff that's happened in the last year as i understand it they don't like take the best stuff that was on youtube that year and turn it into a montage it's all like bespoke made stuff for that video yeah okay let's back up here right i guess what

i'm trying to say is like this video called YouTube Rewind has, as of right now, like 160 million views. Right. They do shove it down your throat a bit. Okay. Yeah. It's incredibly promoted. But I realized talking to normal people that no normal person knows what this thing is. Right.

No normal person seems to watch this or have any interest in this. Right. No normal person seems to watch this or have any interest in this. This thing is, it's entirely a social network that is contained and pointing to itself. It's like the place to be seen, isn't it? It's like, you know, Studio 54 back in the day, people would just want to be seen in it, like, and they want to see who's in it. Yeah. It's very strange. So- It's a status symbol or something, maybe. I don't know. Yeah. So for people who don't know, which are normal people who shouldn't know about this thing, I'll describe it in the most cynical way. YouTube gets a bunch of their most visible, known, photogenic creators that YouTube also wants to promote and gets them all

together to be in a gigantic compilation video of meaninglessness where they're all in it for a couple of seconds, smiling to the camera, doing something funny, maybe passing an object back and forth so that there's some vague idea of continuity through the video across time. But this year's video is seven minutes long and they must cram 200 creators in there, all of whom have like a million plus subscribers, who then tell their subscribers, oh, I was in YouTube Rewind this year. So it gets phenomenal viewing numbers. But the thing is- Calling it meaningless is almost a compliment too, but like it is, it's so, and you can just

tell from watching it. I mean, I haven't watched this year's, but I have watched them before. And I have heard stories from people who've contributed you can tell that every segment would have involved days of filming for those two or three seconds that they actually kept it always alludes to they did something much more big and elaborate that got cut yeah and they just kept half a second of someone winking or something like it's really bad i want to watch it okay yeah like i honestly think you should just put it on in silent in the background while we're talking because okay the thing has always been a little bit embarrassing i will say that like go back five years ago and i thought that they were

okay simply because youtube was smaller it was less obviously pushing an agenda you were more likely to know who the creators were and because there were fewer people packed in the video, it had some chance of being interesting. But I think the last three years have been really terrible. Have you ever been asked to contribute? No, I have never been asked. But then again, like I'm not an on-camera person. It doesn't make any sense to ask me to be part of it. They had like an animation section this year, they didn't they? I heard about that. There was a little animation section at at the end this year which i actually thought was the best part of the whole video was they had a bunch of animators at the end and the reason it was the best part of the whole video is they obviously told each of the animators that they were going to have whatever it was five or

ten seconds just do whatever they want and the animators were unconstrained by all the dumbness that every one of the physical people was constrained by. Like, we put you in a room and we have these props and we want you to interact with these props. And like, look goofy or look happy or whatever. So the animator part was clearly the best part. But the rest of it was just. Oh, this fills me with dread watching this. It's so like glossy.

And do you know what else makes me feel a bit like icky? What? Knowing that the people who were in it would be watching it with like wide eyes feeling so good about their one section and thinking how like impactful it was like i'm what i'm imagining them watching it i don't know because someone needs to tell youtube to stop doing this it's become a thing that's like the oscars for them it's so self-absorbed that it's revolting that's the good term for it self-absorbed that it's revolting. That's the good term for it, self-absorbed. Because if you don't know who all these YouTubers are, the video is meaningless. And this year's was especially bad because they were cutting between scenes so fast.

Very fast cut. There's no pretense that you can follow what's occurring. So it's like, okay, what am I watching here? I'm watching a thing where if I am the most obsessive YouTube viewer, I'm just going to recognize a bunch of millionaires. That's what's happening here. It's also a bit like, how good a thing did I get in the yearbook? Yeah, it's a little bit yearbooky.

And all the popular kids have a page in the yearbook full of all the things they did. And you and I are the ones who aren't in the yearbook. Yeah, it's... Oh, I just saw someone I recognized. Amazing. Yeah. And don't like. This year is in particular, I feel like it's so clear that this year it's like,

here are all of the acceptable, beautiful people that we want to promote. And there are plenty of people on YouTube who, if you were doing some compilation of the year, would be in there. But it's like, but YouTube doesn't want to show those people. We only want to show certain kinds of people, right? We don't want to show other kinds of people. But how is this promoting anything? It's not like you're going to see anything in this video and go, hmm, I might look into that person more and explore their work or subscribe to their channel. It's almost like YouTube are giving you a like on Snapstagram.

Yeah. Yeah. Like these are the people that we're giving a like to. That's 100% what it is. Yeah. YouTube is handing out hearts to specific creators in this way. And this year's was super cringy. It was really hard to watch.

There's a thing that really just rubbed me the wrong way, which is also like, and I think it's a little tone deaf on YouTube's part, which is ostensibly this is like, oh, hey, let's look at all of the creators on YouTube. But they open it up with a standard late night TV guy introducing the YouTube people. And I feel like this has been a year where all of the YouTube

people have been complaining about the invasion of late night TV and how YouTube is like weirdly obsessed and promotes like a whole menagerie of late night TV personalities. Like it's just all over YouTube. And it's like, oh, okay, well, this is just another indication that the thing YouTube really wants is more late night TV on YouTube, which I just, I just really don't get. Do you know, Greg, I've been watching this video the whole time we've been talking, admittedly with no sound. And I realized like, you know, I'm an old guy now who makes boring educational videos. So I'm, you know, I'm in the minority, but this, this kind of makes me a bit embarrassed of my job. And like, if people watch this and associated this in any way with what I do for a living, I feel really bad. Like,

I know I'm like the old man and YouTube's a young person's game, but I'm like, oh no, it makes me not want to say that I'm a YouTuber for a living. Like, i have to change how i describe my job this is definitely a thing that there has been a change in the cultural mind shift about the idea of a youtuber and yes it's like i will i will never say that because now it used to be like people would say something like what does that even mean like what are you talking about but now people have a very particular idea of what that means and it's this right like this video is what a youtuber is it's like oh god i don't want anything to do with this young like sickeningly extroverted yeah attention seeking will do any crazy thing if it results in being on a screen

that is 100 the case i feel like i'm kind of a like the grumpy old yeah youtuber person who has nothing to do with this and wants nothing to do with this the thing that has been happening for years which i i just don't like but was obviously inevitable which is this weird hollywoodization of the youtube platform that does lead to like this very particular, I'm going to make people angry, but like desperate LA kind of person who's on YouTube and like, they can do very well on YouTube, but it's, it's like, I just don't want anything to do with what you said. Like these people who are sickeningly extroverted, like I don't want anything to do with you. Like, I can't imagine what YouTube could have asked them to do that they wouldn't do to be in this video.

Exactly. Yeah. Now bark like a dog. Yeah. Now. Yeah. Okay. Like, they just seem to be doing like, okay, now dress up as a monster and get out of this grave.

Yeah. Now hold this fidget spinner. Okay. Okay. Do you know, all that said, I don't know what I'd do if they asked me to do something for it. Because you'd feel like, like if they said to me, oh, Brady, can we do like a six second thing to do with one of your channels to put in the rewind? Like, would I say no? Like, I kind of feel like you'd have to say yes.

Why do you feel like you'd have to say yes? Part of my job is to like, you know, promote my channels and make sure they're successful, not just for me, but for the people who are involved. And like, it does get watched like 160 million times. Is any good coming from that? Well, probably not, you know. As far as I can tell, none of these channels get any kind of bump from this.

Because again, who's watching this, right? Or like you've watched this in the background okay and you've seen half second clips of 200 people are there any of those people you're gonna go like wow that person took a water balloon to the face really well i want to check out his channel you're not going to do that for any of these people it's not happening no like i think this is 100 a case like some other things we have discussed, where like an institution is getting people to do a thing and the currency that they're paying them in is honor, right? They're like, oh, what a great honor it is to be in YouTube Rewind, right? I was like, oh, okay. Honor sounds like I'm not getting paid. And honor sounds like I might not have a good reason to do this.

But you want me to do this thing? I'll tell you what, I reckon the only people that would benefit from being in this are probably the animators. Because they're the only things that I would look at and think, oh, that looks good. I've never seen that person before. Looks like they're doing some interesting stuff. Yeah. Whereas everyone else is not doing like their native thing.

Yeah, that's why I said like the animation part of it was by far the best part of it. It was at the very end in the credits and because they had total control and they didn't have to do all of this cringeworthy stuff and that yeah they're doing the thing that they do whereas everyone else is like whatever they normally do they're not doing they're just like yeah taking a water balloon in the face yeah instead of their normal beauty channel or their normal vlog or their normal skydiving whatever they normally do it's really cringy and even though the animator part was the best part, if they asked me to do it, I would say no, because I feel like the video is just so uncomfortable.

I wouldn't want anything to do with it. And in particular, the thing I don't like is you're watching it on silent so that you might not have picked up on this. So they're doing like, oh, here's a million memes and people being outrageous and doing funny stuff. But then in the in the middle, the music gets all serious and people start holding hands. And there's like a little moment of like, oh, boy, how did we come together in 2017? Like we all came together as a community. And it like to do what exactly like well we don't want to get too specific about what we came together to do but we sure did come together in 2017 it's like to write some edsense yeah exactly it's just like we're gonna have a like a solid and i like i hate that stuff i really really hate that like forced togetherness like oh we're like if you want to make a movie with a million cameos and some fun memes, like, fine, make that, but don't like do a tone shift in the middle.

I want no part in this. It's absolutely awful. I'll also just recommend there was a really interesting video to watch by one of the participants, which backs up what you were describing, like, all of these clips look like they're part of a much bigger thing. Yeah. And there's a youtuber in the uk called emma blackberry who did a long discussion about what was it actually like to film youtube rewind yeah and she was actually talking about in the uk and it just sounded brutal she's done it for the past few years and it is literally a full day of shooting

where you never have any idea when you're going to be on camera when they're going to call you For the past few years. And it is literally a full day of shooting. Where you never have any idea when you're going to be on camera. When they're going to call you. Like you're standing around. You just have to be there for enormous amounts of time. And then the end result is that you are on camera for three or four frames. Like what an incredible waste of a person's time. And especially when like they're asking people for whom like the opportunity cost of doing this project is non-trivial. Like Emma Blackberry is not a tiny vlogger.

Like she has a million and a half subscribers. And to ask her to be like standing around for a whole day for like for the glory of being in a YouTube video for a few frames. It's crazy. It's a crazy opportunity cost multiplied across all the people who are participating. Answer me this then. Most of these people are now big business, right? And they know their worth. They're not like naive anymore. Not many people who are that big on YouTube are. Why are they saying yes? Like you said, you would quite comfortably say no, because you see no benefit to it's a waste of time. Like, are they saying yes, because they see some benefit? Are they saying yes, because they're

vain? Are they flattered by it? Like, why are they saying yes? Why are they saying, yeah, I'm a big YouTuber, I can command tens of thousands of dollars for my time, but I'm going to stand around all day for three frames in YouTube Rewind. Well, I think there's many different levels of this, right? So level one are the genuinely big people that the video is featuring for a significant period of time. Right. Right.

So you have the big names who are brought out they're able to do their thing very quickly and they leave and they're genuinely featured for a non-trivial amount of time like i could see like if i was a vlogger with 10 million plus subscribers doing youtube rewind might make sense because it's less of a time commitment and you know that you're getting some promotion out of it what sort of keeps you in the zeitgeist a bit yeah it keeps you in the zeitgeist and like maybe at that level it's not a bad idea to just like have some connections with youtube or like to be seen to be doing youtube a favor i can see that i can see why doing youtube a favor could help you down the track when you need help. And I'm just trying to say like, where do you start with this? Like if you're the

really big person, there's a way that it makes sense. Okay. So now let's get down to like the people who are in the YouTube rewind, smaller YouTubers, where we're talking like a million plus subscribers. It's just like, it's just a funny world. Cause I think the statistics now, there's something like 2000 channels that have more than a million subscribers on YouTube. It's a a funny world. Because I think the statistics now, there's something like 2,000 channels that have more than a million subscribers on YouTube. It's a crazy number. Does that mean I make up 1,000th of them? Yes, that's exactly correct.

You count twice, Brady. Thanks, Tim. That's how that works. I think it's 4,000 actually. I think it's even higher than that. Whatever it is, the number keeps going up. And every time I hear it, it seems crazy big. Why are they doing it? Because they think they were going to have more time than they did that's probably one answer well yeah okay thinking they're going to have

more time that they do is one answer i'm trying to think of a nice way to describe a particular type of person um i'm gonna say this i'm not talking about anyone in particular, but I am talking about like the kind of people who might want to move to LA to become movie stars. Right. There's a certain kind of person. Ambitious. Aspirational. Okay. Yeah, sure.

I'm using nice words. Yes, those are nice words. What I would say is that there are people who are empty inside and try constantly to fill themselves up with the meaningless approval of strangers ah vacuous it's not vacuous i mean it's like they are empty inside and they have to constantly take likes and hearts and approval from anonymous strangers and bring it into themselves. And... Needy. I've met some people like this and I find them unsettling and weird. I feel like you are not my kind of person

if you are really deeply wanting the approval of people you don't know. I find it strange. And there are a lot of people who would say become a vlogger on YouTube because that's the thing. Like that's the thing that drives them is maybe if enough people give me a thumbs up, I won't feel so empty inside.

Yeah. And so I can imagine that those people will say yes to anything that's promotion. So that's one kind of person. And you know what? I'm totally fine with that because the person's making a decision. Like they want to do this thing for exposure. They have their own internal reasons for doing it. I have no problem with that.

But the other kind of thing that I suspect is happening is a lot of these channels are people who have gotten success in like what is a relatively compressed time frame, maybe like a couple of years. They've gone from being nobody on YouTube to being someone who's invited on YouTube Rewind. And I do think that YouTube is kind of exploiting people who this might be one of their first interactions with something like this. And YouTube is saying, oh, come be part of this thing. Yeah. So they just don't know better because they haven't been burned yet. I do suspect that that is a non-trivial number

of the people who are here. Yeah. That it's people who just don't have any experience with what is it like to actually film a gigantic project like this? What does this really mean? And YouTube is taking advantage

of their inexperience in exchange for getting them to be part of this gigantic thing like i did when i got you to help me with my video yes that's true yeah i had no idea actually that was a really fun day brady i really like that you didn't get much screen time for all that sitting around you did though yeah but see the difference is how much screen time did i want i had the reverse problem i had more screen time than i wanted in that video so i wanted zero screen time and there was some screen time there was a little bit of sneaky screen time it's a very different thing but yeah so youtube rewind it's cringy it's embarrassing it's for no one i think it's kind of exploitive and it's awful.

And I wish YouTube would stop doing it. Link in the show notes. Yeah, link in the show notes. Go enjoy it, people. Make sure to give it a thumbs up. you you any more mr chomper story i think we're just that's just about it for today's podcast yeah thanks everyone for listening uh thanks grey for sharing their latest stories and mr chompers we'll be back in a few weeks time with another episode. See you after Christmas, everybody.

Yeah. I did sign up for an Instagram account, though, so I can follow some of these dogs. So yeah, I hope you follow Audrey. I'm already following Audrey. I'm already following Audrey. Good. I don't really get the Instagram, but, you know, everyone tells me to try it. So I'm giving it a try, I guess.