NZXT PODCAST - #226 - Built his First PC and Went Viral (Ft. HapaThunder) - NZXT Podcast 226

Episode Date: August 7, 2026

On this week's episode of the #NZXT Podcast... we are joined by HapaThunder! He'd never built a PC before. Filmed it for fun and 100,000 people showed up before he even finished the build. We get into how he became a content creator all while being a husband, father of four, and working a full-time hospital job! Follow HapaThunder here: solo.to/hapathunder

Hello, everyone, and welcome to episode 226 of the NXC podcast, the official podcast of the NZC community. This podcast is recorded live on Fridays at 10 a.m. Pacific, Sanctime, on the official NXC Twitch is available to stream on demand on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and SoundCloud. My name is Mike Kim, and before I introduced our very special guest, I just wanted to give a quick shout out to Intel for helping us sponsor the NZX Intel Club and wearing the little shirt. If you guys want to go to nzicc.com slash club or escomation point club in the chat You guys can join the nzc endo club you guys can do quests which is like following our social media You know commenting on one of our posts joining us in our discord events or right now some people are able to get some poochie points By watching the after stream and like I said you can get poochie points out of doing the quest and those will be entered or those would be returned for entries in to our monthly giveaway.

I know, like, I don't know if he's here, G.T. Beaker, he just won the PC, which is super dope. So you guys can win an NXC Intel PC every month we give away. We have some chippy and poochy plushies right here that you guys can also win. And you guys also win some NZXC Club shirts that I'm wearing right now. So go to nccccc.co slash club or Eskmalich point club and chat and join on in. All righty. I think that's it for the announcements for me, so I'm going to go ahead and introduce our very special guests. Introducing a creator who decided to build his first PC and film it and gained 100,000 followers before he was even done with it.

He's the swagiest sneakerhead I've ever seen, husband to a lovely wife and a father of even lovelier four children, though he considers himself the fourth child or the fit child, not to mention a full-time assistant clinic manager at a hospital. guys that's insane all the way for the bay area everyone please welcome jason aka hapa thunder can you introduce yourself to our audience and tell us what you're all about yeah so thanks for thanks for everybody tuning in my name is jason um yeah lovely intro thanks so much mike for for that um yeah so just excited for this this opportunity and and to get to share my experiences with everybody yeah so we're gonna like we do with every single person that we had on a podcast we're going to start from the beginning where it all started so first of all how did you get into gaming and tech in the beginning yeah i mean i was introduced to video games

like super early on um you know as a kid you know with a mom working full time i was in after school programs um i remember vividly the after school program had an atari that was just there for everybody to play. So, you know, that little one joystick and playing the game. So very early on I was introduced. We got a Nintendo for the house, you know, playing classic games like Kung Fu, Mario, Duck Hunt, things like that. Super fun, you know, playing with my sister at the time. And yeah, really, really, really early on got introduced just and then kind of progressed through, you know, the different consoles as I got older. What was like the number one game that was like this is on repeat pretty much the entire time? I mean, I really liked Ninja Gaden. Ninja Gaden, yeah. I mean like the super like the very first OJ game, like that was like my thing. Yeah, I love that.

Just pretty much any Mario game really, Super Nintendo, Super Mario World. Classic. Yeah What How was it like gaming? Because I know back then You know like now gaming is kind of like Usual it's okay

How did your like family feel about You know There's their kid just like glued to the TV For you know hours on end Were they okay with it? Were they like I hate gaming? I mean Classic Asian mom

Very kind of like Hey you should be in the books right now and not glued to the TV, but I mean, I wasn't outside getting into trouble, so I don't think it was a bit of a problem, it wasn't that much of a problem. So yeah, I really had no, like, issues with not being able to play. So yeah.

Yeah, as long as you're doing your school work, they're like, as long as he's, as long as he's doing okay in school, that's fine. Exactly. Yeah. So as you grew up gaming, like what we're like, the games and consoles that you kind of evolved from. So you had Atari, NES, did you go into, like, other type of consoles?

Like, did you get to Xbox or PlayStation? Or did you strictly stay with, like, Nintendo? Yeah, no, I mean, I mean, definitely was Nintendo early on because I feel like they were just kind of the kings at the moment, like the early 90s. But then, you know, I got introduced to like Super Nintendo after the NES. And then a family member had a Sega Game Gear, which, was kind of like the handheld. I mean, I think it used like

8 AA batteries or something crazy and it would like die super fast. So, you know, getting introduced to Sonic. You know, that was kind of like the next evolution into that. I mean, I had a GameCube when I was in high school PlayStation 2, some classics on those consoles.

I think the GameCube is my favorite console at all the time. Yeah, I mean, there's so many good games on there. I mean, I loved the Zelda when Waker. Marrow Sunshine was a classic. I personally liked some of the sports games like like NBA Street volume 2 was a good one. I just loved the music the tracks on that and just you know the ability to dunk all crazy and um that blitz like you know just slamming on people and yeah it was it was so fun so fun back in the day. I'm glad that's a six tricky

was a huge one for me too. Oh that's a good one. I I'm glad you mentioned Super Mario Sunshine, though. That is officially my favorite game of all the time. So I'm glad someone here also has appreciated the beauty of it. Like everyone loves, you know, the standard Super Mario, but Super Mario Sunshine will always have that place of my heart, man. Oh, yeah. Let's see.

Oh, oh, yeah. So, you know, you're playing on all these, you know, games, mainly Nintendo, you know, which is that's what I also grew up with, GameCube, DS, and stuff like that. What like you guys you know you are tech content creator you have every type of tech that anyone would dream of having so like how did you get from just playing video games to kind of this era of content creation? I mean you know I've always been a gamer you know love playing games but I've always been a bit of a creative like on you know on my my personal side, like, I was really into sneakers early on. So, you know, shoes. And then my love for sneakers and shoes kind of turned into my love for customizing sneakers. So I would paint on sneakers. I would kind of deconstruct them and, you know, soul swap. And I would do, you know, kind of these

things. And then by me doing these things, I also posted it on social media. So initially early on, my early introduction into content creation was I was kind of a sneaker head influencer on YouTube. So I was like a sneaker influencer or sneaker YouTuber. So I would kind of review some shoes and talk about the releases and things like that. So that was like my first introduction into content creation. And then kind of involved, right? I started having a family and then I wanted to really document their lives growing up so they can look back on something and saying, hey, you know, like I, you know, instead of having these pictures, now I have these vivid memories of videos that you created and things like that. So I did that. And then, yeah, somehow it, you know,

the stars aligned and, you know, right place, right time and became this, this tech influencer I am today. Yeah. I mean, you have one of the, I think honestly, you have one of the most interesting, like, ways of getting into content creation because a lot of people are like they were they had this plan right they're like i want to be a tech influencer like this is my thing and then it happened for you it just kind of like just kind of came about so i'm going to go a little bit into it i am showing off uh on your twitter from man from 2019 this has been a long time but i i brought up your custom you're customizing your bloodline uh air or air jordan ones and i love the look of it so guys for those that are here getting into content creation everything like that you do not have to

start off in that specific you know niche you can slowly grow out of it or something evolves from it and this is sick we're going to get a little bit into your sneaker head stuff because i also a little bit of sneaker head as well so we'll definitely talk a little bit more about that but first of all you're making content creation and you know you're making these things from you know sneaker heads to documenting your family. First of all, how did the name Hoppa Thunder come from? Like, what was the reasoning behind that name in the first place? Yeah, it's a pretty funny, interesting story.

So for those who don't know, the term Hapa means someone who is partial Asian. My mom's Korean and my dad is Irish. So, you know, just by me being who I am, I'm Hapa. So that kind of where that term came from. But the term hoppa thunder as a whole came from someone who gave me that nickname when I was playing rugby. So I was actually, I was on a rugby team in San Francisco probably like, you know, mid-2010s. And usually when you, you know, become an official member of the team, they kind of coin you with a nickname. and obviously they knew I was Hapa, so Hapa came from that.

But the thunder part was the interesting part. So in rugby you're wearing like soccer shorts, you know, small, small shorts. So they're like, dude, you got some thunderous thighs. So Hapa, thunder, half Asian, thunder thighs. So that's where it came from. And it just kind of stuck. And it was kind of a fun little story to tell when people ask. Have you ever had to explain the reasoning behind your?

your name to like other brands or anything like that or no luckily no you know they might be a little turned off by that but no but it's luckily i haven't had to explain to brands but it's just an interesting story when i get to tell it so i actually kind of want to go a little bit into that so you know you did some rugby you're going through you know your time in school you for those that are not here he is not a full-time contact created. You also won, you know, you're a husband and a father, but you're also a full-time assistant manager at a clinic or an assistant clinic manager at a hospital, correct? So like, first of all, how did you get up into health care in general?

Yeah, I mean, you know, it's funny, like in high school, you know, you kind of aspire to be a certain thing or have a certain job. For some reason, I always wanted to be a nurse. It was just kind of one of those things where I was like, you know, no, no. no guy in high school is usually like I want to be a nurse, you know, but it was just something in the back of my head that I wanted to do. I mean, mind you, I went to school and went to college for business, so I didn't really have nursing kind of in the forefront of my mind. You know, I went and played football in college. I had a great experience.

And then, you know, it wasn't until a few years into the corporate world. And I was like, you know what? This is really not for me. So I went back to school and then got a nursing. degree. So I'm kind of following that path. Now I'm on the administrative side of health care. So yeah, I'm kind of, you know, in both worlds kind of thing. Wow. So you so you started off as like, you know, business school. Then you're like, this isn't for me. I'm going back. How, how was that like talking to your family and stuff like that about, hey, this isn't for me. I'm going back. Was it

was there some pushback or was it like go for it? Absolutely. pushback. I mean, mind you, I come back home after college. I'm like 22 and, you know, I'm living with my mom and my mom gives me a couple years to figure it out, you know, and she's like, you know, at a couple years, if you don't have it figured out yet, she kind of gave me an ultimatum. She's like, you live into my house. You got to live by my rules. So it's like, hey, I respect that. So she's like, you either go to the military or you go to nursing school. So I made the, you know, decision of going to nursing school. Fun fact is me and my wife were in the same cohort. So we were basically nursing students together. And that's where we met. Oh, that's so awesome. It all works out of the yet.

It all works out of the end. Like you're, you're like, I don't think this is for me. It's something in the universe, but like, you know what? I think this is the right way for you do it. And look at that. It all works out in the end. That's so awesome. Yeah, you know, but it was crazy like, you know,

getting out of college and wanting to do the corporate thing. I really wanted to work for Nike. That was just like my dream. Anybody, any sneaker has dream is like, I want to work for Nike. You know, I had a great opportunity to visit the corporate campus up in Oregon. And, you know, I had like a week there. I got to meet and have informational interviews with a bunch of like executives and stuff. It was great.

Got a lot of free stuff. That was awesome. And then applied for a few jobs, didn't get in. So I decided to go to retail route. So I was a lead at one of the retail shops. and it just didn't work out. You know, going retail and trying to work your way up to corporate is not the easiest route. So, yeah, going back to school was kind of probably a right thing for me.

So, you know, you're going back to school. You're in your nursing program. You're working hard. You know, you meet your future wife there. You're going through all this stuff. And then I know that like 2020 was kind of like, things kind of turn for to crazy. Like things are happening, you know, COVID's happening,

quarantine's happening. But also, this is like the time that you start to kind of get into where you are currently. So first of all, I would love to, I love to hear the story about, you know, you giving your brother your PlayStation. And then that kind of falters into you creating content about your first PC.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So at the time, you know, we were living with the in-laws just kind of get, you know, get our feet set before we moved into our new home. And, and we had a PlayStation 4 at the time. We were all game on it. You know, it was great. Kind of shared it as a family. But when I moved, my brother-in-law asked me if he can keep it. And I was like, well, you know, this is dear to my heart. But sure, you can have it, right? So I was kind of left with the decision of like, hey, the new consoles are coming out, PS5, Xbox 1. Like, what should I do? What console should I go with? And then the funny thing is,

actually asked one of my coworkers who was kind of in the PC gaming kind of what his thoughts were. And he was like, man, like if you really have the budget and the time, you should really look into building your own PC. So then I went down that rabbit hole of what parts to get, what is good, what is not aesthetically what I would like. And I decided to just go for it. I was like, you know what? Hey, this is a risk I'm willing to take. it's definitely the more costly decision, but, you know, it got me to where I am today. So essentially, I was, you know, I built this PC and in a time where PC components weren't

all that cheap at the time. And I decided to go with an all white build, which obviously has a bit of a bit more of attacks just for even getting white components. So I think the fact that I was building a very high-end computer. at the time where not a lot of people were doing it and aesthetically was probably one of the cleanest builds that that i've seen um it was just kind of like a perfect storm of you know me being able to share that with with everyone uh for whatever reason i decided to get on ticot and document the process of the of the computer build um i think i did about six part like a six part um series back when um you know there was no editing apps and everything like that i was

just doing it directly in the in the in the in the app itself uh video the videos were like a minute long and um yeah it just kind of happened and it was it was awesome i actually because you know i do my research on my on on my guess and everything like that i have the first ever ticot video you made and it is like quintessential like this is the first like first like like TikTok I've made. So I want people here to know that, you know, if your TikToks aren't great or your videos aren't great, like you will evolve throughout this time. So I just want to show people, you know, this is from October 17th of 2020.

Gosh, that's coming up on six years ago from the day you started posting TikTok, which is crazy. I just love the how this is like. the old school TikTok like the caption is my name is jason this my first posts on ticot hashtag for you uh y p for you page uh follow me like quintessential and i love it but uh all the music's also very nostalgic too yeah like i i love how different your styles have changed we'll go a little bit into like how your thing evolved but i always love bringing back like the first ever tic talk or youtube video people make because people go like oh my gosh what was i doing like now i would never do something like that right but it's it's great for people here oh shoot sorry i had the um had the uh thing needed but just knowing

that this is that you're you're everyone here if you start making content it will evolve you'll get better just start posting um so first of all did you ever expect you to grow so much so fast not at all not at all i was literally just kind of randomly decided to start had no expectations whatsoever um and and it just kind of took off you know it was it was at a time where people were at home quarantined, you know, a lot of people were on social media scrolling. So again, it was just one of those things where it's like, hey, you know, people are here and they're watching. And, yeah, I mean, what it became like, so basically like when I started, I did this PC build. And obviously when you build a computer, you got to kind of have a set

up for it, right? So I built this computer with literally nothing else to go with it. So I was like, well, I need a desk. Well, now I need a microphone. Now I need a headset. So it's just, it just became this like snowball of like me building my setup and it that in itself was its own series was me building my dream setup back in 2020 and I did like maybe 14, 15 parts so it was like it was like very long drawn out series

but at a time where a lot of people weren't doing those things. Also for those that don't know you gained around how fast was it to get to 100,000 followers? I feel like it was, it was, I want to say by the end of the year, so, you know, mid-October to the end of the year, it was, I think I got like 200,000 within the first couple months. So it was like very rapid. How was it seeing that gross just like spike up? I mean, it was, it was honestly insane.

Like, I don't know if it would be like that again. It was, it was wild. That's what I'm saying. Like, people would dream of getting. 100 followers, a thousand followers. You gained 200,000 like that. Yeah. How did your family feel about that?

I mean, my wife to this day is very like kind of anti-social media. So, I mean, she kind of doesn't quite understand the magnitude of what that was. But I mean, overall, very supportive. They know that it's a means for me to, you know, express myself and, and, you know, share my experiences with others. and, you know, have opportunities that I probably wouldn't have had previously, you know. So now we're going to get a little bit more into what you do now because, you know, you have some awesome videos. I love the style that you have, which is like you're really like talking to the audience. So like what first of all was kind of like that next step into, okay, I have a hundred,

200,000 followers now, I should probably start taking this seriously. Like what was like the thought and the plan behind that? I mean, it's, you know, obviously when you start off doing content creation, especially in the tech space, right? I mean, going from just sharing my experience building a computer and now I have brands knocking on my door wanting to send me stuff, you know, asking if they can repost my content. It was just, it was a time where I just, I wasn't ready for it, you know? And it was just a bit overwhelming, but I mean, it's evolved so much.

I mean, especially just me being in the space for six years. It's evolved so much. And I've grown so much. And obviously there's ups and downs with it. But, yeah. Yeah. I would love, and I love asking this question because hopefully people that are here listening or watching, you know, they are starting their content creation journey.

and they're not necessarily knowing what to do next. How do walk me through how you decide to make a video for, let's say, like a keyboard that you love or a brand deal. Yeah. I mean, like I said, the contents evolve so much. I mean, just for context, right? I mean, yeah, I've been making these videos for six years, but I still film on my phone and I still edit on my phone. So a lot of people think that I have these nice setups, these nice computers, and yeah, I have a nice camera, but I always go back to my phone and I always go back to editing on my phone just for the simple fact that it's just accessible, right? As you know, and as the viewers know now, I'm always on the go.

I'm constantly working. I'm constantly with my kids. I'm out running around. There's never really a time where I can sit down on my desk and focus on something, right? If I do have to make a video, okay, I give myself maybe 30 minutes. Let me just knock out the filming part. And then I'll get back. I'll get to the edit whenever I have the chance on my phone.

So it still kind of blows some of the other content creators when I meet with them or when we, you know, get together. They're like, oh, what editing, what editing software are you using? What platform are you editing on? What camera are you using? I'm like, I just film on my iPhone. And I just use one of the, you know, apps that I use. And it's, I have no issues with it. How do you feel about people that are like, if they want to get a content creation,

that they feel like they have to get the, the gear bug and they have to get, like you said, nice camera, nice mic, nice this and that. Do you just need like, what is like the baseline stuff that people really need? Honestly, you just need your phone. And that's it, really. I mean, you don't even really need an external microphone. Like you can get like one of those little wireless mics for your phone if you really want to. If you want your audio quality to be a bit better.

But a lot of people just whip out their phone and film. You don't need anything extra. You don't need anything more than what you have in your pocket. I mean, even to this day, I've spent thousands on gear that I really don't use. Right. I mean, even when I'm like the camera that I'm using now, it's an Osmond Pocket 3. So yeah, it's like a $400 or $500 camera. And it literally just sits here.

It's a gimbal camera for action. And it just sits right here on my desk. I don't use it for what it's intended for when I could probably just use a regular my, you know, web cam and it'd be okay. I have a $5,000 Sony camera that I bring out every once in a while, but I always go back to my phone. And that's what I should stress to people who are wanting to get in to content creation or in the tech space that you don't really need a lot.

You have, you have it all within your pocket. That's something that I would love to learn is how do you decide, like, what, you know, what type of video needs to make. Do you do like script it out, outline it? Oh yeah, yeah. Okay, so you do do a lot of time. Yeah, so I mean, for, you know, the content has evolved so much.

When I first started out, it was literally whip my phone out, press record, and I'll talk while I'm filming, right? So it'll be the audio plus the video in the same clip and then I would have to cut it like that. But now obviously I have dedicated cameras, microphones, things like that. So how I usually go about making a video is I script it out.

So I usually write a quick script that I know is going to be roughly about a minute. And then I'll do a talking head piece like this where I would basically read the scripts and talk into the camera. And then I would, if I'm filming a product, say like a keyboard or a GPU or what have you, then I'll film B-roll. And then I'll just basically add the B-roll bits into my talking head. headshots and that's essentially my video nothing too crazy and i don't do any like out of the ordinary like shots or anything like that uh mind you i just don't have much time to get super creative and i you know i have a very short window that i can try to fit these into my day um so yeah that's that's kind of how i go about it i script it and then i film the talking headshot film b roll and kind of piece it all together

and actually i would love to talk about that sage actually had a great question about it is, you know, people think that when you want to get into content creation, you're like, I'm putting every little bit of time into it. I'm staying up all night, but you have a full-time job. You have a family. You have a wife that, you know, you have to actually, like, communicate and talk with and hang out with. How do you do that?

Like, how do you make time in your day to make all these contents and keep up with your TikTok account and everything like that? and your hundreds and thousands of followers. I mean, I wish I had more time to spend on it. Obviously, I love making content. I love being creative. But, you know, I have to always, I have to also look and say, I have a family.

I have someone, you know, I have little people that I need to support, right? I have four kids. So, and they're all under the age of 10. So I have a 10 year old, a 9 year old, a 5 year old and a 1 year old. So it's very busy, very crazy, chaotic in the house. but yeah, it just, it's, so I'll kind of take you through my day. So I work a full-time job. I commute really far.

So my job is about 65 miles. And if you're dealing with Bay Area traffic, it's like two hours each way. So I'm going basically hour and a half, two hours to work. I work eight hours. And then I take about hour and a half to two hours to get home. So I'm literally out of the house, 12 hours of the day. I don't get home until about seven. At that point, if I have a video that I need to make or want to make some content, I have to then have dinner with my kids, hang out with my family, put them to bed and then make some content.

So it's not until like, you know, the night hours, 11 o'clock, 12 o'clock that I actually have to fit that in. And then I go to bed, start the next thing, you know, go back to work. And then it's fit in editing throughout the day when I can because I've literally doing it on my phone. So it's, you know, I could do it between breaks and lunches and things like that. So that's my day to day. And then the weekends is when I can really do some bulk, you know, filming and content. But then again, that's the time that I want to spend with my kids. So it's that balance of, you know, giving my family the time, but also keeping up with the content and making it still, you know, a passion of mine.

How do how do you balance it? Like, is there like a thing like, okay, if I spend an hour here, I'll do it? or is it like family first, I'll figure it out after? It's usually family first. It's always been like that. I really want to, like, you know, be present with my family and make sure that, you know, my kids know that I'm here and with them. And then, you know, content will come, you know.

It's always been that way, you know. Obviously, you know, I don't make the amount, the quantity of videos that I used to make. Because at a point in time, I think I did like two videos a day, right? Oh, gosh. I'm doing like maybe two videos a week, you know? So, I mean, it's slowed down quite a bit just because responsibilities have, have, you know, became more, more like serious. A question I love asking because people think like, you know,

you have 500,000 followers on TikTok. Like, you know, you have 100,000 of followers. You're getting brand deals left and right. Everything's all peachy keen. Like, nothing is terrible. But I know, and, you know, I relate to it, burnout is such a huge thing, especially with a family as well. So have you ever felt burnt out before? And did you ever like consider just like walking away from like content creation in general?

Yeah, absolutely. It is for sure a thing. Burnout is real. I mean, I get burnt out at work. I get burnt out at home. I get burnt out with content creation for sure. But it's just, you know, being able to take breaks, you know? give yourself that time where you can reset i think is important um you don't have to take long

breaks right i mean sometimes sometimes i go like a month without making video but i really i sometimes stray away from taking that long to make a video uh i mean mind you i you know i have i have i i work under a talent agency now so you know i have a have a brand manager so it kind of does all the back end stuff for me which is awesome um funny thing enough the the guest that you had on last week, Driggsie, we actually under the same management and actually have the same brand manager. So that's kind of how I got introduced with Trigzy. So yeah, it's it's nice that I have someone to relate to, but also have a talent agency who can help me with not getting burnt out because I was doing everything before I was doing in the back end,

you know, negotiating contracts, all that stuff. Like it was a lot. That's actually a great question. for people is when should you consider like, you know, finding help, you know, either finding an agent to help you out with or help finding like an editor or something like that. When should you probably consider, you know, finding that extra thing before you, you know, overscale too much? Yeah. No, I think maybe maybe the turning point would be like if you, if you find your time is more valuable, then, you know, like you're spending a lot of time doing a lot of the stuff that

people don't see, right, to where it's taking away from you actually creating, actually making the content, then at that point you might want to consider getting some help, whether it be someone to help you write the scripts, someone to help you edit the videos. Even to this day, I still edit all my videos and all that stuff. So it takes a lot of time. But it's also very scary to try to ask somebody to replicate the videos that you're trying to make in your head. So I still haven't went down that path of figuring out if I should get an editor or not. But I mean, even just working with a talent agency, I've been with them for, I think,

two and a half years, almost three years, I think. And it's been great. You know, they do all the backend stuff. I don't have to worry about it. I have more time with my family, have more time making content. Yeah. And mind you, they take a percentage, but that's great. I don't mind that because it relieves so much off of my shoulders, you know. I think there's a certain time where like, like you said, time is more valuable than getting every little bit of profit. Like there is a time where it's like, I need to, like, time is something that you can ever replace.

You know, money will always come back. You can always make it. But I think spending time with your family is such a huge thing. Sage actually had a great question, which was like, you know, you work for a talent agency. You have brand deals. Like, you know, you have to be like, hey, we need this. thing by this month or in three weeks or something like that. How do you handle, you know,

taking a break and going on vacation and doing that stuff? Like you said, sometimes you won't post for, you know, sometimes weeks on end. But, you know, some people are like,

I need to post every single day to get the algorithm, I get as many views and stuff. Like, how do you handle that? I mean, it's, it's always a bit difficult to, to try to juggle everything,

you know, Yeah, it's some sometimes brands give you a decent amount of time to figure it out. Some brands are like, hey, I need this in a week, you know, but at the end of the day, you got to always just get it done. And the best way to avoid any issues with you having to reshoot or having to make any edits is just follow what they ask. Right. I mean, if they ask you to say a few things in it, say it, right? and make sure you just kind of I mean they they obviously chose you for a reason because they they like maybe the style or or what have you just stick to what you normally do do what they ask

and that's pretty much it um yeah uh this this is like my favorite part of like learning about contract is you working with brand deals and people here they love they love hearing about this because in their head oh you give you free stuff and I just Yeah, that's how it works. You know, that it's just easy. There's a much difficult side to brand deals and then asking for it. So I'd love to go into that aspect of, you know, working with an actual brand or business. So first of all, like, how do you get these brand deals in the first place?

Do you reach out to them? Do they reach out to you? And how does that process go from, you know, them talking or you talking with them to, to getting a video out and then you also getting the product. Yeah, I mean, early on, it was a lot of free product for promotion, right? And it was a lot of like, I mean, when you're when you're starting off, it's like, why wouldn't you want free stuff, right? Like, why wouldn't you want a free keyboard or, or, you know, a free microphone or what have

you? So at that time, it was like, man, I will make a video or two for you for that product. No problem. I get a free, free keyboard. Absolutely. But then it comes a turning point where it's like, hey, well, now, now my time's a little more valuable and, you know, and some brands are paying me, but now you're asking for free. So that becomes a bit of an issue where it's like starting to ask for money or compensation or asking for what their budget is and they're asking what my current rate is. Me figuring out what my rate is has always been one of the hardest things, right?

Like, what do I value my content and how much would what I tell brands like they should pay for my content? It's always been like a thing because who knows I might charge a certain amount, but another creator would say, oh, I'll take it for free. So that can it, it's a bit tricky, you know. That's why it's also important to have, you know, someone like a town manager who can navigate those situations and help me, you know, get the money that I would essentially have a difficult time asking for myself. But yeah, it's it's always good to appreciate the free stuff early on. Now again, it's for me a lot of times when I'm making videos, it's it's a bit hard to make videos that aren't paid now just because of my time. And I want to make sure that if I'm spending time away from family or work that I'm getting essentially paid for it. but it sucks that most of my videos are like paid you know and and essentially like

advertisements but um yeah i can't complain because it's it's essentially a way for my for me to you know be able to provide for my family outside of what i do you know on a nine to five um yeah i actually um that's something that i think a lot of content creators kind of have an issue with, which is like you said, it's, it's hard to say no to a free stuff and sometimes they pay you to do something like that. How do you know when to say yes and when to say no to a certain thing? It's tough because sometimes that dream brand is going to knock on your door and they say, hey, you know, I would love to send you free stuff, but we don't have a budget right now, right? Then it's like, what do I do? You know, like most of the times I'm, I mean,

Right now it's a bit tricky, so I would most likely turn it down. But sometimes I'll be like, hey, you know what? Let's let's do something on, let's do something free. And then go from there and then see where it leads us, kind of build that relationship. It's important a lot of these brands want to build relationships, which is super important, right? Because they want to build trust that they can count on you to make a video for them. And yeah. And then eventually it'll turn into something.

something more fruitful for both parties. Sage actually has a great question, which is, do you ever feel pressured? Like, let's say, you know, we cut by, NZXT comes by and you're like, oh, wait, I, you know, I want to work with these guys. Do you ever feel pressured to say like yes to the brand, even though it may be something you may not be like super knowledgeable in

or you don't want to introduce your audience to? Yeah, I mean, there's I get I get my inboxes flooded with stuff that it's like, oh, you really want me to do a video on Korean skin care. I mean, I could I could do it, but but would my audience really, you know, like relate to that? Probably not. So I mean, I get a lot of that in the inbox and, you know, I see everything that comes in. Even though I don't manage my inbox, I see everything. So usually if I, if I see something from a brand, obviously I'm going to say, hey, I'm interested. And then they kind of gauged the level of interest in which I would be willing to work with that brand. Most times I'm willing to work on something on a lower budget or even free if that, you know, can, obviously it won't guarantee anything in the future, but it'll it'll kind of build that, that initial relationship. And then, you know, sometime it will, you know, be something better in the future. I mean, mind you, like, for instance, like there's a, there's a cell phone case company that that I've worked with over the years, maybe a couple years now. And it's always been like, hey, we'll just, you know, we'll send you, we'll send you, we'll send you, you know, the cases for the new iPhone.

Sure. No problem. You know, I generally like their product, so I don't mind posting about it, right? And then hasn't been a couple years, you know, since I, you know, I built that good relationship. I made a few videos for them. Some of them went fairly viral. and then, you know, two years pass, and they're like, hey, I remember you. Would you mind now working on something on a paid level since we've, you know, we've had their relationship with you.

And, you know, we thought about, we thought about you and we thought it'd be a good fit for the future. So I was like, hey, you know, building those relationships can become more, more profitable in the future. Texas House actually has a great question is, you know, like you said, you have to think about your audience. but has there ever been offered that you were like tempted for by an actual like a very incompatible brand for your audience that you're like I really want to work with you guys but I don't know if my audience can do that you know what like I've always been a bit of a anti AI not necessarily like AI like services or like apps that offer AI things but more just like hey we want you to post like an AI generated video

to promote our brand or something like that. And most of the times these AI brands are, they have a decent size budget, right? So usually for me personally, I don't like that because I know some brands kind of post AI genera video and they get a bunch of heat for it. Because it's like, hey, like, what are you doing? You're a big brand.

Why are you, you know, why are you posting AI genera videos? But so that's something that I would probably stray away from, even though it can be lucrative if I decide to go that path. That it's it's tough right because I know especially us in the PC industry, AI has caused pretty much rise in everything that people want in the PC gaming industry. But like you said, those guys have a very large paycheck, especially compared to other brands. How do you keep that integrity?

of your brand and how do you make sure that that stays staying? Because like you said, like it's hard to turn down a large amount of money to keep that brand. So how do you dictate that? Yeah. I mean, for one, it's just communicating with my team that, that, you know, I have certain standards and I, and I have certain things that I, that I want to portray on my channel, but also, you know, shy away from things that that don't really make any sense. So they kind of have an eye of what to look out for. Obviously, if they think that something may work out for me, they'll shoot it my way.

But they're very in tune on what I like and what I don't like. So they'll turn it down for me if they don't think it's good for my channel. So being relying on them has been pretty helpful with that as well. That makes sense. you know something that i love asking as a brand ourselves what is something that brands do that they get wrong when they work with creators like you guys they get wrong um i don't know i haven't had much negative interactions with brands usually it's been pretty pretty great

um maybe because i'm handpicking these these brands where You know, I usually no issues, but I mean, I think sometimes with brands, they, they, especially when brands are like, hey, if, you know, we'll give you this, we'll give you this money, we'll give this budget. But if your video is better, we'll give you some more. But it's like, hey, you can't, you can't dictate the views, right? You can, you can hope that views are going to be there, but you can't guarantee anything, right? I might spend forever to edit this video and it could flop, right? I could spend 10 minutes editing this video and it go viral. You know, you can never know.

So it's hard to anticipate and hard to like tell these brands that you can live up to that. I like that. I love the wall behind you of all these keyboards and all these things. So I want to first go into your love of keyboard. So how did that start in general? I mean, it's kind of started with the whole building my dream setup back in 2020, 2021. Obviously, I needed a solid keyboard. Mechanical keyboards were kind of on the rise at the time, right?

I mean, if you're really into the keyboard space, you know, about group buys and, you know, being able to like, basically pre-order something. I mean, early on, when group buys were very popular back then, I would buy something. I think I bought like a $400 keyboard. I didn't get it for like two years. Jeez. So I mean, but I mean, like how I got into it was like obviously I built my setup and I needed a solid keyboard.

And one of the companies reached out to me saying that, hey, we'll provide you a mechanical keyboard. And it was cool because it wasn't just a keyboard. Here it is great. They're like, we can send you the bare, bones kit plus the switches plus the key caps and then you can put it all together yourself so that that kind of spiraled and and and and turned into this thing and love for mechanical keyboards because I love I love taking things apart I love building things that's kind of why I was I took the risk

of even building a computer because I was like this is a challenge that I'm willing to take on and mind you I don't know everything about it but I can figure it out so building a keyboard is kind of the same thing but just at a smaller level and And then it's even a more larger rabbit hole of, you know, types of switches, you know, materials of key caps and, you know, sound dampening and all this crazy stuff. I wouldn't change it for the world. I love keyboards. I love, I mean, mind you, my whole shelf is just all the keyboards that I've built over the years and all kind of custom one-off keyboards, which is awesome. So, yeah, I mean, these are kind of like essentially like timestamps of my.

my content creation journey. So it's it's it's awesome that I get to kind of show it off and display it all. But it got to a point where I loved keyboards so much and I was working with so many keyboard brands so often that I had like like a closet back there was just flooded keyboards like more keyboards than I can even think about. Right. So I think it was the 2020 or 20 or 2022 or 2023 that I was like, hey, I'm just going to give away keyboards every single week for an entire year and see where it happens, you know? So every week I would show off the keyboard and then give them a week to enter. And then every Friday, I would essentially pick a winner and then on to the next week. It was great. It was awesome. Yeah, I actually have that video of the first one.

You're right. January 2nd, 2023 was your, uh, 52 weeks. was 52 keyboards and you thought I was playing the rules will be simple I'll announce the giveaway on Monday I'll pick a winner on Friday every Friday like or every idea that you're like I'm gonna start giving away these things how successful was the 52 give a 52 keyboard giveaway yeah I mean it was the whole the whole purpose of it obviously was to give back to the community right I mean I have I have all this I don't need it right I mean yeah I could probably sell it on Facebook market and make it you know some money but I really didn't want to do that and I really wanted to just give back so I decided to do it

as a way to give back to the community but also find a way to kind of grow my my platforms my channels obviously as you can see through you know most of my most of my channels TikTok is obviously the biggest biggest audience so the goal was to kind of grow the other platforms right I mean at the time of me starting that giveaway weekly giveaway I was that basically zero YouTube, zero Instagram. Like I was, I didn't do any of the other platforms. I was like TikTok and that's the only thing.

So it was a shift that I was trying to grow basically the other platforms, mainly focusing on YouTube because I was like, hey, I'm going to post these, I'm going to post these shorts every week, kind of gained, you know, hey, some of the ways to enter is to follow my YouTube. And yeah, I probably, you know, gained most of my following from these giveaways for the most part yeah uh one thing that i i i love keyboards too like but it built i built my first keyboard uh you know got the the whole kit you know i also waited for i think two months when i pre-ordered some of my switches uh for those that do not understand why making your keyboard is so

awesome and so like gratifying like what what do you think they are missing out on i mean it's hard to It's hard to explain because like when you when you have a really nice keyboard and you're typing away on it, it just feels so nice. And the sound is just so so nice to hear. And when when you really get into it, you get to like understand how it feels, not only how it looks, but how it feels, how it sounds. And then when you're typing all the time, it's it's, you want something that you enjoy, right? You don't want some kind of mushy membrane keyboard that you don't really get much enjoyment about. with so if you're able to tailor that make it feel how you want make it sound how you want make it look how you want it's it's especially when you're interacting with it every day it

makes total sense to to start customizing a keyboard what is your favorite keyboard that you've ever made um hmm it's a good question just trying to look back there um um There's some good ones. There's some good ones, actually. There was a Tifu-inspired keyboard that I made. Like right here, I'm getting. So it's like anodized rainbow and then has these key caps. I think this is GNK Striker.

So it's very Tifu-inspired keyboard. So I think this was kind of cool to make. As you can see, it's pretty crazy. Fingerprint magnet. But, I mean, that's a good one. Some of my favorite keyboards is this one right here. Oh, my gosh. This one's like 10 pounds, I swear.

This one's super nice. One of my favorite keyboard creators, his name's Alex Otos. He designed these key caps. So these are one of my favorite key caps of all the time. This keyboard, also another fingerprint magnet, you can see all over the place. My kids love pressing on these keyboards, by the way. They come in and they're just at the bookshelf, just clacking away, right?

So, I mean, this was an awesome one. This is an awesome one that I like. But I mean, my keyboard preferences have obviously evolved over time, right? In the very beginning, I was like, 60% gaming keyboard, got to have as small as I can so I can have the most maximum space for my mouse. And then it's like, now I just want full-size keyboard so I can work. and play, you know, I work on like hybrid. So I need my numpad.

So it's, it's different. I'm glad that you brought up the Tifu inspired one. Actually, this is like one of the like my favorite videos you made of the $3,500 Tfu custom keyboard that you made for I think it was like $400 or something like that. I think that's something that people do not realize like you do not have to spend thousands of thousand dollars on a custom keyboard. You can make one relatively cheap and these things last. I mean, you made this two years ago, and it looks as pristine noun than it did back then.

So these things last a long time. Highly, highly recommend people to build your own custom keyboard because it is awesome. And like mechanical keyboards have evolved over time so much. Like I remember back in the day when I first started, you had to do so much to a keyboard to make it sound halfway decent, right? You had to lube everything. You had to tape mod. you had to add foam, like all this crazy stuff. But now keyboard brands have gotten so good

to where you can get all these mods for essentially super. You can get a really good sounding keyboard for under $100. Oh, man. I remember trying to lube up keys and then ending up going too far in. And then it just sounds like a squishy man. I'm like, dude, I remember starting off. And I'm like, I had no idea what I was doing. And like you said, now it's so.

so easy to I you could literally just be like oh I like to sound to that order it and boom you just put it together and yeah like switches come pre-loop now and and yeah it's it's definitely a crazy space I mean it got to the point where um you know I was getting so many switches in I was I was building so many keyboards that like I started streaming doing doing doing like you know crafting streams where I would build keyboards and I found enjoyment with that because I didn't feel pressure to to to like game at a high level in front of people I could just chill, talk, build a keyboard, and it was just more of a vibe, definitely. That is it on my questions.

I'm going to go ahead and transition us into my favorite segment, which is rapid-fire question. So I'm going to ask you, don't worry, I'll start off easy, and it will start to go lean more into the, oh, this is a very interesting one. So, first of all, what is your favorite Pokemon of all time? Favorite Pokemon of all time. I mean, I started out when Pokemon was when it started, right? I mean, I remember getting my first Pokemon card. I remember getting my first Pokemon game. It was Pokemon yellow with my Game Boy color, Atomic Purple Game of Color.

So, I mean, and I remember going to a card shop and getting my first hollow base set packs and stuff. Like my first ever holographic cards were base at Blastor. is based at Alka-Zam. So getting those cards, I think they were at the time, they were like charging $10 or something, which nowadays is you have to pay thousands for, you know, a card like that. But favorite Pokemon,

I've always been like a Gen 1 fan, right? Classic, you know, Charzard, Dragonite, um, Brien, you know, it's always been those, like a Mew 2, Mew, right? Pretty much. If you could own one of these Pokemon, own one. Any Pokemon in real life,

what would you decide? I always love asking this question because people go like, oh, I really like my favorite one, but some people go like utility base, you know, functional. Like I don't know.

I mean, I would definitely just have it more if it was like a household pet type of thing. I don't know. Something cute that kids could play with, I guess. Maybe, you know, it'd be like a funny one, like a side duck. Oh.

Just like a funny, quirky, you know, I don't know, kind of, uh, I don't know, just like a funny, funny character just to have in the house. I think, I think that would be so much laughter just brought in from side duck, just being confused, running to walls an accident. Yeah. It'd be pretty funny. That's a good one. Fortnite, almost a decade in, how much have you spent on the,

Fortnite store. Um, I don't know if I want to disclose that. No, I'm just kidding. I mean, like, obviously, Fortnite's been that game for, for almost a decade now. And it's funny because I started playing Fortnite, like, around the same time I had kids. So like, my oldest is around the same age as me playing Fortnite, which is crazy to, to say. But I mean, mind you, I've probably spent thousands on the game, right? I mean, probably if I could really quantify it, maybe like,

four to five thousand, just on cosmetics alone. I mean, it got to a point where I was trying to get all the rare skins. And the only ways you can get them would be like on the secondary market, people were selling codes and stuff. So, I mean, mind you, my locker is pretty stacked with a lot of these exclusive, like, console-based skins. And I'll tell you one story, Fortnite related. Pretty crazy.

So back when the galaxy skin first came out, the galaxy skin was exclusive to a Samsung Galaxy phone. And the only way you can get it was redeeming it on that new phone that came out that year. There was only one per phone that you can get. So what I did was I took the day off. I went to stores that had the phone on display and I redeemed it from a phone that was on display in a Walmart. But the trick was you had to play five games on that phone in order to get to. So I was literally like two hours playing at a at a kiosk phone to redeem this this this cosmetic but I got it and it's a funny story to like say like hey I could have either bought a phone for a thousand dollars and got the skin but I just spent two hours in a Walmart and got it instead did anyone stop you at any

time like wow the workers were like what are you doing and I'm just like oh I'm just checking it out like don't worry about me I'm just dropping in you know killing people like on the mobile device. And it was funny though because like, you know, sometimes they have like, um, restraints where you can't take the phone out. Um, but it was funny because like I logged into my account and everything. And in order for me to log out, I had to like press the corner of the screen, but it was blocked by the restraint. So I had to ask a court, I had to ask one of the workers and say, hey, can you, can you take out this phone so I can log out of my account now that I have it redeemed? It was just one of those things. It was just, it was awkward, but it was so worth it.

So, I mean, it worked out at the end, right? So worth it. Yeah. Now I have a funny story and a really exclusive skin. What is the best sneaker of all time? Best sneaker of all time. That's tough because, again, my sneaker preferences have evolved so much. I mean, I let him a dad.

I'm just like, oh, I love new balances now because it's just more comfy, right? I'm right. I'm right. Exactly, right? So, like, I mean, it's changed so much, right? I mean, I've always been Nike through and through Jordan. Obviously, when Connie went to Adidas, I was huge easy. Who wasn't?

Right? An ultra boost. And then now I'm kind of in my comfort bag with New Balance and A6 and things like that. But I mean, I love the classic Jordans, you know, growing up, always wanting retro Jordans as a kid. Jordan 11 is always a classic for me. Jordan 1. Can't go wrong with a Jordan 1. I probably have like 20, 30 pairs. of Jordan one by itself.

My closet is just, it's my sneaker closet now. So I was like, that's only my sneakers. So, yeah, it's, it's, it's always going to be like a classic retro Jordan for me. What is the one grail that you would love to have? Would I love to have? Like, it could appear right here right in front of you. Oh, my grail sneaker? I mean, maybe something crazy.

like an air mag or something. Like I always love Back to the Future, right? I've always been a fan of Martin Refly and, you know, riding the hoverboard and things like that. So I think auto lacing sneakers. So cool. It would be such an awesome thing. I mean, I'm not paying 20, 30,000 for a pair,

but it'd be cool to have. That is true. You talked about it is that closet behind you. How many pairs of sneakers do you think you have? I don't even know at this point. The thing is, is like, Like, I've had, like, the quantity of sneakers that I've had has varied, you know, through over, through the years.

I've had 100 plus and then I've condensed into 30, 20 of, like, the shoes that I really want. And it kind of fluctuates. Right now, probably like 50, probably like 50 pairs. Yeah. Wow. I mean, yeah. It's, it's very, it's been a lot slowed down recently just because, you know, I have other priorities, you know.

But yeah, right now it's more just like I wear almost the same shoes at work every day So it's like you know I got a nice pair of Nike running shoes and I you know like Vermeros and then I have some new balances like some nine nine eight or you know Nine ninety V sixes or some something comfy where I can just wear all day What is your favorite shoe that is in your collection as of right now? I I'm on the hunt for I mean I've been trying to collect all the Travis. Travis Jordans Travis Scott Jordans. So I have almost all of them.

But I mean, probably one of my like Travis Lowe, like Travis Fragment Lows or something like that. Classic white blue cream sneaker, right? Yeah. So probably that. You know, I bring it out every once in a while. Like if I'm going to a convention or something, I'll wear the fragments. But other than that, yeah. I mean, yeah.

What is your favorite piece of tech you've ever reviewed? ever reviewed yeah um man i'm that's six years of products that i have to come through my my my doorstep um gosh so many so many things um probably probably the first thing that comes to mind is like a pair of ar glasses you know something i can hook up to my phone watch a big screen like it's been especially awesome in like planes so I'll hook it up to the plane instead of watching on this little five-inch screen they put in front of you now I get to watch it full HD 100 some inches you know just looking into a pair of glasses like that for me is it's been pretty cool I mean the really cool thing about doing all

this tech stuff and and having all these cool things is my kids my kids have they don't understand what they have because what When I was a kid, I had nothing like they have it now, right? So I mean, they get they have so much at their fingertips. Literally any console they can play with, literally, you know, and any, any tech item that they, you know, like they're playing Fortnite with their, with their friends. I'm like, you do know you're playing on a $5,000 computer and they're probably playing on Nintendo Switch.

You know what I mean? And you're playing on a, on a 32 inch OLiv, 4K, you know, 400 Hertz, you know, like they don't understand the magnitude of what they have. So I think they, a bit take it for granted. But it's just funny to like see like you know how much they they get to enjoy the things that I you know I'm a part of. Yeah, they don't understand. They're like, oh, cool. Santa came back early with some awesome.

And some of the stuff that you have are like these are people would literally kill someone for this type of stuff. And you're, you know, you're free. It is very funny to think about it. Yeah. Uh, funny thing that you talk about, uh, uh, AR glasses is, uh, we had Drigsy last week. And his also favorite tech was also that as the same. way, which is really funny. Yeah.

I mean, it's like that tech has evolved quite a bit and has gotten a lot better. I'm actually due to review another pair, I think, the next coming week. So, I mean, I'm excited for that because not only are they getting better, but they're getting thinner because before it was like super thick and, you know, it looks like like you're wearing something foreign on your eyes. But now it's like almost at a point where you're wearing sunglasses and it feels like sunglasses and they're making them lighter, thinner. you know, better quality.

It's pretty crazy. Tech with Siong just said Hopa Santa. Hi, Si, how are you doing, man? No, literally. Like, it's like every, every Christmas, I'm literally like digging into my closets and boxes. It's like, okay, what can I give people, you know, for Christmas gifts? My sister has a field day when she comes to my house.

She's like, what do you got? Let me take it home, you know? Like literally going to my closets and just, I'm taking this keyboard. Let me get this microphone. It's pretty wild. Oh, what is a mod that every Tesla owner should have? That's a good question. So aside from doing tech, I also do Tesla content,

which was also kind of tied into just me being a tech creator. It kind of just also tied into the whole tech creator thing. So I got a Tesla back in 2023. I've been doing modifications on my car for, for what, three years now? probably the most important thing to get honestly this this might be kind of a random one but there's these this cup holder mod that you can put on your door because because if you're in a Tesla you're very limited to the amount of cup holders you have it's literally like two in the middle and that's it right so then you know I have these like cup holders that you can put

on the door and you have to like screw it into the door handle and it just kind of sits there but it's you get to add two more cup holders to the front like that's that's game changing i got i got to go pick up five drinks from my kids where am i going to put them all right so at least i have four cup holders and i can hold one right so that in itself was very functional very very underrated um another thing is um i have custom handles like door handles on the outside And the reason why I like them is not only are they auto presenting. So when you walk up to the door, when you walk up to the car, it opens for you, like, it presents itself and then you can just grab it instead of trying to figure out where to open up the car door. But that's cool.

But it also has like LEDs on the front, on the front face of it. So it looks pretty cool. When I break, it's like RGB. And it's, you know, people are like, every time I stop at like a like a drive-thru, if I go through a drive-thru and one of the workers is like, whoa, like those are some really cool. handles like you know I've never seen those before but also there's a function where it it taps into your blinkers so then you're blinking but it also flashes as a blinker so it's it's also like an added safety feature too you know wheel covers are they do you do you believe that they make things better or is it like kind of overhyped like I guess it depends on what

type of wheel covers because obviously like if you buy like a base model Tesla you're getting like an arrow dynamic wheel cover that's kind of already on the car. And mind you, that helps with maybe some of the range and some of the battery. But changing them out or taking them off doesn't change the range or battery all that much. You may be gaining a few miles or a few percentage on your battery. But I mean, early, because I have a base model. So obviously I use it to commute. It's been great. But I was swapping my wheel covers out a lot, right? because aesthetically, I just want something different, right? So for me, it didn't matter how much range it gave me or that.

It was more just how it looked. So I swapped out my wheel covers all the time. But there are wheel covers that cover the whole face of the rim. So that's also something to consider. I think those are called like Halo discs or something like that. But I have full on rims now, so I can't put wheel covers on. But yeah. What is the dream mod?

If like said no money, no time limit is no not like a thing. What would that dream mod be? I mean, I'm at the point where I'm almost done modding my car. I mean, I've wrapped it. I've got new rims. I've done pretty much every interior modification. I really wanted red seats. So I got fully custom red seats. So it's not just seat covers that go over my white seats. It's like I had to rip out the white seats and put red seats in. So that's super cool. But I would say the next step would be. suspension so like if i want i want to put it on bags i want to go air suspension you know that that's kind of the next evolution of of it um there's really nothing else i would do other than that really uh oh okay got a couple questions here about community so what was the one community moment that you think about when the work or the day gets heavy it's it's it's a bit of a tough thing. I mean, you know, doing this for this long, obviously, you've, you've built relationships with people and built a community, you know, that you were able to, you know, inspire and and assist. I mean, any chance I get, I try to help the community, whether it be me doing

giveaways or maybe even just saying, you know, if someone reaches out to me asking for help, you know, I'm there to help, right? I mean, it's, it's, it's, it's, a lot of the stuff you don't like people don't see because it happens on the back end or you know they're reaching out to me maybe because they have tech questions or things like that but you know just me being able to help either with their setup or with tech questions um it's funny like i'm i'm like the designated IT tech guy at work now because it's like oh like you're no you know tech like i'm having this computer issue can you help me out right nonstop do i get those questions i'm just like man they really need to just like pay me more i'm like the IT guy now too Um, no, but it's just really helping the community out when, you know, when otherwise I, I didn't have a community to, to do this for, right? So it's being able to help out. Sometimes I'll sometimes someone reach out and like, hey, like, I really need this. And I'm like, well, I can't send you a computer. But I can, you know, I can see how I can help with, you know, with your build, you know, sending you some fans or something. Um, because I have just some, sometimes I have a surplus of computer parts, which is not a bad. that thing. What is your favorite or funniest moment of your community that you will like laugh about for years on end? I don't know. I mean, it may be like the early, early streaming days. Like when I first started TikTok, you know, I was like, hey, I'm going to start streaming, right? So I started streaming and playing games and stuff. And I just had a lot of fun experiences with that because

it was like I had no idea what I was doing, right? Half the time I felt like I was, having audio issues and all like, I don't know what I'm doing, but I'm going to figure it out. I mean, so like having those moments with the community is like trying to figure it out, but also like I'm not a very good, I'm like a decent gamer, but I'm not like, I'm not a pro gamer that's like, you know, wiping out lobbies and stuff. So just like me basically, you know, kind of being a mediocre camera on the stream, like it's, It's funny to me. You know, I did a few giveaways, which was obviously pretty fun.

We did like the whole like Marbles on stream. And I doing something like that back in the day was like super fun. So yeah, probably like early streaming moments was probably my most memorable with the community. And the final question. Yeah. Someone going through college not knowing what they want to do suddenly switches majors. Then all of a sudden like they start filming. and getting into content creation,

what advice would you give that person now? I mean, I would just say don't give up. Like, like, if you, if this is what you want to do or if this is something that you want to pursue, like don't think that you can't do it, right? I mean, mind you, this tech space has changed so much. The bar is always set so high because a lot of these Instagram people

who are photographers and stuff, videographers, they've made their way into short four minutes. They're just killing it, right? So the bar is set very high. I myself am not very cinematic. I try to be, but it's like I do what I can with what I have. So it's, you know, just being able to understand that your content doesn't have to be perfect, doesn't have to be super cinematic, you know, because and I guess don't compare yourself

with others because you guys are not the same, right? And just stay consistent. I say stay consistent. Even though I'm not the most consistent, I try to stress that because I've been doing it for, you know, for six plus years now. It's like I've stayed consistent in that aspect where I haven't gave up my dream, right? I haven't gave up this, this thought of, you know, being this tech congregate or maybe potentially doing a full time, right? I mean, mainly the reason why I'm not doing a full time is because I have, you know, dependence and, you know, I need a steady job to bring in that steady income.

And the thing with content creation is, is the money isn't very consistent, right? You'll have some months that are great and some months where it's like, oh, man, I haven't done anything as far as like making any money or, you know, building any brand deals with, you know, making money. But, yeah, I would just say, don't, don't give up. and just work with you at work with all you have i love that all right that is it for the questions i'm going to go through one quick announcement and then i'm haunted back over to you jesus and both if you want to reveal anything you don't have to reveal anything if you want to you want to you

want to welcome to uh but first of all thank you guys for joining us um the nccc intel club uh is popping right now so special thanks to intel for helping us sponsor it because of them we're able to give you guys so much free stuff we got the shirt here we got plushies uh you can see poochie right behind find Jason right there. We're giving away stuff like that. And a monthly NZXT PC, which is super, super dope. One of our, one people that I see

all the time of community, JT. Beaker, just won the PC, which is super awesome. So you guys can go to nz60.co slash club, sign up, participate in our community to earn Pucci points, which is our little mascot right there. And then you guys can basically enter into these giveaways.

So the more points you earn, the more entries you get into the giveaway. So I would start ASAP to get more points and more entries into the giveaway. Now I'm going to head back over to you. Is there any exciting projects you're working on, any events you're going to, anything like that that you want to shout out to the community? Yeah, I mean, this year's been pretty crazy for me. I mean, I had CES in Vegas early this year.

I went to Taipei for CompuTech in the summer in May. I think the next big thing would be Pax. I'm going to be going to Pax West. So that's going to be pretty cool. I've never been to a Pax. I know Drixie is very, he does Pax every year. I think he goes to both East and West. Like he's, that's his thing.

He loves it. So being able to, like, be in that space is going to be really cool. And I really feel like it's, I feel like this is, even though I just, I've been doing this for quite some time, I feel like it's just, it's always fresh and it's always new to me, you know. Yeah, for me, I'm just hoping to travel more and build these, build these relationships with these brands. Currently, I, what do I have going on as far as any, any things come in my way? AR glasses.

I have a new AIO that I'm throwing in the PC. Yeah, that's pretty much it right now. Just excited. Where can our listeners find you online? Yeah. So, I mean, hop a thunder. most platforms so hop a thunder underscore on Instagram

hop a thunder on TikTok hop a underscore thunder yeah it's all different but it's hop a thunder essentially you can always go to the link in bio and all my socials are on there as well which is in the one stop one stop shop for that

as well as you know any other links to anything else but yeah that's pretty much it hop a thunder on everything and where to final one any final thoughts you want to give to our audience Yeah, no, I just want to say thank you for spending this time with me and tuning in. It's rare that I get an opportunity like this. So, you know, being able to connect with the viewers as well as, you know, reconnect with NZXT.

It's always been great. No, no, thank you for joining us. So we have a giveaway going on for an NZXT Intel, hoodie, shirt, and mousepad. I have an option there for a secret code word that we give at the end of the stream. It's my way of holding everyone here hostage to make sure they're listening in. But that gives about a thousand extra entries into the giveaway. I would love to give it to you to give us the code word for those thousand entries. It can be anything you think of.

Code word, I was going to say, hopapoochee. Hopapoochee. I love that. I love asking the code works because people are like, oh, what do I do? Hopa Poochee. I love that. I am updating the code right now, guys. So there it is.

Please refresh your gleams is Hoppa Pucci for the thousand extra entries into the giveaway. That is it for the NCC podcast. So thank you guys for joining us. And remember, tune in live on Fridays at 10am Pacific Standard Time on the official NCC Twitch. And don't forget to listen to previous episodes on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and SoundCloud. If you have any questions for us, send an email to podcast at nCC.com or tag at NCC on social media platforms. Thank you so much to Hop a Thunder from joining us today.

Awesome podcast. And I hope everyone here has a very safe, beautiful start to August. We're hitting fall, everyone. My favorite season. Have a good weekend, everyone.