Offline with Jon Favreau - Why You Should Make Silly Things

Episode Date: June 18, 2023

Simone Giertz, YouTube’s favorite inventor and robotics enthusiast, joins Offline this week to discuss the joy of building useless things and why adults should be able to play like kids do. She and the guys talk about overcoming perfectionism, the joys of “forward facing” activities, and how branding pastimes as productive vs. meaningless undermines the creative process. Jon and Max train their sights on Simone’s most recent invention, and then they talk about ways to cut down on their screen time, from positive reinforcement strategies to phone cases with teeth and electric shocks. For a closed-captioned version of this episode, click here. For a transcript of this episode, please email [e-mail] and include the name of the podcast. 

What if around your phone there was a rim of teeth? Oh my god. And it actually created, so like you can't sit and use your thumb on your phone because there's like a little wall of teeth around it. And also if you bring it out in public, people are going to be like, who the fuck did you kill and why did you put their teeth? And they're like yellowy and maybe there's some cavities. No, they're actually like hit up your local dentist and be like,

hey, do you have any black teeth? Yeah, wisdom teeth. I'm Jon Favreau. Welcome to Offline. Welcome to Offline. I'm Max Fisher and my long coup against the host you once knew as Jon Favreau is now complete.

Jon, how do you feel knowing that as a result of losing the offline challenge, you've had to surrender your own show? Harsh punishment. Harsh punishment, but I accept it. Harsh but fair, I think. I was a little too busy recovering from a condition known as four days in Manhattan, which is why I wasn't able to take the lead today. Yeah, you've been feeling under the weather. I'm feeling better. I contacted Vladimir Putin and got his dioxin guy to try to take you down. But it turns out drinking 18 cups of coffee a day

really builds up your immune system and you were able to resist. 18 on a low day. Yeah, but I am filling in for you today. And John, what a guest we have on the show today. Simone Yetch is an inventor and YouTuber. She is known for imaginative creations like musical instrument that plays bubble wrap, a selfie booth for dogs, a drone that gives haircuts, and a Tesla sedan she personally converted into a pickup truck known as Truckla. She describes her aesthetic as the intersection of appealing and appalling but to me it has always felt like a cross between tim burton wes anderson and the nicest friendliest bond villain you've ever met simone welcome to offline thank you also that text message was under nda max it's all coming out now you didn't say off the record so it's all coming out now. You didn't say off the record, so it's all here.

So, Simone, you often make creations that are deliberately not useful in the way that we typically expect modern inventions to be. They don't clean your floor. They don't manage your finances. I mean, you do make some things that are primarily practical, like the coffee table with the sliding top for puzzles. But I'm thinking of things like the piano whose keys play a wall of mechanical teeth, which is my personal favorite, or the proud parent machine that charges you a quarter to have a mechanical arm pat you on the shoulder. Can you talk about what draws you to this way of thinking about inventing and why you think it resonates so much with your viewers? You know, I think I just unlocked a new bucket list item, which is to have me be one of those

TikTok filters where it's like, which Simone Yutchen mention are you? You're like, oh, I'm the thief piano. You know, other than cash and clout, it's I mean, I kind of started. So my career started building shitty robots and only doing comedy. Like I was building these machines that were mostly meant to be translated into a GIF. And then it kind of evolved from there. And I think, you know, it's like I can try to duct tape a more profound meaning to it. I think, I mean, bottom line is that I'm just doing it because I think

it's really fun and it brings me a lot of personal gratification. But I think if there's any more profound value to it, it's like wanting to communicate, seeing your world as malleable and seeing the little frictions that you have in your life as opportunities rather than as hurdles. So it's like whenever I find something that bothers me in my everyday life, it's like, oh, what could I build to solve this? And before in like 2016, 2017, I would have an idea that's like the most ridiculous thing I could think about. It's like, I don't like brushing my teeth. Like I could have a helmet with a robot arm on it that brushes my teeth for me but now i'm trying to be like still unique but um have something that could have a semblance of utility why do you think it's

hard for some people to wrap their head around the idea that there's value in making things that might not be practical or you've called them useless things. You know, honestly, I think this is such a fallacy. Like I, I think now I get questioned a lot less because it's like, I don't know, but especially in the beginning, I felt like I had to defend my right to build useless things a lot. And it's like, I don't understand why we question when people make things. Like if you spend a lot of time on making something, people are like, why did you spend all that time? And I'm like like why did you spend all that time and i'm like why did you spend all that time on fucking twitter john which is a great question yeah speaking of useless things yeah it's like i think i think making things even if it's not something that you have a clear end goal with or that has a place in its life or should exist

in this world it's still a better use of your time than like scrolling on your phone so like can can we stop shitting on people making things even if we don't see the point of them yeah i feel like the you really put your finger on it with like you had to defend your right to make things that way because our culture has like such a preoccupation with invention as this like narrow capitalist like we have to make things to make money or to like take the startup public or to pursue some like very practical purpose.

Like, why do you think it's so hard in our culture now to just want to make things for the sake of the fun of it? And that is why I'm running for president in 2024. You know, I think a part of it is also just the idea of engineering being this thing that you do for work and for utility and making things. I think it's like if it's like arts and crafts, people give you a taller ceiling or whatever the expression is. And they're like, okay, you're just doing that for the hell of it because you enjoy it. But especially when you're starting to involve components of engineering, people are like, no, that's what we do for work.

And work needs to be purposeful. And then I kind of like managed to shoehorn myself into like some sort of entertainment category. So I give myself some slack there because I'm like, no, it's for the children. After all, kids don't watch my videos because I curse too much. They're very funny there is something kind of like i mean this is a compliment like something childlike about it because it's i feel like i remember when i was a kid i used to love playing with legos or like playing with lincoln logs and there's something so fun about just creative just for like you just build something up and then it's just because it was fun to make and then knock it down.

But we really don't give ourselves permission to do that as adults. Yeah, I think something that is so good about child play and that I want to retain into adulthood is like kind of the frolicking nature of it. Like I feel like kids, they're just like they're just fucking around, you know, and there's no like a clear end goal. You don't need to justify it. Nobody's going to be like, why did you make that Lego car? Because the purpose is the build itself. And I think that I think I've really had to fight to keep that space for me because it's also like the typical story of like, you do things for yourself and because you enjoy it. And then suddenly a lot of people start watching you do that thing and then you don't have as much time and I'm really like trying to make sure that I have down time to just sit and like play around and and do things because I do think that there's a lot of value in it I loved um Legos as a kid but I was one of those kids especially as i got a little older who every time i bought a lego set i would like follow the instructions on how to build oh sure what was on

the front of the lego set like just exactly like i had to do it yeah and now that i have a child and he's starting he's almost three and he's starting to play with stuff i'm purposely trying to avoid having like you know like he's just now building whatever he wants. And I'm like now trying to do the same thing with him. Cause I was like, I don't want him to be like I was and just like follow all the instructions because it does, I think sort of sap your creativity to just like have to follow the instructions. I mean, I think that there are other values to following instructions because it's like helping your three-dimensional thinking and reading things really clearly or following yeah i mean there's there's learnings in there too but i think the kind of off-road you threw the ikea manual out the window type of building is

really good yeah john what do you make when it's just when you're just following your imagination with me now yeah yeah i'm just i't even, nothing specific because I'm not that Impress us. John, do you have any builds in the studio today? He's very bad at that. Justify the time you spent on that Lego set with your child. Honestly, I

was home the other day and it was during the offline challenge so I didn't have my phone and he wanted to play with Play-Doh and I spent two and a half hours with charlie playing like just building a giant ball of play-doh with like every color imaginable for and i was just like it was a weird experience because i'm like i don't even know what i'm doing it was like it was flow we've talked about yeah it was like i don't even know what i'm doing right now i'm just like building random shit i haven't done this since i was 10 years old.

But you were present. Do you think we've sort of lost as a culture that this drive for fun and playfulness? Or did we ever have it? I think something that we've definitely not learned and that I wish that we learned because I want to know how to do it is like using enthusiasm as fuel rather than duty. Like what we learn so much in school and in the workplace is like how to be disciplined and how to sit through boring things. And as somebody who's like in a choose your own adventure type of work environment, I'm like, I just want to be excited and I want to harness that as the fuel that propels me forward.

But it's hard to retain excitement over a long time, especially as pressure. I mean, it's like the psychology experiment of as soon as people get paid to do something, they don't like doing it anymore. So I think for me, a lot of the thinking I have around that is like, yeah, how do you create a work environment where you're kind of, it's force free, but there also are force elements, but you still are pumped about being there. Well, how did you get there? Because you, I mean, you made the point that initially a lot of your builds were about,

in a sense, about the final product, like getting the gif, getting the kind of like punchline. But now your videos are so much about the process of you kind of exploring your way through the build and being creative on camera. I think, I mean, there's a lot of different things that happened there. But yeah, the initial projects that I did, they were very much, yeah, give forward and kind of a punchline. And the whole video that I used to shoot was about me playing around with this machine that I had built. But then I started building things that, you know, I can't have a 15 minute

video of me playing with a puzzle table. But like a mechanical table that switches between two tabletops. So it's like I need to justify the video space of it. And that was kind of forced me to start documenting the build more. So, yeah, I think the way that I'm thinking about it is what do I want to do? And then how do I justify that in the work context that I'm in now? That's so funny. So even as you are producing this wonderful experience of play and creativity for its own sake, it's still a little bit guided by the form and the structure. Of course. It's like, yeah, I mean, I'm not, this is a job. As much as I love doing it, it's like, it's still a job and there are always compromises

you have to make. The compromise I have to make is like, put your logo here. It's like, I'm a human billboard and the way that I can justify spending this amount of time on a project, like two months on a table, is because I have a sponsor. So it's like, there's always going to be compromises. I think that the ones I have are pretty minimal.

Speaking of... We sell underwear to talk about politics. So obviously we really look down. Speaking of your forehead as a billboard, you brought a hat to the studio today. I thought that was going to be a brain tumor segue for a second. This segment sponsored by Brian, the brain tumor. Yeah, okay. No, we don't take brain tumor money here.

We do have a line somewhere, yeah. Okay, well, I was ready to pay you $20 to let me tell you my sob story about how I have a line somewhere. Okay, well, I was ready to pay you $20 to let me tell you my sob story about how I got a brain tumor. But no, let's talk about my train hat. I think this, honestly, it might be its premiere on the internet. Oh, I'm so flattered.

Okay. You guys are very honored by that. I am. Extremely. Okay, so it's a little bit beat up because it just came back from me to Jordan. But I wanted to make a hat that has a train track around it so I can have a model train that goes around my head. I'm going to have to take off my headphones for this. Also, I hope that it still has batteries.

So for people who are listening on the podcast, it's a big green felt, I think a bowler hat. And it has not just a little model train track around the brim with a little tiny train on it, but some really beautiful like trees. And I think I see some sheep on there. There are sheep. There are flowers. There are trees. I should have brought Charlie into work today because he would be obsessed with this. He is big into trains right now.

Just wait until I sell this to Charlie for $250. I'm just kidding. No, I'm not selling this. Yeah, so this kind of just started as an idea of, you know, a lot of my projects are just scratching visual itches of just being like, oh, what would that look like? So putting it on here and then turning on the train and it kind of goes around. Oh my God, it's running around the brim.

It's perfection for those of you who are just listening. It's incredible. How do you get the train to stay on there? That was a big challenge. I spent way too much time doing this. And this is also the time where I'm like, I am so grateful that I can spend the amount of time figuring out how to get a train to stay on its track. Because they're really, I remember going to the model train store.

I think there's one in like Pasadena. And they were like, oh, that's never going to work. You're never going to get the train to stay on the track. And I was like, challenge accepted. Watch me. Watch me. Fucking watch me. And I was like, they do not know who they're dealing with here.

Should we send a picture to them? Should say, in your face, Pasadena train hobbyist. Did they know who you are? No. Okay. But honestly, I don't know. Even if they knew who I was, I don't know if they would have had more faith in my capacity to pull this off. But the thing I ended up doing is I stitched in this piece of wire in the middle of the track.

And then I glued in all these magnets under the train. So that kind of helps it. It doesn't help hold it perfectly. Like I can't wear it and shake my head and stuff i could probably not walk around with it but it's definitely um good enough for the vine i love it what was the impetus for it what does impetus mean max efl over here english is not my first language about simone is that not only is english your second language but you have only been living in an english speaking country for what, like five years? I think it's six or seven now.

Wow. Yeah. Impetus. Does that mean? Why? Are they like the genesis of the idea? Genesis? What does genesis mean, Max?

Okay. That's in the Bible. Everybody knows it. What led you to start that? What led you to do that? Well, I am an unbaptized bastard. Who has a very different definition of what it means to get on my knees. Appealing and appalling, folks. Appealing and appalling.

Crude and wholesome. Oh, that was my first audience testing. I wrote that joke in a script and it made you laugh. I remember that, Cass. I remember that control. audience testing i wrote that joke in a script and i'm uh it made you laugh so yeah i remember the origin i mean yeah i was just uh wondering what it would look like and thinking that it would be funny you know i i think um i've been kind of thinking about how my brain works and i think a lot of my humor is also assimilies so it's like kind of comparing two different objects that don't really have something to do with each other and i think that's a lot of my humor is also with similes. So it's like kind of comparing two different objects that don't really have something to do with each other. And I think that's a lot of the stuff I build as well.

It's like the most recent project that I did and that I'm in the edit of now is a flower vase that's also a lamp. So I call it a flamp. And it's mostly just like, oh, but what if it's a vase? But it's also a lamp. And the flowers kind of become like the bouquet becomes the lampshade so a lot of it is just like a kind of toy car crashing two objects together and being like what would that look like i do love the like sense of humor you bring to your invention so i have a question about the proud parent machine and this might be me projecting some like english major bullshit onto it but i really read it is this kind of like

commentary on the role of technology in our lives and then we like look to these devices and products to fulfill all our needs but of course like the our most basic needs like a parent's approval we will never get from a gadget is that just yeah i i think uh we think we can definitely add that to it. That's really putting you on the couch here. Yeah. I just want to get a compliment. If I ever have an art exhibit, can you write the little descriptions of it? Like the lofty explanation of it? I think mostly the thing that really hammers in the joke or hung the joke for me on that one is that it charges you 25 cents for it.

That is, yes. joke or home the joke for me on that one is that it charges you 25 cents for it so i think it's like rather than being a machine it's like yes you can have parental approval but we're going to bring capitalism into it it's like parental approval on an app like a subscription model i completely make it up i do feel like there is a like only dads that is so good wow put it in the store i like it crooked.com only dads you've you've talked about um that your advice to friends is to um lower the bar for what they're trying to make um and I started thinking about this

because in another life, I was a writer. I have pretty much stopped writing, partly because I always feel like there is this pressure every time I look at a blank page to like write something great. And you write something and then people like it and you're like, I have to do better next time. Why do you think we struggle so much with just letting ourselves just create, do the easy stuff? And how are you finally able to like lower the bar for yourself as you just start creating things? Years of practice. I mean, I think it's just, you know, if you set the brief for yourself that you're going to make something perfect and profound, it's like you're never going to get started. So I think it's just, you know, if you set the brief for yourself that you're going to make something perfect and profound, it's like you're never going to get started. So I think it's like it's just all about getting the ball rolling in some way.

And if that's like drawing a dick on the paper, then it's like, yeah, it's going to be easier to write on after that. The ball's rolling. Yes. And so I'm just thinking of, because I'm definitely a recovering perfectionist and I used to be so scared of even trying to do something because I'm like, I'm not sure I'm going to be able to do it well enough. And just starting small and kind of getting excited about something I think is the way to go. So it's like, I mean, for writing, if that's like's like i mean let's just write one sentence but now maybe that's too high of a bar as well you're like okay let's rewrite this menu for papa john's and like try to punch it up i don't know like yeah yeah it's just it's about like getting stuff on the page and being like uh you know what that's not great but it's okay and i got it yeah i mean for me like especially if i'm if i'm writing scripts or having to do voiceovers or something,

then it's like, I'll ask somebody else to write a draft for it. Because then I also know that I'll be like, oh my God, this draft is so bad. I need to go in and make it better. Editing is good. It becomes a lot easier.

Yeah. And it's, so I think it's like, how can you create that artificial situation for yourself in some way? So like, maybe that's even like having chat GBT, write a draft and then be like, okay, fuck this. Yeah. Well, we had on the author, Catherine Price last week, and she talked about a definition of fun that she uses, which is playfulness plus flow or being present plus connection. And I feel like that last one is easy to forget about and miss sign on. And you actually

have that a lot in your videos where you'll bring in other people to like work on a little component of a project that you're working on. Was that I mean, I know, probably to some extent that just to like, bring some variety into the the video but I would imagine that that helps a lot in keeping it fun yeah I can only beat my own face so much um yeah I think it's I mean I I'm also I'm a bit of a lone wolf creator but I noticed that I you know few moments in the career feel as good as you expect them to and I noticed that the ones that feel the best is when you're working towards a common goal with other people and it's so much easier to feel pride for a group of people than for yourself it's really true so i i think wanting to recreate that and i think that's also like something that i'm what i'm doing now is like, I feel like I have no excuses to not have a great life because I'm so

much at the helm of my own work destiny. And I'm very privileged in that sense that I'm like, okay, anything I'm interested in, I can kind of go for. So I'm trying to really see like, what are the values that don't just look good on paper, but that feel really good. And having community and creativity feels like one of those. And then it's like, how do you, how do you, how do you build that? So I'm trying to, I mean, I'm working on some bigger projects now and where it's like, I have to work in a team because the YouTube thing, it's like, I got it down. It's fine. But yeah, just trying to figure out how to create that work environment that just feels as good as it looks.

I think that point about working together with other people on a common task for fun is a really important one. There's actually this theory I think about a lot that says that one of the reasons that we're getting lonelier is that we've lost what they'd sometimes call, sociologists call, forward-facing activities, which is like a shared task like a recreational sports league or like bowling is the classic example where we don't have these activities where we all come together and do something for fun towards a common, which of course when you're a kid, that's what play is, right? Is you're building the Lego set together. And then one of the things that I've been thinking a lot about, partly with your videos,

and also just partly like, as John and I have been talking about, like reconnecting with what's meaningful in life, because we're, you know, have three hours a day back that we, you know, took back from our smartphones is finding a way back to that kind of common activity with friends where you're working towards some common task with them. Because it's also the way that we hang out, which is great, but to an extent is like meeting up for lunch and being like, tell me what's up with you. And I remember going to this YouTuber who, Karen Puzzles,

she just makes puzzle videos, like jigsaw puzzle videos and she was having a launch party well if she has to because her name is karen puzzles i know i know yeah uh no it's i mean i'm simone inventor yes so i was like well that was chosen for me um and she was having a launch party for this puzzle and it was like maybe 10 people and she brought in a bunch of puzzles 10 people in a bar just sitting working on a jigsaw puzzle and it was like maybe 10 people and she brought in a bunch of puzzles 10 people in a bar just sitting working on a jigsaw puzzle and it was so lovely in the sense that it took all pressure off of have keeping a conversation yeah it made it so not awkward to remain silent i mean i also like broke up with somebody or we were breaking up if we were working on a lego set during like the breakup

conversation which also like in retrospect ended up being a really nice way because it added this natural breaking point of the conversation like it gave us a choice to enter the conversation in and out and and i i think that like it's so hard to like be like we're gonna hang out or we're gonna keep a conversation like i just want to hang out or we're going to keep a conversation. Like I just want to be side by side with somebody. That is really smart. Although now if my girlfriend ever breaks out of Lego set, I'm going to do something terrible. This is it.

John, I like you have been thinking a lot about how to make writing fun again. And I actually a couple of years ago stumbled into finding a way to do it as a like forward-facing group activity and like coming up in like a bit kind of yeah so it's um revolutionary technology i invented something called google docs two years ago you guys are gonna boutique website i had during lockdown in the pandemic some friends of mine started as a like group activity as an excuse for us to stay in touch this board game that we would all play where it was like, you do one move every day, which takes five minutes, but it's an excuse for us to all be like texting each other all day. And it was great because it's like forward facing activity that you can do when you're not together. And the game takes like two or three months because it's just one move a day. And at the end of it, as a group activity, because there's a bunch of reporters, we collectively wrote an oral history of the game we had just played, which was a ridiculous way to spend our... Oh, huge. Not only nerds, but it actually later got written up by Vice because that's what happens

when you do something as a reporter. And headline was i thought so funny the impossibly nerdy online game that's fixing the brains of media twitter which they really they really got our asses with that one um but it was really fun because you're writing just for the enjoyment of you and your friends you're doing it together you're kind of playing around with each other's drafts and i feel like actually sometimes we get that on the shows a little bit where you're writing together. So I'm really going to try to find more ways to take that creative outlet that, John, like you, I used to enjoy a lot and try to do it like with friends because I think it really works. Yeah. We need a catchier name for this than forward-facing activities.

I know. So forward-facing, is that that we're not face to face? Yeah. The idea is that like you were saying, it's like a contract of like the contrast is instead of like you go to a cafe and you're like facing someone that you get like, you know, if you go on a bike ride with a friend, you're both facing together. It's actually we joke a lot on this podcast about how men need therapy. I mean, everybody jokes about that because it's, you know, a thing that is true, but something that they often say that men have an easier time bonding with forward-facing activities because it takes a lot of the pressure off on the relationship. And it's true. And that's why there's a lot of like cycling leagues or like, I don't golf personally, but I think it works for people. Or why you pee side by side.

That is a big one. A lot of deep conversations happen while peeing side by side. That's actually most editorial meetings take place. That's mostly why I've stopped looking at my phone at the urinal, so I could start. Also deeply sexist because you're excluding all the women or dickless population. So Simone, you have also made inventions that are about working through tougher feelings. Can you talk about some of the stuff you made when you were going through your treatment for your brain tumor and what it was like to work through that by making things and inventing honestly i think this is a great exhibit like exhibit a of that i make my best work when i'm happy because looking back at the things that i made when i was profoundly sad and it's just bad you know and i feel like there's this this idea that art comes from like

a deeply depressed place and it's like and for me it's like no it comes from feeling really good and being excited and and yeah and when i'm sad the the stuff that comes out is kind of poop i made a so i i went through i had a brain tumor i went through surgery and then i went through radiation treatment for it i'm doing good thank you for your concern that's great um and and when you through radiation treatment, you get this like weird mesh mask that's molded after your face because they need to keep your face in a super still position and make sure that they get the same spot every time. And I turned it into a terrible lamp. I don't know why you're so down on it. I really like the stuff that you made.

Thank you. You can have it. If you want to have it hanging on your wall. I offer you. When is your birthday, Max? It's November and boy, can I not wait. Radiation mask layout. But I really am surprised to hear that you, I mean, do you think that, I mean, I imagine

it's probably tinged because you were going through a terrible experience when you made it. I mean, it's not that. It's not that I look back at it and I'm like, oh, I don't want to think about that time in my life. It's more just like, oh, man, that was bad. It just wasn't very pretty or appealing or something that I want to have around me. But then I do. I mean, I guess I can't. I think that the things that I wrote during that time still hold up. time capsule and I'll and I'll cry with my past self so yeah but the the things that I built I can't think of anything other than the radiation mask didn't don't feel definitely don't feel like my best work but did it make you feel better when you were making it at least yeah I think so because it but I do I do remember that making videos about it made me feel a lot better. And I know that that sounds incredibly millennial. It's like, yeah, you know, I'm going to exploit this on Twitter.

But it wasn't so much that. It was just like, when something big happens to you like that, people react in different ways and you feel in control in different ways. For some people, that's like gatekeeping the information. And that's what I call the dad strategy. It's like, I'm not going to talk to anybody about that. And they're not going to know until it's stage four. Dad's famously doing great emotional. Only dads. But for me, the way that I process this was like, I wanted to scream it from the top of a mountain. And I remember being like, I need to stop telling Lyft drivers that I have a brain tumor because they

were like, hey, what's going on? How are you doing today? And I'm like, well, I have a brain tumor. And I'm like, I need to stop doing that to people because it's putting them in an incredibly awkward spot. So for me, it was like telling the story of what was happening was a way to feel like I was getting some value out of it. I was able to provide some value to other people and also just very cathartic. So yeah, I think maybe that is the one thing I did create and that I'm proud of. So the, you got healthy and then the pandemic started, so that's fun. And you have said that the sort of the limitations around the pandemic sort of led you to change the kind of work that you did. You created an online store. Can you talk a little bit about that transition and why the pandemic sort of led you that?

I think it's also I mean, part of this is just me being a chronic upside seeker. You know, you're like, like okay i got a brain tumor but at least i can make content about it or like the pandemics happen well i guess that means i can spend a lot more time in my workshop and i can really work on my skills so it's like it's more just being like oh this is the dish we were handed and what what can we actually make turn this into um but i think it was yeah i think it was off of the brain tumor. It changed the kind of projects that I wanted to build because I wasn't feeling as silly anymore. I feel like I definitely got a lot older during that time and a lot of the stuff that I did before.

And when I was a bit younger, it's so much about like, oh my God, look at me. I'm so silly. I'm going to get things flying in my face. And I didn't really feel like doing that anymore because also my skull I actually have the time now because I'm not traveling and speaking at conferences to do things properly. And out of that also the product business started because you're like, oh, these things are actually really nice. And it started with the everyday calendar that we launched on Kickstarter, which I made because I wanted to meditate every day. Yeah. So how does that connect to the meditation? Because I've seen the calendar and I was like, I think I could use that. But where does the meditation come into play?

The meditation comes into play. So basically it's this electronic calendar that you can hang on your wall and that has a grid of 365 days. And every time you do the thing that you want to do, maybe use your phone not that much. You get to tap that day to light it up. And it's basically just this like way to make your streak a little bit more sacred and have it very visual on your wall. So yeah, I made it because I wanted to meditate every day and I would make these grids in my notebooks and check little boxes. And you're like, what's a prettier, more sacred version of this? Oh, i should get one of these for uh charlie using the potty we're basically doing that with like stickers right

now but the calendar looks is beautiful people use it yeah to to keep train their kids to brush their teeth and everything and there's actually a surprising amount of parents using it max mentioned um the uh dog selfie booth that's not in the store. Not in the store. Why not? Because I would definitely buy that. Some of the best stuff. It's talking about gatekeeping. Yeah. A dog selfie booth sounds amazing. You know, the world just isn't ready for it.

Yeah. I trained my dog to, I built this little booth, like a photo booth for dogs out of Lego. And I trained my dog to hit a pedal with her button and it dispensed a treat and took a photo. That's so cool. For my dog to take selfies, which was very cute. I love that. What's the thing that you get asked most about? Like people say they want to buy that because I, for me, it would be the chair that your pet can sit on. Yeah, that's a good one. Uh, truckla. Yeah. I would imagine that as a, yeah. Um, so the Tesla that I converted into a pickup truck, a lot of people want to buy. Um, but what's the best offer you've gotten on it? No serious offers at all, but I'm, we're actually considering

selling her. Really? Wow. Okay. You heard it here first. What's your, what's, what are you looking to get? What's the floor? I don't know. Where should we start the bidding? I don't know. It's tricky. It's, um, yeah, but it's like I'm not I'm not driving her anymore because I got a Volvo but also it's like she's such a spectacle

and I just can't take it and I don't want her to just sit in a garage and then it's like I might as well sell her I don't want to

gatekeep truck club So we have been doing over the last five or six weeks the offline challenge where, yeah, I told you about it a little bit, where we're breaking our addiction to our smartphones and to social media by every week. We had some set of restrictions we would oppose on ourselves to try to reset our relationship to our phone and famously I just knocked it out of the park and just killed John three to one was not even close it's like one by four minutes twice two weeks in a row yeah really do you I mean I know we're going to talk about some of your ideas that you have which I love for breaking up with your smartphone.

Do you struggle with smartphone addiction at all? Play Lego with it. Yeah, definitely. I have a terrible relationship to my phone. I don't like it. It's such a pacifier. When do you find yourself going for it? When I'm lonely and also when there's something I don't want to do.

You know, I'm really tired from work. I'm laying on the couch. I should start cooking dinner. My blood sugar is in free fall. And I'm like, you know what? Let's just spend 45 minutes on TikTok. Yeah. And it's not going to make anything better.

I felt like the big breakthrough for me was in realizing that it wasn't just the smartphone, but it was when I needed something to cope with, like feeling a little sad or a little lazy. Do you remember what you said to me when I was telling you about my smartphone addiction? No. You said, it sounds like you don't need a new phone. You need a new personality. No.

Wow. Wow. Oh, that is mean of me. How did I say that? How have you been able to do with that? I've been doing great, actually. Yeah, totally new. You can't tell mean of me. How did I say that? How have you been able to do with that? I've been doing great, actually. Yeah, totally new. You can't tell?

New me. New me, I'm thriving. I feel like that has to have had some sort of context. I think you were joking, I think. Good joke. It was pretty funny. It was tough. It was fair.

No, I noticed that, I'm glad we didn't do our, we were supposed to do our screen time for this week. I'm ready. But I relapsed in a big way. Oh, no, really? Because the couple days I wasn't feeling good coming back from New York. Oh, yeah. It was like a five-hour flight and I wasn't feeling good.

And I was just scrolling on the phone the entire time because when you feel like shit or you're trying to cope, you go right to the phone. So what are your averages? Because I looked up mine before. Well, now my average was like two hours and, no, it was, yeah, two hours and 48 minutes. Yeah. But if you look at the early days of the week, it was like one, one, one,

and then it was like four, three. Oh, you were doing like an hour. Okay. I was doing better, and then the last couple of days really screwed it up a little bit. But this is, are you guys like watching your screen time on the computer as well,

and not just doing the phone? No, but that would have been it's okay it's okay two hours 35 oh that's not bad that's pretty good it's on the low end yeah yeah you're well below average for people our age i think oh wow watching the video of you in the bathroom for 40 hours gave me extreme anxiety it's like my worst nightmare because of the proximity to a toilet when you're sleeping yeah the toilet's great i think that's just convenience to me that's convenience um no there was a lot it was a good place to a toilet when you're sleeping. The toilet's great. I think that's just convenience. To me, that's convenience. No, there was a lot.

It was a good place to do it if you're going to do it. But why did you do it? And how did you do it? And what did you learn about yourself in the process? So I locked myself in my bathroom for 48 hours because I had this idea that I wanted to make a DIY astronaut series where I was like in the most hokey way possible was putting myself through astronaut training.

And it led up to me going on one of those zero gravity flights, which was really fun. Very cool. And yeah, and a part of that was isolation training and I'm going to be in my bathroom. It's like a very YouTuber origin story where you're like, oh, this is going to be a good thumbnail and title. Sure.

And I think it's still, it's like one of my most watched videos which i wish it wasn't yeah what did i learn about myself that it is not fun i would be i am so not planning on a career in crime because being in prison must be fucking awful. Like that is just, and I had a good, like I remember sitting up next to my door and I didn't end up having this in the video, but I could yell to my Amazon Echo. So I was actually able to like listen to a song

on my Amazon Echo, but then she couldn't, when she was playing music, I couldn't turn it off. So I'd just be like, Alexis, stop! And, but yeah, she couldn't hear me through the door. But yeah, mostly it's just so boring. I wrote a book,

which is like going to prison because you were locked in a tiny room for months at a time. That's why I'll never write a book. That's why I'll never do it. I don't recommend it. Also, I feel like that's the most privileged thing I've ever heard you say. No, I recognize that.

It's not great. Yeah. Don't worry. We'll top it in the next. But the thing that I learned was that I was actually really good at it, which I actually feel like is really dangerous because I really could cope with spending a lot of time locked in a room by myself, which I think is why I have to really make it part of my practice, which I did as part of the breaking up with our phones to go outside and be deliberate about seeing people. Yeah, I think what's interesting, and I try to do this whenever I go on a flight, is lower the amount of stimuli or stimulus that I need. And I think that's like if I meditate when the flight or the airplane is taking off

and kind of don't bring out the heavy hitters, which is like playing Candy Crush and listening to podcasts at the same time. Like if I kind of like lower the amount of stimulation my brain needs, then I'm happy just listening to a podcast or just reading a book. But then it's like when you start getting like the reward needs to be so much. That's interesting. Yeah. So I noticed like if I do that and especially meditation helps with that, it doesn't take a lot to entertain me. Like I can be entertained just looking out the window. Yeah. That is very interesting. You said that because when i'm on flights and i'm not a great flyer anyway i'm sort of an anxious flyer uh not sort of very anxious flyer but on the way to new york last week i was working on prepping for pod save america and i was like not connected to the

internet i wasn't on twitter and i was just working and i didn't have any problem with the flight i wasn't that anxious it was great on the way back when i wasn't feeling great and i was just like watching the clock go by and Twitter and listening to everything. It was much worse. It was much worse. I used to fly all the time for work. And when I lived in London, I would fly between London and New York like every few weeks. So I am responsible for climate change personally. On your private jet. Yeah, that's right. On the Roy family chat, yeah. And I actually loved it because you're like, you're not connected to the internet. There's no Wi-Fi. There's, especially if you're going over the ocean, you're in this like enclosed space where there's no activities. There's a lot of white noise going on. I would get more work done on a plane than anywhere else I would be. And I really enjoyed having like an hour of just like sit and contemplate being on the plane. I found it really healthy actually. How's the view from that high horse of yours? We're down here in the candy crush pit. Just watching the world burn.

Just working on his new personality. Is it not good? Is it not good? Back to the drawing board, don't like this one? I think if your new personality is like grind mindset no i think you should revert back to the previous i've been in la for four months now so it's just fucking ruined me just destroyed my soul um so simone one of your ideas that i'd love for breaking the smartphone addiction is the hairy phone case. Can you tell us about that?

It's so disgusting. Yeah. No, I added a bunch of hair to my phone case. I've been thinking about, like, you know, it's the thing is whenever I run into a problem, I'm like, how can I solve this with product design? It's like the same thing. I don't like having people over for too long. Like, I don't like having people stay at my house because I need my own space. And I was like, I can solve this by getting a trailer. And I put a guest trailer, like a separate little guest house in my front yard. And it has completely solved the problem. So that's like always I'm like, ooh, I don't like this.

How can I solve this with product design? So I was starting to work on like, is there a phone case that would be uncomfortable to hold in my phone? So I just wouldn't be unaware that I'm using it? I think that's the problem when you get stuck in a scroll hole and you kind of forget that you're doing the thing that you don't want to be doing. And another version that I did was I was like, okay, but what if it's a phone case? Because I still want to get all the value that I have out of my phone. I want to get all the information. But what if my phone kind of has like bangs. So there's there's hair partially covering the screen. So like I

still see everything, but I kind of need to like move the hair aside. The hair is down off the top of the like. Yeah. And it's just more cumbersome. Like are there ways to introduce friction? And I think this kind of falls in the category of like those apps that add a little delay before you open apps that you don't want to use. I don't know how you have found that to work for you. Didn't work for me. It's not working. The apps. Now, I think we found that the like physical restrictions, putting it in a box, putting it in another room.

Those are the best. I do think if you're going to do hair on the phone, though, if it was more like, if it was stubble, that feels, that's friction. I don't like that. I don't want to hold a phone. Well, you showed me a picture of it, and I mean, it looks like real hair. Is it like somebody's hair?

It's not. No, it's off of a wig that we got when I built a robot replica of myself for Westworld. I have to say it looks like a little gross. I don't know if that's just me having a weird wig hair. Of course it's fucking gross. It's got to be the idea, right? There's nothing revolutionary about it looking gross.

I have a beautiful haircut on my phone. I didn't want to offend you if you thought it was beautiful. I actually found, I thought one of the most effective things that we did was when we switched to the big clown phone cases. Because it was like huge and cumbersome and ugly. And I really found that that like physically making me aware of holding the phone was really effective. Yeah. I wonder if it's like if there is a way that you can harvest things that you really have a strong dislike for. Like, I think the grossest thing in the world to me,

one of the grossest things is chewed chewing gum. I like even just thinking about it. It's so disgusting. And if I had a phone case that kind of looked like chewed chewing gum, I don't think I would sit with my phone. But also, I don't want that. But like, I wonder if there's a phone equivalent of like the uh cigarette packet like psa stuff like a big sticker on it or like you know something writing off the success

you know the back of the success of the phone hair case uh the runaway staggering what if what if around your phone there was a rim of teeth. Oh, my God. And it actually created, so like you can't sit and use your thumb on your phone because there's like a little wall of teeth around it. And also, if you bring it out in public, people are going to be like, who the fuck did you kill? And why did you put their teeth? And they're like yellowy and maybe there's some cavities. No, they're actually like hit up your local dentist and be like, hey, do you have any full teeth? Yeah. Yeah, wisdom teeth. Oh, wow. Well, Charlie're actually like hit up your local dentist and be like, hey, do you have any real teeth? Yeah. Yeah.

Wisdom teeth. Oh, wow. Well, Charlie's going to be losing some baby teeth. I'm sticking those right on the phone. That's it. They're going right on the phone. That is so revolting. I'm so upset right now.

Well, I think we solved it. So you had one idea that I really liked of making it collective and social by having you and your friends like keep track of how much time you social by having you and your friends keep track of how much time you were saving by not using your phone and then pooling that into an activity. Can you talk about that? Oh, was that an idea?

I don't remember that, but that's a good idea. Things passed me. I think, you know, it's like, because I've been thinking about this a lot and I also was looking through my list of ideas that I have and one of them was making a phone out of a rock. And I also was looking through my list of ideas that I have. And one of them was making a phone out of a rock. And I think that was something where I'm like, okay, but if I just want to hold something in my hand, it would actually be more useful for me to sit with a fucking rock.

Like an iPhone-shaped rock than my actual phone. But I'm thinking about, like, what's the negative reward? And what's the positive reward? And it's like the negative, yeah, it's like, can we make three different categories? One is like adding friction. That's hair phone case, putting it in a box, stuff like that. Then there's a negative reward, which is, yeah,

which is like chew chewing gum. Or I was also thinking of like, is there a way to build up static electricity as you're using the phone and that it like just very randomly and mildly zaps you because that would get me to stop i i have that on my idea list like a dog shot caller i was gonna say it's like a bf skinner like a stanford prison experiment but on your phone but like i mean i take a lot from dog training in in trying to get myself to behave better but then the other one i

was thinking is like i want like in in kind of the spirit of the everyday calendar of being like, how can I build positive change? And how can I be motivated to do better? Like what I wish is that there was a gadget on the lock screen where you can say, okay, I only want to use my phone for two hours a day. And as soon as you open your phone, it starts counting it down. And then it's going to feel like something I need to save. Like I want to have that feeling of like, oh, I can't waste water because I only have this big of a tank. You know, that feeling I'm thinking might be a more efficient one and kind of just being like, oh no, no, no, I can't, I can't spend that because I want to be able to do this later. I like that because the app now that's on the iPhone will just say like you have five minutes left if you set a time limit.

But by the time you get to five minutes left, you're like, oh, now I'm fucked. Now it's over. Right. Yeah. Like you can't. You just have to blow through the limit at that point. Plus, I like the idea of getting to the end of the day and putting down your phone and knowing that you have, you know, 98 minutes left. Yeah.

And feeling really good about the number being high instead of feeling bad about hitting the like friction thing at the end of the day. And I think that's the, because then it also like building a streak of being like, yeah, you've had seven days of not using your phone for more than an hour or half. And I think that like, yeah, getting the feeling of that it's something that I'm saving. Like those are the, it's the little, little chocolate pieces in the back of my drawer. So much of smartphone addiction breaking like apps and discourse is all around like the negatives as like taking the phone away from you, which you should do. But I do feel like I wish there was a way to frame it as more a positive because I really started to get into it when I thought of it as time that I'm getting back rather

than like, oh, I can't be on Twitter. I can't be on Instagram. Because the shaming just doesn't work for me. And I feel like it's so much, so much shaming. And I like, yeah, OK, but how can I instead build a sense of pride and like being like, yay, I did it. Yeah, I do. The idea that you had suggested to me, I guess, in a like drug induced haze or a drunk of some kinds is what you can't remember it yeah was that you would you would save up you guys have had some fun time well the idea that i really max for framing me like that

the idea that i loved is that you would get to the end of the week and your phone would tell you how many hours you had saved and you had banked by using your phone less than whatever your goal was. And then you could take that and your friends who you're doing the challenge with, you would pool those hours together and be like, okay, we all saved three hours. So we're going to treat ourselves by going out and doing this thing together that we wouldn't normally do. Or Max's case, write another chapter of your book. Or just take another trans-Pacific flight just for kicks, just for the fun of it. I think that's like, I mean, I have two other examples that I think play into this. One was where I wanted to start exercising more often. And I set a goal for myself. I'm like, okay,

how can I have a positive reinforcement at this? And I said that if I do this, if I exercise more than eight times a month, I get to buy a fun little like exercise clothing item or some gear or something. And that kind of became a positive reinforcement on both ends of the spectrum, because I was excited about like, oh, I'm going to get to buy a scrunchie. But then also once I had that scrunchie, I'm like, oh, I'm excited to go to the gym and wear my new scrunchie. And then the other thing I was thinking about was first time I flew with my dog on a flight. I have an incredibly barky dog and it's an 11 hour flight to Stockholm. And I was so nervous about that she was going to bark throughout the entire flight. And what I did was I printed all these little cards with like some cute little texts on it that was like, Hey, I'm so sorry that

you have the unfortunate privilege of sharing a flight with me for my first time. But the way that I framed it i was like i'm gonna count each bark and for every bark i'm gonna donate a dollar to the aclu so if you get woken up in the middle of your sleep by a dog barking just know that it's for a good cause that's great that's really smart yeah so i'm thinking like what's if you do have those, yeah, nothing. She was so good. Yeah. So shame on you, ACLU. You missed out.

But I'm thinking like, yeah, what could you, once you have those phone case hours, yeah, if only my dog hadn't been paid so well. We're so close. Yeah. 70 votes in Wisconsin. But like, what is something really value, like something that could actually feel like a reward to use those hours for? And I think like, yes, seeing your friends, great.

But also, is there something else where you're like, you can use that and you get cash? Yeah, I like this. I like the positive reinforcement. What are you working on next? I'm working on next? I'm working on, right now I'm in post for the Jordan shoot. I went to Jordan and met this toy maker, Mohamed, who lives in a refugee camp outside of Amman.

And we built a project together. So doing that and then I have my flamp, the flower bouquet lamp, yeah, that I'm finishing. And then I'm going to go back to Sweden. And then in August, we start shooting the Forks show. Oh, really? Yeah. Oh, that's so exciting. Yeah, I'm doing a show about everyday objects. Okay, I'm not doing a show.

I'm writing a pilot episode for a show that I then want to sell that's about everyday objects and why they look the way that they look. So each episode is just like nerding out hard on an object and why it looks the way that it does, how his manufacturing and development and manufacturing kind of impacted it or different cultural movements. And it's just like product design nerdery. The Secret History of the Fork.

I love that. Yeah. Well, I can't wait to see it. Simone, thank you so much for coming on Offline. Thanks for doing this. This is I can't wait to see it. Simone, thank you so much for coming on Offline. Thanks for doing this. This was so fun. Thanks for having me.

Offline is a Crooked Media production. It's written and hosted by me, Jon Favreau. It's produced by Austin Fisher. Emma Illick-Frank is our associate producer. Andrew Chadwick is our sound editor. Kyle Seglin, Charlotte Landis, and Vassilis Fotopoulos sound engineered the show. Jordan Katz and Kenny Siegel take care of our music. Thanks to Michael Martinez, Ari Schwartz, Amelia Montooth, and Sandy Gerard for production support. And to our digital team, Elijah Cohn and Rachel Gajewski, who film and share our episodes as videos every week.