Cortex

00:00:00 ◼   ► Good afternoon, Mr. UK Tech 100.

00:00:04 ◼   ► [DING]

00:00:05 ◼   ► I saw on Twitter that you are the 67th coolest UK tech person.

00:00:12 ◼   ► Is that what I'm supposed to take away from this article that mentions you in Business Insider?

00:00:16 ◼   ► Yeah, 67's the coolest number.

00:00:19 ◼   ► What is this? What is this thing?

00:00:20 ◼   ► As of right now, I'm not 100% sure.

00:00:23 ◼   ► I know I received an invite to a party which I'm going to this evening.

00:00:28 ◼   ► that Business Insider are hosting a VIP party, I might add.

00:00:32 ◼   ► - Oh my, you're a VIP, huh?

00:00:34 ◼   ► - For the top 100 coolest people in technology.

00:00:37 ◼   ► But I didn't know if I was gonna be on this list

00:00:39 ◼   ► that they were talking about,

00:00:41 ◼   ► and then this morning it just popped up,

00:00:43 ◼   ► and I am apparently the bearded British man.

00:00:46 ◼   ► I'm making light of this,

00:00:48 ◼   ► but I have to say, real talk for a moment,

00:00:50 ◼   ► I'm incredibly proud of myself.

00:00:51 ◼   ► I'm feeling very happy today.

00:00:53 ◼   ► - You have been recognized for your hard work.

00:00:57 ◼   ► That's what it says, Myke.

00:00:58 ◼   ► Let's see, what do they say about you?

00:01:00 ◼   ► Oh, they literally do say the bearded and British

00:01:03 ◼   ► Myke Hurley.

00:01:04 ◼   ► - That's me.

00:01:07 ◼   ► - Co-founders and host of Relay FM Podcast Network

00:01:10 ◼   ► launched in 2014, Focus on Technology,

00:01:13 ◼   ► with podcasts featured by Apple.

00:01:16 ◼   ► It's a good picture of you there, Myke.

00:01:17 ◼   ► - Yeah, it's on our about page.

00:01:19 ◼   ► They cropped Steven out.

00:01:20 ◼   ► - I was gonna say, is that Steven's shoulder

00:01:22 ◼   ► on that picture? - I think so.

00:01:23 ◼   ► I think so.

00:01:25 ◼   ► - They could have cropped it a little more

00:01:26 ◼   ► did not make it so obvious. Well they could have got any photo of me really. Like there

00:01:31 ◼   ► are many photos of just me. I don't know why they felt like they needed that one but they

00:01:35 ◼   ► did. You're getting ready for this party though? Are you all prepared? Do you need to go soon

00:01:39 ◼   ► while we're recording this? Yeah I'm gonna be recording on the road today. Okay. Though

00:01:43 ◼   ► I did go and get my hipster trim today. I've had my beard and my hair cut by my friend.

00:01:50 ◼   ► Oh is this that fancy place that you go to for your beard massage or whatever? My beard

00:01:56 ◼   ► massage yeah that's that's it I don't know how you maintain these things there

00:02:00 ◼   ► is a little bit of massaging going on after I okay so I'm not wrong then he's

00:02:04 ◼   ► like Oh beard massage what a ridiculous notion actually they did massage my

00:02:08 ◼   ► beard right that's that's what I'm just hearing from it kind of puts this like

00:02:12 ◼   ► beard moisturizer and he massages it into my face

00:02:15 ◼   ► he's done yeah that's I'm gonna call that a beard massage Myke yeah but first

00:02:20 ◼   ► I was like I refute this claim and then like rolled back the the thoughts and I was like, oh no

00:02:27 ◼   ► He did do that. That's how it ends

00:02:29 ◼   ► So I'm currently in that state of when you get a haircut and your clothes are just stabbing you. Mm-hmm

00:02:35 ◼   ► You know, I mean, I'm in that stage right now. It's uncomfortable. Yeah, funnily enough wearing the nail and gear t-shirt

00:02:41 ◼   ► Flying the flag. I like it. Yep. I actually have a flag as well. Perfect. This is great

00:02:48 ◼   ► Welcome to the hell of internet nation. Yeah talking about nations

00:02:51 ◼   ► Actually, you're back in this one after being away for a while. I am again again. Yes

00:02:58 ◼   ► Did you just you walk down to the train station and appeared in Amsterdam again? Is that what happened? Why is this?

00:03:04 ◼   ► I don't understand why this seems to like irritate you this whole thing is so strange to me. It's just so weird

00:03:11 ◼   ► so yeah, I have

00:03:14 ◼   ► relatively recently returned from a

00:03:17 ◼   ► a second trip in Amsterdam, a second working trip in Amsterdam, and I feel like it was

00:03:25 ◼   ► in the theme of the Year of Less. I went there, I did a lot of thinking, I did a lot of work,

00:03:33 ◼   ► and it was a very good experience for me.

00:03:38 ◼   ► I like that the idea of the Year of Less entails you going to another country and, like, shacking

00:03:46 ◼   ► up in a hotel room, I assume, for a few weeks. I feel like less would be, you know, a more

00:03:52 ◼   ► minimal environment where you're just at home in an empty room or something, you know.

00:03:56 ◼   ► No, okay, okay, okay, okay, so listen. It's the year of less and more extravagance.

00:04:01 ◼   ► No, no, you're coming, you're coming at this, you're coming at this just the wrong way.

00:04:06 ◼   ► Okay, so listen. I took this trip because it happened to work out that, given a couple

00:04:13 ◼   ► of scheduling things. I had like a week of no meetings or anything and so I

00:04:18 ◼   ► thought at the last moment again I was going to take this trip and do some work.

00:04:24 ◼   ► But it is less, Myke, because the reason I find this trip so beneficial is that

00:04:31 ◼   ► it is a decision minimal environment. There's nothing to decide on a trip

00:04:41 ◼   ► like this. So I say it like I've done this a hundred times, like really this is the second time

00:04:45 ◼   ► I've done it, but you may hear from my voice that I'm thinking in the future that this is a thing that I might want to do again.

00:04:51 ◼   ► I've been thinking about your cycles that you mentioned last time. This has been on my mind a lot.

00:04:56 ◼   ► I have a hard time figuring out how this exactly works in my schedule,

00:05:00 ◼   ► but that thing you said last time about having an on week and an off week,

00:05:04 ◼   ► I keep thinking about that and how to do that on a broader scale. But so the hotel thing is

00:05:10 ◼   ► the decisions are taken away from me.

00:05:14 ◼   ► So I went to Amsterdam with this whole notion of like this very

00:05:18 ◼   ► limited things here. I'm going to have the same

00:05:22 ◼   ► foods every day. I'm not going

00:05:25 ◼   ► sightseeing or anything. I'm just going to have

00:05:28 ◼   ► the same routine. Everything is going to be super simple.

00:05:32 ◼   ► And then plus, since it is a hotel, there are many things like

00:05:36 ◼   ► I have none of the concerns of a normal house.

00:05:40 ◼   ► I don't have to take out the garbage.

00:05:42 ◼   ► I don't have to do any of this other stuff.

00:05:44 ◼   ► And also because I am going on my own,

00:05:47 ◼   ► it's like there's not another person that I'm thinking,

00:05:49 ◼   ► "Ooh, when are they coming home?"

00:05:51 ◼   ► There's no external concerns here.

00:05:54 ◼   ► Decisions are very few.

00:05:56 ◼   ► And it has put me in a very focused mindset.

00:06:00 ◼   ► And I fell into a really great routine while I was there

00:06:05 ◼   ► there that I have been attempting to continue to follow since I have been back. So it has

00:06:10 ◼   ► been, it's a great experience, but it is less, Myke. Even though I'm going somewhere else,

00:06:14 ◼   ► it's definitely less.

00:06:15 ◼   ► I want to come back to that routine that you mentioned before. Why Amsterdam again though?

00:06:22 ◼   ► Like you could do this in London or somewhere else in the UK. Like what took you there again?

00:06:28 ◼   ► Because last time, if I remember correctly, Amsterdam was a good location because you

00:06:32 ◼   ► actually were meeting with some friends.

00:06:34 ◼   ► Yeah, the Amsterdam thing this time was mostly laziness

00:06:38 ◼   ► because I decided again at the last moment that I was going to do this

00:06:41 ◼   ► and I didn't feel like trying to research a whole other environment, right?

00:06:46 ◼   ► I knew that the place that I was going had the things that I wanted.

00:06:50 ◼   ► It had minimally decorated rooms, of which even the decorations that did exist,

00:06:56 ◼   ► I put them all in the closet, much to the confusion of the hotel staff,

00:06:59 ◼   ► and it had appropriate exercise facilities and there was the ability to run nearby

00:07:06 ◼   ► and there were a couple of places in the hotel to work

00:07:09 ◼   ► so like it ticked all of the boxes for things that I was looking for in a place to work

00:07:13 ◼   ► and I didn't want to spend a whole afternoon trying to find a second new place

00:07:19 ◼   ► I thought since I'm doing this at the last minute, let me just go to the guaranteed location

00:07:24 ◼   ► I've been thinking about this a lot and it's it's it's hard to

00:07:27 ◼   ► It's hard to express but I feel like I have gained this real

00:07:35 ◼   ► Feeling from doing this it's actually kind of funny my wife when I came back described it as though like oh you have been on the

00:07:42 ◼   ► Grey incorporated company retreat, but it's just you like there's nobody else

00:07:47 ◼   ► but that this was the this was the equivalent thing because when I came back I was talking with her about it a little bit and

00:07:54 ◼   ► And I imagine like many annoying CEOs of large companies when they go away on retreats,

00:08:00 ◼   ► they come back and they're like, "Oh, we have all these great ideas for how we want to change the way the company works!"

00:08:04 ◼   ► Right? And all the employees are going, "Oh god, oh no, he's read some business book and he has a whole new idea about how things are gonna happen."

00:08:11 ◼   ► And I basically did that to myself, with just myself, while I was in Amsterdam.

00:08:15 ◼   ► Thinking about it this morning, probably the thing I can say the most clearly is,

00:08:21 ◼   ► In this theme of "year of less" brackets me, when I went here to work and when I established this routine

00:08:32 ◼   ► and when there were no decisions to make about what was going to happen, it almost brings into

00:08:39 ◼   ► very sharp focus how limited amount of time you have to accomplish the number of things you want to do.

00:08:49 ◼   ► So it's not necessarily that like the day itself is limited

00:08:53 ◼   ► But if I look at the list of all of the projects or all of the things that I want to work on

00:08:57 ◼   ► There are more things on that list than I could reasonably accomplish in an entire lifetime

00:09:02 ◼   ► Right if we are in the David Allen parlance looking at a someday maybe list of all of the potential projects that I might want to

00:09:09 ◼   ► Do or work on it's like oh, okay

00:09:11 ◼   ► There's several human lifetimes of stuff in here like there isn't just enough time for anyone to actually do everything that they want

00:09:19 ◼   ► And, I don't know, I think sometimes being busy with a lot of the little day-to-day stuff of life can kind of hide that.

00:09:32 ◼   ► I don't know, I feel like busyness is this feeling that you can get wrapped up in that distracts you from how much you are actually accomplishing and getting done.

00:09:46 ◼   ► Whereas when I was there at the hotel and thinking like, okay, I am every day at this time just going to write for a certain number of hours and there's no decisions about this, like this is just what's going to happen,

00:10:00 ◼   ► it makes it really clear that like, okay, if you are working on the things that are most important to you and then that already takes up half of the day, like at best you have another half of the day to do other stuff,

00:10:13 ◼   ► So like what are the things that it's going to fill the rest of that time?

00:10:16 ◼   ► Somehow it just it made me much more aware of the limited time and energy in a way that is

00:10:22 ◼   ► not so

00:10:25 ◼   ► Obvious always in a in a busy

00:10:27 ◼   ► normal daily life

00:10:30 ◼   ► situation what I'm thinking about is

00:10:33 ◼   ► Not even so much all of the things that I would like to do forever

00:10:39 ◼   ► Mm-hmm, but sometimes just like all of the things I need to do today

00:10:42 ◼   ► mm-hmm and

00:10:45 ◼   ► Quite a lot of the time. I don't have the time to do them because of

00:10:48 ◼   ► The things that occur in my life that I want to do that aren't work, right?

00:10:54 ◼   ► So for example when Adina comes home and we cook together

00:10:58 ◼   ► We eat we talk and we watch TV shows or movies. They're all things that I really want to do

00:11:06 ◼   ► But if I didn't do those things, I would have more time to get more work done.

00:11:10 ◼   ► So if I had a really big project, and when I do have really big projects, we do skip those things.

00:11:17 ◼   ► But I can kind of see the advantage of having a block of time where there are no distractions like that.

00:11:28 ◼   ► The more that you're talking about it, and even though it is still kind of a little bit crazy and ridiculous to me,

00:11:35 ◼   ► I do start to see the benefit of completely uninterrupted "I can work for as long as I want" time.

00:11:47 ◼   ► There really is something that is fundamentally different about having big, uninterrupted blocks of time.

00:11:57 ◼   ► Like, even the most minor of things.

00:12:00 ◼   ► So when I work at home, for example, my wife will go to work and then she comes back at some point later in the day

00:12:07 ◼   ► Her coming home is the world's most minor of interruptions

00:12:12 ◼   ► But there's something about when I am home and I'm working

00:12:16 ◼   ► There's an awareness of "Oh, my wife is in the house" and then there's a feeling of "Well,

00:12:21 ◼   ► there's an obligation to spend time with her" like "and I want to spend time with her and now she's here"

00:12:26 ◼   ► That's a thing that we can definitely do and then suddenly like the whole work environment just shifts your brain is ever so slightly now

00:12:34 ◼   ► debating between two things or having to

00:12:38 ◼   ► Resist doing the easier option if there's something that you need to finish working on whereas in this kind of constrained environment

00:12:45 ◼   ► Like it's just me. There's there's no one here to see there's no one here to talk to

00:12:51 ◼   ► There's just me and either the work that I'm doing or the few books that I have brought with me that I want to read

00:12:57 ◼   ► And focus on and that's it. Like there is no other place for the brain to get

00:13:03 ◼   ► Distracted by I think it's really important to point out though

00:13:07 ◼   ► Those distractions are extremely important that they should happen

00:13:12 ◼   ► Mm-hmm, right like the idea of you deciding I'm going to move to Amsterdam

00:13:18 ◼   ► Forever on my own because I can do work 24/7 that is not a healthy thing to do

00:13:25 ◼   ► Right, like you you agree with that. Yeah, they are distractions. Yes

00:13:29 ◼   ► but they're worthwhile distractions, but there are times where

00:13:34 ◼   ► It's good to just be able to focus completely on something

00:13:39 ◼   ► There's two clarifications that I want to bring up here, right?

00:13:42 ◼   ► The first is that if this podcast has not already made it clear, I will refer you to episode number one entitled

00:13:50 ◼   ► "I don't really like work" and that I have no desire to

00:13:55 ◼   ► move to Amsterdam permanently, leave all of the responsibilities of my life behind, and just work all day every day.

00:14:03 ◼   ► Because I don't really like work.

00:14:06 ◼   ► It's I am not consumed by work in the way

00:14:11 ◼   ► that I think someone like, he's always my go-to, but like someone like Richard Branson, I think, for example, is a person who is

00:14:19 ◼   ► I always say that he's like a broken person

00:14:23 ◼   ► But he's broken in a useful way in that that man gets his thrills out of starting new companies

00:14:31 ◼   ► He obviously can't not start new companies and always be doing business like that is

00:14:38 ◼   ► his obsession and that is why he's a billionaire with a billion companies, right?

00:14:43 ◼   ► I'm not that kind of person. I have never been that kind of person. I have no aspirations to be that kind of person.

00:14:50 ◼   ► I am much more interested in the idea of

00:14:54 ◼   ► how do I get the maximum amount of result for the amount of time that I am putting in?

00:15:04 ◼   ► And one of the things that also aligns with the year of less for me is really trying to be very aware of any kind of working time that is not maximally effective.

00:15:20 ◼   ► And this is what I mean by a little bit like a, like, "busyness is bad."

00:15:23 ◼   ► It's very easy to be busy and feel like you're doing a whole bunch of stuff, but not actually doing the things that are really important.

00:15:32 ◼   ► And so going to Amsterdam was not about, "Boy, I can't wait to work all day, every day."

00:15:41 ◼   ► Because that's not something that I necessarily find enjoyable.

00:15:45 ◼   ► For me, it was about, "I am deciding in advance that this is a place where I am going to be very focused for a finite amount of time

00:16:01 ◼   ► on the things that are the most important.

00:16:06 ◼   ► And so that's why when I was there,

00:16:08 ◼   ► I was focused primarily on my health actually,

00:16:12 ◼   ► and then also on writing scripts,

00:16:16 ◼   ► which is the most valuable thing that I can do

00:16:19 ◼   ► in terms of my business.

00:16:20 ◼   ► And if I wasn't either exercising or writing,

00:16:24 ◼   ► I was reading a few books that I thought would be helpful

00:16:29 ◼   ► in thinking about the direction of things for the next year

00:16:34 ◼   ► and about business and the rest of it.

00:16:36 ◼   ► So those were the activities that I was focusing on,

00:16:41 ◼   ► primarily.

00:16:42 ◼   ► And it's funny because again,

00:16:44 ◼   ► when I think about my routine for the day

00:16:46 ◼   ► and how things were going,

00:16:47 ◼   ► at the end of every day, I felt just exhausted.

00:16:51 ◼   ► I felt just completely drained

00:16:53 ◼   ► from the result of a full day of being mentally focused

00:16:58 ◼   ► on just the things that are the most important.

00:17:00 ◼   ► So a trip like this to me is valuable and possible.

00:17:05 ◼   ► I think a key part of it is

00:17:09 ◼   ► because there is a clear end point, right?

00:17:13 ◼   ► Where it's like, I'm going to do this thing

00:17:15 ◼   ► at maximum capacity for X number of days.

00:17:19 ◼   ► And when you have something like that in your mind,

00:17:21 ◼   ► it's much easier to stick with.

00:17:23 ◼   ► But I think if I was trying to work like that,

00:17:27 ◼   ► all of the time just in my normal life, I don't think that I could possibly do it.

00:17:32 ◼   ► Like, I think I would burn out very fast.

00:17:35 ◼   ► Or just be too exhausted after a certain point.

00:17:38 ◼   ► Like, you can't live your life like a monk in a cabin in a city forever.

00:17:46 ◼   ► Or at least I don't want to live my life like that.

00:17:48 ◼   ► Business monk.

00:17:49 ◼   ► Yeah, like a business monk.

00:17:51 ◼   ► It's not possible.

00:17:53 ◼   ► Do you not worry though that the more that you do this,

00:17:58 ◼   ► the more that you may become dependent on it?

00:18:00 ◼   ► Does that not concern you?

00:18:01 ◼   ► Like if you keep doing this,

00:18:03 ◼   ► say you do this every couple of months,

00:18:05 ◼   ► do you not worry that you might get in a situation

00:18:07 ◼   ► where you can only fully focus

00:18:09 ◼   ► when you're in these types of surroundings?

00:18:11 ◼   ► - It's funny, while I was actually there,

00:18:13 ◼   ► one of the books I was reading was talking about,

00:18:16 ◼   ► in one section, just as a slight tangent,

00:18:18 ◼   ► like the incredible importance of working at hotels

00:18:21 ◼   ► and working at different environments.

00:18:22 ◼   ► I was like, oh, this is positively reinforcing.

00:18:26 ◼   ► They were describing--

00:18:27 ◼   ► I think it was JK Rowling in talking about how she couldn't

00:18:30 ◼   ► finish her last book and ended up

00:18:34 ◼   ► like booking the entire top floor of some hotel in Glasgow

00:18:38 ◼   ► and just working there to finish the final Harry Potter book.

00:18:41 ◼   ► That's too much.

00:18:42 ◼   ► She didn't need the whole floor.

00:18:44 ◼   ► You know, the penthouse suite or whatever.

00:18:46 ◼   ► The penthouse suite-- - Oh, OK.

00:18:47 ◼   ► Right, like at the top, that's the whole floor.

00:18:49 ◼   ► She books out seven rooms.

00:18:51 ◼   ► I could totally see that though, right? You don't want neighbors, not even in a hotel. Nobody wants neighbors.

00:18:57 ◼   ► I am not worried at all about this becoming a thing that is a necessity for me.

00:19:04 ◼   ► Because I am viewing this as one of the tools in my arsenal.

00:19:11 ◼   ► And I really do mean like I have been trying to think a lot about trying to do this on some kind of regular schedule.

00:19:19 ◼   ► And it just so happens that it's been about three months since the last time I went.

00:19:24 ◼   ► So I'm thinking like, "Oh, maybe this is a thing that I can try to plan for to do like once a quarter."

00:19:31 ◼   ► And maybe the idea of having that as a thing that I can anticipate and plan for,

00:19:38 ◼   ► maybe this would work really well in a schedule as part of this idea.

00:19:44 ◼   ► Like have a cycle to your work. Don't just have a constant uniform

00:19:49 ◼   ► grind to what it is that you're doing.

00:19:53 ◼   ► I think the only way you can save yourself from yourself is to put this in a schedule.

00:19:57 ◼   ► I genuinely mean that as well. Like I think if you don't plan this type of thing in

00:20:02 ◼   ► you could end up in a situation where

00:20:05 ◼   ► you cannot work in London.

00:20:09 ◼   ► No, see, I think it's the exact reverse here that if I don't put this in a schedule

00:20:13 ◼   ► it will be very difficult to actually make time for this.

00:20:17 ◼   ► Again, this trip just happened because

00:20:21 ◼   ► a bunch of things in a particular week cancelled, leaving me unexpectedly free.

00:20:25 ◼   ► But that's not a normal situation. So I think it's actually the reverse.

00:20:29 ◼   ► I need to plan for this to ensure that it does happen.

00:20:33 ◼   ► Not, "Oh, if I don't plan for it, it will creep and take over my entire life."

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00:22:53 ◼   ► routine yeah you doing email again I'm still terrible at email absolutely

00:23:01 ◼   ► terrible at email. Yeah, I know I had a good routine there. To describe a general day,

00:23:07 ◼   ► it looked like that. So I got up at about six in the morning most days and I went down

00:23:14 ◼   ► to the restaurant and I got the same breakfast every morning, right, because it's no decision.

00:23:20 ◼   ► So I would just get an omelet and I would get a coffee and I would read for maybe half

00:23:26 ◼   ► an hour while I was having breakfast. And then right after having breakfast, I went

00:23:32 ◼   ► back up to the hotel room. And this was kind of the key thing was, in the hotel room, I

00:23:39 ◼   ► then had my iPad Pro actually set up sort of on a chair, on a desk in the hotel room

00:23:46 ◼   ► so that it was at standing height. And I would write the scripts that I was currently working

00:23:55 ◼   ► on for as long as I was able to do that. Like as long as I could stay focused on this script

00:24:04 ◼   ► and still feel like I am making progress on it. And so these were usually sessions that

00:24:08 ◼   ► were like three or maybe four hours long depending on the morning. And as always with this stuff,

00:24:15 ◼   ► I look kind of like a crazy person because the most effective way for me to spend time

00:24:22 ◼   ► writing is actually to be talking it out loud. So it was a lot of time of I'm standing up,

00:24:28 ◼   ► I'm kind of pacing back and forth a little bit, reading it out loud or like trying out

00:24:34 ◼   ► new sentences out loud and then adding them to the script if I like them or cutting stuff out.

00:24:38 ◼   ► And so that is without a doubt, and also according to my spreadsheets,

00:24:45 ◼   ► the most effective way that I can spend my time

00:24:48 ◼   ► is bringing a script closer to completion

00:24:54 ◼   ► and it is also the most focused and mentally draining of the time that I can spend

00:25:00 ◼   ► and I think in some ways this is similar to people who do computer programming

00:25:08 ◼   ► that blocks of uninterrupted time where you can really get into the focus of it

00:25:17 ◼   ► is incredibly valuable and difficult to replicate time. And just the simple knowledge that there was

00:25:28 ◼   ► nothing else on my calendar for the rest of the day, like there was no podcast to record,

00:25:34 ◼   ► there was no bank appointment to go to, there was no nothing.

00:25:37 ◼   ► It mentally changes the frame, like it feels like there is a relief,

00:25:44 ◼   ► like the brain can relax and say, "Okay, look, if we were here for five hours or six hours, it wouldn't matter

00:25:52 ◼   ► because there's nowhere to be. Like, you can just focus on this thing until the point at which you are done.

00:25:59 ◼   ► and you don't have to worry about trying to shut stuff down before you're finished or not.

00:26:04 ◼   ► So that part of the day, just that morning part, was the absolute most valuable thing.

00:26:13 ◼   ► Getting up at a consistent time, having, as people know, I'm very sensitive to changes in the early morning schedule.

00:26:19 ◼   ► If things don't go quite right in the morning, it has bad knock-on effects for me.

00:26:23 ◼   ► But it's like, nope, this is going to work perfectly every time in this hotel because you're going to get up,

00:26:28 ◼   ► the restaurant's always going to be there.

00:26:29 ◼   ► There's always going to be nobody there

00:26:32 ◼   ► because you're the only lunatic in the restaurant

00:26:34 ◼   ► at six in the morning.

00:26:35 ◼   ► You're gonna get the exact same omelet,

00:26:36 ◼   ► you're gonna read for the same amount of time,

00:26:38 ◼   ► and then you're gonna go up

00:26:39 ◼   ► and you're going to be able to now focus on the writing

00:26:44 ◼   ► in an environment where you're guaranteed

00:26:46 ◼   ► not to be interrupted and you have nothing

00:26:48 ◼   ► on the schedule later in the day.

00:26:51 ◼   ► So that was the morning part of it.

00:26:55 ◼   ► when I was done writing, then that was where I changed and I focused on health

00:27:00 ◼   ► so then I would go to the gym

00:27:03 ◼   ► or I would go for a run

00:27:05 ◼   ► so I was alternating that on either days

00:27:10 ◼   ► and at that point, like after going to the gym or going for a run, which always takes a

00:27:14 ◼   ► surprisingly long amount of time, for some reason in my brain I'm always thinking

00:27:17 ◼   ► like "Oh, exercising, it's going to take half an hour!" but the whole thing

00:27:20 ◼   ► between like getting ready, actually exercising, and then coming back and

00:27:24 ◼   ► and taking a shower and changing, like,

00:27:27 ◼   ► I find that whole thing takes way longer

00:27:28 ◼   ► than you always think it does.

00:27:30 ◼   ► - Or that you want it to.

00:27:31 ◼   ► - Yeah, that's exactly it.

00:27:33 ◼   ► Maybe that's what it is.

00:27:34 ◼   ► Like, my brain is like, "Ah, this'll be 20 minutes."

00:27:36 ◼   ► It's like, "Actually, it's like an hour and a half, buddy.

00:27:37 ◼   ► "Do you know this, right?

00:27:38 ◼   ► "Like, this happens every day."

00:27:39 ◼   ► Like, "No, no, it'll be 20 minutes this time."

00:27:41 ◼   ► No, it won't. - I've got it down.

00:27:43 ◼   ► - It just never works out that way.

00:27:47 ◼   ► And so at this point, having done the,

00:27:54 ◼   ► writing, mental exhaustion, and then exercise, physical exhaustion

00:27:59 ◼   ► I was a completely drained human being

00:28:04 ◼   ► It was just like, I can do nothing now

00:28:07 ◼   ► And so as I have learned, well this is an excellent time to do the thing that I mentioned on an earlier podcast

00:28:12 ◼   ► which is the coffee power nap thing

00:28:15 ◼   ► where you have some caffeine right before taking a nap

00:28:18 ◼   ► which then allows you to sleep briefly but wake up without any kind of sleep inertia

00:28:23 ◼   ► And then in the rest of the day, like afternoons are not super productive times for me as I have mentioned,

00:28:29 ◼   ► but then I would read for a large portion of the afternoon until there was an early dinner that I would have,

00:28:36 ◼   ► always the same thing. There was one restaurant that I was either ordering a burger from or this kind of chicken dinner from,

00:28:43 ◼   ► alternating either day, so again no decisions to be made there whatsoever.

00:28:47 ◼   ► And then in the evenings I often find that I have an additional burst of energy to work on things,

00:28:52 ◼   ► And then I was working on just a bunch of projects that had been causing me the most amount of stress related to my business.

00:29:02 ◼   ► I finally finished a whole bunch of stuff related to taxes and just a bunch of business nonsense.

00:29:08 ◼   ► That it's not super important in the same way that a video is, but it was important to get done because I had been aware that in the past few months it had been really dragging on my mind.

00:29:20 ◼   ► So I was able to really kill a few projects while I was there

00:29:24 ◼   ► that feel like they were mentally freeing to get done.

00:29:28 ◼   ► And then, you know, after that made me just read a little bit before bed

00:29:32 ◼   ► and then fall asleep and do the whole thing again the next day.

00:29:34 ◼   ► And it was glorious. It was absolutely glorious.

00:29:37 ◼   ► Yeah. Knowing you as I know you, I can see why you loved that.

00:29:41 ◼   ► It's also why I didn't leave the hotel most days because there was no need to.

00:29:46 ◼   ► As crazy as it sounds, there was no time to.

00:29:51 ◼   ► Right? Like it really felt that way.

00:29:53 ◼   ► Yeah, sure.

00:29:54 ◼   ► Almost every day. Like, I like...

00:29:56 ◼   ► This is what I mean by this. This feeling of it highlights the year of less in a way that is hard to articulate.

00:30:01 ◼   ► But it's like, in some ways I was doing so little, but also never felt like the days were shorter.

00:30:07 ◼   ► Like, how could I possibly do anything else? How could I have any other life outside of this?

00:30:12 ◼   ► of this. I know not. Like the day just flies by even though it's like, okay, what have

00:30:17 ◼   ► I done? I've done some writing, I've done some exercise, I've done some reading, and

00:30:21 ◼   ► I've done some administration. It's like four actual discrete tasks, but then the day is

00:30:26 ◼   ► over and I'm exhausted.

00:30:27 ◼   ► Why can't you replicate a lot of that at home?

00:30:33 ◼   ► Because Myke, life intrudes in a way.

00:30:37 ◼   ► Life finds a way, Greg.

00:30:39 ◼   ► finds a way to annoy you. And this kind of activity is an artificial holding at

00:30:47 ◼   ► bay a bunch of things. Like you can't actually live your life in this totally

00:30:52 ◼   ► disconnected way. And as contrast, because I had been holding a bunch of things

00:30:57 ◼   ► back, when I returned home everything was waiting for me. And the very first day

00:31:05 ◼   ► that I had back after this Amsterdam trip was the exact opposite of this.

00:31:10 ◼   ► It's like okay so I get up in the morning and my wife is awake as well and

00:31:14 ◼   ► so she's getting ready for work and like we have this little morning routine like

00:31:17 ◼   ► we're talking to each other and then so she goes off to work and I sit down and

00:31:20 ◼   ► like okay gonna get gonna get right to writing now and not five minutes later

00:31:25 ◼   ► like the front doorbell rings and there's a packet from Amazon.

00:31:28 ◼   ► Okay great thanks okay fine package from Amazon like I sign for it I grab it I go

00:31:34 ◼   ► back to sit down and literally not 10 minutes later because I had to check my

00:31:38 ◼   ► watch because I couldn't believe that it wasn't true

00:31:41 ◼   ► ding dong the bell rings again and there's a guy who needs to come and

00:31:44 ◼   ► check the gas meter in the house

00:31:46 ◼   ► oh ok fine come in check the gas meter and he's oh don't worry I only be five

00:31:50 ◼   ► minutes

00:31:51 ◼   ► ok but now there's someone in the house and like I can't be pacing around like a

00:31:55 ◼   ► crazy person talking out loud and writing and it's also just weird that

00:31:58 ◼   ► someone's there and of course with these things it's a creeping delay and he's

00:32:01 ◼   ► not there for five minutes

00:32:02 ◼   ► He's actually there for an hour and a half.

00:32:05 ◼   ► Like that's how long he was there for.

00:32:06 ◼   ► - What was he doing?

00:32:08 ◼   ► - There was something broken

00:32:09 ◼   ► and something needed to be fixed

00:32:11 ◼   ► and then a second guy needed to come.

00:32:13 ◼   ► And it's like, my perspective on it is like,

00:32:15 ◼   ► I don't care what they were doing, right?

00:32:16 ◼   ► It doesn't matter.

00:32:17 ◼   ► They just needed to fix something in the house,

00:32:19 ◼   ► but it just took forever.

00:32:20 ◼   ► And then I had, after that,

00:32:26 ◼   ► there was a phone call that I had to take,

00:32:29 ◼   ► like a meeting that I had to take with someone

00:32:30 ◼   ► while I had to take that meeting,

00:32:32 ◼   ► someone else came to the house who needed to repair a lock on the front door.

00:32:35 ◼   ► So like I need- so now I'm like on the phone while someone's in the house repairing a lock on the front door

00:32:41 ◼   ► and the lock guy leaves because I was on the phone

00:32:43 ◼   ► I didn't have a chance to like check his work entirely and it didn't- wasn't fixed the first time so like now I need to

00:32:49 ◼   ► arrange for him to come back and do this other thing. I forget what it was. There was some other

00:32:53 ◼   ► thing that happened in the evening and it was one of these days was like I cannot believe this.

00:32:58 ◼   ► This is the exact opposite of this experience. Like I have now come back

00:33:01 ◼   ► I have had an entire day that has felt really busy and draining

00:33:06 ◼   ► But over which I feel like I have accomplished literally nothing

00:33:09 ◼   ► It's like okay the gas that I thought was fine was fixed

00:33:13 ◼   ► but so from my perspective like nothing has really changed a dude came and

00:33:17 ◼   ► wanted to fix the lock but didn't fix the lock and then I you know, it's just like I

00:33:22 ◼   ► Received some packages like okay great packages

00:33:25 ◼   ► Obviously there's stuff in the house that I need these packages for but when I'm in a hotel like I don't need any of these things

00:33:31 ◼   ► because it's all just taken care of.

00:33:32 ◼   ► So this is what I mean, like, it's an artificial environment that only works for a limited amount of time.

00:33:38 ◼   ► Right? You have to come back to regular life, and regular life just has all of these little intrusions that are frustrating.

00:33:45 ◼   ► But the one thing that I have definitely taken away from this,

00:33:48 ◼   ► like the concrete thing that is going to be different,

00:33:52 ◼   ► is...

00:33:55 ◼   ► I am now

00:33:57 ◼   ► looking for a

00:34:00 ◼   ► dedicated office space in London

00:34:02 ◼   ► So I don't I don't yet know how practical this idea is. I don't have a good understanding of the

00:34:10 ◼   ► Office space rental market around where I am. I don't know

00:34:16 ◼   ► I'm just beginning to look into this but from this trip I was thinking about it afterwards and thinking okay

00:34:21 ◼   ► What was the most valuable part the most valuable part was that initial writing and the thing that it depended on?

00:34:29 ◼   ► Was a space that was my own that was private at which I will receive

00:34:36 ◼   ► no interruptions and

00:34:38 ◼   ► So I thought okay, let me try to replicate

00:34:41 ◼   ► This so what I'm going to try to do is just find an office. It's like a room

00:34:48 ◼   ► Somewhere nearby that has a door that I can close so it's my own space

00:34:54 ◼   ► And I can just go there first thing in the morning and not either

00:34:58 ◼   ► Try to stay at home, but then be vaguely worried about just pointless interruptions which happen all the time

00:35:03 ◼   ► Especially when you live in a building where there's like 15 apartments and so anybody delivering packages all the time

00:35:09 ◼   ► We'll just press all of the buttons so that someone answers which is hugely frustrating

00:35:13 ◼   ► So that's the idea like I'm gonna see if I can replicate at least the most valuable part of that experience

00:35:19 ◼   ► Going forward in the future, but I literally just have started this in the past couple days

00:35:24 ◼   ► So I don't have any idea if this is gonna work out or how practical it is

00:35:28 ◼   ► But I'm hoping to take away this valuable part and reproduce it here

00:35:33 ◼   ► When you said that there was this part of me that was gonna ask you that seriously was gonna ask you

00:35:38 ◼   ► Oh, that sounds interesting

00:35:39 ◼   ► Let me know if you needed a desk mate and then realize how that is like the complete opposite of what you want

00:35:45 ◼   ► You would be the worst desk mate. You'd be the worst because I'd be so awesome. No, you'd be doing podcasting stuff

00:35:51 ◼   ► I wouldn't record from an office. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. I know have a desk mate

00:35:55 ◼   ► I'm not I'm not splitting the rent with you. This is the whole purpose of this thing. Exactly

00:35:59 ◼   ► That's why that's why it's so ridiculous to have that idea

00:36:02 ◼   ► It's like oh, this is a good idea. I'll go in with you and then realize how terrible that would be

00:36:07 ◼   ► Yeah, maybe we just find somewhere with two rooms and we just never talk to each other

00:36:12 ◼   ► No, I just don't take this the wrong way mike, but I don't want to be anywhere near you with my office

00:36:16 ◼   ► Like it's got to be separate. This is the whole thing

00:36:20 ◼   ► It has to be completely separate

00:36:23 ◼   ► I keep my office away from you.

00:36:24 ◼   ► For those of the listeners who remembered me mentioning in the past that I do have a co-working space

00:36:28 ◼   ► and wondering what the deal is,

00:36:30 ◼   ► going on this trip made me realize something that was obvious in retrospect

00:36:36 ◼   ► but was not obvious until I had a break from it,

00:36:39 ◼   ► which is that over maybe the past six months in particular,

00:36:44 ◼   ► my co-working space has gotten very popular.

00:36:47 ◼   ► It is very busy and I used to be very good at using it outside of normal business hours.

00:36:55 ◼   ► Using it in the evening when I could have it all to myself or using it on the weekends when no one would come in.

00:37:00 ◼   ► Or sometimes using it very early in the morning.

00:37:03 ◼   ► But I sort of didn't notice that over the last six months there are always people there now.

00:37:08 ◼   ► It doesn't matter what time I show up. It doesn't matter if it's on the weekend.

00:37:13 ◼   ► I always have this thought, which is great, because I'll walk in and it'll be like 6pm on a Sunday

00:37:19 ◼   ► and I'll think, "Okay, great, let me go to this space and I'll have it to my own and I can talk out loud."

00:37:23 ◼   ► And I'll walk in and there'll be some people in there and I'll always have the exact same thought, like,

00:37:27 ◼   ► "Who are these losers in this co-working space right now?"

00:37:29 ◼   ► What's wrong with you?

00:37:31 ◼   ► - Yeah, like... - You thought you have a life?

00:37:32 ◼   ► - That is always my thought. - I know.

00:37:35 ◼   ► What the hell are you guys doing here?

00:37:37 ◼   ► I'm supposed to be the only loser who's here right now, but you're here.

00:37:41 ◼   ► This ruins everything for me.

00:37:43 ◼   ► But again, it sounds dumb, but something about the slow increase of people being there over a long period of time made the change invisible.

00:37:56 ◼   ► Until I realized, like, "Oh man, having a guaranteed private space that I can go to without interruption is invaluable."

00:38:02 ◼   ► It's like, duh, man, duh. That's so obvious.

00:38:06 ◼   ► But you don't notice things until you see until there's like a change and then you can reflect back on

00:38:12 ◼   ► Like what is different so that that is that has been extremely valuable for me

00:38:18 ◼   ► Yeah

00:38:18 ◼   ► If I was in the position location wise to be able to ruin to rent an office space

00:38:24 ◼   ► Like that which I could set up equipment in and it could be all safe and it was over walking distance

00:38:30 ◼   ► I would have done that already

00:38:34 ◼   ► Continuing to work a hundred percent at home. I don't think in the long term is gonna be the best scenario for me

00:38:40 ◼   ► Yeah, so this actually this actually brings up another thing

00:38:43 ◼   ► that

00:38:45 ◼   ► has come to the front of my mind as a result of this trip, which is I

00:38:49 ◼   ► Have this clear feeling of

00:38:55 ◼   ► Location contamination and what I mean by this is I

00:39:02 ◼   ► I, the longer I have been self-employed,

00:39:05 ◼   ► the more firmly I believe in this idea of like,

00:39:09 ◼   ► okay, when you don't have clear constraints on your work,

00:39:13 ◼   ► it is very helpful to associate particular activities

00:39:17 ◼   ► with particular routines or locations.

00:39:20 ◼   ► And so even within the hotel, when I was in Amsterdam,

00:39:25 ◼   ► I was very conscious of,

00:39:27 ◼   ► I am only on this side of the room

00:39:30 ◼   ► when I'm talking out loud and doing the writing.

00:39:33 ◼   ► And I'm only going to be at this table

00:39:37 ◼   ► in this cafe downstairs when I am doing administration stuff

00:39:41 ◼   ► to clear other projects.

00:39:43 ◼   ► Like the only thing I'm doing in the gym

00:39:46 ◼   ► is I am working out in the gym.

00:39:48 ◼   ► I'm not lounging around.

00:39:50 ◼   ► - I was gonna say, what else do you do in the gym?

00:39:52 ◼   ► I take my laptop to the gym.

00:39:54 ◼   ► Sit on the treadmill.

00:39:55 ◼   ► - They had like a spa section kind of thing.

00:39:58 ◼   ► And I just thought like, this feels like a weird contamination.

00:40:01 ◼   ► Like they had a place where you could sit, you know, and I was like, no,

00:40:03 ◼   ► I don't want to do this and listen to like Zen music or something. Like, no,

00:40:06 ◼   ► no, this is too,

00:40:07 ◼   ► this is like the same routine and the same environment of like going into the

00:40:11 ◼   ► gym and you know, getting flip-flops or whatever.

00:40:13 ◼   ► I just feel like you have to keep things clear and,

00:40:18 ◼   ► and mixing stuff is bad.

00:40:21 ◼   ► And I don't know what episode it was on,

00:40:23 ◼   ► but on one of the earlier episodes of Cortex,

00:40:26 ◼   ► I made a comment and it's like, "Okay, now I understand why."

00:40:30 ◼   ► But I said that I have found that my home office,

00:40:34 ◼   ► even though I am super thrilled to have it,

00:40:36 ◼   ► is a place of really low per hour productivity in many ways for me.

00:40:43 ◼   ► And I think I know why now, and the reason is because

00:40:47 ◼   ► I have, since I moved in here, done almost every single kind of activity in this room.

00:40:53 ◼   ► Like, I will write scripts in this room, I will animate in this room,

00:40:57 ◼   ► I'm recording a podcast right now in this room,

00:41:00 ◼   ► I will edit a podcast in this room,

00:41:02 ◼   ► I will also then do administration, like, email work here,

00:41:06 ◼   ► but, like, also when I'm editing a podcast,

00:41:09 ◼   ► I'll be playing a game at the same time in this room.

00:41:12 ◼   ► It's like, this office is great to have at home,

00:41:17 ◼   ► but it is suffering from this problem of, like,

00:41:20 ◼   ► it's not clear to my brain what am I supposed to be doing right now in this space.

00:41:25 ◼   ► It's never clear because I do almost absolutely everything.

00:41:29 ◼   ► So my idea with trying to rent out an office space in London, if I can do it, is I'm going

00:41:36 ◼   ► to try very hard to only have writing and talking out loud happen in that room.

00:41:44 ◼   ► That it's like, I'm going to go into this room, I'm going to do this particular activity,

00:41:48 ◼   ► and if I'm not doing this particular activity, I'm going to leave.

00:41:52 ◼   ► I want my brain to learn that this happens here.

00:41:58 ◼   ► And then that has a little bit more of a separation, where it's like, okay,

00:42:02 ◼   ► then my home office becomes much more of a podcast recording and editing place,

00:42:08 ◼   ► but I'm not even going to try to write in my home office.

00:42:11 ◼   ► I'm going to try to always do it in a particular place.

00:42:15 ◼   ► I'm convinced that this is very helpful, but I'm curious to try to be much more conscious about this going forward.

00:42:24 ◼   ► To have locations and routines associated with particular kinds of work.

00:42:29 ◼   ► So I never, for example, want to bring all of my tax paperwork and do all of that stuff in the same place that I want to be, the place where I do writing.

00:42:40 ◼   ► I'm going to try to keep things much more separate going forward from here on out.

00:42:45 ◼   ► You know what makes it worse?

00:42:48 ◼   ► What?

00:42:49 ◼   ► When your office is also your bedroom.

00:42:52 ◼   ► Well yeah, as I was discussing about this I was thinking about you, Myke.

00:42:57 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:42:58 ◼   ► Yeah, do you want to tell the people why you were thinking about that, Gray?

00:43:01 ◼   ► Yeah, because we actually had our first FaceTime chat ever last night.

00:43:06 ◼   ► So Gray needs to call me for something.

00:43:09 ◼   ► And instead of calling me with audio like people do, I see CGP Grey's calling, I press

00:43:17 ◼   ► the answer button, and then up he pops and he can see my bedroom.

00:43:23 ◼   ► I didn't want you in my bedroom, Grey.

00:43:25 ◼   ► Well, you know, you let me in.

00:43:27 ◼   ► You press the accept button.

00:43:30 ◼   ► Yeah, yeah.

00:43:33 ◼   ► I can't wait to change this.

00:43:36 ◼   ► And I understand the idea of having the home office brings those problems, but I'm really

00:43:41 ◼   ► looking forward to sleeping in a different room that my desk is in.

00:43:47 ◼   ► Oh yeah, don't get me wrong, the home office problem, this is way better than having a

00:43:52 ◼   ► single room in which you do literally everything.

00:43:55 ◼   ► Having your podcasting studio also be your bedroom is frustrating.

00:44:00 ◼   ► It's frustrating.

00:44:01 ◼   ► But you didn't make your bed when I called, I was surprised, there was just unmade bed

00:44:05 ◼   ► in the background.

00:44:06 ◼   ► Don't tell people my secrets.

00:44:07 ◼   ► - That you don't make your bed?

00:44:11 ◼   ► I'm sure nobody else does that.

00:44:13 ◼   ► Just as a quick piece of evidence

00:44:16 ◼   ► that I think favors this theory,

00:44:18 ◼   ► is going back to what you refer to as the spider dungeon.

00:44:21 ◼   ► - Oh yeah, the spider dungeon.

00:44:23 ◼   ► - The original place where I started my YouTube career.

00:44:26 ◼   ► I think that that is great evidence for this,

00:44:31 ◼   ► because like that environment was horrible,

00:44:34 ◼   ► But it had the key feature that my brain learned, like when you are in the basement, you are writing.

00:44:40 ◼   ► And this is the only activity that we do down here because it's a horrible place and we don't want to stay.

00:44:46 ◼   ► But it's also the only place where I could be on my own and talk out loud and not disturb, you know, my wife or neighbors or anybody else or anything.

00:44:53 ◼   ► So I feel like I lucked out in my early career by doing that kind of behavior.

00:45:02 ◼   ► Train your brain to associate this work with this place.

00:45:05 ◼   ► And in the past couple years I haven't been doing that so much.

00:45:09 ◼   ► There's been a lot of bleeding over of edges and boundaries.

00:45:12 ◼   ► And so I think I'm going to attempt to reinstitute that as a lesson that I have learned from my most recent trip in Amsterdam.

00:45:20 ◼   ► I don't know, Myke, how well I've been explaining this stuff.

00:45:23 ◼   ► I have this feeling as a result of the end of this trip that is difficult to articulate.

00:45:28 ◼   ► And the only analogy that I can make is

00:45:32 ◼   ► I have heard from people who do psychedelic substances.

00:45:39 ◼   ► They have a feeling that sticks with them long after doing psychedelic substances

00:45:45 ◼   ► that they find difficult to articulate.

00:45:48 ◼   ► But that nonetheless is a positive experience that they find influences their future behavior

00:45:54 ◼   ► Mm-hmm, and I think that's what Amsterdam this trip was like for me in the most boring

00:46:00 ◼   ► Workway possible. I feel like I've had some kind of business

00:46:04 ◼   ► Psychedelic experience that is impossible to explain to outsiders

00:46:09 ◼   ► But is nonetheless positive and is affecting my future decisions. So in summary

00:46:16 ◼   ► You went to Amsterdam you had a psychedelic experience and now you're gonna get an office

00:46:22 ◼   ► Yeah, okay the end

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00:48:35 ◼   ► There's been another beta, Myke.

00:48:38 ◼   ► Yeah, it came out on like I think the day we released our last episode.

00:48:43 ◼   ► So I was in this weird feeling where as much as I want Apple Pencil support to come back

00:48:49 ◼   ► to us in the way that we wish, when that came out, I was a little bit like, "Man, if they

00:48:54 ◼   ► put it back in today, Apple's ruined the show."

00:48:57 ◼   ► I was in a real quandary about that.

00:49:01 ◼   ► Do I want it back enough that I'm happy for the show to be completely outdated?

00:49:06 ◼   ► Within hours?

00:49:07 ◼   ► The answer is yes, Myke.

00:49:09 ◼   ► Yes.

00:49:10 ◼   ► And you felt, you felt some sort of conflict about this because of your businessman tendencies.

00:49:17 ◼   ► But I couldn't have cared less.

00:49:19 ◼   ► I wanted that, I wanted the pencil support back the way it's supposed to be immediately

00:49:24 ◼   ► and I would have gladly immolated the show that we had just released hours before in

00:49:30 ◼   ► order to have that. But you still have your wish here, Myke, because I'm going to

00:49:36 ◼   ► talk about the Apple Pencil some more because nothing nothing has changed.

00:49:41 ◼   ► Actually, that's not strictly true because I have had several independent,

00:49:51 ◼   ► unrelated sources in the know confirm to me what was simply a fear last time that

00:50:00 ◼   ► removing the functionality of the Apple

00:50:03 ◼   ► Pencil is a decision inside of Apple. It

00:50:07 ◼   ► is not a bug that they have overlooked

00:50:09 ◼   ► for three betas. It is a decision and I

00:50:13 ◼   ► obviously think it is an absolutely

00:50:17 ◼   ► disastrous decision but it seems like

00:50:19 ◼   ► this is something that Apple wants to do

00:50:22 ◼   ► differently and I would like to take

00:50:25 ◼   ► another swing at trying to convince them

00:50:27 ◼   ► to not do this differently. Yeah I would

00:50:29 ◼   ► also like that so we can carry on on this route.

00:50:33 ◼   ► It has been frustrating to hear this from a few different corners

00:50:37 ◼   ► of people saying that this is something that Apple wants to do. Have you been

00:50:41 ◼   ► invited to Cupertino for your secret meeting yet? I have not been invited to Cupertino

00:50:45 ◼   ► I am waiting. Just check your spam folder.

00:50:49 ◼   ► That's not in my spam folder. If you are at Apple and would like to invite

00:50:53 ◼   ► me to Cupertino, please use the contact form on my website so that my personal assistant

00:50:57 ◼   ► can find that and bring it to my attention because I'm terrible at email and I would

00:51:02 ◼   ► really hate to see an email from tim@apple.com three months from now when I actually go through

00:51:08 ◼   ► all of my public email.

00:51:10 ◼   ► It could be in there, you don't even know.

00:51:12 ◼   ► No, it can't be in there.

00:51:14 ◼   ► But maybe I should search for @apple.com after this podcast.

00:51:18 ◼   ► So here's the thing, here's the thing, right?

00:51:20 ◼   ► So I think this is a terrible decision but I have been given some indications from people

00:51:25 ◼   ► that they're like, "Oh, but don't worry, Apple has amazing stuff planned for the pencil."

00:51:31 ◼   ► And as we tried to discuss last time, I don't care at all about the amazing stuff that they

00:51:35 ◼   ► have planned.

00:51:36 ◼   ► But trying to think it through, so like here is my imagining of what is going on in Apple.

00:51:42 ◼   ► So it's like, "Okay, what do you want the pencil to be able to do that you can't do

00:51:47 ◼   ► if the pencil can scroll a Safari webpage or turn a page in a book or slide over in

00:51:53 ◼   ► a share sheet?"

00:51:54 ◼   ► what is on their mind? And my best guess at this is that Apple's idea is they want people

00:52:03 ◼   ► to be able to mark up whatever they are looking at.

00:52:08 ◼   ► This has been a very popular theory in the Reddit thread as well.

00:52:12 ◼   ► The thing that really makes me sad about this is it seems to me like the perfect kind of

00:52:16 ◼   ► thing that makes a great demo on stage. Like I can see someone who's thinking about demoing

00:52:24 ◼   ► new features on stage, loving the idea of pulling up a website, circling something on

00:52:31 ◼   ► that website and then being able to send like a picture of the screen with the circle on

00:52:36 ◼   ► the page to their friend or whatever.

00:52:38 ◼   ► It just seems like a great tech demo that someone would love to do despite like the

00:52:45 ◼   ► actual usefulness of that, like how much is someone going to do that?

00:52:49 ◼   ► In the same way that I think of those little, all of those demos about, oh you're going

00:52:54 ◼   ► to be able to draw a tiny flower on your watch that you will then send to someone you like.

00:53:00 ◼   ► I don't think there's a lot of people out there who are still using the drawing features

00:53:04 ◼   ► on their watch.

00:53:05 ◼   ► Great tech demo, actually not so useful in real life.

00:53:09 ◼   ► So I think this is what the utility of the Apple Pencil is being sacrificed for.

00:53:17 ◼   ► And I don't think that's a good trade-off.

00:53:18 ◼   ► Here's what I've been thinking about.

00:53:20 ◼   ► The iPad Pro is being sold as a professional tool.

00:53:27 ◼   ► And when I think about what does that mean, professionals need tools that are more precise

00:53:38 ◼   ► than just using their meaty monkey hands on a screen.

00:53:44 ◼   ► I think for any kind of professional work that someone does, you need a precision pointing device.

00:53:52 ◼   ► And so, for example, I think of the Mac.

00:53:55 ◼   ► And so on the Mac, in my own work, I do animating, I work with audio, I work with video.

00:54:01 ◼   ► I do all the kinds of stuff that Apple and their commercials just like loves to see people doing on their machines.

00:54:08 ◼   ► "Ooh, look at this creative work!" Like, this writer uses it, and he draws stuff, and he makes videos.

00:54:13 ◼   ► To do all of those things, you need, if you're going to do it professionally, a professional tool.

00:54:21 ◼   ► If, for example, Apple decided that only trackpads were allowed on the Mac,

00:54:28 ◼   ► that would be a horrible experience for almost any professional.

00:54:33 ◼   ► Like, I dare you to go to Pixar, for example, and take away all of their Wacom tablets and hand them trackpads.

00:54:41 ◼   ► and say, "Oh, but look! You can paint with your fingers on this trackpad on the screen.

00:54:45 ◼   ► Isn't that great? It's a one-to-one experience.

00:54:47 ◼   ► You're able to touch this thing and you make a line on the screen."

00:54:51 ◼   ► It's like, no, listen.

00:54:51 ◼   ► For professional work, you need professional tools, and those tools need to be precise.

00:54:57 ◼   ► Now, a trackpad, much like iOS, is for a normal user, a much more intuitive experience.

00:55:05 ◼   ► Because it is a direct one-to-one relationship.

00:55:09 ◼   ► Like you move your hand on the trackpad and the thing moves on the screen or you do gestures and stuff

00:55:14 ◼   ► People love trackpads, but professionals need better tools. And so when I look at the iPad

00:55:22 ◼   ► the whole of the iPad is

00:55:26 ◼   ► already a trackpad like the whole

00:55:30 ◼   ► freaking screen is

00:55:33 ◼   ► the trackpad and now if you want to have something that you are selling to professionals that you want

00:55:42 ◼   ► professionals to use you need additional tools for the future of the platform you need a

00:55:50 ◼   ► precision

00:55:52 ◼   ► pointing device and

00:55:54 ◼   ► Apple has made that very precision pointing device it works

00:56:00 ◼   ► Today right now. I think one of the things to point out at this point

00:56:05 ◼   ► Which I think is a really important distinction is like when you're saying about professionals doing professional work. Let's imagine that

00:56:12 ◼   ► Part of what you're talking about here is animating, right?

00:56:16 ◼   ► You do the animations with the pencil and that works even with the 9-3 beta restriction

00:56:23 ◼   ► But the problem is if you want to change tools if you want to scroll through a list of tools

00:56:28 ◼   ► You have to mode shift you have to put the pencil away. You have to use your finger that friction is

00:56:34 ◼   ► Enough to make you not want to use it. That is exactly the thing. I am thinking about something like a

00:56:40 ◼   ► Podcasting tool in the future on on iPad Pro, right?

00:56:44 ◼   ► This is something that like I know there are some now

00:56:46 ◼   ► But I'm trying to think about the future of these tools

00:56:48 ◼   ► And so if you were say editing a podcast on an iPad Pro

00:56:52 ◼   ► I can easily see a situation that kind of like maps the very weight comm tablet that we we were talking about a couple shows ago

00:56:59 ◼   ► Now onto the screen where you could say like do gestures with one hand and you can be doing

00:57:04 ◼   ► Precision pointing and and cutting with the pencil in the other hand without a doubt with professional level tools you

00:57:12 ◼   ► Constantly need to shift stuff right it's not going to be a basic painting app if you're using a vector drawing tool

00:57:19 ◼   ► It's not going to be something like GarageBand if you want to have a professional audio tool on an iPad Pro

00:57:25 ◼   ► And you're not going to be able to have something like iMovie be usable for for professionals on an iPad Pro

00:57:31 ◼   ► You need much more in-depth tools, and you know what much more in-depth tools require?

00:57:36 ◼   ► Lots of menus lots of submenus lots of lists that you scroll through

00:57:42 ◼   ► switching things all of the time and and

00:57:46 ◼   ► If Apple says you can't use the pencil, like this professional tool to navigate the interface fully,

00:57:54 ◼   ► I think it limits the way these things can be made.

00:57:59 ◼   ► Like it just makes them so much more frustrating.

00:58:02 ◼   ► It's frustrating on both ends.

00:58:04 ◼   ► It's frustrating if someone is, say, trying to design a professional drawing app for the iPad Pro,

00:58:11 ◼   ► and then thinking, "Oh right, but I shouldn't make any of these lists long because if someone has the pencil in their hand

00:58:18 ◼   ► they're not going to be able to scroll with it."

00:58:21 ◼   ► And it's also frustrating, like you said, because it makes someone who is a professional

00:58:26 ◼   ► kind of not want to just use the pencil all the time as this tool if you constantly have to mode shift back and forth.

00:58:33 ◼   ► Who does Apple think this is for?

00:58:37 ◼   ► Like if the pencil is just for drawing and just for basic markup?

00:58:42 ◼   ► Like, okay, the iPad Pro is already a niche Apple product.

00:58:47 ◼   ► The pencil within that is a niche within a niche.

00:58:51 ◼   ► But I think like the iPad Pro with the pencil as it is today,

00:58:56 ◼   ► Apple's market there is every artist or everyone who works on a computer

00:59:03 ◼   ► that uses a Wacom tablet, right?

00:59:04 ◼   ► Like that is no small market,

00:59:07 ◼   ► but if they then say like,

00:59:08 ◼   ► "Oh, okay, the Pencil can only be used in markup,

00:59:12 ◼   ► it can't be used in the interface."

00:59:14 ◼   ► It's like, okay, well,

00:59:15 ◼   ► anybody who uses pen tablets professionally,

00:59:17 ◼   ► that's not an attractive option.

00:59:18 ◼   ► Like that's a pointlessly frustrating option.

00:59:21 ◼   ► I don't know, I just, I see so much potential

00:59:26 ◼   ► in the iPad Pro for the future

00:59:29 ◼   ► with the addition of this precision pointing tool.

00:59:33 ◼   ► And it seems insane to me to limit that future.

00:59:38 ◼   ► Like, to limit what people can do because you have an idea of how you want people to use it.

00:59:47 ◼   ► And there was a link about Johnny Ive a while ago talking about the pencil and how he thinks about

00:59:54 ◼   ► And it's pretty clear from this interview that like Johnny Ive in his mind has the thing that we mentioned last time that he

01:00:01 ◼   ► imagines people are just going to use the pencil to draw pretty pictures and he doesn't want it to be confused for a

01:00:09 ◼   ► Useful tool for professionals on a device called the iPad Pro. Let me read a quote to you

01:00:16 ◼   ► This was sent in to us via a listener with the name of Matt

01:00:20 ◼   ► I think there's a potential to confuse the role of the pencil with the role of your finger in iOS

01:00:26 ◼   ► And I actually think it's very clear

01:00:28 ◼   ► The pencil is for making marks and the finger is a fundamental point of interface for everything within the operating system

01:00:35 ◼   ► And those are two very different activities of two very different goals. That is directly from Johnny Ive. I

01:00:41 ◼   ► understand what he's saying

01:00:44 ◼   ► But he's wrong. Like I get what he's trying to

01:00:49 ◼   ► Set out to do I can completely

01:00:52 ◼   ► Understand that argument that there is some level of simplicity to the idea that your fingers navigate the interface and

01:01:00 ◼   ► The pencil is for making marks. I can understand where he is coming from. I just think that's so limiting

01:01:08 ◼   ► Do you know the problem with it? What didn't ship that way Apple gave us a taste of

01:01:14 ◼   ► of what we now feel is the perfect solution, which is the Pencil operates everything.

01:01:20 ◼   ► If it shipped the way it's currently in the 9.3 beta, if it shipped the way that Johnny and I have

01:01:26 ◼   ► clearly set out to make it happen, we wouldn't be upset right now. I would still be pretty upset if

01:01:31 ◼   ► the Pencil couldn't navigate the interface. You would think, oh I would like it if it could do

01:01:36 ◼   ► that, but you wouldn't know what you're missing. I wouldn't feel how I feel now, which is that

01:01:41 ◼   ► Almost like I have been personally burned by Apple.

01:01:45 ◼   ► Apple handed me the most amazing perfect tool for the future of my work

01:01:49 ◼   ► and the future of many other people's work

01:01:51 ◼   ► and they took it away.

01:01:53 ◼   ► It's this line here where he says,

01:01:55 ◼   ► "The finger is the fundamental point of interface for everything in the operating system."

01:02:01 ◼   ► That to me is the worrying part.

01:02:04 ◼   ► A vision of iOS for the rest of time

01:02:08 ◼   ► that requires you to always be pressing just your fingers and only your fingers against the screen.

01:02:15 ◼   ► Fingers are a great way into a platform, right?

01:02:20 ◼   ► Like, clearly the success of the iPhone was in no small part due to the fact that people could just touch the buttons on the screen with their hands, right?

01:02:27 ◼   ► Like, no doubt about that.

01:02:29 ◼   ► But to then say, like for iOS, for now these huge iOS screens that they're building,

01:02:37 ◼   ► like that this device, the interface can only and forever be navigated with human meaty fingers

01:02:43 ◼   ► and cannot be interacted with using other tools.

01:02:47 ◼   ► I just think that is a deep, deep mistake to make.

01:02:52 ◼   ► It is the same to me as just saying on a Mac, if only touchpads could be used to interact with the interface.

01:02:59 ◼   ► You can't use keyboard shortcuts, right? You couldn't use anything else.

01:03:03 ◼   ► Like, that's the same level of decision here.

01:03:05 ◼   ► And that's also the thing that I find frustrating, especially with the Pro, because it's like, "Oh, okay."

01:03:09 ◼   ► You think that the finger is the fundamental point of interface for the system.

01:03:13 ◼   ► Why then can I press Command + Space on the iPad Pro and bring up Spotlight and start typing in Spotlight?

01:03:21 ◼   ► That's not using my finger for the interface.

01:03:23 ◼   ► Why do you have command tab on the iPad Pro allowing me to access the task switcher without touching the screen?

01:03:30 ◼   ► Gee, could it be that these are features that the vast majority of users never touch, never even know exist,

01:03:38 ◼   ► but that for professional users are vital every single day?

01:03:44 ◼   ► Maybe that's the same thing with keyboard shortcuts.

01:03:47 ◼   ► Like I would bet for anything, Apple knows on the Mac where they have data about this,

01:03:52 ◼   ► that like 0.01% of users ever use any keyboard shortcuts.

01:03:57 ◼   ► Like when I see normal people using computers, they never use keyboard shortcuts.

01:04:01 ◼   ► But you know what? You still build them in because they're vital for professional users.

01:04:07 ◼   ► So the whole idea of like, okay, Apple has this iPad Pro. They've put in keyboard shortcuts.

01:04:12 ◼   ► They put in all of this keyboard stuff to work with the interface without having to touch the screen.

01:04:17 ◼   ► Like that goes against Johnny Ive's design principle as stated in this quote here.

01:04:22 ◼   ► It's like, come on, you know this can't really be the only way to interact with the interface.

01:04:30 ◼   ► Give people more tools to work with your systems.

01:04:37 ◼   ► That's all I want.

01:04:38 ◼   ► Just put it back.

01:04:41 ◼   ► And everyone will be happy.

01:04:43 ◼   ► It's not hurting anyone.

01:04:45 ◼   ► Exactly.

01:04:46 ◼   ► I have been hearing from people who are in my position as well, like, this is actually

01:04:51 ◼   ► a health issue. Like I do really think Apple, like you are hurting people by not keeping the

01:04:58 ◼   ► way it is in the pre-beta state. Like I've been hearing from people with RSI issues who've been

01:05:04 ◼   ► saying the same thing about like "oh my god the pencil makes a huge difference in working on iOS,

01:05:08 ◼   ► like this is a big deal for me." I've heard from people who just have mobility difficulties with

01:05:12 ◼   ► their hands, like the pencil and being able to navigate the interface, this is way better and

01:05:17 ◼   ► and way more comfortable for me than having to use my hands.

01:05:20 ◼   ► - You're all really smart people.

01:05:22 ◼   ► If part of what you wanna do is just make iOS markup-able,

01:05:27 ◼   ► you can find a way to do it.

01:05:29 ◼   ► Put a button in the share sheet.

01:05:31 ◼   ► Like, you can do this.

01:05:33 ◼   ► - If you wanna make everywhere markup-able,

01:05:36 ◼   ► there are already ways to do that right now.

01:05:39 ◼   ► Like you said, taking screenshots

01:05:41 ◼   ► and working on them in other editors,

01:05:42 ◼   ► it's not super elegant, but it's possible.

01:05:45 ◼   ► - Like you can find a better way.

01:05:47 ◼   ► Like you have the ability, you build the operating system.

01:05:50 ◼   ► You can find a better way than that to make this work.

01:05:53 ◼   ► - Yeah, two seconds worth of thought.

01:05:54 ◼   ► You can have a button that you press in Control Center,

01:05:57 ◼   ► which then toggles the screen to be mark-up-able.

01:05:59 ◼   ► - Kapow, job done.

01:06:01 ◼   ► And there's so much space in Control Center on the iPad Pro.

01:06:03 ◼   ► - Yeah, I know, we're not short on real estate there.

01:06:06 ◼   ► There's plenty of space.

01:06:07 ◼   ► You can add it right next to your creepy,

01:06:09 ◼   ► always watching me eye icon that you now have in there.

01:06:12 ◼   ► Like it's always watching you.

01:06:14 ◼   ► Hello, it's the worst.

01:06:16 ◼   ► (laughing)

01:06:17 ◼   ► So that's why it's additionally frustrating.

01:06:19 ◼   ► It's like there are other ways to mark up the screen

01:06:22 ◼   ► if that's what you want to do

01:06:24 ◼   ► and if people really want to do that,

01:06:25 ◼   ► you can make things for that,

01:06:27 ◼   ► but you're taking away the only way to do something else,

01:06:32 ◼   ► which is to precisely work with the interface.

01:06:36 ◼   ► - Look, if there's one thing that I've learned

01:06:37 ◼   ► over the years of following Apple

01:06:40 ◼   ► is that they are willing to, and they have done,

01:06:46 ◼   ► changed back the changes they make.

01:06:49 ◼   ► - Yeah, I think the classic example of this

01:06:51 ◼   ► is the iOS 7 changeover,

01:06:54 ◼   ► when they had the ridiculously thin and light text

01:06:59 ◼   ► the first time around.

01:07:00 ◼   ► - Yeah.

01:07:01 ◼   ► - And when they were running that beta program,

01:07:03 ◼   ► I think they quite wisely realized,

01:07:06 ◼   ► okay, we've gone too far in this direction of,

01:07:09 ◼   ► we have an ideal that we want.

01:07:11 ◼   ► - Did they go from Helvetica Neue to just Helvetica, right?

01:07:15 ◼   ► Like they went from the super thin Helvetica

01:07:17 ◼   ► to a little bit thicker.

01:07:18 ◼   ► - But it was enough of a difference

01:07:20 ◼   ► that it made the difference, right?

01:07:21 ◼   ► Where it's like, it was still thin,

01:07:23 ◼   ► but it wasn't crazy thin.

01:07:25 ◼   ► - Yep.

01:07:26 ◼   ► - So this is also, this is still just my hope

01:07:29 ◼   ► that within Apple, while this is still in beta,

01:07:34 ◼   ► this is a thing that they will reverse on.

01:07:37 ◼   ► And I've been just trying to make the case as best I can.

01:07:41 ◼   ► - We are using our political platform.

01:07:43 ◼   ► - Yeah, exactly, right?

01:07:44 ◼   ► on the side of keeping the pencil the way it is.

01:07:47 ◼   ► Leaves it a professional tool in a device

01:07:49 ◼   ► that is marketed for professionals.

01:07:51 ◼   ► It is beneficial for the mitigation

01:07:56 ◼   ► and avoidance of repetitive strain injury.

01:07:58 ◼   ► It is beneficial for people who have difficulty

01:08:02 ◼   ► with their hands.

01:08:03 ◼   ► It is a thing that you should leave in.

01:08:05 ◼   ► It is just frankly pleasant to use the operating system

01:08:10 ◼   ► with the pencil.

01:08:11 ◼   ► If you are used to using a Wacom tablet,

01:08:14 ◼   ► which is almost certainly the very market

01:08:16 ◼   ► that you want to sway with with this exact product.

01:08:19 ◼   ► Or you could be able to draw on the screen at any time,

01:08:22 ◼   ► which is a thing that you can have other solutions for.

01:08:25 ◼   ► - Everybody that needs to do that, to do markup in iOS,

01:08:30 ◼   ► already knows how to do it and does it.

01:08:33 ◼   ► The people that need that and would buy the Apple Pencil

01:08:36 ◼   ► to do that already do it.

01:08:39 ◼   ► - Exactly, I don't know who this market is

01:08:42 ◼   ► because that is exactly the kind of thing

01:08:44 ◼   ► that is for a casual user,

01:08:47 ◼   ► not the kind of person who's probably buying

01:08:49 ◼   ► an iPad Pro and a pencil.

01:08:52 ◼   ► - Yeah, but I will stress though,

01:08:54 ◼   ► that we don't know that that's what they wanna do.

01:08:56 ◼   ► We don't know what it could be, right?

01:08:58 ◼   ► Like there could be something that, you know,

01:09:00 ◼   ► which just happens with Apple,

01:09:02 ◼   ► things that me and you aren't perceiving

01:09:03 ◼   ► as the things that they wanna do with it, right?

01:09:05 ◼   ► We need to appreciate that that is a fact,

01:09:07 ◼   ► that there could be things that they want to do

01:09:09 ◼   ► which are really cool, but we don't see what they are.

01:09:11 ◼   ► - Yeah, this is our best guess.

01:09:13 ◼   ► - Yeah.

01:09:14 ◼   ► - But I still say that like--

01:09:15 ◼   ► - It fundamentally doesn't matter though.

01:09:17 ◼   ► - Yeah, it's hard to imagine what a different thing is,

01:09:21 ◼   ► but as I have expressed to you in very certain terms

01:09:24 ◼   ► in private, but like I will again say in nicer terms now,

01:09:28 ◼   ► I don't care at all what it is.

01:09:32 ◼   ► Whatever feature they're developing,

01:09:34 ◼   ► there's no argument, I think,

01:09:37 ◼   ► against the accessibility argument.

01:09:39 ◼   ► If you want to limit accessibility, I really don't care what the additional feature is.

01:09:45 ◼   ► And as I said, I'm still worried that I'm going to find myself in this horrible position of having to choose between

01:09:51 ◼   ► am I going to jailbreak a device and compromise digital security,

01:09:57 ◼   ► or am I going to be damaging my hands over the long run,

01:10:02 ◼   ► doing the very thing that Apple would want me to do, which is going super all-in on their new device.

01:10:08 ◼   ► So, that's where we are.

01:10:13 ◼   ► Apple please.

01:10:15 ◼   ► Do your old pal Grey a favor here.

01:10:19 ◼   ► Do the right thing.

01:10:25 ◼   ► Grey Hurley 2016.

01:10:27 ◼   ► This message has been paid for by the Apple Pencil community.

01:10:31 ◼   ► Vote stylus.

01:10:32 ◼   ► I want to take a moment to talk about a new sponsor for this show and that is Ministry

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01:13:07 ◼   ► I want to revisit something that we discussed on an earlier episode and that is the YouTube

01:13:14 ◼   ► channel grade A under A. Do you remember me mentioning this a long time ago Myke? I don't

01:13:21 ◼   ► know if you will.

01:13:22 ◼   ► Yeah is this the one where the animation is like really rough?

01:13:27 ◼   ► Yeah rough is generous.

01:13:29 ◼   ► I didn't want to I didn't want to you know like dump on this person.

01:13:32 ◼   ► We had a conversation I was just looking up the show here and this was back on September

01:13:39 ◼   ► 7th episode number 12 called the rule of two.

01:13:44 ◼   ► Ah, classic.

01:13:45 ◼   ► Can it be classic if we're... what is this episode? Is this 22? Is this 23? What are we doing?

01:13:50 ◼   ► Yeah, it's long enough. It's last year.

01:13:52 ◼   ► It's 50% of the way ago. That can be a classic episode.

01:13:55 ◼   ► We were selling t-shirts then. That tells you how long ago it was.

01:13:58 ◼   ► Oh, were we? Okay.

01:14:00 ◼   ► So in that episode, we discussed a little bit a thing that just always kind of infuriates me,

01:14:07 ◼   ► which is this meme on YouTube that I have been hearing for forever

01:14:12 ◼   ► and people always say about how like it's impossible to start a YouTube career

01:14:16 ◼   ► nowadays because there's too much competition and it's all big channels and

01:14:21 ◼   ► We talk about it there. I lay out my thoughts about why this is nonsense. I

01:14:25 ◼   ► violently disagree with this position and

01:14:28 ◼   ► I happen to mention a

01:14:31 ◼   ► Channel that I was just barely aware of then which was grade A under A which was brought to my attention by one of the

01:14:38 ◼   ► listeners to the show and

01:14:41 ◼   ► And I used him as an example of a channel that, one, didn't have high production values,

01:14:49 ◼   ► but that, two, didn't matter because he was producing stuff that was just great.

01:14:56 ◼   ► Like his videos are funny and they are insightful.

01:15:00 ◼   ► And at that point in time he had just under 100,000 subscribers.

01:15:06 ◼   ► I think in the show I said he had like 90,000 subscribers.

01:15:10 ◼   ► I've just taken a look at the page.

01:15:12 ◼   ► - Right, and what does he have now, Myke?

01:15:14 ◼   ► - He has a million subscribers.

01:15:16 ◼   ► - He has a million subscribers.

01:15:18 ◼   ► - And all of his videos are like over a million views.

01:15:22 ◼   ► - Right.

01:15:23 ◼   ► - Again, doing that thing that I just don't understand.

01:15:25 ◼   ► These numbers aren't like any other numbers.

01:15:28 ◼   ► - Right.

01:15:29 ◼   ► (laughing)

01:15:30 ◼   ► The YouTube system is strange, but I wanted to,

01:15:34 ◼   ► I'm visiting this followup in no small part

01:15:37 ◼   ► because I wanted to just point out that like, I was right.

01:15:40 ◼   ► Because in that episode, I said like, he to me,

01:15:44 ◼   ► struck me as a person who was on the cusp

01:15:47 ◼   ► of doing this professionally.

01:15:49 ◼   ► That he was like just about to become big

01:15:54 ◼   ► and be able to do this 100% of the time.

01:15:57 ◼   ► And now as we are recording this episode in February,

01:16:02 ◼   ► he is doing that.

01:16:03 ◼   ► Like he does this for a living now.

01:16:05 ◼   ► He makes these videos and he is very successful.

01:16:08 ◼   ► And so I think grade A under A is now my most recent go-to example

01:16:12 ◼   ► to try to argue against this insane idea that somehow,

01:16:17 ◼   ► even though YouTube is more popular than it has ever been,

01:16:21 ◼   ► that it is impossible for new channels to get noticed.

01:16:25 ◼   ► Like you just-- no one can break into this environment.

01:16:28 ◼   ► Like it's not true.

01:16:29 ◼   ► Like look at this guy.

01:16:31 ◼   ► He made a thing that people liked and in the space of several months he 10x'd his audience.

01:16:39 ◼   ► I think he's just a great example of this.

01:16:42 ◼   ► And as far as I can tell, again, I don't know this person, I've just seen this from the outside,

01:16:46 ◼   ► but I think he's just one person making these videos.

01:16:49 ◼   ► Like, that's the impression that I get. Like, it's just him.

01:16:52 ◼   ► That's what he says on his videos, so I have no reason to doubt him.

01:16:55 ◼   ► So it's like it's totally possible. It's just a question of making something that people like.

01:17:04 ◼   ► It's not a question of can you compete with the production values of huge media companies.

01:17:13 ◼   ► So again, I will emphatically encourage anyone who is listening to this show, who is thinking,

01:17:22 ◼   ► Oh, I would like to start a YouTube channel, but everything is done already and I can't make high quality videos

01:17:28 ◼   ► and there's all these big media companies out there to compete with.

01:17:31 ◼   ► It's not relevant. Start something today.

01:17:36 ◼   ► Try to make videos that people will like and if you are successful in that, you will find success on YouTube.

01:17:44 ◼   ► It is almost impossible not to.

01:17:46 ◼   ► Grade A under A.

01:17:49 ◼   ► That's so interesting.

01:17:50 ◼   ► Yeah? What's so interesting?

01:17:51 ◼   ► In that discussion that we originally had on that episode, I believe it was in that episode,

01:17:56 ◼   ► we spoke about the idea that really kind of what you need is the thing.

01:18:02 ◼   ► And that thing is the thing that people have or they don't have, and it's really difficult to know

01:18:07 ◼   ► what it is, and it's really difficult sometimes to know if you or somebody else has it. But we used

01:18:14 ◼   ► MKBHD as the example of that and how he even in his very first video talking about Ativo or something

01:18:22 ◼   ► Yeah, where he's 12. You can tell he has a thing and like you watch it and you can see you know what?

01:18:28 ◼   ► This is just a younger version of the guy

01:18:33 ◼   ► Who has three million YouTube subscribers, right? You watch it and you're like, yeah

01:18:39 ◼   ► "Yeah, this is Marques. This is him."

01:18:43 ◼   ► He's not fully grown yet, but it's there.

01:18:47 ◼   ► You can see that. And he's developed

01:18:51 ◼   ► a style over time, and he's gotten much better over time.

01:18:55 ◼   ► He's also gotten much older over time. But it's definitely the case

01:18:59 ◼   ► that he has a way of explaining things

01:19:03 ◼   ► that's very clear to people, and people like that and they respond to that.

01:19:07 ◼   ► I'll give another example actually of this kind of thing that I think is interesting for people to watch and it is

01:19:12 ◼   ► It is the YouTube channel your movie sucks

01:19:18 ◼   ► which is made by a guy named Adam and he to me is a very interesting example of

01:19:23 ◼   ► someone starting a thing and

01:19:26 ◼   ► Having something right from the beginning, but then also clearly developing his own style

01:19:32 ◼   ► So Myke are you familiar with the red letter media Star Wars reviews? Please say yes. Yeah. Okay good

01:19:39 ◼   ► Yeah, I haven't watched them, but I know about them. Okay, you know, you know about their existence

01:19:44 ◼   ► Yeah listeners, and I talked about them all the time because I think they are brilliant

01:19:47 ◼   ► But they are these review of the Star Wars movies that are done in this very particular style. That is

01:19:55 ◼   ► Striking it's a it's unique. It is impossible

01:19:58 ◼   ► Not to notice

01:20:01 ◼   ► So this guy Adam who started the Your Movie Sucks YouTube channel

01:20:05 ◼   ► I think it is a worthwhile endeavor for anybody who's thinking about doing a YouTube career

01:20:11 ◼   ► To go back and watch like his first 20 videos in order

01:20:15 ◼   ► Because they are the clearest example I have ever seen of someone

01:20:20 ◼   ► very clearly and explicitly in his own videos saying he is copying the style of

01:20:28 ◼   ► red letter media. Like his first few reviews are the exact same style

01:20:33 ◼   ► He is saying that but even when you watch them you can see like oh, but there's this guy has something here, which is

01:20:39 ◼   ► His and if you watch those first 20 videos in order

01:20:43 ◼   ► You can see someone

01:20:46 ◼   ► go from

01:20:48 ◼   ► imitating a style which is a great way to start learning how to do a thing and then

01:20:54 ◼   ► develop into his own style and become a successful person. Like that to me is the key. Like it's totally fine

01:21:01 ◼   ► to

01:21:03 ◼   ► start with somebody else's style, but like you need to develop your own

01:21:08 ◼   ► thing and his is the best example I have ever seen of that where it's just so clear to watch each video

01:21:16 ◼   ► he is a little less red-letter media and he is a little more himself.

01:21:21 ◼   ► Until now his modern videos where it's like it is just entirely his style

01:21:25 ◼   ► There's there's nothing anymore of the red-letter media influence that was there in the beginning and it's just very interesting to see and it happens over

01:21:32 ◼   ► A short enough period of time that you can watch it in an afternoon unfold in a kind of similar way

01:21:37 ◼   ► not exactly but similar like you can look at something like this podcast and

01:21:42 ◼   ► If you listen to episode one, it's different in feel and style to what we're doing now, I think

01:21:49 ◼   ► Yeah, yeah, we found a doubt. We found our groove together for the show

01:21:54 ◼   ► And we you know felt what the show was about and it kind of has morphed over time

01:22:00 ◼   ► You know anybody that that has paid real close attention will see that like we changed the description of the show

01:22:05 ◼   ► Right to kind of fit a little bit more as to what it was that me and you decided we wanted to talk about every week

01:22:11 ◼   ► Mm-hmm. Like that. This is a very normal thing

01:22:14 ◼   ► I think in creative endeavors like this and it happened most of the shows that I have done

01:22:19 ◼   ► change in some way over time they morph into something a little bit different as the people

01:22:25 ◼   ► working together find their groove a little bit more and I think that's exactly the same thing

01:22:30 ◼   ► that you see with some of these channels and what you're pointing out here with the Your Movie Sucks

01:22:35 ◼   ► is it just took him a little while to find out what he liked to respond to the the feedback that

01:22:41 ◼   ► he received and to the criticisms that he received and kind of morphed it a little bit from there

01:22:46 ◼   ► That is the creative process.

01:22:48 ◼   ► Yeah, without a doubt. And yeah, this show is definitely an example of that.

01:22:52 ◼   ► Like, if you listen to the earlier shows and you listen to the shows now, they're different.

01:22:55 ◼   ► It's almost hard for me to say precisely what's different. Like, they were sort of more interviews in the beginning, but yeah, really exactly.

01:23:02 ◼   ► But something changes over time and it becomes its own thing.

01:23:06 ◼   ► And yes, everyone should keep that in mind that that is totally a natural part of the creative process.

01:23:11 ◼   ► It's a vital part.

01:23:13 ◼   ► And the only way that you can really find the thing that you want to do and do it the way that you want to do it is to do something.

01:23:21 ◼   ► Yeah, exactly. Is to start. Just get started. Get started with that ASMR video, also discussed in that previous episode,

01:23:30 ◼   ► that you want to make and then develop your own style in the ASMR world.

01:23:35 ◼   ► Whatever it is you want to do, like even if you think that the field is crowded,

01:23:39 ◼   ► If you can develop your own style, there is always room for more good content.

01:23:46 ◼   ► That's why there's always room on YouTube for more good channels.

01:23:53 ◼   ► Even if you're just rubbing a hairbrush against your face?

01:23:56 ◼   ► You just have to do it well.

01:23:58 ◼   ► There's got to be a nice hairbrush.

01:24:01 ◼   ► I don't know what they like, but you've got to figure out what they like.

01:24:04 ◼   ► Someone's going to like it, right? You know?

01:24:06 ◼   ► That's what happens when you have billions of people watching YouTube.

01:24:09 ◼   ► How niche is it? It's never niche enough.

01:24:12 ◼   ► In the theme of addressing things that happened months and months and months ago,

01:24:17 ◼   ► have you finally played with that Steam Controller that you've got?

01:24:21 ◼   ► Oh yeah!

01:24:24 ◼   ► This has been sitting in the document for forever in our...

01:24:27 ◼   ► Months! Basically, listeners, to peel back the curtain a little bit,

01:24:31 ◼   ► I put it in the document, I say "Follow up, Steam Controller, have you tried it yet?"

01:24:35 ◼   ► it yet and for many many months there was a little box well there was a little

01:24:39 ◼   ► word next to it that Grey had put in there that just said no and every time I'd

01:24:43 ◼   ► bring it into the document and it never changed and then this week it changed to

01:24:46 ◼   ► yes you noticed that it changed to yes this week but I I changed it to yes

01:24:53 ◼   ► after I put up the Antarctica video that was the first time I had a chance to play around with the

01:24:58 ◼   ► steam controller so I thought yeah it's been sitting here for months I felt kind of

01:25:02 ◼   ► bad like "oh I bought this piece of hardware and I never tried it out"

01:25:06 ◼   ► But yes, in the video game section of the podcast I have

01:25:10 ◼   ► tried out the Steam Controller and also this connects to

01:25:14 ◼   ► me because it's the RSI concern of the podcast which is I like to

01:25:18 ◼   ► switch input devices and I mentioned I had gotten this thing because I was concerned about

01:25:22 ◼   ► using my keyboard and the pen or using a mouse for games

01:25:26 ◼   ► as well as for just regular working stuff so I wanted something different

01:25:30 ◼   ► I was pretty doubtful about the Steam Controller, but I thought, "Ah, what the hell, let me give it a shot."

01:25:35 ◼   ► And I decided when I was going to try it, that I was going to try it under the worst possible case,

01:25:43 ◼   ► which is playing a game called Factorio, which I love, which I have mentioned many times,

01:25:49 ◼   ► but it's a game that just involves an infinite number of mouse clicks and sub-windows and right-clicks.

01:25:55 ◼   ► You know, it's one of these kind of games. Like, you're just managing something,

01:25:58 ◼   ► So it's all about ticking boxes and window management and all kinds of stuff.

01:26:03 ◼   ► So it's a really difficult game to do with any kind of controller.

01:26:07 ◼   ► It's obviously designed for a mouse.

01:26:10 ◼   ► And also it's not inside of Steam at all.

01:26:14 ◼   ► Like, it's not within their little network at least at the time that I played it.

01:26:18 ◼   ► So I thought, "Oh, this will be a great way to try to test this controller."

01:26:21 ◼   ► Because this is the worst possible scenario.

01:26:24 ◼   ► And the bottom line is the Steam Controller...

01:26:27 ◼   ► I am a huge fan of this thing.

01:26:29 ◼   ► I was so impressed with the way it worked under the least optimal case

01:26:37 ◼   ► that it is just amazing. I really like it.

01:26:40 ◼   ► It's a weird, weird controller.

01:26:42 ◼   ► Because it has touchpads, right?

01:26:44 ◼   ► Instead of any analog sticks.

01:26:47 ◼   ► Okay, yes. I have it in front of me right now.

01:26:50 ◼   ► So it has in the center one analog stick for your left thumb.

01:26:56 ◼   ► and then the standard X, Y, A, B buttons for your right thumb.

01:26:59 ◼   ► But immediately above it, there are two touchpads.

01:27:02 ◼   ► And it's those touchpads that seem crazy,

01:27:07 ◼   ► but totally work for all the kinds of games that are going to be in the Steam library,

01:27:11 ◼   ► and also are the kind of things that I like to play.

01:27:14 ◼   ► So, again, work simulator kind of games that have lots of windows

01:27:18 ◼   ► and lots of submenus and boxes to tick and all this kind of stuff.

01:27:21 ◼   ► It allows you to, with your right thumb, essentially operate a trackpad and move the cursor around on screen in a really natural way.

01:27:34 ◼   ► Like, you can adjust what the sensitivity is so that you can, with just very slight thumb movements, move the pointer back and forth across the entirety of the screen.

01:27:43 ◼   ► You can do all kinds of crazy things, like there's triggers on the bottom that you can have to be modifier keys,

01:27:48 ◼   ► so it's really easy to do something like left click or right click.

01:27:51 ◼   ► The whole thing is super customizable, everything you can change to work any way that you want,

01:27:56 ◼   ► which is absolutely vital.

01:27:59 ◼   ► Like even those touchpads, you can have them work like they're a touchpad,

01:28:04 ◼   ► but you can also change it to just pretend that it's a basic D-pad,

01:28:08 ◼   ► so that there's only four inputs depending on where your thumb is,

01:28:11 ◼   ► or you can change it to work like a joystick.

01:28:13 ◼   ► It's amazing to me how well it works, and to be able to do something like

01:28:17 ◼   ► move the game pointer around with one thumb

01:28:20 ◼   ► while zooming in and out on the map with the other thumb with the two touchpads

01:28:24 ◼   ► just feels like magic. I can't believe how well it works.

01:28:27 ◼   ► So, I was extremely doubtful.

01:28:29 ◼   ► But for anyone who plays games on a computer,

01:28:33 ◼   ► I can highly recommend it.

01:28:35 ◼   ► Like, this gets the CGP Grey seal of approval.

01:28:38 ◼   ► And it is really beneficial to me to be able to switch to this

01:28:42 ◼   ► for game playing instead of using the same tools all the time.

01:28:46 ◼   ► So it's like yes RSI helps mitigate it. I I really like it even though I was extremely doubtful about it

01:28:53 ◼   ► huh

01:28:56 ◼   ► You sound doubtful still

01:28:58 ◼   ► No now I'm interested

01:29:00 ◼   ► But you're a console peasant right Myke? Yeah. Yeah sure

01:29:04 ◼   ► I don't think I play enough PC games because everything tends to be underpowered and pointless on a PC

01:29:13 ◼   ► Nothing. Nothing really.

01:29:15 ◼   ► Pointless claims there.

01:29:17 ◼   ► Pointless claims.

01:29:18 ◼   ► Well I do find it really interesting that for you to have a superior PC gaming experience,

01:29:24 ◼   ► you've had to turn to a controller. That is really interesting to me.

01:29:28 ◼   ► I would honestly prefer to use a mouse and keyboard all the time for all of my gaming,

01:29:33 ◼   ► and I would do it were it not for my hand issues.

01:29:35 ◼   ► I think it is, for the kind of games that I like, it's impossible straight up to beat

01:29:41 ◼   ► a mouse and a keyboard. You're just not going to do it.

01:29:44 ◼   ► But this is a very comfortable, very close experience

01:29:49 ◼   ► that doesn't strain my hands in the usual way.

01:29:51 ◼   ► Yeah, it is a weird looking thing though.

01:29:55 ◼   ► It's super weird looking. I was even... I'm just holding it in my hands right now

01:29:58 ◼   ► and I was really doubtful about the way... like the handles really curve up into the palm of your hands

01:30:03 ◼   ► in a way that looks dumb. Like it almost looks like the whole controller is too low.

01:30:08 ◼   ► but again using it for long periods of time you can see why they have it set up that way because

01:30:13 ◼   ► it's very comfortable then to have your thumbs on the track pads. And then their triggers are

01:30:17 ◼   ► they on the back of the hand the palm rests? Yeah there are big triggers. Yeah there are

01:30:24 ◼   ► two triggers that are on each side directly underneath your index finger and there's two like

01:30:29 ◼   ► grippable triggers that are on the bottom that you can trigger with your middle and ring fingers.

01:30:34 ◼   ► So there's tons of buttons and again you can set them to be anything that you want which is really great.

01:30:39 ◼   ► Have you played any other games with this?

01:30:41 ◼   ► Oh yeah, I actually was trying out a whole bunch of stuff in my library just to see how it worked.

01:30:46 ◼   ► So I was trying City Skylines, I tried Half-Life 2 in my Steam library.

01:30:53 ◼   ► That was probably the trickiest one to use with the controller, which is interesting because of course you normally think about lots of first person shooters as being controller based.

01:31:01 ◼   ► In theory that should be the one that makes the most sense.

01:31:03 ◼   ► Yeah, that one was the one that I found the trickiest

01:31:06 ◼   ► but that might have also just been that I'm so used to playing those games with with mouse and and

01:31:11 ◼   ► Keys like it's wired into my brain from hundreds and hundreds of hours of Quake 3 on computer lands in college

01:31:18 ◼   ► That it's just like my brain does not like doing it that way

01:31:21 ◼   ► But yes, I tried all of the different kind of stuff in my library and it worked very well with all of the games

01:31:29 ◼   ► even if they weren't designed to work with a controller at all. So super impressed.

01:31:33 ◼   ► I was thinking a couple of days ago trying to connect the PlayStation 4

01:31:40 ◼   ► controller to my PC to try American Truck Simulator.

01:31:46 ◼   ► Oh Myke, Myke don't mention it because I'm so tempted right now. I cannot believe

01:31:52 ◼   ► this is the life that I am living but I've been seeing people on Twitter tell

01:31:55 ◼   ► and the American Truck Simulator is out.

01:31:58 ◼   ► And it's like, okay, I have several big video projects

01:32:02 ◼   ► that are coming to a close quite shortly.

01:32:06 ◼   ► I feel like I cannot wait to have these done,

01:32:08 ◼   ► mainly because I cannot wait to play

01:32:10 ◼   ► American Truck Simulator.

01:32:11 ◼   ► I am dying to give this a try.

01:32:13 ◼   ► - Yeah, it looks really good.

01:32:15 ◼   ► - Looks beautiful.

01:32:16 ◼   ► - It does, doesn't it?

01:32:18 ◼   ► - The problem is it doesn't look as good on a Mac.

01:32:20 ◼   ► Apparently there's some like graphic card issues

01:32:22 ◼   ► that like it looks much better on a Windows PC

01:32:24 ◼   ► than it ever looks on a Mac.

01:32:26 ◼   ► But it's the same thing with Euro Truck Simulator.

01:32:28 ◼   ► Like Euro Truck Simulator on a Mac doesn't look super great

01:32:31 ◼   ► as compared to a Windows PC.

01:32:32 ◼   ► - No, it doesn't look so good.

01:32:34 ◼   ► - Yeah, but nonetheless, like I am,

01:32:36 ◼   ► I cannot believe I am now the guy who's like,

01:32:39 ◼   ► I can't wait to try my Truck Simulator game.

01:32:42 ◼   ► And it really is true.

01:32:43 ◼   ► It's like, man, as soon as I get those videos out,

01:32:46 ◼   ► I am going to drive up and down California

01:32:50 ◼   ► and listen to some podcasts

01:32:52 ◼   ► and it will be gloriously relaxing.

01:32:54 ◼   ► - I'm very tempted to give American Truck Simulator a go.

01:32:59 ◼   ► Euro Truck Simulator doesn't really work.

01:33:01 ◼   ► I don't like playing on the keyboard.

01:33:03 ◼   ► I just don't like it.

01:33:04 ◼   ► It doesn't work for me.

01:33:06 ◼   ► - No, it's terrible on the keyboard.

01:33:07 ◼   ► It's terrible on the keyboard.

01:33:08 ◼   ► - You didn't get a wheel, did you?

01:33:10 ◼   ► - Don't you remember, Myke?

01:33:11 ◼   ► I only didn't get a wheel because I couldn't sort out

01:33:13 ◼   ► any of the Mac configurability issues.

01:33:15 ◼   ► - Yeah, I wasn't sure though

01:33:16 ◼   ► if you maybe ended up getting one in the end.

01:33:18 ◼   ► Like, I don't know.

01:33:19 ◼   ► We didn't ever come to a resolution from it.

01:33:21 ◼   ► No, I don't have a wheel. My recommendation for American Truck Simulator was a trackball.

01:33:26 ◼   ► Or sorry, for Euro Truck Simulator. I like a trackball a lot for that. I found it very

01:33:32 ◼   ► comfortable. And I did play around with the Steam Controller and that's pretty good. I

01:33:36 ◼   ► haven't quite figured out in Euro Truck when I was just playing around with Steam Controller

01:33:40 ◼   ► of precisely how I wanted it to work because there's a lot of different options. But the

01:33:43 ◼   ► keyboard is the worst. Don't use a keyboard with it. It's miserable to play with a keyboard.

01:33:50 ◼   ► I think I'm gonna see if I can get the PlayStation controller working the way that I want.

01:33:55 ◼   ► Because I'm looking at it right now and it looks so much nicer.

01:33:58 ◼   ► I like the idea of driving across America more.

01:34:00 ◼   ► There's the Golden Gate Bridge, Las Vegas.

01:34:04 ◼   ► Seems more exciting to me.

01:34:05 ◼   ► I really wish they did proper 2 player.

01:34:07 ◼   ► Like I know there's like a mod for Euro Truck for multiplayer.

01:34:13 ◼   ► I'd love to go driving with you somewhere.

01:34:14 ◼   ► It'd be nice.

01:34:17 ◼   ► We wouldn't really be driving.

01:34:18 ◼   ► But we could honk our horns and stuff, you know?

01:34:19 ◼   ► Yeah but you're such a...

01:34:20 ◼   ► Haha!

01:34:20 ◼   ► This is just like, this is just like you wanted to rent an office with me.

01:34:23 ◼   ► The whole, the whole thing that I like about driving my imaginary truck across the highway is driving it alone.

01:34:29 ◼   ► Yeah but we'll be, we could race, you know?

01:34:32 ◼   ► Driving it alone.

01:34:34 ◼   ► A man on the highway by himself.

01:34:39 ◼   ► It's Zen.