hey uh have i got your attention can i
hold it are you exhausted by content the
fact that there's just so much of it and
you can just scroll and scroll and
scroll and never hit the bottom or the
fact that if you're a creative person
there's this weird pressure this
gigantic pressure to make content
content content and have you noticed
that every single creative person
whether you're a filmmaker a
photographer or an artist everything
that you make is now just called content
and whatever it is that you used to do
now you just called a content creator
when and why did this happen
is it good is it bad and what can we do
about it those are the questions that
i'm going to try to answer in this video
what the heck is going on baby that's
the series title
tell me if this sounds like a familiar
scene you're a musician you got into it
because you love making music you love
production songwriting and getting lost
in your instruments one day you make an
amazing song you put it on spotify and
nobody listens meanwhile you see another
museo blowing up because they're jumping
on tick tock trends and sticking their
songs underneath videos you take note
and decide to do the same thing and it
works one of your videos pops and your
music get some listeners game on you
repeat the process make a few more
videos and you start building up a
following you are now a musician content
creator cool
until it isn't one day you wake up and
you want to make music all day but you
feel like you have to make videos to
keep up with the algorithm
so you decide to do both but the music
because you're splitting your time it's
just not that great and the content
without your heart in it just flops
instead of blaming the system you blame
yourself the spiral begins you try
resurrect your content because you feel
like it's the only way that people will
hear your music and meanwhile your music
suffers because you are giving so much
time to the content when you do go to
finally sit down with your instrument
you end up writing songs to go viral as
opposed to songs that are good one day
you wake up and you realize that you
haven't made proper music in months at
some point you became a full-time
content creator and you didn't even mean
to so imagine that scene gets played out
millions of times for millions of people
the net result is that every creative
person who's posting their work online
is now just called a content creator and
their work is now just called content my
thesis is that this is a bad thing the
main reason is that the label content
limits creativity by calling art content
our art is given a very specific purpose
serve the algorithm set out by a handful
of tech companies instead of creative
exploration these algorithms reward art
that seek and hold attention this is
because this attention is the product
that these media companies are selling
it's how they make money over time by
very much intentional design the art
becomes formulaic and it affects the
three main groups i'm the consumer of
art and content i am desensitized and
bored but i will not stop scrolling
because these platforms are designed to
keep me actually addicted genuinely
addicted on a neurological level
why don't we check this with large tech
companies i don't know i'm an artist i
keep posting stuff to serve the
algorithm and i'm scared to post my
actual work because i don't think it
will work i don't think it will go well
ah and i'm the technocrats any and all
money that is being made by this process
is going straight into my pockets yeah
yeah yeah yeah yeah basically something
that was designed to facilitate or push
art and music out is now at its core a
poison like a virus killing its host oh
god that was quite dramatic but i
genuinely believe that but this kind of
thing doesn't just happen overnight
let's look at the history
in the 16th century there was an
explosion of creativity called the
renaissance q shakespeare michelangelo
da vinci much later renaissance fairs
but more interestingly to this subject
cue patrons a patron was a wealthy
person who invested money into art
typically this would mean that they
would fund an artist's life so the
artist could make what they made as an
exchange the patron would often appear
in these artworks something that was
previously unseen in the middle ages and
they would also cultivate a large art
collection thus it was in their best
interest to make their art collection as
valuable as possible by driving up the
perceived value that art had just in
general patrons could increase their
personal wealth fast forward a few
centuries and enter paul durand rual a
name that i am most definitely
butchering a french name now this fella
paul he notices that there are a lot of
underground artists who are really good
but they're just not getting attention
in 19th century france this is a bit of
a problem for artists because to be seen
you had to have an in with the french
academy so paul says this and he thinks
nah and he invents a new system
decentralized exhibitions basically
instead of needing government backing
for your art you could stick your art in
a gallery and if somebody liked it
because they went to that gallery they
could buy it part of that money would go
to the artist and part of the money
would go to the person who owned the
gallery something that seemed super
simple right now but back when paul
pitched it it was revolutionary
the key impacts of this were that
promotion and private selling were now
powering the art world and from this
there was one strange side effect that
we would see dominate in the 20th and
21st century people would value an
artwork by the artist who made it as
opposed to just the composition of the
artwork a lot of people could paint like
monet but only monet could sign the word
monet the artist drove up the value of a
piece as much as their art did thus
placing an emphasis on branding
andy warhol saw this a mile off and took
it to its extreme theoretically an
artist could bring more value to an
artwork just by having painted it than
the art on the actual canvas warhol's
thesis was this meant that an artist no
longer needed years of training they
just needed to be popular if the artist
was famous enough then even art that was
cheap and easy and fast to produce could
sell for more than art that had taken
years and years of dedicated practice
hence marilyn monroe and campbell soup a
nickname that i thankfully got all
throughout high school since warhol a
lot of artists have invested more time
into their branding and their story than
their work also since warhol technology
has done a bit of growing up
we've gone from broadcast media to the
internet the key difference being paid
distribution broadcast media was owned
by a company for example a television
network somebody that you had to pay
money to in order to be distributed by
on the internet though distribution is
relatively free and if you make
something good enough it can potentially
be distributed to millions and millions
of people i'm talking about going viral
but for the early internet this wasn't
really a commonplace thing and it didn't
really happen that often for creative
work it was really more reserved for you
know funny cats and dogs
until this happened
[Music]
lyrics lyrics lyrics sorry if i put the
actual music i'll get a copyright strike
so you know an indie band out of nowhere
hit the big time on next to no money
okay go we're a hit all they needed was
a decent song an okay camera and a
brilliant idea something that most
musicians around the world had access to
this kickstarts a wave of indie bands
filmmakers artists writers all trying to
go viral naturally the tech companies
who are hosting these artworks catch on
and start adjusting their platforms and
algorithms to suit the market to suit
the growth they're getting views so why
wouldn't they want to grow the indie
creators the more artists that were
trying to go viral the more users they
had the more eyeballs they had the more
engagement they had and the longer that
people stayed on those platforms the
more money they could get from
advertisers everyone was winning well
not everyone record companies weren't
winning tv wasn't winning a lot of
broadcast media wasn't winning but they
could pay to get those views while indie
bands had to have a brilliant idea a
record company just needed a lot of
money to get their exposure on the
internet this drove up the price of
exposure diluting feeds with sponsored
content making it even harder for
independent artists to grow organically
but while all this is going on you know
what's happening in the background the
modern day influencer was born
the person who could make all of their
money without a day job they could just
get all of their cash from being a
person online and doing
whatever it is they do but the message
was clear to a lot of us watching
instead of having a job you could just
make content it was a viable alternative
baby travel the world with a little
mavic 3 freaking last cool right
wrong
we'll find out later why being an
influencer looked a lot more fun than
having a desk job and for a lot of
people it looked like it would genuinely
make more money this ignited a cambrian
explosion of people actively making
content people actively participating as
opposed to just lurking and consuming a
new generation of people chasing the
influencer holy grail with so many
categories growing everybody had more
competition than ever before for
eyeballs the one thing that it seemed
like you could exchange for cash then
tiktok comes along pours a pool worth of
petrol onto this forest fire skippable
ads mean that now sponsored content is
everywhere so people will actually
consume the ads and all these forces are
working in tandem driving up the value
of having a following online then the
pandemic hits now those already valuable
online platforms have become even more
valuable which means more people are
chasing them which means it's even
harder to get through everyone is
suddenly indoors all the time just
staring at their phone and now it's not
just the internet the economy starts to
change as well people with actual money
advertisers networks record companies
they need a safe bet and a safe bet for
them is people with a lot of social
media followers who don't look like
they're a flash in the pan the result
andy warhol was kind of right man
commercially speaking branding and
audience size becomes more important
than the work you actually produce but
it's not all bad i mean for some people
this actually pulled them out of poverty
the online follower lottery was not gay
kept the cost of entry was just having a
phone and an internet connection you
could build a following from anywhere in
the world and if you hit a big you could
strike the big bucks but to sum up all
this history where we are now is this a
lot of people are chasing branding and
audience size they're doing these things
by making content and sticking them on
social media platforms and a lot of
these people assume that when they get
the audience size that they'll be able
to experiment make the creative work
that they actually wanted to make but
there are two big problems the first is
experimentation is now a risk to their
core asset and the second problem is
they have now trained their creativity
to suit an algorithm the end result is
that suddenly all creativity just looks
like content
so
have i still got your attention
the real question is can i hold it to
the end i mean surely right i feel like
i just set up a gigantic problem and i
haven't even solved it and i feel like
we both know that a resolve is coming
because i mean look at the time bar
there's still a little bit left so with
that in mind here goes nothing
the current system places an emphasis on
width go viral siphon some fans from
that viral hit and then you know figure
out how to monetize later that's the
platform right and for what it's worth
this totally works but there are two
problems the first is that width often
leads to 15 minutes of fame the other
thing that andy warhol was talking about
viral attention is pretty unsustainable
and mass attention is really hard to
keep it's just the fact we've seen this
time and time again and the second
problem is that width is often seen like
it's the only method that will work in
the internet age it might seem like a
viral breakout hit is necessary for a
creative online career but i just don't
think this is true so the big question
what else works you guessed it
depth
depth is the idea that you nurture a
smaller group of people for a longer
period of time instead of focusing on
going viral or serving an algorithm you
focus on creating brilliant work
regardless of what the algorithm is
serving it might hit less people but for
the people it does hit it'll be far more
memorable i mean think about the last
time you got lost in a scroll how many
of those videos do you actually remember
instead of jumping on trends it's
focusing on creating an actual community
but why does this work what is the
actual reason behind it the idea here is
that going for depth is catering to a
need that i believe has been forgotten
the market is made of humans and as
humans we still want to connect to deep
resonant art but with 99 of people just
trying to go viral a gigantic chunk of
that market is now left starving for
something good now that's a nice thing
to say yeah depth is better than width
make good art blah blah blah but
firstly does it actually work and
secondly is there a practical strategy
that can help you with this
yes and yes
here it is
[Music]
kevin kelly was the editor of wired
magazine and a whole lot of other things
i do recommend checking him out and in
2007 he made this call right he said
that with so much scattered attention on
the internet your best bet is not to try
chase all that scattered attention but
to just build 1 000 true fans so what is
a true fan a true fan is somebody who
will follow you from piece to peace
regardless of whether it's your best or
you're you know you're most average
they'll buy the products that you launch
they'll migrate with you from one
platform to another they're just there
to support that's a true fan kevin
kelly's thesis is that with one thousand
of these people minimum you can have a
sustainable career here's why if 1 000
people are buying the things that you
make for example then you are
financially self-sufficient these 1 000
true fans also work as your marketing
they evangelize your message to other
people thus growing your platform so now
the question becomes how do you get
these 1000 true fans
before i answer this we just got to take
a quick dose of reality i wish i could
just say hey ring true to yourself and
you'll ring true to the world kid but
the market and making stuff it's all
just way more complex than that so here
are some practical strategies that i've
seen work make one for me one for them a
journalist once asked john mayer about
how he crafts an album the journalist
asked how many of the songs are for you
and how many of the songs are for your
audience assuming that the ones for him
might be slightly more indulgent or a
bit weirder and the ones for the
audience might have a bit more of a
crowd-pleasing aesthetic to them and
john replies i make one for me one for
them 50 50. and that seems like a pretty
good idea so if you think 50 to get new
people and then 50 for i don't know
creative expression and also for the
true fans who actually want to see what
resonates with you that seems to be a
pretty good number the second strategy
is serve the people who serve you
instead of trying to chase new people
it's cultivating a community around the
people who've already said yes to you
it's writing back to dms or making
memorable one-on-one interactions with
people the third strategy is make
something big it's pretty tempting to
get the short-term rewards of say
tick-tock virality making an album or a
comic book or a full stand-up special
has a far higher chance of converting
somebody for life as opposed to just
converting somebody for the day
so how do you conclude a video like this
well i think for me the best way is
probably just to make a couple of
predictions what i think we might see in
the future the first prediction is that
i believe that exhausting content
schedules will decline in relevance and
i think that reasonable content
schedules will take their place for
example i think we'll see a decline in
daily video creation and a rise in
people who make a few quality videos
every month secondly i think that
community-based platforms like discord
and twitch will continue to rise thirdly
i don't think going viral as a strategy
for internet fame is going anywhere
anytime soon i think that will still be
a method that people use and still be
profitable for a lot of people that said
i also predict that a lot of social apps
will start promoting content that
doesn't look typically viral in order to
stay fresh the best example i've seen on
this is probably on youtube the dude who
blew up like in the past year or so
called nate the hoof guy he just cleans
cow hoofs and it's pretty great
i predict that this will start a wave of
creators making non-viral content or
content that just doesn't look like it
does right now another example would be
francis bourgeois on tiktok he's found
his place on the internet not because
he's trying to go viral but because he
genuinely just loves trains what i think
this is is the start of the wave of
content that just doesn't seem viral on
the surface my next prediction is that
taking breaks will be normalized in a
similar way to how sport is played in
seasons i imagine that creative people
who are posting things on the internet
for a living will start making things in
seasons and they'll start pulsing their
work as opposed to feeling like they
have to be on all the time and then my
last prediction is that the ability to
create in-depth work work that takes
time and effort and research will become
the ultimate indicator of commercial
success if you can make something deep
powerful and well thought out it'll mean
so much more to so many more people than
a few viral hits
i mean
those are just my predictions but hey at
least i kept your attention right
thanks so much for watching i really
hope that you enjoyed that if you didn't
that's cool man with different people
subscribe if you're new and also let me
know what you think your predictions are
for the future what do you think is
gonna happen do you think things will
continue to stay as they are or do you
think we'll see a mass migration towards
deep work who knows
not me
nobody
that's the nature of predictions maybe
anyway that's it for me have a beautiful
day catcher