Latest / The Christian Reeve Podcast / Andrew Scott | The Christian Reeve Podcast #209

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Andrew Scott | The Christian Reeve Podcast #209 · The Christian Reeve Podcast

• 0:00
  Hello and welcome to another episode of the Christian brief
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  podcast. Today's guest is a voice-over
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  artist and a copywriter and many other different things all the
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  way from Portland. Oregon, his name is Andrew
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  Scott, welcome to the show, how you do.
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  Hey Christian, I am doing great, man.
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  Thanks for having me on the show.
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  Now I'm going to explain or first of all.
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  Thank you very much for appearing on the show.
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  It's an old man. I should have here.
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  Secondly I too am a voice actor and voice over artist.
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  Yeah. Okay.
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  That would be, why is the Big River?
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  - yeah no. So you can tell why I'm so
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  excited to have this gentleman on my show.
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  I there's a million different things I could ask you but I
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  think that the first thing that kind of struck me as soon as I
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  heard your voice was and you did kind of clarify it before radio.
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  You've definitely either been on radio before or there's some
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  history there. Please talk us through your time
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  on radio first before with everything else.
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  Yeah. There is some very old history
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  there for your listeners. My name is Andrew Scott.
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  And as Christians said, I'm a producer and a voice-over artist
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  and a narrator and a YouTuber, and a voiceover coach and
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  voiceover educator on YouTube. And yeah, my, my path into this
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  world started back in the 80s, I grew up wanting to be on radio.
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  I grew up literally from about the age of five years old.
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  I wanted to be an announcer for some reason, I would like
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  memorize the Has of the day and be able to recite them at the
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  drop of a hat. It like five and six years old
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  and my older brothers and sisters would be like why on
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  Earth is that something that you do?
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  You strange child? But um, you know that really led
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  me into most of the things that you get into when you're in your
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  teens and your early 20s I was a musician.
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  I was a rock and roll Roadie for a while.
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  I was a club DJ and I had always wanted to get into radio but
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  getting into radio in the market that I was in in the Was you
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  needed to know people? And I at that point in time?
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  I really didn't know people but I knew enough people and I did
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  get work in both College radio which is easy because you're
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  there. But I parlayed that into some
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  time in broadcasting, mostly working as a board.
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  Operator as a board APA overnight, doing the putting in
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  the carts and playing the commercials and making sure that
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  that record wasn't skipping. Yes.
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  We were still using In LPS back then but that's in Vogue now.
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  So I can I sound like I've got some credential on the street
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  but I did a little bit of time in that I was more focused
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  really on music production home studio recording, which was
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  becoming something of a thing where you could record
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  multitrack and we would build studios in our parents disused,
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  cobweb filled basements, and try to build isolation.
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  Booths, and pretty much annoy everybody until all hours of the
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  Night, but really, that practice combined with doing a little bit
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  of work in radio really did set me on the path to doing
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  voiceover production from Home Learning recording, techniques,
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  learning routing, learning about things like microphones and, you
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  know, later on from when I was a roadie back in the 90s and yeah,
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  I probably worked for them. That that's, you know, I was
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  doing a lot of work in the grunge era.
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  Of rock and roll. And so, I did a lot of work for
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  a lot of famous bands over the course of about five or six
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  years but really. Hey, oh yes.
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  Those guys know, you know, I've done, I've done shows for Pearl
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  Jam. I've done shows for Soundgarden.
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  I've done done shows for oh gosh, I mean I go back.
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  So Screaming Trees, Mother Love Bone.
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  I did a couple shows for Mother Love Bone when they were still,
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  you know, a going concern before Tragedy and you know, lots of
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  other, I was a did time on the road.
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  I did about 40 percent of my time on the road.
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  The other 60% of my time was was I was a local Rodeo.
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  I was local crew. When a big show showed up and
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  they needed more bodies, aside from the ones that were packed
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  into the smelly bus. Then, you know, they would hire
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  a local crew. And I worked for a company
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  because I own my own sound system, I worked for a company
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  that would pull us in and I would bring my guys and we would
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  compliment The, the touring crew but what?
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  That wound up putting me in touch with were recording
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  professionals. And so I did some second
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  engineer work at a couple famous studios in the Midwest.
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  And was fortunate enough to work with some amazing people like
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  Butch Vig who, of course, Very famously produced, you know,
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  Nirvana and was is, excuse me, is the drummer for garbage.
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  And, you know, at some point Just decided, I better have a
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  fallback. And so, I went to college and I
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  got a degree in philosophy, which makes me immensely
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  employable, but I did a bunch of other things there, but that was
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  really kind of my path in that set the tone for me, as an audio
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  professional. And the one thing that was
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  keeping me away from doing commercial voiceover work, was
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  back when I was wanting to do it, we We were still on tape.
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  If you were lucky, you had a DAT machine you had at machine which
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  was digital tape recording. But those were prohibitively
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  expensive for somebody like me and what really changed was
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  around about the Millennium. We were being held back in in
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  home recording by a simple mechanical prohibition, hard
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  disks didn't spin fast enough for us to record high-quality
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  audio back. Then we were When we were, like,
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  38 4200 RPM discs, and that couldn't keep up with an audio
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  signal as soon as we crossed over that threshold, and we got
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  into 58 7200 RPM discs. That's what broke the damn down
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  and really, that's when the home voice over industry really
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  exploded, right about the Millennium and very famous
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  people in the broadcast world people like Don LaFontaine Who
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  is the famously in a world? Where that that was Don
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  LaFontaine. Don LaFontaine was one of the
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  first guys who built a studio in his home and Leverage The Power
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  of new technologies. Like high speed internet back
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  then, which was done with a either a DSL modem or something
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  like Oh yeah, he was one of the first people to bring digital
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  technology into the sphere and use it to build a very
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  successful studio, and he made millions and millions of dollars
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  in the latter years of his life, just working from home.
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  And broadcast, also shifted at that time, we had people who
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  were able to run entire radio Empires from from literally, the
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  middle of nowhere. The best example of that is the
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  late Art Bell. We used to host Coast to Coast
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  AM, you know, he was a low-power FM and ham radio operator, from
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  back in the day, who realized that with the right high-speed
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  internet access. He could run a national, a
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  nationally syndicated, radio show, and he did.
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  So very successfully for many many years that getting the
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  technology to support us working at home.
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  That opened the door for literally hundreds of Thousands
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  of people and that's why I'm here doing what I'm doing today.
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  One thing I've certainly noticed and is becoming more and more.
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  Abundantly clear is there is a stark difference between radio
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  and podcast and you hear a lot of different things about.
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  For example, radio is dead, radios dying, and I still think
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  it's very much alive, but now there is this kind of crossover
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  that makes you kind of wonder. Where does where is the line
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  drawn? But I think one of the key
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  considerations here is, is how A presenter voices things.
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  And how the show is done. I know a lot of those factors,
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  don't aren't really present it on a podcast because, you know,
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  you're not live, you don't have to consider a live audience.
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  I know some podcasts are, but a lot of the time a podcast is
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  just what we're doing. An interview type situation.
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  So the host is more focused on getting a good conversation out
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  of their guests rather than worrying about, you know, what
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  the next song is going to be or like the figure by the next
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  commercial that's coming up or whatever.
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  No, I'm interested to kind of get your perspective on this
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  coming over from Radio into podcasting D.
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  Think what? Let's start with what is your
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  perspective on the majority of what podcasts are doing, but
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  from the perspective of your background in radio.
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  Well, first off, you know, I've been a podcast consumer for
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  well, over a decade. I, you know, I go back my My
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  internet history. One of the things that brought
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  me out to the West Coast where I currently live from, the Midwest
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  was I was, I started up a web development company and like
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  1994 I was, you know, one of the first people, we were literally
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  coding HTML on notepad by hand, you know, I wow, with Dinosaurs
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  looking over our shoulder but but I mentioned that because For
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  me. The democratization of
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  technology is, I mean, and we're experiencing right now and I'm
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  sure we'll talk about it before the show's over.
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  It's a double-edged sword on one hand.
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  I am very big in putting technology in the hands of the
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  people. People individuals who have
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  their own points of view, who have their own views on the
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  world and want to express them, I'm a huge fan of that.
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  And at the same time, the unfettered unrestricted
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  development of technology that we're now literally right now,
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  as we record this in 2023, we all our heads are spinning
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  because of the rapid, rise of things like generative, AI, 11
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  labs, and mid-journey and chat GTP.
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  You know, these things are suddenly all around us in a more
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  noticeable way, and it's making a lot of us kind.
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  Of dizzy and very nervous but really I mention all that
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  because I have been a technological person for a long
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  time and my history with internet audio goes back to
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  things like winning a and real video I believe is what it was
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  called. It was one of the first
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  streaming video platforms. I've bet I was an early adopter.
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  I Early developer. And I long long ago, saw this
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  coming and going, this is going to give people so many more
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  voices to listen to to hear were not going to be stuck with the
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  same while you know, you're in, you're in Europe.
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  So you have a different palette. But, you know, back when I was
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  growing up, we had three stations to watch on TV and
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  maybe for to listen. Two on the radio.
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  Now, we're suffering from an embarrassment of media channels.
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  I mean, and and again, for good or not so much because you can
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  hear so many different voices, but at the same time, you can
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  also very easily crawl into a very comfortable intellectual
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  Silo where you're only hearing things that reinforce and
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  support your own views that can be dangerous.
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  But overall it's fantastic. You know the the podcasts that I
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  listen to which are generally particular to me and you know my
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  Niche is of Interest being able to go out and find something
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  that speaks to something that you thought you were alone in
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  enjoying or being fascinated by or loving.
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  That's an incredibly powerful and empowering experience
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  because suddenly You go all, I'm not alone.
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  I'm not the only person and that can be a really amazing and
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  powerful and positive thing in somebody's life, completely
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  agree. And one of the things that you
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  were talking about, there is something I have noticed and it
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  is split into two things. It's the double-edged sword
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  argument that we sort of touched on before, but it's also, There
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  is an oversaturation of podcasts and one of the good guys, and
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  one of the things about radio which I think is still true to
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  this day. People have said, like to me,
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  like, why don't you go on radio? You have a voice for radio.
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  Be great and I'm like, well, yeah, but there's not like an
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  in. It's not like you just oh, I'll
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  just go to broadcasting school and then I'll get in its sixth.
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  I mean, I don't know, I don't know if it's changed in the US,
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  but here in the UK, as far as I can see, you have to be invited
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  in. You have to have a certain level
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  of prestige of to be known. I guess as a celebrity or
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  whatever. No always but generally
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  speaking, I suppose the mindset there is 0.
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  If this person is known, they'll bring a viewership initially
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  with them because its business, its numbers.
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  However, You could make the same argument for podcasting, to be
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  honest. And I don't know when I started
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  this podcast, I started it because I just wanted to do a
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  podcast for years and years and years and years and years.
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  And then I quickly came to realize, oh my gosh, you need a
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  structure. You need to create a show.
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  And I knew that from day one and I was prepared from day one, but
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  it's only throughout the course of the last three years.
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  I've been doing this now that it's really kind of come into
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  its own and I've seen sir So many podcasts come and go and
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  every time I hear people say oh I'm saying up a podcast on my
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  all right come back to me when you do your first 20 his it's
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  always the same I see it all the time or sometimes it's even more
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  frustrating. I'll see a really good show go
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  for like six months and then they'll give up.
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  Now I'm not getting numbers that I'd like to get on my podcast
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  but I tell you what I am getting is wonderful conversations of
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  wonderful guests and I just keep going because it's exciting to
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  have these kind of conversations.
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  I'm glad to hear that you bring that.
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  Asset of it up because, you know, I do a lot of I consult
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  with people and businesses who are wanting to get into this
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  podcast thing. And you know, the one thing that
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  I put in front of them, first before, anything else is that
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  this is work. This is real work thing.
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  And I was happy to hear you mention, you know, a podcast
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  that you maybe start listening to that.
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  Seems great and they do 40 shows and then suddenly poof, they're
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  gone. Normally the poof they're gone
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  is when the guy who is saddled with the actual work goes.
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  Screw you guys. I'm going.
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  I'm taking my mics and I'm going home because this is way more
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  work than I ever anticipated. Didn't sign up for.
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  I thought we were going to have fun and this is turned into a
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  second job for me that happens. So frequently.
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  And you know, it's interesting because the bar to get into
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  podcasting, as you know, is really low.
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  You can do it, you can do it almost for free but you're going
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  to come off like a freely done podcast but the investment you
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  know, of like the platforms that we might have to use things like
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  that 50 bucks a month literally like for Starbucks coffees a
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  month and you could be doing a halfway decent podcast and Any
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  people flooded in are still flooding, the flood is not done,
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  you know, you get on Reddit and you get into the podcasting
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  subreddits and every single day, there's four, five, six, ten on
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  thinking of starting a podcast that is kind of.
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  And, you know, all of us, people who've been doing it for years.
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  Just sit back and look at our monitors and go, oh, you have no
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  idea what you are getting yourself into, um, you know that
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  Ins with any new kind of offering that makes itself
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  visible in the world, a lot of people who have thought about
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  it, Goat now's my chance, and that's true.
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  Now's your chance, now's your chance to prove that this is a
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  thing that is truly valuable to you.
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  And in any value proposition you have to, you have to be willing
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  to give something into it and sometimes it's too much even for
• 17:42
  a simple podcast, that's done. Let's say generously that it's
• 17:47
  done twice a month which is a not not uncommon production
• 17:51
  cycle for a podcast you're looking at for a good podcast
• 17:57
  that's well-researched and you prepare for it.
• 17:59
  You're looking at probably the right there you go.
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  This guy on the other side of the camera you're looking at
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  probably 10 hours a month dedicated to the production of
• 18:09
  your podcast and that's if you're going Lightly for me.
• 18:14
  Me and that includes the recording in the production
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  time, but if you really want to be successful at this, you need
• 18:22
  to want to do it for the right reasons.
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  And it's the reason that you stated.
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  I love having conversations with people as well.
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  That's why I have my podcasts. That is the first reason why I
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  have my podcast. It certainly isn't money because
• 18:37
  I'm leaking money hand over fist in order to do stuff like this.
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  It certainly not for fame because I'm anything but Amos
• 18:46
  even notoriety. It's hard to get visibility in
• 18:49
  the podcast Spirit expressly because you are one fish in a
• 18:53
  massive Shoal of people. So you've got to want to do it
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  for some other impractical reason, I love talking to
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  people, I find this rewarding. I'd like to think that I'm
• 19:06
  putting something good out into the world.
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  Those reasons are the reasons why podcasts stay in production
• 19:14
  and Honestly in my opinion those are the reasons why podcasts
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  maybe eventually wind up being successful because that kind of
• 19:24
  enthusiasm for the mission that comes through the listener that
• 19:28
  comes through to the viewer. You know my largest podcast
• 19:32
  product is one. We got a handful of viewers and
• 19:36
  listeners but we keep doing it mostly because me and the other
• 19:40
  three people involved We need to be able to hang out with each
• 19:45
  other at least once a month and kind of just do a reality check.
• 19:49
  And, you know, check in with friends, it kept us all sane
• 19:53
  during lockdown, in the pandemic, where were suddenly
• 19:56
  able to see people that we care about and that a byproduct of
• 20:02
  that is something that everybody else can watch.
• 20:04
  And hopefully enjoy is just that.
• 20:06
  It's a byproduct. We always say we're going to
• 20:09
  keep doing this until we don't feel like doing it, and if we
• 20:11
  don't feel like doing it, You will probably still do it for
• 20:14
  ourselves because these are three of my friends and and I
• 20:18
  sitting around trying to have a decent conversation about
• 20:22
  watching the world burn, you know.
• 20:24
  So now I do agree with you completely.
• 20:28
  I remember I was talking about this recently.
• 20:30
  I set myself a goal that I would do the show for 10 years.
• 20:34
  I'm three years in and the reason for that is started in
• 20:38
  2020. I figured I can do a decade, why
• 20:41
  not Who else gives up at like first 10 or 20?
• 20:44
  Why not be the difference? And so, the first thing I want
• 20:47
  to say to that is that I've noticed now whenever I talk
• 20:52
  about the fact that I've got over 200 episodes People seem to
• 20:59
  look at that differently now. I think the First Response
• 21:02
  generally is, oh, you got a podcast like everyone and their
• 21:06
  mom was got a podcast you, right?
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  But when you say something like that, It's a bit like saying
• 21:12
  that I've got a degree or something.
• 21:13
  It's like it tells the person that you're talking to that
• 21:19
  you're serious about this that this is something that means
• 21:21
  something to you. And as you said that when you
• 21:24
  have that kind of enthusiasm for what you're doing that will come
• 21:27
  through in the work and I look back at my older episodes
• 21:31
  throughout the years and I can see that I got better with it.
• 21:35
  Good practice. But I think more because I just
• 21:37
  had the right shift in mindset I don't think about the numbers in
• 21:42
  what I get down about the numbers.
• 21:43
  That's true, my listeners will either.
• 21:47
  Give it again. Really develop me sometimes
• 21:49
  mentioning this. But what you said there about
• 21:51
  having a handful of listeners that actually cared, that's what
• 21:53
  I was always looking out for. It was never.
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  So if there's a thousand people or 10,000 people was, are there
• 21:59
  just a handful of people that care?
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  And once I realized there are some people that care and those
• 22:03
  people continually like sending questions and are interested
• 22:07
  might, right? Okay, that's who are making the
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  show for, right? But then also, So throughout the
• 22:11
  course of making this show and I've said this many times, so
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  I'll if notes, this is about sharing the stories and getting
• 22:18
  good content out there and telling stories sharing stories.
• 22:24
  Everything in between that and speaking of which I want to draw
• 22:29
  back to you, fantastic segue. By the way, that was totally
• 22:32
  bro. I wish, man, I'd love to see
• 22:36
  what you do and get into radio and all that stuff, but I don't
• 22:39
  know that it be the same now because I think like as I said
• 22:43
  in either, yeah it's not the same.
• 22:45
  It is a is one thing that confuses me actually, I don't
• 22:49
  know if you have this in the States but I hear a lot of time
• 22:52
  when you go. Listen to local radio station.
• 22:55
  They'll start plugging that they have a podcast like Oh, Hey,
• 22:57
  listen to this. All it is that is that is
• 23:00
  absolutely a movement here as well.
• 23:02
  What he's done, I think more than it would because okay?
• 23:08
  First off for your listeners on, you know, the your Continental
• 23:13
  listeners, there's a dramatic difference between broadcast in
• 23:18
  Europe and particularly in the UK and broadcast here, you know,
• 23:22
  in the UK. You have the Beebe and then
• 23:25
  you've got a couple other players and your couple other
• 23:30
  players actually only came in relatively recently, you know,
• 23:34
  the D the the decentralization of broadcast and and allowing
• 23:39
  more broadcasters in than just the BBC really is a, you know,
• 23:43
  is something that came out of the Pirate Radio movement in the
• 23:47
  UK, back in the 70s and 80s, you know, with with kiss and and all
• 23:52
  that stuff. So, Or you guys a
• 23:54
  decentralization of broadcasting is only really about 30 or 40
• 23:58
  years old here in the United States.
• 24:01
  Every broadcaster was an was an independent broadcaster until
• 24:07
  the Federal Communications Commission started centralizing
• 24:10
  certain aspects of broadcast and we had lots of restrictions, not
• 24:14
  as many as in the UK. But what happened from that is
• 24:20
  Our television stations became more powerful than our radio
• 24:24
  stations by way of Mass Appeal right around 1970.
• 24:28
  And in that time, a lot of our television stations bought
• 24:34
  independent radio stations and brought them in under their
• 24:37
  corporate umbrella umbrella. And then what happened in the
• 24:41
  80s with the decentralisation and and and the the FCC changed,
• 24:48
  a lot of regulations. So So deregulation happen.
• 24:51
  And then we had these massive corporate conglomerates buying
• 24:56
  up, all the radio and television stations.
• 24:59
  And what wound up happening was that we went from a very
• 25:05
  individual dependent broadcast model to a very restricted
• 25:10
  broadcast model, 123 companies owned all the broadcast In the
• 25:18
  United States, Clear Channel iHeartRadio, you know, these
• 25:22
  large corporate entities bought up everything and I think what
• 25:29
  really happened to come back to your question about why they're
• 25:31
  all pushing podcasts now is those large corporate entities,
• 25:36
  went wait a minute, we can't have the public knowing that
• 25:42
  they're still independent voices to listen to.
• 25:48
  Take a memo have have somebody in legal, check out what this
• 25:52
  podcast thing is about. We need one of those and so it's
• 25:57
  really just a co-opting it's getting in on the trend.
• 26:01
  And at the same time, it's protecting their audience
• 26:05
  because they were losing audience because people aren't
• 26:08
  commuting as much. They're not spending as much
• 26:11
  time in their cars, going to and from their big glass and
• 26:14
  concrete box offices and then back home.
• 26:18
  And so if they're not listening to the radio, what are they
• 26:21
  listening to 0? The iPod?
• 26:24
  What is that? It's this little thing.
• 26:26
  You can carry in your pocket and listen to whatever you want.
• 26:29
  Oh, do they have shows? Well, there's this new thing
• 26:32
  called a podcast and you can get them on that as well.
• 26:35
  Oh, wait my phone can do that now.
• 26:38
  Okay, and so it was suddenly giving the Power of Choice back
• 26:43
  to the listener and corporations.
• 26:47
  Really a fan of that. So yeah, the larger networks
• 26:51
  here were very quick to get in on podcasting and interestingly
• 26:57
  the first group to really Leverage The Power of the
• 27:00
  podcast by way of being being a broadcaster was our version I
• 27:07
  guess a little bit of the BBC we have something here in the
• 27:10
  States called NPR which is national public radio and some
• 27:16
  you know some of the very The most famous show.
• 27:18
  I think that anybody in Europe, might know of is a show called
• 27:22
  This American Life and it is really what podcasts often are
• 27:28
  now. But way back in the day, this
• 27:30
  American life is about 25 years old and it's announcer.
• 27:34
  Ira Glass is really one of the people who saw that.
• 27:41
  Well, I want people to hear my story.
• 27:44
  And I don't necessarily want them to be Tethered to a time
• 27:49
  and a place. So let's take our shows and turn
• 27:53
  them into this podcast thing so people can listen to them
• 27:57
  whenever they want and all the other larger corporate stations
• 28:02
  and and conglomerates went well, it seems to be working for them,
• 28:06
  get on that. And that's really where we are
• 28:09
  now. Everything, that almost
• 28:11
  everything that is a radio program is now Able downloadable
• 28:15
  as a podcast because the cost to do it is virtually nothing.
• 28:20
  You've already done. The audio, you already own the
• 28:22
  studio, you've already produced everything, just dump it out as
• 28:26
  an MP3 and your your reach is extended.
• 28:31
  Is it just me though, or as I've not really come across any kind
• 28:37
  of corporately produced shows like that, that I actually could
• 28:42
  sit and listen to, I mean, there are exceptions.
• 28:44
  Ins, you know, with the ones that follow more of a
• 28:47
  documentarian style of Storytelling or guess that,
• 28:51
  they, they have over and stuff like that.
• 28:53
  That's, that's different. Well, you know what?
• 28:55
  I'm going for here, like do entertainment so to speak.
• 28:59
  It's always very kind of like, I just get a Vibe, a laziness that
• 29:04
  when I think of the top podcast out there across any platform
• 29:07
  chances are, they're independent or they've been now bought by a
• 29:13
  podcast Network. Core Network or something like
• 29:15
  that. But interestingly the ones that
• 29:17
  opted to go with networks or get bored out in some shape or form
• 29:22
  they always change like that straight away.
• 29:24
  Yeah, you know, II, I think there are some there are some
• 29:30
  examples of staying independent and being successful.
• 29:34
  I think the largest one would probably be probably be WTF with
• 29:39
  Marc Maron Mark has while Mark does.
• 29:44
  And famously, take sponsor money.
• 29:48
  He has fought tooth and nail, he could very easily have gone on
• 29:52
  to drop another name. He could have very easily gone,
• 29:54
  The Joe Rogan route and allowed himself to be bought up by
• 29:59
  Spotify for a hundred million dollars.
• 30:04
  That's what Rogan's sold his podcast for a hundred million
• 30:08
  dollars. Do you happen to know though if
• 30:10
  they have liked? But I would say that creative
• 30:12
  control, but do they have They tell him what he can and can't
• 30:15
  be out there. They can't tell him what to say
• 30:19
  on Mike, but they are absolutely in control of what gets out to
• 30:24
  the public, right? And good.
• 30:26
  And there are, and there have been instances with Rogan where
• 30:30
  Spotify has faced some serious backlash.
• 30:35
  Seen, some of the stuff unsurprisingly with Rogan and
• 30:39
  have had to take down episodes or or, or redact sir Certain
• 30:44
  things in episodes in order to, you know, appease their
• 30:48
  investors frankly Marin on the other hand is is is vociferously
• 30:55
  independent and is you know, he'll take sponsorship money,
• 31:01
  but his sponsors no upfront. I'm going to say dirty words and
• 31:04
  they might be about your product.
• 31:06
  I'm going to do it in such a way that my audience understands
• 31:09
  that I'm being funny but you got to be cool with that in order to
• 31:13
  ride with me. So, there's there's examples of
• 31:17
  both there are outliers in both Dynamics as well.
• 31:23
  But overall, the thing that I kind of get concerned about with
• 31:27
  podcasting, does reach back to what we were talking about.
• 31:30
  About the ones that I like the most are the ones where the
• 31:32
  person, the broadcaster's, passionate and is doing
• 31:35
  something that they love to do. We also have this mentality in
• 31:40
  podcasting, now with the bigger properties, where it feels like,
• 31:45
  what I refer to collectively as the Microsoft angle build
• 31:50
  something good enough that eventually Microsoft will sweep
• 31:53
  in and buy you up and then you get your payday, you know,
• 31:57
  because honestly, for the majority of podcasts and the
• 32:02
  vast majority of podcasts, not only don't make any money, they
• 32:06
  actually cost. The producer they cost the
• 32:09
  podcaster money to do as we were saying in the beginning.
• 32:13
  So suddenly being offered a million dollars for a two-person
• 32:18
  podcast, sounds pretty attractive because you know
• 32:22
  what, even if the contract is for two years, you can do it for
• 32:24
  two years and everybody walks away.
• 32:26
  Both of you, you people walk away with a half a million
• 32:28
  dollars, that sounds attractive and that mentality still exists
• 32:34
  in the podcast. World be good enough to get
• 32:36
  bought do For a while and then go about your day.
• 32:41
  And that's good and bad because honestly, you know, it's bad
• 32:46
  because you might lose a product that you enjoy, but it's good
• 32:50
  because for me, those people are not the people that I want to
• 32:54
  invest my emotional capital in because if that's the only
• 32:59
  reason why you're there. Why am I listening to you?
• 33:03
  If all you're waiting to do is be bought out?
• 33:06
  So, you know, there are both that way and at the same time,
• 33:10
  somebody rocks up to my front door and says here's a million
• 33:13
  dollars to do a podcast for a year.
• 33:16
  I'll talk to you in a year. I'll be talking to you from a
• 33:20
  different set of digs and it's going to look really cool.
• 33:25
  Like I say that something like that does seem quite alluring,
• 33:28
  but just just for a year, did it?
• 33:31
  I mean you could sort of tell you the light a little bit you
• 33:33
  can't you can't come off to me as being so ethical and
• 33:38
  holier-than-thou that that's not going to make anybody stop pump
• 33:42
  the brakes and go. Yeah, you know.
• 33:46
  Okay sure. Here's what I do.
• 33:49
  I have two shows. Well, I've got a show this the
• 33:51
  question we've podcast completely free always will be
• 33:54
  and let's look at border and then I've got show called life
• 33:58
  of Christian read which is more just all about me is some
• 34:01
  Patreon is a different show, different angle a different feel
• 34:05
  sure if I was bought out for like a year or two, I would just
• 34:10
  have two different offerings and be like this is what this is
• 34:14
  going to be. It might not be might be a bit
• 34:16
  different because it's more commercialized, but this
• 34:19
  offering over here totally different and that's how I'd
• 34:22
  split up. And I don't know, I think I
• 34:24
  think it depends how much your show changes because like I've
• 34:27
  said, for example, there's a show here in the UK called The
• 34:30
  Happy Hour podcast. All right, and they started
• 34:32
  area, you know. Okay, cool.
• 34:34
  So they started out as just a YouTuber podcast and it's a
• 34:38
  great start. It's actually one of the few
• 34:40
  podcasts that I like where I don't listen to it anymore, just
• 34:45
  too busy with my stomach, right? Right.
• 34:47
  I look at it and I look at their progression and it's kind of a
• 34:50
  fair progression, they stepped it up, they realized they could
• 34:53
  do more with it. They've got more money and they
• 34:57
  improved the improved it as they went along, which was it for me.
• 35:01
  It was its own reward because I like seeing people with good
• 35:05
  ideas, be able to get better at what they do right now.
• 35:09
  Yeah. And I think like the interesting
• 35:11
  thing is now that they've kind of gone commercial there, go my
• 35:13
  Spotify and everything I wouldn't say that they've
• 35:17
  conquered like sold out. It's just that the show has a
• 35:20
  different vibe. Now, like now they're getting,
• 35:22
  like, a big big celebrity guest. Yeah, legit celebrities.
• 35:25
  You're right. And it's like now, I suppose the
• 35:29
  only kind of negative aspect to it would be that.
• 35:34
  And this is a, I've always been about with my podcast, it's all
• 35:38
  about the conversation. I'm like, people have asked, why
• 35:40
  don't you have celebrities? I've had people that are
• 35:43
  successful have massive followings online, I guess I've
• 35:46
  not really had like quote-unquote celebrities, but I
• 35:50
  wouldn't really be interested because a just having a
• 35:53
  celebrity doesn't guarantee you anything just on a sorry.
• 35:56
  No true guys. I've seen that happen.
• 35:58
  But on other people's shows, he did nothing for them.
• 36:01
  Secondly, why would I want a guest who is restricted on what
• 36:07
  they can say? Right seems pointless to me.
• 36:11
  Yeah, a little less, unless I know for definite, I can ask
• 36:13
  this person, whatever I want. And here's the thing, I don't do
• 36:16
  a show where I'm looking to catch people out, right?
• 36:18
  You don't, I mean, I just want to eat that.
• 36:21
  Yeah, I just want to tell that person story, and have fun with
• 36:24
  it and make them feel comfortable, but I've heard it
• 36:26
  so many instances of, right? Who took into someone's PR agent
• 36:30
  they're like oh you can't ask them this right?
• 36:32
  Let's give that kind of airboat and things.
• 36:35
  Yeah, that reminds me actually a couple of years ago.
• 36:38
  I did actually reach out to us and laboratory and she got back
• 36:42
  to me. It was really cool and it looked
• 36:43
  like it was going to happen and she made me jump through all
• 36:46
  these hoops, only for it to not happen.
• 36:48
  And one of those Hoops was to write out a list of all the
• 36:52
  questions. I was going to ask her and I
• 36:54
  never do that because it's bit and it, because back then, Then
• 36:58
  I was beginning to ad-lib a lot now.
• 37:00
  I pretty much just ad-libbed the whole thing, I barely look at my
• 37:03
  notes but back then I was learning to do that and I was
• 37:06
  like, well, how can I? I know I'm going to do that but
• 37:09
  I did it anyway, I acquiesced and I sent it over, she peruse
• 37:12
  them, she said, great, this is brilliant and then she just kept
• 37:15
  fobbing me off and eventually I was like after the third or
• 37:17
  fourth time was a fine then. Yeah, whatever.
• 37:20
  Because this is like doing like, okay, so I think any podcaster,
• 37:25
  who is trying to reach out and get other people The come in has
• 37:29
  had an experience like that to one degree or another.
• 37:31
  Yes I have certainly or I've been I've been promised one
• 37:36
  person in email conversation and another person shows up who is
• 37:41
  oh, you know unwilling you know they're the same person but
• 37:45
  they're there. Their interaction with me.
• 37:48
  An e-mail is very positive and then they get on and it's just
• 37:52
  like a cold fish in front of the camera and there.
• 37:58
  I recently interviewed a very actually a very prestigious
• 38:03
  professor of ethics and technology in, in Berlin,
• 38:08
  Germany. And, you know, I said, my show
• 38:13
  is about an hour. They said, you can have a half
• 38:15
  hour, I'm like, okay, I'll do that.
• 38:17
  And then when they, when they did wind up, being on the show,
• 38:21
  they really weren't answering my questions.
• 38:24
  They were just going through their talking points and I'm
• 38:27
  like, I like to have, I do my research, I do some planning, I
• 38:31
  have a process but at the same time, I want my conversation to
• 38:35
  be organic and I want it to flow and I wanted to go where the
• 38:38
  conversation is taking us and getting somebody in, in a
• 38:43
  podcasting environment who really is more comfortable,
• 38:48
  talking from a Podium. And taking questions from
• 38:51
  reporters is, it's a very different vibe.
• 38:55
  It's a very different flow and sometimes it just Just winds up
• 38:58
  being awkward AF and you know, you just kind of have to throw
• 39:01
  your hands up. Well, let me ask you this
• 39:03
  because I've had a similar experience.
• 39:05
  I've had that like, twice. One of the times this person was
• 39:09
  like, really pushing their products and services.
• 39:13
  So, like, I remember, I remember it was to do with Along the
• 39:18
  lines of mental health. And one of the questions I asked
• 39:22
  was like, what's the first thing you would suggest to people
• 39:26
  going through x, y, and Zed problem?
• 39:28
  And the very first thing they said, was a wide direct them to
• 39:32
  this page on my website that at it.
• 39:34
  And I'm thinking in my head I'm like, really, that's the first
• 39:36
  thing you do is like all he did. Yeah.
• 39:39
  Did you have the sound of money going off your back?
• 39:42
  Please come. It was a good combo in total but
• 39:46
  that that stuff. Because that look, I know that
• 39:49
  this is about promotion, I get that, but the best way to
• 39:52
  promote yourself is to put yourself out there.
• 39:54
  Like whenever I appear on people's shows, you don't hear
• 39:57
  me like spend the whole hour going.
• 39:59
  Oh, you can follow me here and do this.
• 40:01
  You do that like I'm barely do it.
• 40:02
  Just pointing at yourself all the time.
• 40:04
  Yeah. That comes up that comes off.
• 40:07
  Like it comes off when people do that, it's always very it makes
• 40:12
  you come off as very self-aggrandizing and very
• 40:14
  self-important and know if I'm on somebody else.
• 40:17
  A show like yours. I am like I want to talk about
• 40:21
  what you want to talk about, you know, because that's the thrust
• 40:24
  of the show. And frankly, I find that more
• 40:27
  compelling. I wanted to make a mention of
• 40:30
  something though that I think is really Salient.
• 40:33
  And that is, you know, when you're talking about the
• 40:36
  difference between big podcasts that have been bought by some
• 40:40
  platform versus independent. If you really have a, if you
• 40:46
  really enjoy Oi a podcast or a YouTube channel.
• 40:52
  Support it, this drives me absolutely bananas.
• 40:57
  And it's not because I don't get support, I get support.
• 40:59
  I have supporters. I get some financial support in
• 41:03
  order to keep doing what I'm doing.
• 41:05
  But the vast majority of the finances are on my shoulders.
• 41:08
  But for those podcasts that you really enjoyed that suddenly
• 41:13
  disappeared or Went Away. I am willing to put a shilling
• 41:18
  on the fact that they say, and please do us a favor, like click
• 41:23
  and subscribe, and you can always support us on our patreon
• 41:26
  page or on our Kofi page or any of a number of other micro
• 41:31
  donations support platforms. If that podcast disappeared on
• 41:35
  you, it's on you as well. It's on you as a consumer, you
• 41:41
  know, and I don't fault anybody for being bought by Spotify.
• 41:46
  Because one thing, one good thing that does come out of it
• 41:50
  is that those people those producers are able to keep doing
• 41:53
  what they're doing, yes, it might be different by way of
• 41:56
  corporate constraints and a few of the things that you might be
• 41:59
  able to get away with, but they found a way to make it
• 42:04
  financially viable. And so I don't have a problem
• 42:09
  with that unless like you the thing changes in tone and tenor
• 42:13
  so much that it's not even it's just a shell of what it used to
• 42:16
  be. But for those small producers
• 42:19
  that you really like or those that are just consistently
• 42:23
  giving you quality stuff, support them, take five dollars
• 42:29
  a month, one less fancy coffee out in the world a month and
• 42:34
  give it to them. Because I will tell you, if 10
• 42:37
  people do that for a small podcast, that's $50 a month that
• 42:42
  will keep will help keep that product to float.
• 42:45
  It will pay for the platform the aggregator platform that puts
• 42:50
  the podcast out in the world. It will help pay for a better
• 42:53
  microphone so you don't constantly have to listen to
• 42:56
  them sounding like somebody's there with solo rap, you know,
• 42:59
  going kind of those little things actually matter and I am
• 43:05
  a huge Judge Advocate in these days kind of reaching back to
• 43:08
  what we were talking about about the corporate ownership of
• 43:11
  things. I am a fan of the
• 43:13
  democratization of media. I drive my wife nuts because I
• 43:19
  won't watch television, I won't watch a movie, I've been a
• 43:25
  consumer of these things, that culture, or Society tells me is
• 43:30
  important for the vast majority of my life.
• 43:33
  I'm 55 years old and up Until I was maybe 45 the media that I
• 43:39
  consumed was that which was put in front of me.
• 43:42
  But now with YouTube, I'm a massive fan of YouTube and I
• 43:49
  follow many different content creators on YouTube.
• 43:52
  People like Adam Savage, the guy that used to be on MythBusters
• 43:57
  his channel tested that help. Keep me sane.
• 44:00
  During the pandemic. I'm a woodworker in a machinist
• 44:04
  in a cup. Of other creative mechanical
• 44:07
  things. And I watch people like
• 44:09
  restoring old tools or, you know, restoring Furniture things
• 44:14
  like that. I'd much rather watch that I'd
• 44:16
  much rather support somebody who's giving me something that I
• 44:19
  find intellectually. Spiritually, emotionally
• 44:22
  rewarding. And so, I feel it's fair for me
• 44:26
  to help out and pay them, so they can have the good camera so
• 44:30
  that it looks nice. So they can have the right
• 44:33
  equipment. The 400 dollar microphone Oh, so
• 44:35
  that they can sound good. We are spoiled for choice.
• 44:43
  And really, we should be more fair in supporting those people
• 44:46
  who put good things in our life, the days of everything, being
• 44:50
  Freer, having to buy a TV license, only those are gone.
• 44:54
  And honestly, I'm not super upset about it because and
• 44:59
  you'll get a kick out of this. Because now I get to watch
• 45:02
  Taskmaster. Yeah, I get to watch Taskmaster
• 45:06
  on YouTube or or something like, my, I got my wife hooked on On
• 45:12
  our tee time thing is we watch Richard Osmonds House of games
• 45:19
  because we're just nerds like that.
• 45:21
  Or 8 out of 10 cats does countdown huge fan, okay, I'm a
• 45:27
  bit of an. Anglophile I wouldn't be able to
• 45:30
  watch any of that stuff. Were it?
• 45:32
  Not for things like YouTube or one of my favorite podcasts is
• 45:36
  no such thing as a fish, which, of course, is the the elves crew
• 45:40
  from qi. And there are no International
• 45:44
  barriers anymore. I've got listeners and viewers
• 45:47
  in Kuala Lumpur and Dubai. And, you know, all over the
• 45:52
  world, I would never have gotten in front of them.
• 45:55
  And I would never have learned as much about their cultures.
• 45:59
  And so, I support them. I pay them a little bit of money
• 46:02
  every month. It's much better than, you know,
• 46:05
  paying a TV license for a bunch of stuff that I have no real
• 46:08
  interest in. Unless it's maybe on Dave, you
• 46:11
  know, so support people really. Honestly just take a little bit
• 46:16
  of your money and help them out because they're giving you
• 46:19
  something. Hey guys.
• 46:22
  As a reason to subscribe to my patreon.
• 46:24
  Got it there unto himself? Exactly.
• 46:27
  Right. Just put it, I don't actually
• 46:29
  push people to support this show for my Patron.
• 46:36
  I've always kind of just pushed my patreon on other platforms
• 46:39
  that when I do my live streams and stuff, but maybe I should
• 46:42
  start doing it. I mean, I don't know it's it's a
• 46:47
  hard-ass. Yeah, it makes you
• 46:49
  uncomfortable. Yeah.
• 46:50
  Yeah, it absolutely does. Okay?
• 46:53
  And at the same time though, there is some there is some
• 46:57
  shared equity in this experience.
• 47:01
  You know, if people are enjoying what you do, you would want
• 47:06
  their support. It would be nice to have their
• 47:08
  support and At the at the same time you're not asking for
• 47:14
  something that you're just going to burn, okay?
• 47:18
  We're not talking about something like, you know some
• 47:22
  big YouTube person who literally just takes the ad Revenue money
• 47:27
  and goes out and buys a ridiculous car to show on their
• 47:32
  next video. You know, that that bougie kind
• 47:36
  of thing the ball or mentality. I support people who actually
• 47:40
  give me Something in return and I believe in that support
• 47:43
  because I don't want it to go away.
• 47:46
  So if I don't want something to go away, there's some
• 47:49
  responsibility on me to provide for it and I do and I mean I'm
• 47:54
  not you know burning off four hundred dollars a month, in all
• 47:57
  the support, I'd love to be able to do that.
• 47:59
  I'd love to be able to sweep in and say, oh I hear your podcast,
• 48:03
  you broke your equipment. Here's $400 for something new.
• 48:06
  I can't do that but I certainly can You know peel off one or two
• 48:13
  dollars a month in order to just chip in and help out.
• 48:17
  But the ask is always uncomfortable.
• 48:19
  The ask is just like they'd immediately goes off in your
• 48:22
  head. I'm just this little guy.
• 48:23
  I don't, it's a, you know, just I don't want to ask for money.
• 48:26
  That sounds creepy and kind of self-entitled or self-important.
• 48:30
  No, doesn't, this is how the world works and it's your right
• 48:35
  to ask for help, if that's what keeps the boat afloat.
• 48:39
  But at the same time, if Nobody's willing to help in your
• 48:41
  still passionate about it. Full steam ahead, just keep
• 48:44
  doing it anyway for your own sake and if other people jump on
• 48:48
  that, that's great and that's really my model.
• 48:51
  I'm gonna do it if you want to help, that's totally cool and
• 48:55
  I'd really appreciate it. But I'm going to be here
• 48:57
  tomorrow doing this thing because this is what I do.
• 49:01
  This is who I am and I'd appreciate the help but I won't
• 49:05
  judge you if you can't or won't and the story suggested of and
• 49:10
  going for a pretty hard time in my life lately and is sometimes
• 49:14
  funny to me how The Coincidence of things were how certain
• 49:19
  things come to you. And you need to hear those
• 49:23
  things at certain time. I think I needed to hear this
• 49:25
  conversation today. I'm I'm happy.
• 49:29
  I'm I'm happy to be the dad in the situation here and say nah,
• 49:34
  son. You go out and you put your hand
• 49:36
  out and say, you either shake it, shake it or grease it.
• 49:45
  I see, I see, I just about got to the point where I'm able to
• 49:48
  ask people to subscribe to patreon and that took me.
• 49:52
  A while right baby steps up. Yeah, like I mean with that, at
• 49:55
  least I'm producing the show exclusive for them, in my mind,
• 49:59
  I was like, that makes sense. I do have things like a PayPal
• 50:02
  and Amazon wish list and stuff, but I said this in a live stream
• 50:05
  recently, like, I feel so like unit, you'll never hear me going
• 50:10
  like, oh, give you money, give me money.
• 50:12
  Give me money. I'm, I'll always say something,
• 50:14
  like, if you would like to support me, this is how you can
• 50:17
  do it. Yeah, but I never demand it, but
• 50:19
  I do see a lot of people demanded and it's Sometimes
• 50:22
  they'll say things that like like oh if you don't do this,
• 50:26
  then the show can't continue. If you don't do this, then I
• 50:28
  can't keep doing this and it's like, get a job.
• 50:31
  Like we like if it if it, yeah, if it comes down to that, you
• 50:36
  know, that's an approach that it makes me uncomfortable as well,
• 50:40
  only back you on that. But the other thing that happens
• 50:44
  there though. is that that failure might be an important
• 50:51
  lesson for the producer because if people aren't willing to help
• 50:57
  if people don't find Value in what you're doing, I mean your
• 51:00
  reoccurring, people who are supporters, if they are not
• 51:03
  willing to do so that actually points to your content that
• 51:07
  points to the quality of your content, Chan, you can be as
• 51:10
  heartfelt as you want, but if you're not giving somebody value
• 51:15
  in a You proposition. And that's what podcasting is,
• 51:18
  is a value proposition. Then as the producer, that's a
• 51:22
  really important Bellwether. That is a maybe I got to step
• 51:27
  back and think about how I'm doing this.
• 51:29
  What I'm what I'm putting out there, why are people willing to
• 51:33
  consume it? But not support it and that's an
• 51:36
  important thing for a producer to keep in mind because there's,
• 51:41
  there's good ideas done, okay? And then there's good idea. has
• 51:46
  that are brought to their fullest potential and if you're
• 51:49
  giving people the first one, Most people aren't going to pay
• 51:53
  for that if you're doing the ladder and you come to people,
• 51:58
  for whatever reason and say, look, we're really in a pinch.
• 52:01
  We'd love to be able to keep doing this at the same quality
• 52:04
  level, but we need your help. Remember earlier on in our
• 52:08
  conversation. I talked about National Public
• 52:10
  Radio. National Public Radio in the
• 52:13
  United States is funded by the public it's funded by donations
• 52:19
  and so at least three times A year on National Public Radio,
• 52:24
  they have funding drives where they do say that is their tack.
• 52:28
  If you don't support us, we're going to go off the air because
• 52:33
  we don't get government money. We don't get support from the
• 52:37
  government as the national public radio.
• 52:40
  We get paid by you people and by our sponsorships and were asking
• 52:45
  for you to pay for the value that we provide in your life.
• 52:50
  But you got to have Value in what you're putting out there
• 52:54
  before you step up and tell your audience, if you don't help,
• 52:59
  this is going away. So see that though is different
• 53:05
  from like an individual person essentially guilt tripping
• 53:08
  because that right there is more talking about the consequences.
• 53:11
  There's like this is what's going to happen, but it's not
• 53:14
  kind of implying that if people don't do it, they're like bad
• 53:16
  people for not supporting the show.
• 53:18
  Know. I always those in your video
• 53:19
  with that, you know what I mean? Like, I totally get You're
• 53:22
  coming from and I think that's right.
• 53:24
  That's why I'm saying, there's kind of there's a level to which
• 53:27
  it's appropriate to take that tack and then there's not and if
• 53:32
  you're some dude sitting in your garage, you know, with all
• 53:35
  respect to Marc Maron, I mean Cosmic Marin literally had
• 53:39
  Barack Obama, the sitting president of the United States
• 53:43
  come into his garage, you know, he has a famous story about
• 53:47
  like, neighbors, across the street had to allow snipers from
• 53:52
  You know the Secret Service Up on the Roof while Obama was in
• 53:55
  his garage doing the podcast. Oh yeah yeah you know unless
• 54:00
  you're Unless you're a real going concern, unless you've got
• 54:05
  thousands of listeners, thousands and thousands of
• 54:08
  listeners and downloads a month. You don't really have any
• 54:12
  leverage to say look you should pay for this.
• 54:15
  You should I'm giving you something.
• 54:18
  Now there's there's a way to do it in a way not and that's
• 54:21
  definitely a way, not I'm more much more in your camp where I
• 54:26
  say if you if you want to cool. If not again I'm still going to
• 54:30
  be here because Cuz my overhead is low.
• 54:34
  I don't have the overhead of running a podcast, you know that
• 54:40
  that mm, you know, necessitates 10 people doing something in
• 54:44
  order to produce it. Everything I do is either one or
• 54:47
  two people by way of production. That's why I have a Kofi or a
• 54:51
  buy me a coffee where, hey man, if you really liked this episode
• 54:54
  is favorite, get the like, click subscribe on and if you want to
• 54:56
  throw us a couple bucks you can go over here and you know we get
• 55:00
  that every once in a while and And interestingly, I notice that
• 55:04
  we get it when our material is very compelling where people get
• 55:10
  something from that value proposition and go.
• 55:13
  Yeah, you know what, I could tell you guys really work this
• 55:15
  thing. So yeah, here's 5 bucks.
• 55:17
  Thanks a lot for doing it. That was cool.
• 55:20
  But yeah, the whole give me money or else not most people
• 55:24
  are going to say or else. Thanks.
• 55:26
  Peace out. Kind of a bone on that part of
• 55:31
  the podcast. I just wanted to ask what would
• 55:33
  you say are the kind of key takeaways for you and lessons
• 55:39
  from podcasting and radio work. Honestly, I do think that It's
• 55:50
  the passion of the person doing it that comes through.
• 55:54
  That is something that I don't, I honestly don't think you can
• 55:58
  fake and you know even one of the other things that were
• 56:02
  suffering or benefiting from however, you choose to look at
• 56:05
  it. These days is lots of famous
• 56:07
  people now have podcasts, right? I mean and, you know, some of
• 56:13
  its good. Some of them are good.
• 56:15
  Some of them are like like really, really, I just got to
• 56:18
  hear you talk like that. This now no thanks.
• 56:22
  You know, and in the UK pretty much if you're a working
• 56:26
  comedian, these days in the UK you have a podcast, right?
• 56:31
  And some of them are great. I'm a huge fan of rhod Gilbert
• 56:35
  and his wife's podcast. I think it is one of the cutest
• 56:38
  things on earth and and, you know, I'm, I'm happy to hear
• 56:43
  that Rod. Gilbert's coming back from his
• 56:45
  cancer diagnosis. Again, it was quite quite
• 56:48
  significant, but he seems to be Doing better.
• 56:50
  You know, famous people podcasts for me, always feel they Teeter
• 56:57
  on disingenuous. They Teeter on overexposure, I
• 57:01
  am all places all the time and I've got something to say, well,
• 57:05
  maybe you do, maybe you don't. I just I don't need to just hear
• 57:07
  you waffle. But at the same time, with the
• 57:13
  sheer amount of podcasts available, you can hear somebody
• 57:18
  when they're Truly being genuine and you can easily go out and
• 57:23
  find examples of other podcasts trying to do that, but it just
• 57:28
  doesn't feel that way. I go for the genuine.
• 57:31
  I'm a junkie of the genuine when you are talking about something
• 57:36
  that you're truly passionate about when you're emotional
• 57:39
  about something, when you're willing to to strip everything
• 57:42
  away and be be kind of intellectually or emotionally
• 57:46
  naked with somebody and let the rest of the World in on it.
• 57:51
  Those are the things that I find truly rewarding, as a person, as
• 57:56
  a consumer of media, and that's what I think.
• 58:02
  Is the core tenant of a successful podcaster or a
• 58:07
  successful producer if you put something out there.
• 58:10
  That's genuine. More likely than not, somebody's
• 58:15
  it's going to resonate with somebody.
• 58:17
  Now if if it doesn't resonate with enough, somebody's that's a
• 58:21
  different issue. But really the key for me is
• 58:24
  coming on and being real and doing something that you are
• 58:27
  truly motivated to do that. You really enjoy.
• 58:31
  That's the reason why I keep doing one of my podcasts simply
• 58:35
  because I enjoy doing it. If other people want to come
• 58:38
  along, that's fine. And that's what I encourage
• 58:40
  people to go search out and find Voices, who resonate with you
• 58:46
  voices? Who make you feel good hearing
• 58:51
  and and again support them support them either by like
• 58:54
  click subscribe which is a much more powerful tool than many
• 58:58
  people realize our lives as producers are are you know are
• 59:04
  measured by those thumbs, right? And click-through rates and If
• 59:08
  all we're asking you to do, even if you're not willing to pay us
• 59:11
  any money, if you could just like, and We suggest this to
• 59:14
  somebody else, that's got a value to us and it's a free
• 59:18
  thing for you to do in order to support us.
• 59:20
  But you got to be passionate about this weird thing that we
• 59:23
  do or else. You're just another sois of
• 59:28
  another source of noise in the world.
• 59:33
  It can voices. Yeah, that's look into your work
• 59:37
  as a voice-over artist and voice actor.
• 59:40
  I obviously have a hand in this. I'm very intrigued, I've been
• 59:45
  doing voiceover work and voice acting for about four years, but
• 59:49
  this ain't about me, this is about you.
• 59:51
  So let's hear it, let's hear it. Let's the, what have been the
• 59:53
  high points, low points, walk us through.
• 59:56
  What? It's like to be a voice-over
• 59:59
  artist and actor. Well sure.
• 1:00:02
  I have a lot of stage training from when I was younger, I was
• 1:00:04
  trained to sing opera at a young age, and I performed musical
• 1:00:08
  theater. And, and that's why I have a
• 1:00:11
  performance Background by way of my voice.
• 1:00:15
  Part of that training was acting, but my acting training
• 1:00:19
  is the lesser of all my trainings from back in the day.
• 1:00:25
  But Really. I got into voice art.
• 1:00:31
  As I said I was working, I came out to the West Coast at the
• 1:00:38
  tech, boom of the Millennium and I worked a large corporate job
• 1:00:42
  that paid me a lot of money and I just I hated it.
• 1:00:47
  I hated it so much with a white hot burning passion.
• 1:00:50
  So I switched out of that, I did a bunch of other things.
• 1:00:53
  And one of the things that I'll mention to your audience is that
• 1:00:57
  I'm a disabled man. When I was 15 years old, I had
• 1:01:00
  to disable Only accident. I broke my neck in a diving
• 1:01:03
  accident and so I suffer partial paralysis and I have since then
• 1:01:08
  so I can't go out and do a lot of jobs that other people can.
• 1:01:12
  I have a number of physical limitations.
• 1:01:14
  One of the things that's not been limited.
• 1:01:16
  My entire life is my voice and my ability to read and speak,
• 1:01:21
  and that was always something that was very enticing to me.
• 1:01:25
  You mean, I can work from home and I can, I can make money just
• 1:01:30
  by Reading goodly, I'll do that. You know?
• 1:01:34
  And it was always very interesting to me, I had been
• 1:01:38
  working a number of Phone jobs for nonprofit organizations,
• 1:01:44
  Arts, based organizations in my area and 2014, I got fired for
• 1:01:52
  the first and only time in my life from a telemarketing job
• 1:01:55
  that I absolutely despised and was back home.
• 1:02:00
  Waiting for my then partner and told them about losing the job
• 1:02:04
  and said, I think I want to try voice acting full-time.
• 1:02:08
  Now, one of two things happens in that dynamic in a couple you
• 1:02:14
  either get support or you get the eye roll and the can't you
• 1:02:19
  just get a real job? Fortunately, this person that I
• 1:02:24
  was with saw. The wisdom in allowing me to try
• 1:02:29
  And I I had a broken Mac laptop, the screen didn't work, the
• 1:02:35
  keyboard didn't work, the trackpad didn't work.
• 1:02:37
  So I had to use an external keyboard, external Mouse
• 1:02:40
  external monitor, but it had GarageBand on it and I knew that
• 1:02:44
  I could record and GarageBand and I went out, I didn't even
• 1:02:48
  have a microphone at the time that was not what was in my life
• 1:02:51
  at the time. So I went out and I got off of
• 1:02:55
  somebody. Selling it used on the internet,
• 1:02:57
  I went out and I got a Blue Snowball.
• 1:02:59
  Microphone and within two weeks, I'd done my first two hundred
• 1:03:03
  and fifty dollar spot for a large governmental organization
• 1:03:09
  here in the United States. The the National Park Service
• 1:03:13
  and that kind of rubber stamp the oh this can actually be a
• 1:03:18
  real thing and my partner at the time went Mom.
• 1:03:21
  Apparently, this really is a thing.
• 1:03:23
  And within the next month I got my first audio book job, which
• 1:03:28
  was Dollars which was just like mind-blowing at the time.
• 1:03:32
  Very interestingly it was for an organization that is both
• 1:03:36
  important to me and accidentally references your name Christian
• 1:03:40
  because it was for the Christopher Reeve foundation and
• 1:03:44
  Christopher. Reeve course, Very famously was
• 1:03:47
  the 1980s version of Superman, but who broke their neck and a
• 1:03:53
  horse riding accident and was paralyzed for the rest of his
• 1:03:57
  life until he sadly passed away. And that organization is an
• 1:04:01
  organization that as a person with a spinal injury, I was
• 1:04:04
  already very familiar with and I was very excited to do the work
• 1:04:07
  for them and extra excited for a thousand dollars.
• 1:04:10
  And that that job, pardon my French that chewed chewed my ass
• 1:04:15
  like bubblegum I was in so far over my head.
• 1:04:18
  I didn't know what I was doing. This was literally like reading
• 1:04:22
  the phone book instead of phone numbers, it was URLs that I had
• 1:04:26
  to read out bah, blah, blah dot slash Olin at sign but just it
• 1:04:31
  was horrific, but I got through it.
• 1:04:35
  I learned a lot of things. I learned how to apologize
• 1:04:37
  profusely how to beg for more time, how to blame technology
• 1:04:41
  for all the problems but I stuck with it.
• 1:04:44
  Yeah. And my my business, my offerings
• 1:04:48
  have grown since then. And I have Bunches of audio
• 1:04:50
  books that I've narrated up on audible.com.
• 1:04:53
  And my voice is heard around the world.
• 1:04:57
  I am the voice of one. Form million subscriber, YouTube
• 1:05:01
  channel that deals with MMA in sports.
• 1:05:05
  And so you know I am literally my voice is heard around the
• 1:05:10
  globe, which still feels a little weird when I stop to
• 1:05:13
  think about it. But I also do, I've done work
• 1:05:16
  for like large universities with big automated phone systems
• 1:05:20
  where they got you know 200 people working there and press
• 1:05:24
  for now for you know, that kind of thing.
• 1:05:27
  And yeah, it's It's something that I enjoy doing and it's
• 1:05:32
  something that I enjoy teaching people how to do, because one of
• 1:05:36
  the other things is that, I'm a voiceover coach.
• 1:05:38
  So if somebody is interested in getting into this business, they
• 1:05:42
  can take voice lessons with me. They can learn the business side
• 1:05:45
  of things or the technological side of things.
• 1:05:48
  And one of the outgrowths of my business has been my YouTube
• 1:05:52
  channel, which is called the vo Booth camp and for those
• 1:05:56
  interested Shameless plug. For those interested, you can
• 1:06:01
  find me on YouTube at sign at the vo bootcamp and that's what
• 1:06:06
  my channel is about. I've got about 70 videos up
• 1:06:09
  there, covering everything from technique.
• 1:06:12
  I do. Gear reviews, microphone,
• 1:06:15
  reviews, and comparison videos. And I also have a podcast based
• 1:06:20
  on that called Booth to Booth, which is both a video podcast, a
• 1:06:25
  fully produced video podcast and just a standalone audio.
• 1:06:29
  Cast where I interview big people in the vo realm.
• 1:06:33
  I just interviewed, Robert. Sheehan Palio, who is a
• 1:06:37
  voiceover lawyer that. And we spent a lot of time
• 1:06:40
  talking about intellectual rights as they pertain to the
• 1:06:44
  the encroachment of artificial intelligence.
• 1:06:47
  And voiceover, I've had Mike delgadio, who's very famous on
• 1:06:51
  YouTube as the booth junkie? He does a lot of gear reviews
• 1:06:55
  and he's a compatriot of mine and he was on a Couple of my
• 1:07:00
  podcasts and I was on his and yeah, voiceover and voice
• 1:07:05
  production is the one of the most rewarding things in my
• 1:07:11
  life, being able to use my voice as a voice for good.
• 1:07:17
  And not only that, but help people do the same thing.
• 1:07:20
  I find that immensely rewarding What do you think the key kind
• 1:07:26
  of qualities that successful, voice-over artist, or voice
• 1:07:30
  actor, needs to be successful. I'm going to divorce them just a
• 1:07:35
  little bit between voice artist and voice acting.
• 1:07:38
  And and I'm going to I'm going to totally schmear it around as
• 1:07:42
  well. You know, we really have two
• 1:07:44
  types of things that we do in Voice work.
• 1:07:48
  We do narration or what's often referred to, as Vo.
• 1:07:54
  Over which fair to say that it's kind of what people Envision and
• 1:08:00
  announcer to be, you know, the guy that's announcing the thing.
• 1:08:04
  And then we have voice acting and voice acting people think of
• 1:08:08
  like doing dubs for, you know, offshore anime being broadcast
• 1:08:13
  in English. Speaking languages or, you know,
• 1:08:17
  being the voice of a movie in a cartoon movie voice things like
• 1:08:22
  that. So Slightly different, but at
• 1:08:25
  the same time, I also admonished people that all voice Artistry
• 1:08:28
  is voice acting. If you're not saying thoughts
• 1:08:30
  that are occurring to you in real time in your head and
• 1:08:33
  they're coming out of your face hole.
• 1:08:35
  If you're saying somebody else's words, your voice acting because
• 1:08:38
  you are trying to convey an emotional Arc.
• 1:08:41
  That another person's mind came up with the message is, there's
• 1:08:48
  your job is to communicate that message in all, its ways to
• 1:08:53
  somebody else. And that's that's acting.
• 1:08:54
  That's just acting really for me, this ties in nicely with our
• 1:09:01
  discussion of what makes a good podcast for voice Artistry.
• 1:09:07
  It's being genuine. People want to hear a genuine
• 1:09:12
  voice and we've moved very far away, you know?
• 1:09:14
  I mean I go back further than you but you can probably even
• 1:09:17
  remember when you were a young kid towards around about the
• 1:09:20
  Millennium we moved away from this very area announcer.
• 1:09:24
  He kind of voice to just the dude next door talking to you
• 1:09:29
  and being able to bring a Genuine Voice.
• 1:09:35
  Be articulate have a motion. Those things are what the world
• 1:09:42
  wants right now, when it comes to communicating, whether
• 1:09:45
  whether it's commercial, communication entertainment, the
• 1:09:50
  genuine has come back in Vogue and so being confident in your
• 1:09:56
  voice being confident in your abilities, being able to
• 1:09:59
  modulate, bring intonation inflection diction, those kinds
• 1:10:04
  of things. We all think that we could do
• 1:10:06
  this because I have a mouth I can talk.
• 1:10:09
  Well, yeah, but do you talk goodly?
• 1:10:13
  The, how do you actually do you get people to affiliate with
• 1:10:17
  you? When you're talking people don't
• 1:10:20
  affiliate with artificial voices.
• 1:10:22
  People do affiliate with real human voices, and, of course,
• 1:10:26
  that's even more significant, now, as we're moving into this
• 1:10:30
  age of generative AI, which is something that I've in all my
• 1:10:35
  properties, that's all ID, but he's been allowing me to talk
• 1:10:37
  about four. About the past three months is
• 1:10:40
  the impact of artificial intelligence on narration and
• 1:10:43
  audiobook Productions. So, still a Hot Topic.
• 1:10:47
  So let's go there. What are your thoughts on how a
• 1:10:50
  eyes take Card jumps from? Unfortunately, unfortunately, I
• 1:10:55
  am not wearing my Skynet t-shirt, you know, it's weird.
• 1:11:02
  My industry is finding itself of in a very interesting place
• 1:11:05
  right now, because we really are Kind of canaries in the coal.
• 1:11:09
  Mine, we are one of the first visible places where people are
• 1:11:15
  starting to lose jobs to artificial intelligence.
• 1:11:20
  One of the people that I again that I support, as a content
• 1:11:25
  creator is a fellow Brit of yours.
• 1:11:28
  Tom Scott and I follow Tom Scott, I have four years, I
• 1:11:32
  think he's brilliant. He came out with a video about a
• 1:11:37
  month ago. Ago.
• 1:11:38
  And I encourage you to put it in the show notes and it was
• 1:11:42
  called, I tried artificial intelligence, it scared me and
• 1:11:47
  what he was really talking about, was what we in voiceover
• 1:11:52
  are experiencing right now. I get a lot of blowback from
• 1:11:55
  people in the voice-over realm, who say all artificial
• 1:11:59
  intelligence voices, aren't that good?
• 1:12:00
  You can totally tell they sound really stilted and fake and I'm
• 1:12:05
  like, yeah. Now right, this second, they
• 1:12:10
  still do. How long do you think it's
• 1:12:13
  actually going to take somebody to make a synthesized voice?
• 1:12:18
  That is virtually indistinguishable from flesh and
• 1:12:22
  blood human? And Tom.
• 1:12:28
  Gave the world, a great way to look at this.
• 1:12:32
  Mathematically, we have two kinds of growth that were really
• 1:12:36
  regularly familiar with. We have one that's referred to
• 1:12:38
  as logarithmic growth where things shoot up and then they
• 1:12:41
  top off pretty pretty rapidly and then thanks to the
• 1:12:44
  coronavirus pandemic, we're all very familiar with the other
• 1:12:47
  kind of growth model which is called exponential growth.
• 1:12:51
  We're just things go fump. If you combine those two growth
• 1:12:56
  graphs, you get what's referred to in statistics and modeling as
• 1:13:01
  a sigmoid curve where things shoot up and then they top off
• 1:13:06
  at some point in the future. And what Tom Scott pointed out
• 1:13:09
  was something that was incredibly Illuminating for me
• 1:13:12
  by way of artificial voices and generative, AI We're down at the
• 1:13:20
  at the Napster moment of technological progression.
• 1:13:25
  And for those of you listeners out there who aren't familiar,
• 1:13:29
  you know, back after the turn of the Millennium around 2007-2008,
• 1:13:34
  we get something called Napster, which is file sharing and
• 1:13:38
  suddenly, people are able to get music on their mobile devices or
• 1:13:42
  on their computers that they want to listen to and the entire
• 1:13:46
  industry freaked out. Music industry freaked out
• 1:13:49
  because how are we going to make our millions of dollars worth of
• 1:13:51
  money? And within five years, Napster
• 1:13:56
  was gone, Spotify was born. And now what was the last time
• 1:14:02
  you went out and bought a CD? We don't do that anymore.
• 1:14:06
  We don't physically sell music anymore.
• 1:14:08
  All respect to U vinyl nerds out there.
• 1:14:11
  Love you guys, totally. See you what we pay for a
• 1:14:15
  Spotify subscription and we have our entire collection of music
• 1:14:18
  with us wherever we go, either in the cloud or via MP3 on our
• 1:14:22
  phone, this change is going to happen.
• 1:14:26
  So rapidly and it is now We're to this place now, where I
• 1:14:32
  unfortunately already had my voice cloned without my
• 1:14:36
  permission. Interesting, a number of very
• 1:14:42
  visible. Vo Educators on YouTube have had
• 1:14:45
  that happen? Why?
• 1:14:47
  Because we put our voices up on YouTube all the time.
• 1:14:51
  And all one of these platforms needs is two minutes of you
• 1:14:56
  speaking. And interestingly, what I played
• 1:15:00
  it to my wife, my wife said, it doesn't sound like you, but it
• 1:15:05
  sounds like what I think your brother might sound like And
• 1:15:09
  that's scary enough to me. We have We have a, there's a
• 1:15:17
  voice-over talent in in Northern Ireland, who has their voice is
• 1:15:24
  being used as a voice model, that can be paid for on a
• 1:15:29
  generative AI platform and they didn't know about it.
• 1:15:34
  They did not know that their voice was being used that way.
• 1:15:38
  And that's because they did a job in a fashion in our industry
• 1:15:42
  that we refer to as FB or full by out.
• 1:15:44
  The they did the work, they sent it to the client and they did
• 1:15:49
  not retain any rights and he probed prohibition rights to it.
• 1:15:54
  The that client could use it. However, they wanted that
• 1:15:57
  client, decided to sell it to a generative AI platform that now
• 1:16:02
  offers it for sale. And one of the one of the this,
• 1:16:06
  this talents friends called and said, you sold your voice to an
• 1:16:09
  AI platform and she went, no, I didn't.
• 1:16:13
  And he sent her the link and sure enough.
• 1:16:15
  It's her. It's totally her voice.
• 1:16:18
  Interestingly, though, the even advertise it, as a neutral
• 1:16:21
  Pleasant Irish voice, and the image of the person supposedly
• 1:16:25
  providing, the voice is a admittedly, lovely senior Asian
• 1:16:31
  lady. So there's a lot of shenanigans
• 1:16:35
  going on right now. And unfortunately, yeah, we're
• 1:16:39
  going to feel the impact in in the audiobook world first
• 1:16:44
  because there are plenty of titles of audio books, that are
• 1:16:48
  a drag to narrate. Nobody wants to narrate all 18
• 1:16:53
  volumes of the rise and fall of the Roman Empire.
• 1:16:56
  It, you know, it's just but apple is experimenting with AI
• 1:17:03
  voices for narration. Audible is experimenting with
• 1:17:07
  voices for AI narration. YouTube is really where it's
• 1:17:11
  showing up. Lots of small content creators,
• 1:17:14
  it's very attractive to them, $20, and they can generate the
• 1:17:19
  audio from the script. They've already written in
• 1:17:23
  seconds. I don't charge $20, I charge
• 1:17:27
  considerably more than $20 and so those smaller content
• 1:17:32
  creators are going. Yeah, that sounds like, I like
• 1:17:34
  that. I'll listen to that.
• 1:17:36
  And so the choices are starting to be made on whether or not
• 1:17:43
  human beings are worth it. And that's concerning to me.
• 1:17:51
  Oh man, sorry to spin a central crisis for, you know, I already
• 1:17:57
  kind of knew about this fun enough.
• 1:17:59
  I got off a cool earlier today, or I've been, I've been talking
• 1:18:04
  a lot about this with various different businesses lately and,
• 1:18:09
  you know, like I spoke to one business about how it's going to
• 1:18:11
  affect content production as far as writing is concerned.
• 1:18:15
  Oh yeah, I'm very worried about it from here, and I've heard of
• 1:18:19
  instances that what you're talking about.
• 1:18:20
  And one thing I wanted to just ask you about is, have you taken
• 1:18:24
  any action towards that company or person or whoever who cloned
• 1:18:29
  your voice. I mean, I mean because this
• 1:18:32
  raises, Has a very important question and I spoke about this
• 1:18:35
  in the show about 10 episodes ago.
• 1:18:39
  I did a show with a man called Craig Blackmore, who does a lot
• 1:18:43
  of like AI art and stuff like that.
• 1:18:45
  We got on the topic of AI and AI Arts specifically, we were
• 1:18:49
  talking about licensing and he kind of said, like, or enjoy it
• 1:18:52
  while it lasts because eventually going to have to pay
• 1:18:54
  licenses to use. These AI platforms, bring it
• 1:18:58
  back to what we're talking about now.
• 1:19:02
  I mean. Essentially, we're going to have
• 1:19:05
  to like pattern copyright, our voices.
• 1:19:07
  That's the only way you can really get around this.
• 1:19:10
  So that, fortunately, you can't, you cannot copyright or
• 1:19:15
  trademark your voice at least in the states.
• 1:19:20
  Interestingly, there are there are certain agencies who are
• 1:19:27
  starting to take action on this. The EU has an artificial
• 1:19:33
  intelligence. Since it's not a mandate but
• 1:19:35
  it's more like a guideline and the UK is currently working on
• 1:19:43
  directives towards artificial intelligence particularly
• 1:19:46
  generative. AI Here in the States, you can't
• 1:19:50
  trademark or copyright, your voice, it is referred to as an
• 1:19:56
  ineffable or intangible asset. What happened to me?
• 1:20:04
  Was that one of my users on my Discord server, in my community
• 1:20:08
  decided to do it as a test to see how easy it would be.
• 1:20:13
  And they honestly, they did it for the right reasons.
• 1:20:18
  They did it because They wanted people to see just how
• 1:20:21
  incredibly easy it is to do it. Unfortunately, they left me out
• 1:20:25
  of the decision-making Loop. And that's why, you know, it
• 1:20:30
  came off as little ham-fisted and awkward, but I am taking
• 1:20:37
  steps as best I can as Allowed by law and that is I don't
• 1:20:42
  accept work that is full by out. I have people in have people
• 1:20:49
  Express and understanding of my prohibitions on what my voice
• 1:20:53
  can and can't be used for I have and and this is going to sound a
• 1:20:59
  little bit awkward, but I do use these tools myself, I use chat
• 1:21:03
  GTP, I use 11 Labs, I use mid-journey to help with my
• 1:21:10
  content creation because I'm a solo producer and if you know I
• 1:21:15
  in my voice coaching, if somebody needs a an original
• 1:21:19
  Script written, it's fantastic for me to go over to open a, i
• 1:21:24
  and use Chad, TTP, put in a bunch of conditions and say, I
• 1:21:27
  want 160 word script that when read aloud will come in at 28
• 1:21:34
  seconds, and it's about this that and the other thing and and
• 1:21:38
  it shoots out in literal seconds and I proof it and I might make
• 1:21:42
  some changes by way of meter or punctuation, but it saves me.
• 1:21:48
  A lot of time it does but I don't just throw it into
• 1:21:55
  artificial intelligence and say work your magic and then just
• 1:21:59
  use it as is. I'm still trying to use it as a
• 1:22:04
  tool but very famously. There's a Japanese saying that
• 1:22:10
  to every man with a hammer. Everything looks like a nail and
• 1:22:15
  there are going to be people who use artificial intelligence in
• 1:22:21
  ways or for reasons that are less than altruistic.
• 1:22:25
  And so we're in this really weird, uncomfortable place right
• 1:22:29
  now where as is so often the case with technology, we love
• 1:22:33
  what it does. We think it's cool, you know?
• 1:22:37
  And and it's and it's powerful and empowering.
• 1:22:41
  But what part of the technology are you actually aware of?
• 1:22:46
  What part of it listening to you?
• 1:22:49
  I mean, I've got this right here, my phone right here, it's
• 1:22:52
  listening to me all the time. And I've said, that's okay why?
• 1:22:58
  Because if I say no, it won't do all the cool things that I
• 1:23:01
  wanted to do. So I have to give it some of my
• 1:23:05
  permissions to do things. My big thing about the whole AI
• 1:23:10
  issue is one that you were discussing you know about
• 1:23:14
  generative art. A, i who owns the copyright.
• 1:23:17
  Where is the material from did, was their permission to use that
• 1:23:21
  material? And I mean the big thing about
• 1:23:23
  mid-journey is that it's scrapes images off of the internet from
• 1:23:28
  everywhere and it's not really good at like pulling out the
• 1:23:31
  Getty Images logo that of the image that it took and that's a
• 1:23:35
  copyrighted image and so we're running into all these issues of
• 1:23:40
  intellectual property and ownership and I don't know how
• 1:23:45
  it's going. To shake out.
• 1:23:46
  The only thing that I can control is my use of it every
• 1:23:51
  time I use artificial intelligence in my content
• 1:23:55
  creation, I make sure to put a disclaimer that says some
• 1:23:59
  aspects of this production have been assisted with artificial
• 1:24:01
  intelligence tools. But yeah, it's it, we're all in
• 1:24:08
  and I don't know, place right now and again we're all at the
• 1:24:11
  bottom of this curve and this is going to change so rapidly all
• 1:24:15
  our heads are going to spin. So the only thing that we can do
• 1:24:17
  right now is make wise choices as from an it as informative
• 1:24:22
  place, as we possibly can be, which I admit is pretty
• 1:24:26
  confusing right now, but for us, as creators, you know, take the
• 1:24:31
  time, if you're selling something, Thing that's
• 1:24:35
  intrinsic about your person, your voice, your writing and
• 1:24:40
  make a declaration on everything.
• 1:24:41
  You send, every single email. I have now my foot or now
• 1:24:44
  contains the literal paragraph that says, everything that I
• 1:24:49
  prohibit my material being used in.
• 1:24:52
  That's just one bowler between me and somebody else running off
• 1:24:56
  with my voice again. Because now, if I said that and
• 1:25:00
  they kept communicating with me and and, and essentially, De
• 1:25:04
  facto agreed to that. Now, I, at least had legal
• 1:25:07
  recourse to say, you can't do that.
• 1:25:10
  Let's go to court and talk about this, you know, and, and and
• 1:25:14
  settle up, because you were not allowed to do what you did with
• 1:25:17
  my voice. Pause to think about this.
• 1:25:25
  Let's go on a bit of a more fun directions, move a little bit
• 1:25:27
  away from me own for a bit. We can we please I'm so tired of
• 1:25:32
  talking about it. I think is yeah I mean it's to
• 1:25:41
  hear me talk about it. I would just love to talk about
• 1:25:43
  bunnies and kittens though I mean I just something else
• 1:25:47
  please this you know, Eating spaghetti every single night for
• 1:25:50
  three weeks is just kind of gotten old.
• 1:25:53
  Okay, what's the most outrageous or unreasonable request you ever
• 1:25:59
  received from a client for voiceover work.
• 1:26:03
  Go. There's been a bunch.
• 1:26:05
  Yeah. I one of the things that I was
• 1:26:09
  willing to do very early on in my voiceover career was I
• 1:26:13
  developed a very good muscle for saying no.
• 1:26:17
  Yeah. I've had a lot of requests for
• 1:26:20
  odd things there more often than not.
• 1:26:24
  I politely decline. I did get paid This is
• 1:26:30
  tangential to my voiceover business, but I did some
• 1:26:33
  recordings. I did some re-recordings of some
• 1:26:38
  and I'll be careful here. Some famous music by probably
• 1:26:43
  the most famous British band ever where the lyrics were
• 1:26:47
  changed in order to support a different message.
• 1:26:50
  It was a it was a perfectly ethically acceptable message.
• 1:26:54
  But yeah, I sang some did some music work and sang some Stuff.
• 1:27:00
  Weirdly for people who loved it and I was fine.
• 1:27:04
  I think, probably what I have more of is instances where in
• 1:27:10
  negotiation with the client, I discovered that what they were
• 1:27:13
  trying to hire me for was something that I was not
• 1:27:16
  ethically on board with. I have a story in my book that I
• 1:27:21
  wrote the quick and dirty Guide to the home, voice over industry
• 1:27:26
  where I talk about this in it and it was a ridiculous amount
• 1:27:29
  of money. It was a crazy amount of money
• 1:27:32
  and it was a crazy amount of money at a time where crazy
• 1:27:35
  amounts of money would have really helped me out.
• 1:27:37
  But once I discovered what the message was, and who it was
• 1:27:42
  aimed at, I was more than happy to tell him to go pound sand.
• 1:27:47
  I just, I would not put my voice to it and there's a lot of
• 1:27:50
  things that I just refuse to put my voice to, but more often than
• 1:27:55
  not. I don't mind if I'm being paid
• 1:27:59
  to say something that I don't necessarily feel, but I won't
• 1:28:04
  let my voice be used for things that harm people or misinform,
• 1:28:10
  people, or support disinformation those kinds of
• 1:28:14
  things. Yeah, no, I totally agree with
• 1:28:16
  you. I do this quite often because
• 1:28:20
  obviously clients will send over script ideas.
• 1:28:26
  I tend to kind of avoid, for instance, like political stuff,
• 1:28:30
  Every year, it just staff are also things of a sexual mature
• 1:28:34
  nature, which I know is kind of an interesting one because when
• 1:28:39
  you lend your voice to something like that, people wouldn't
• 1:28:41
  necessarily notice your voice and you know, it's just content
• 1:28:44
  its content. But when I look at the way I've
• 1:28:48
  presented by brand so far to then do something like that.
• 1:28:52
  That's so left-field and so far removed from what I present feel
• 1:28:56
  like it presents a conflict of interest, you know, it can come
• 1:29:00
  across that way. I totally understand.
• 1:29:01
  Yeah, yeah, I fully appreciate your perspective on that in your
• 1:29:06
  decisions by now. I think it's important.
• 1:29:08
  Yeah. When you're when you're
• 1:29:09
  beginning to not, just go for anything, it's very tempting to
• 1:29:13
  do so. Oh yeah.
• 1:29:14
  And and I try to educate people on that all the time.
• 1:29:18
  They're the the, the worst time to make a decision about working
• 1:29:23
  on a project as when you feel most desperate.
• 1:29:26
  Yeah, and beginning voice Talent, pretty much always feel
• 1:29:29
  desperate. The You feel desperate for
• 1:29:31
  money, they feel desperate for career, progress or validation.
• 1:29:35
  And yeah, it's it's, it's hard to say no when you're first
• 1:29:40
  starting out because you just want to work, you just want to
• 1:29:42
  do something that you can point to and say I did that.
• 1:29:45
  That's my voice and it can be really challenging to say no.
• 1:29:51
  I could ask you questions all day but I got a wine this down.
• 1:29:55
  I can't take all of your time. So from a couple of final
• 1:29:58
  questions, completely unrelated to everything.
• 1:30:00
  We've been discussed in today by ask every single one of my
• 1:30:02
  guests. I'm good.
• 1:30:04
  Go, what's the best advice you've ever received?
• 1:30:08
  If you're going to blow your life up, blow it up in such a
• 1:30:12
  way that at an absolute minimum. You can stand back and go.
• 1:30:17
  Wow! Would you look at that sucker
• 1:30:18
  burn? Look at that.
• 1:30:20
  That's beautiful. And that is that is
• 1:30:24
  honest-to-god advice that I got from my college philosophy.
• 1:30:28
  Professor who is a dear friend of mine and is on my podcast,
• 1:30:34
  which is called keep your hat on.
• 1:30:36
  And yeah, that's the reason why I moved out to the West Coast
• 1:30:40
  literally overnight. See you say that.
• 1:30:43
  That is an inspiring message but what I hear is, hey if you're
• 1:30:46
  gonna fuck up, make sure you really fuck up.
• 1:30:48
  Oh yeah, at least it's going to be entertaining to look at I
• 1:30:53
  guess I always look on the bright side of life.
• 1:31:02
  What's the biggest life lesson you've learned so far?
• 1:31:08
  The little tiny things in life are the absolute biggest deal.
• 1:31:14
  And don't look away. Don't look away from your life,
• 1:31:19
  observe your life, be active and be an active participant in your
• 1:31:24
  own life. Don't just let it be a movie on
• 1:31:26
  the screen. Be a player in your own life.
• 1:31:31
  This expanded a little bit. See, do you mean kind of live in
• 1:31:33
  the moment and analyze every decision you make and stuff?
• 1:31:38
  Or is it more than a? Well, you can see over my
• 1:31:42
  shoulder there, I got a Buddha I've been a practicing Zen
• 1:31:44
  Buddhist for about 25 years and you know, the term mindfulness
• 1:31:50
  is a very, very she topic. It's been beaten to death in the
• 1:31:55
  last 10 or so years but the the core wisdom of it too.
• 1:32:01
  Experience your life from moment to moment.
• 1:32:04
  BB in that, and be aware of it, not analyzing experience.
• 1:32:10
  It experience it as it happens because I just turned 55 and it
• 1:32:16
  felt like I was 22 yesterday. But as time moves on as time
• 1:32:21
  moves forward, it goes faster and faster and faster.
• 1:32:25
  And if you are just a passive Observer of your life, your So
• 1:32:31
  now that all the magic you're missing out on all those little
• 1:32:33
  moments of just watching a Hummingbird at a hummingbird,
• 1:32:38
  feeder, or seeing the smile in a friend's eyes, when they walk
• 1:32:44
  into view and they see you, those are the greatest rewards
• 1:32:49
  of life and they're the most beautiful poignant powerful
• 1:32:52
  moments and because this dumb thing keeps on making noises and
• 1:32:57
  makes you look at it all the time.
• 1:33:00
  What are you missing? Thank you so much for sharing.
• 1:33:06
  As we draw things to a close for today's shows you have any
• 1:33:08
  upcoming projects or some final thoughts that you'd like to
• 1:33:11
  share with our listeners. Well, I'll just run down the
• 1:33:14
  places where you can come see me if you want to.
• 1:33:18
  Again, I host a four-person podcast.
• 1:33:21
  It's a fully multi-camera, produced podcast on YouTube,
• 1:33:24
  with an audio component called. Keep your hat on on the
• 1:33:27
  narrowband broadcast network. That is available on YouTube.
• 1:33:30
  Just search, keep your hat on nbb.
• 1:33:33
  And we constantly fight with, if you search, keep your hat on
• 1:33:38
  Joe. Cocker comes up all the time
• 1:33:40
  because of his famous song. You Can Leave Your Hat on, but
• 1:33:43
  you can find a stair. You can also find us over at KY
• 1:33:47
  H, 0 podcast.com. That's our webpage.
• 1:33:51
  As I said, if you're interested in voiceover Voice, work
• 1:33:55
  voiceover technology. You can find me on YouTube at at
• 1:34:00
  the vo Booth camp or you can. Find me.
• 1:34:04
  You can find that also at the vo Booth camp, or excuse me.
• 1:34:07
  I'm going to get my own URL wrong again, at the vo Booth dot
• 1:34:13
  Camp. That's the webpage for it and
• 1:34:17
  no, just this is who I am. This is what I do and I love
• 1:34:20
  helping people. So if anybody ever has any
• 1:34:23
  questions about home, Voice work, or anything of that
• 1:34:26
  nature, you can always get a hold of me directly at Andrew
• 1:34:29
  at. I'm just going to give you my My
• 1:34:33
  cuz I've got like, 37, email addresses.
• 1:34:36
  You can always just get ahold of me at Andrew at, Andrew Scott,
• 1:34:39
  media.com Awesome. I spend an absolute pleasure.
• 1:34:45
  Thank you so much for being on the show.
• 1:34:46
  It's been a treat Christian. I really appreciate you having
• 1:34:49
  me on and I'm happy to come back on again because I imagine we
• 1:34:52
  probably have four shows worth of work to talk about.
• 1:34:55
  Oh yeah, I didn't I didn't even ask you like a quarter of what I
• 1:35:01
  had planned today, but I have had a absolutely amazing time.
• 1:35:06
  So, thank you really please. Thank you again.
• 1:35:08
  I really appreciate it. And to all the listeners of the
• 1:35:11
  Christian Grey podcast as always, thank you for listening.
• 1:35:14
  Be safe. Be well and I'll see you in the
• 1:35:17
  next one.