Latest / How To Protect The Ocean / From TikTok to Impact: How Erica Hernandez is Inspiring Change for the Ocean

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From TikTok to Impact: How Erica Hernandez is Inspiring Change for the Ocean · How To Protect The Ocean

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Are you interested in speaking up for the ocean on social media? you're going
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to want to watch this episode because I have Erica Hernandez who is a
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personality on TikTok that I love to watch. She talks about
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climate, she talks about environmental science, she talks about wildlife conservation,
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she talks a lot and it's great and it's really wonderful
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to see how she's progressed over the years. She started talking
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about it over two years ago and has really developed
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a great account, lots of views on
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her videos and she's kind of looking at different ways to
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do environmental messaging. And we talked to her about that. I talked to her about that
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on this episode. And I'm really excited to share that because
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I'm hoping that people who are maybe thinking about starting
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a channel or a profile or what have you, you
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know, can take this and take some advice from from Erica and
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myself on this. We had a great conversation and to say, hey, you know what? I'm
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going to start one, too. I'm going to start a profile, a TikTok account, an Instagram page
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or start talking on YouTube or whatever that might be, podcasts, and
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be able to check that out and see what can come out of that, see how
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your life changed with that. But we're gonna talk about that on today's episode of the
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How to Protect the Ocean podcast. Let's start the show. Hey
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everybody, welcome back to another exciting episode of the How to Protect the Ocean podcast. I'm
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your host, Andrew Lewin, and this is the podcast where you find out what's happening with the ocean, how
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you can speak up for the ocean, and what you can do to live for a better ocean by
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taking action. And today we're gonna be talking about speaking up
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for the ocean, something that I love to talk about, science
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communication. It's probably one of the most important things in conservation, in my
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opinion, and it's the reason why I started this podcast, because
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people that I talk to just around my own life, like my
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own circles, my family, my friends, didn't really know a lot about
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what was happening in the ocean. And they would come to me and ask me great questions, but
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I was like, why aren't more people talking about the ocean? I just realized at
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the time when I started, there weren't a lot of resources to find out about
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the ocean. There's a lot of competition for information these days. So
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I started a podcast that you're listening to right now, and now
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you have a resource to talk about ocean news or to hear about ocean news and
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how to talk about it and all that kind of stuff. So if you're interested in starting some
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kind of profile, whether it be a TikTok account, an
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Instagram account, a podcast, a YouTube channel. This
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is, as I said before, this is the episode for you because Erica
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Hernandez, who has a profile on TikTok, talks
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about environmental science, climate change, all those great issues
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that we need more information on. She talks on
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today's episode about why she started it, how she started it, how her
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message has evolved, how her confidence has been building over
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the last two years with each and every video. We talk about
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followers, we talk about commenters and how to deal with them, just
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a lot of different things that has to do with social media. And I think it's really
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important because it's such an important tool. And I know a
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lot of people talk about being on social media, how it's bad for
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you. But wouldn't it be great if there's more great content on
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there? And I think that's really important. Erica does provide that great content. It's
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information. It's something that you can use. It's not only just on, you
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know, this endangered species or that endangered species or this
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wildlife habitat. It has to do with just like how people can
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live by living just a little bit better for the planet,
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a little bit better for the ocean by buying clothes, like through thrifting,
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by just having a better lifestyle, a more sustainable lifestyle. Not that
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it's perfect. Nobody's perfect. Erika even mentions that she does this
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sort of imperfect kind of way of living. And I think it's really important to share
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that and to share how people can do to get better and
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what people do for a better, how people can live for a better planet. So
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with that said, here is the interview with Erika Hernandez talking
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about her TikTok account and her science communication. Enjoy the
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interview and I will talk to you after. Hey, Erika, welcome to
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the How to Protect the Ocean podcast. Are you ready to talk about science communication?
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Nice. I love it. Look, this is exciting. I have been watching
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your TikTok account for quite some time. You are
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talking about climate change. You were talking about the environment. And
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it's a really interesting platform to be on because you
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can go like mega viral at times, sometimes just 10 views,
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a couple hundred views, but you're getting that constant connection
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with your audience. And that's what I really wanna talk about today, answering
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questions from the audience and so forth, but really how you got to pick all
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that up and what your plans are in the future for this wonderful
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platform as well as just science communication in general. So
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we're gonna get into all that, but before we do, Erica, why don't you just let
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Okay. My name is Erica. I'm 23. I have
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a degree in environmental science and a geology minor. I went
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to Appalachian State. And I'm currently going
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to work as a environmental justice organizer and researcher for
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Clean Water for NC. And I'm excited about that. And
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I've always just had an interest in environmentalism. I feel like it
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really sparked when I was in third grade. And the way it
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Just saw a forest just totally cut down and I don't know something in
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me clicked and I felt like I had to fix something like me like me personally like
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it's such a So
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you had like so what did people come into your classroom like did you
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have people like from an organization come into your classroom and talk about
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you know different things you can get take part of or like plastic or
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Anything that had to do with the environment. Is that what you had or was this your teachers that were
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I feel like for teachers, they started talking more about climate change
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probably in middle school, but what
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really got me into it was just seeing that forest and I just
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wanted to do more with them. I was just thinking of like the
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wildlife conservation, like where did the animals go? How do they
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adapt to human activity and how it's progressing over
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time? In
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high school, when we were applying to colleges, I was gonna go undecided
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because I really didn't know what I wanted. But then I forgot,
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like I had that spark. I'm like, environmental science. I feel like that's what
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Yeah, they say your inner your inner child has all the answers you need.
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So I'm like, okay, my inner child wanted this. And I still
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I love it. I love it. Now. So going to Appalachian State,
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you're, you know, it's kind of discovering environmental science, right? Because,
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you know, you're going back and thinking, like, what can I do? What were your
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ideas as you're going through college, like maybe
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at the beginning compared to at the end of how you're sort of image
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change of what you could do in conservation or
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Well, like a lot of college students, when they first go in, they're kind of naive.
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And I knew the climate crisis and like human
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activity, environmentalism was depressing. But I didn't know it was that
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depressing when I started going into it and learning more about it. And a
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lot of the times I kind of wanted to just switch my majors because I just
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I don't know. I don't I can handle it. But I did always wanted
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to lean more towards wildlife conservation. And I'm
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still not where I am where I want to do that at the moment, but hopefully in the future. But
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like I said, there's so many topics
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within the environmental sector, climate change, environmental science.
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It's very broad, which is one thing I love about it because it's
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a very diverse degree. And
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I remember thinking when I was about to graduate, I'm like, I feel like this is this
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degree is not going to help me. I feel like it's not worth it. But my my
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advisor, like my teacher, she said, no, no, no, no, no. This is a very good
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degree. And it's it's actually growing field, I believe, like a
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lot of companies are trying to be more green and they really need
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environmental scientists. And I feel like every
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job can be a climate job if you use what you know to help
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Well, I mean, you know, as you and I know, climate change affects
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everything we do. And it doesn't matter if you're a marine scientist,
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a wildlife biologist, an environmental scientist, or you own
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a business. You're impacted by climate change. Your business is impacted by
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climate change. Supply chains are impacted. Everything is impacted. We
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can't get away from it. And I think a lot of people try to deny it so they don't
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have to worry about it out of sight, out of mind. But we know now it's
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definitely not out of sight, and it's on our minds quite a
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bit. It's interesting how you're talking about
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how you thought you were going to switch out, or you thought about switching out,
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because a lot of the things are heavy. A
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lot of the issues are heavy, and there is no real
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like switch to be like, if we just, you know, flip this switch, we're
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going to be fine. It's a lot heavier. Do you remember
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some of the, some of the issues that really got
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Yes. I feel like for me, it's more endangered species.
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And I remember in one of my classes, you can't save all of them. And
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like essentially how biologists, I'm
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not sure who, but the way that they decide on which
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species deserves more protection is what they offer in
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a way. Like, do you know what I mean? It's like, okay, which one brings
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more money to us? Like, that's, I was like, when I heard
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about that, I'm like, that was, that's kind of depressing, because you really can't save all the
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species. And that's what I want to do. But obviously, you
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can't, but you can try. And I think another one, I
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feel like would be just Displacement because not everyone has
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can just pick up and leave where they were is better. Some
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people are gonna Suffer and I remember watching this they
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showed us a documentary and I tried to look for it again on youtube But I couldn't find
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it and it was titled the island that disappeared and it was some
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natives from an island that essentially sea level rise just kept getting
9:59
worse and worse and they were basically not being heard and
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essentially they just hadn't deal with the consequences and
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It is. I mean, if you think about people actually having to leave their
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homes and leave their land that they've been living
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there for who knows how long, hundreds of years, you
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know, like multiple centuries, it's really depressing
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when you think about it. We don't think about it here in North America as
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much. because it doesn't impact us
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or it has impact family members as of yet. But there's definitely going
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to be times in the future where people on the coastline are
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going to have to move and they're going to have to try and sell
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their homes, not going to be able to, and they're going to have to move
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to a different spot. And they are going to be what we're going to consider
10:46
climate refugees because they weren't, they had to move with nothing because their
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homes are flooded or they can't sell. and they move. The
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ones that can sell are gonna be, or that are okay with leaving the
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home are gonna be like the super rich. And that's the people who don't really
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care and they have most of the power. So it's frustrating and
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depressing when you hear about that. But
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what made you, you know, like that's enough for a lot of people to
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turn off. Just like I know from my case with science communication,
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I started a YouTube channel when I was like maybe 24, 15, 14 years ago. And
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I remember one of my gym owner was like, yeah, I started watching your videos. And
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I got depressed because you talked a lot about some depressing things. So
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I stopped watching it. And I was like, oh, that's interesting to learn, you
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know, like in terms of how you communicate that. But what was
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it that really kept you in it? Because I can understand a lot of people leaving the
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field even while you're learning because you're in college. You're like, I want to make sure
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that I'm going to be happy with my job. I don't want to have to
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watch all these species leave. What made you stay in
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If I'm being so honest, I feel like it was the Lorax movie,
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Yeah. But it makes me cry every time. It's like, unless someone like you
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cares and hold off a lot, things aren't going to get better. It's really not. And I
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know because they say like, I clearly believe there's power in numbers.
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And if we're being realistic, one person can make a difference, but it can only
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do so much. But still, if everyone had that mindset, I
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feel like things really could turn around for
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the better. And yeah, I even have a sticker of
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it on my laptop. It literally has a quote, unless someone like you cares. Yeah,
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but that movie, I feel like it's really special to me. And I'm
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hoping the future doesn't look like that in the end where people forget about
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it. But it does leave some
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hope for the future. And I feel like, for me,
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I try not to let climate doomism get to me, because that
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gets a lot of people. And I know what it feels like to have climate doomism
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and just to give up and be like, all right, I'm just waiting for Mother Nature to kill us
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100%, I agree. I agree completely. It's really interesting. My
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kids grew up on that movie too. They're teenagers now. They love,
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they still go back and watch that movie. And it's like, there's some hard parts
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in it when you think about it. Cause for me, especially, I relate, I see
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it happening in real life and it's not a far-fetched
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story. Maybe sort of like what's happened in
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the movie is far-fetched. Maybe, hopefully, but
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just the message of it, if
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everybody has their own voice, they all stand up, you can change. I
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think that's really empowering because I think we've seen
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that with Climate change already, you know,
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we saw the the climate strikes happen and we saw starting
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off with you know One or two kids or three kids or four kids
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and then starts to you know Grow and grow and then we had millions
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of people around the world start to say hey like we
13:49
need change here You know all the people who are in charge aren't changing. They're
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denying climate change all this kind of stuff and And we know
13:55
it's real and so we need to do something. And now if you look at many governments,
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although they can be criticized of not acting fast enough.
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a lot of them, like 10 years ago, weren't doing anything. And
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now they've got these major plans to do something. And like
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I said, they're not perfect by any means, but we're seeing those changes. And
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I do believe it's because people are standing up and people are starting to mobilize
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and empower themselves to be like, look, yeah, I know I'm one person, but if
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everybody starts to talk, we all know the feeling. And
14:25
so we're starting to see governments change and we're starting to see that representation start
14:28
to kind of fill out for people who are more, who are going to be more affected. and
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who are being affected right now. So I love that. I love the movie. I'm like, yeah,
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this is it. This is the movie that's gonna kind of keep me into it. That's
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awesome. Now you did a minor in geology. Why geology?
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I have to know. I think it's a great field, complicated
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and complex in terms of what you're learning and stuff, but why, those
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are two big things to learn about, you know, major environmental science, minor
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in geology, very, you know, they mesh together quite
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Um, I'm not sure because I, when I was younger, younger,
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I also wanted to do paleontology and I could kind of get a little bit
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of taste with that because, um, I could have
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gotten. I could have chose to get a degree in like some paleontology, but
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that's too much for me. I don't know if I wanted it
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that bad. But yeah, when I got my degree in
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environmental science, I focused on life science. And then I
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got a geology minor because I could get a
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little bit of both. Because they do go well together. And I
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Love it. I love that. And so that
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was more of like, it's a fun thing to learn, obviously usable in
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a lot of different fields as you go. So when you graduated, you've
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got your life ahead of you. You've got your undergrad degree. What
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were you thinking? What kind of area did you want to go? Because even environmental science
15:54
is still quite a broad field to learn from.
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Well, I was applying to jobs and I did get job offers, but the thing was
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they were in cities a bit away and I kind of needed to
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save up money at the moment to get an apartment. So as
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soon as I graduated, I just was an environmental educator at
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a local camp. And I did that for a few months and I loved it. And
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then I worked as a restoration technician. And
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now here I am starting about to start my new job, my big girl job.
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Like if you think about three very different jobs
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if you think about like the context, right Obviously
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this one you the environmental justice one is gonna be new so
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you haven't done that one yet out of the other two Which ones did you prefer
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Yeah, it was a very because um, I it was like during outdoor education
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season so it was like four or five months and
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essentially it was mainly elementary middle
17:05
school kids but often on the weekends there would be conference groups that
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they would do their own little things but sometimes like we would do like environmental
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lessons for them and and I loved like we talked about water ecology, forest
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ecology, the water cycle, things like that and also like having
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fun which which I thought it was fun because I was still using it's
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still kind of related it did relate to what I studied and
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I During my undergrad, I also had
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two internships. One was an outreach, and it was mainly for elementary school
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kids as well, and then a research one. But the
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one I enjoyed most was the outreach internship, because like
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a lot of people say, or the cliche saying, kids are the future. And
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what they know, they're going to end up carrying on with them in
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the future years. And surprisingly, a lot of the kids do
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Well, I mean, it worked for you, right? Yeah. If you go back to grade
17:58
three, you're like, yeah, that's, uh, you know, that's what I kind of wanted to do. And
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I agree. I think that's one of the most important things to do. I think as
18:05
science communicators now as well is this to
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the people, whether it doesn't matter what age group at this
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point, obviously young kids are, it's like an investment, right? You're investing into
18:15
the future of education. So they don't come up and. You
18:19
know, just learn or listen to anything that's said
18:22
that's wrong and then they believe that. You know, you want them to
18:26
understand science, you want them to understand nature and what
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it can do, the potential, but also the consequence that
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we can have if we start to disturb it too much like we're doing now. So
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it's always great to see that. One
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thing you mentioned too about, you know, you had job offers that were away from
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where you lived. I think that's a really interesting point because
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I find I've had this a lot of times too. You know, growing up in Canada, there's
18:49
a lot of jobs in the US. They offer you the job, you're
18:53
like, okay, this is great. But then you're like, I'm far from
18:56
home, you know, and you got to look at lifestyle, you got to look at,
19:00
you know, what you want in terms of in the future, how
19:03
you want to live your life. I think a lot of us, especially in marine biology,
19:07
for me, You know, you have to grow up along a coastline, or you have to
19:10
live along a coastline. And for me, my family's in Ontario, where
19:14
we have freshwater coastlines, but not ocean coastlines. And I
19:17
chose to stay here, even though it was going to be challenging for my position in
19:21
the future. But this is what came out of
19:24
it, was this podcast. But a lot of the jobs, they wouldn't
19:28
offer enough to live in that city. You know like it was it was and
19:31
it's like how do you expect me to survive or I'm not sure if
19:34
you came across this but the jobs weren't full-time they
19:37
were like a few months here or a few months there or maybe a
19:40
year or a year and a half and that's a very difficult thing
19:45
when you start to look at trying to live somewhere
19:49
or trying to build a life somewhere. I don't think some of these organizations think
19:52
about that. It's probably due to funding and how long the funding
19:56
is, but I find that's a really difficult thing to
19:59
process when you first start out. I'm curious to hear
20:04
your opinion on that type of building
20:09
I agree. And especially within like the environmental sector, a lot of jobs are
20:13
seasonal or it's based on funding or they're really,
20:16
really competitive because they're just really competitive to
20:19
get into. And I feel like that's not talked about enough. And I was
20:23
grateful enough to have job opportunities and eventually get a job. And
20:27
especially now, because apparently the job market is really bad right now. And
20:31
I thought it because I remember when I was applying like
20:35
a few months ago when I was at my job I was like, okay cuz I knew I was there for just
20:39
a little bit of time just to save money Yeah, I was trying to
20:42
fly and I kept getting interviews, but then they just ghosted me I'm like is it me
20:46
but then I'm like no it's it's it's a lot of people and I
20:49
It's harsh out there right now. It's harsh. Yeah, it's a hard
20:53
one. So when did you start getting the,
20:57
I'm gonna pick up my phone and start talking about the environment bug?
21:01
When did that really start to hit you and
21:07
I think my first environmental TikTok was
21:11
talking about why blue whales are my favorite. That was
21:15
like, that was almost two years ago, I think. And I don't
21:18
know, because I do remember actually the time when I was like, okay, I want to I
21:21
want to make content about environmentalism. And
21:24
I told my boyfriend, I want to do it. You have
21:28
the technology, you have the knowledge, go ahead and try it. And I'm
21:32
really glad I did because, like I said, I know my following is
21:35
small, but I have screenshots of every time someone Messaged
21:40
me on there saying hey, thank you so much. I love your content.
21:44
It gives me. Hope please don't stop posting I hope
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one day you get like a million like stuff like that and and it makes me
21:50
feel good to post like for me I love posting because I love it
21:53
myself, but yeah and other people loving it. It's just like a bonus
21:59
Well, look, I'm here. You're just shy about 4000 followers on
22:03
TikTok. And but I'm looking at
22:06
like your videos. And like, I've done stuff on TikTok,
22:10
not nearly as good as your content, in my opinion, but you
22:14
have like quite a few views on these videos, like you're averaging
22:17
probably around like, you know, five to
22:21
800 on average, and then every once in a while, I see like a
22:26
10,000, or a 1,000, or 5,000. I think your
22:29
highest is, what, I see one here for
22:34
74,000 views on this one video, and this is weekly
22:38
positive climate views. I love these.
22:43
And you have another one where you have 200,000. I didn't even realize it, it was right beside
22:46
it. When
22:50
you first started out to now, how have things evolved
22:56
My messaging? I think my first, in
23:00
terms of positive climate news, my first one posted, I put positive environmental
23:04
news. And I probably should go back to that because some of the news I post on climate isn't
23:08
really under the climate. It's a little more broad. Gotcha. But
23:12
because I know like the TikTok algorithm changes too, and
23:15
that's not really on the creator's fault. And I'm trying to find Different
23:20
I guess how I make my content is I think what
23:24
would I want to see in my for you page? I know every now and then I do some lifestyle videos
23:28
and I just usually just make content on what I don't see
23:31
as much a lot of people post like Some positive climate
23:35
news and they have their own way of doing it and the way I do it I just do
23:38
like pictures and so I just keep it short and sweet and
23:42
then some of my followers say you should try talking about them instead and
23:45
I'm like maybe I Maybe I might do that in
23:52
Well, and I think, I mean, one good thing about being a scientist,
23:56
which we both are, is you're okay with experimenting, right?
24:00
Like, I mean, you put up, everybody's gonna have an opinion
24:03
on what they'd like to see, and I think that's good. I think, you know, trying different things, and
24:07
if somebody suggests something and you're willing to do it, or
24:10
you're willing to try it, or you have the time to try it, because a
24:13
lot of these things are not easy to put together, as I've noticed.
24:19
I think it's interesting to experiment. Even
24:22
like you said, to put these climate news where you put a picture and you just kind of swipe
24:26
across for the different climate news, which is great because
24:30
it's almost like you read articles and you're like, here's some cool climate
24:33
news you should know about. You just summarize them so people are like, oh, this is
24:37
nice because this is the positive stuff. that you we
24:40
see and it's like sometimes it's like oh you know another couple of
24:43
countries signed on to you know like it
24:47
could be like the ocean treaty say or or what have you right it's just really
24:50
cool stuff that people are like oh that's nice to know that's nice to know and
24:53
they could share that with other people who knows or they could repost it or or
24:56
what have you, right? I find, though, a lot of people will have suggestions on
25:00
the way to do things, and I know we feel pressure to do them, but then you're just like,
25:03
well, I like doing my own stuff. You know, it works within my workflow,
25:07
because, like I said, sometimes it takes a long time to do it, but it's really
25:11
cool. And one thing I really noticed, too, is you put
25:14
in sort of your, like you kind of mentioned, your lifestyle into
25:17
here, right? And one of your most recent videos is
25:21
your thrift clothes. Yeah, it's kind
25:25
of cool. You have like a fun style to your clothes. I
25:28
don't know anything about style, right? I'm a, I'm a 46 year old dad,
25:32
but you have, you like, you show off your, you like, it's almost
25:35
like a get ready with me or like, Hey, look what I got. And these
25:38
are like nice looking clothes. And you're like, this was thrifted. This
25:41
was thrifted. This was thrifted. Do you find people get surprised at what you
25:54
Yeah, for sure. I remember I got
25:57
a comment, I posted another type of thrifting video, and I was like, oh my gosh,
26:00
you have such good luck. But it's funny because I go through every
26:04
rack and I search everything, and I feel like people that say,
26:07
oh, I never find anything, they're just like, Like, you'd be surprised how
26:11
much good stuff is at the thrift stores. And personally, I don't like
26:14
to buy, even though it's from the thrift store, I try to avoid fast
26:18
fashion brands because they usually don't last long regardless. And for
26:21
me, I just like finding brands that are a little older just to have a little more sense
26:24
of No one else is going to have this. It makes me feel like more unique
26:32
I like really colorful clothes and I
26:37
recently was starting thinking maybe I should start dressing my age, but I'm like, So
26:41
far, I'm still gonna have my little style, but that's a problem
26:46
You know, but what do you mean by dressing your age? I'm curious
26:49
about that. Like, is it you want to dress, you know, quote unquote, more
26:53
like more like professional or is it like, what
26:56
is that? Because I, because I feel like you've got a good style, you know,
27:00
it's professional or not, or fine. Like not everybody dresses professional
27:04
every day, you know what I mean? Like, yeah, I'm just curious,
27:09
I guess probably yeah, like more professional or maybe it's
27:13
because we're like social media gets to us be
27:16
like, um, like, why are you like, or like where they say, Oh my gosh, my
27:19
frontal lobe is developing. I no longer find that
27:24
Because I mean, my, my, my style, I don't, I
27:28
don't really wear that much crop tops anymore. You know, just things
27:31
like that. And I do have some professional clothing, but I
27:39
Not many people do. I mean, people like to be relaxed and
27:42
they like to be comfortable in their clothes. And sometimes the professional clothes is
27:45
not as, like, I know that, like when I wear a suit, I'm not as comfortable as if I'm
27:48
wearing. You know, like a nice pair of pants, like even jeans
27:52
or something like that, that makes me feel comfortable, right? So
27:56
it's interesting though, too. The reason why I asked is because I remember having
27:59
somebody on because I was, I had never thrifted before and I was trying to figure
28:03
out what it all meant. This was a couple of years ago. I've now started to
28:06
do that. But a lot of like the person I had on
28:09
the interview, she was saying that she actually buys a lot of her that
28:14
she goes to conferences with and she spends like less than $100 on
28:17
an outfit or maybe even a couple of outfits. And
28:21
then she goes to these professional conferences and people are like complimenting her
28:25
on, you know, her styles and what she's wearing and things. And she's like,
28:28
yeah, this was, I didn't, I barely spent any money on this. Not only that, but
28:31
I know the clothes are used and it's better for the environment and all this kind of stuff. So
28:35
I think a lot of people like, I think this is kind of a thing now. I
28:39
know in my city, we're starting to see more thrift stores pop up
28:43
that have a lot of different styles and a lot of different brands. My
28:46
kids like to do it as well. But they kind of search as
28:50
well. You have to kind of search for that. I know what you mean
28:53
by that. It's like search for that unique kind of material. So I
28:56
I'm really glad for like secondhand fashion
29:00
is getting popularity, especially like we even have apps now like Depop
29:04
and whatnot. And I usually go on there too if I'm looking for something specific.
29:09
But yeah, I feel like a lot of people are into thrifting. I
29:12
know, I don't know if it's because people do it because it's in now because I
29:16
remember thrifting used to be looked down upon a few years ago, like it was
29:19
like, like, you're poor or like, ill. Like,
29:22
I don't know, but now people are like, oh my gosh, like, look at me, I'm thrifting. But I've
29:27
So yeah, I think I used to see it because it used
29:31
to be like, you know, like a value village or a goodwill that
29:34
we have up here, where it was, it was for people who couldn't afford clothes.
29:37
So they went and they got used clothes, and you would donate your your used
29:41
clothes there. But now I see a lot more stores popping up like saying no,
29:44
no, here we are. It's like a thrift store. It's like this is you know, come for these
29:47
types of brands or what have you and you see a lot more
29:51
kids who are doing it and young adults who are doing it and it feels
29:55
like the fashion plus like... things are expensive, so it
29:58
makes sense to be able to buy something that's cheap but still quality
30:02
made, which is nice to see. And I'll be honest, I try
30:05
to look for new clothes that are environmentally friendly, and they
30:08
are crazy expensive. Like shirts that go
30:12
for, like T-shirts that go for like $30, $40, and it's like, I
30:15
can't afford that. I can't spend that on a T-shirt. There's no way.
30:19
But anyway, that's good. So in terms of the messaging for,
30:24
you know, what you do on, like when you do, is it just TikTok that you do
30:30
I do post on Instagram occasionally, but it's usually the same
30:36
posts, specifically the ones I make on Canva and every now and then I
30:39
do post stories about like important environmental issues that are going around,
30:42
but mainly TikTok is where I post at. And I'm thinking of,
30:46
recently I was starting to think of Maybe posting on
30:50
YouTube because I did have a YouTube channel before but that was more like me But
31:00
That's where people are. I mean, I don't know how many users it has now. It's
31:03
got to be over a billion And you know not
31:07
knowing what's gonna happen in the future with tick-tock in the US and other places
31:10
I mean, it's kind of interesting to see this platform
31:14
grow and evolve. So now like
31:17
from the beginning when you first started a couple years ago posting to now
31:21
how is your social media like messaging and like
31:34
I feel like I'm still on I mean,
31:37
it looks like I'm confident, but my videos, like there's so
31:40
many tries I do, or I stutter and I have to like edit. I'm
31:44
like, I don't know why I cannot speak. But I
31:48
feel like I've gotten better a little bit at editing. Recently, I've started using
31:51
CapCut. And by recently, I mean, like literally four days ago. Because recently,
31:56
because I was just editing on the app itself and the CapCut. It's
32:02
A little bit cap cup is a little I feel like a little more difficult
32:09
Yeah, I'm trying to get the use hang of it and
32:13
The message explain a little more me. I'm not getting it like my messaging. How
32:18
Well, the confidence is a thing to like, you know, like I know for me when
32:21
I first started I had huge imposter syndrome, right? So when
32:25
I first started and I would say stuff I wouldn't even tell people that I published a
32:28
podcast I would just and see who was listening and see
32:32
how many. If I had a lot of people, I'd be like, ugh, I'm not sure. Because like when
32:35
I started, even like started, like
32:38
I started with a website and a YouTube channel and then I went to podcasting because
32:42
it was easier for me. But when I first started, I was very worried about
32:45
being called out. And like scientists weren't talking about
32:49
the work that they were doing. Because there was no incentive to do so. And there was
32:52
almost a disincentive because people would take what you had and they would cut
32:56
it to what they wanted to. So if you talked about climate change, people
33:00
like it or you did an interview about climate change, people would mess up your, the journalists,
33:04
if you call them that, some of them, they would mess up your words,
33:07
they wouldn't manipulate your words. So a lot of scientists didn't have trust in
33:11
talking to mainstream media. And, and so
33:14
when I first started the podcast, the whole point was not to cut anything out,
33:18
not to edit that to not to manipulate it so that people would feel comfortable. and
33:22
to get cool stories out. But I was so worried that scientists would
33:26
be like, what are you doing? You're not supposed to be doing this. People are going
33:29
to attack you all the time. And I realized after a while that people weren't
33:32
attacking me. And other scientists supported me so much that they would come on.
33:35
And then they're like, we're having so much fun. You should talk to this person. And you should talk to this person.
33:39
And this person is doing it cool. And then I just started to get more and more people coming
33:42
to chat. And I think through that, through getting that acceptance, And
33:47
comments back being like, hey, like, you know, you changed my
33:50
life, or I'm really glad I never had this. I never knew about
33:53
this before. And that kind of built my confidence. Now
33:57
where it's like, I feel guilty if I don't post an episode, because
34:00
I'm like that person who's who could learn about this, or I'll read an
34:04
article like, oh, that's not that important. And I'm like, No, it probably is
34:07
probably important for somebody. And so I'll
34:10
do an episode on it and I'll publish it. And then somebody responds like, I'm
34:13
so glad you did that episode. I'm like, ah, I knew it.
34:17
But sometimes you're into it so much that you're
34:21
like, oh, I've seen that so many times. People don't want to
34:24
talk about that. Then I'm like, Once I publish it, people are
34:27
like, I didn't know about this. And you're like, oh my god. OK, so it's still worth it.
34:30
So my confidence in the material and what to publish
34:34
has changed from feeling like I'm an imposter in
34:37
this field and not knowing what I'm talking about to trying
34:41
to serve somebody by providing information for
34:44
that person. And so it's less of about me and more about the
34:47
audience that I have. So I've got a little bit more confident in what I'm
34:55
I feel the same way, in a way, actually. I posted
35:00
a TikTok about vultures a few days ago, and then someone commented today,
35:06
That's the video that happens all the time. I had to turn mine
35:10
I was like, where did those balloons come
35:14
Yeah, so if you do like if you move your hands, and like it looks like a celebration
35:18
balloons and celebration. Do you like a heart shape
35:25
Essentially, they just said, Oh my gosh, I didn't know about
35:28
this. Thank you. I learned so much from you. And yeah, I just I just
35:31
like spreading information and Environmental communications, it's
35:35
like a good bridge between like the science and the community. And
35:39
I feel like that's not what there is a lot of. So I like
35:43
doing it to what I can in a way. And I like speaking on topics that
35:48
Yeah, for sure. So what topics do you think? Like, what
35:55
Uh, well, like I said before, I like talking about like different animals
35:58
and species every now and then I do like it's like it's blank day and I talk about that
36:01
animal. Uh, definitely the positive climate news. Cause I've, I've
36:05
been doing that continuously for like a year and
36:08
a half now. And I haven't missed a single week, even
36:11
though the views don't bother me. I know some days, like I don't get that many views. Like
36:15
I'm still going to post them because some people still like seeing them
36:18
and I like seeing them too. And those, those videos I
36:21
like doing and just. If there's like
36:25
a local or like issue, environmental issue
36:28
that I know about or I'm aware of to a good knowledge, I usually speak
36:32
out on that as well. And I was thinking of doing a TikTok. I
36:35
think I think in Texas there was like a chemical power
36:42
Yeah, I think I think I think that happened this morning and I'm like, uh, that's
36:46
bad yeah, well, I'll be honest one of the reasons actually
36:49
we connected and I never told anybody at the beginning was you
36:53
did a Story on the Florida State Parks recently.
36:58
Maybe like three fourth four weeks ago. Yeah, I and you're talking about how you
37:01
know that the the state wanted to be able to build or having public comments
37:05
on building these massive resorts these golf courses, disc
37:08
golf course too, I didn't know that was a big thing but apparently that's a big thing
37:12
and they want to build in these beautiful state parks and they're giving like
37:15
less than a week notice of like these public comments You
37:19
told me you you kind of let me know of that story through your content and
37:23
I was like I gotta do an episode on this and I mentioned you in the episode that's when
37:26
I reached out like hey just to let you know I mentioned you in this episode because
37:29
this is important um and so that's what I feel like that's
37:32
the cool thing I also feel too I don't know if you ever noticed this but like when
37:36
we get on social media And I don't know if we, it's just because so many people talk
37:39
about it. And like, there are a lot of celebrities out there that have like millions of followers.
37:42
They get so many views. And even like the quote unquote Tik Tokers
37:46
that are like huge. It's their brand, right? They're the influencers of
37:50
the world. And they get, you know, millions and millions of views. And then I
37:53
look at mine and I'm like, I got like only a hundred views on this or 300 views
37:56
on this. I'm like, then I think to myself, That's like
38:00
300 people. Like if you can fill a lecture hall with 300 people
38:04
and it'll look busy and you just like imagine if I had to speak in front of
38:07
300 people, you know, for like two minutes of
38:11
like an episode that I do on TikTok or even like 10-20 minutes of an episode that
38:14
I do on the podcast. I was like, that's a lot of people to
38:18
connect with and you never know who you're connecting with, right? It could be
38:21
a decision maker, it could be the kid of a politician who's
38:25
like, hey, mom or dad, you need to see this
38:29
because this is important. And you may change somebody. You never
38:32
know who's out there watching your content. And
38:36
so I think that's quite interesting when it comes out. Do you
38:39
ever get that feeling though? Because you get a good, you get a solid amount of
38:42
views. Do you ever feel like sometimes you're like, oh, I wish that
38:45
did better, but actually it hit a lot of people. Like it got to a lot of
38:49
Yeah, I do. Like perspective is everything. And even
38:53
likes, like let's say you get like 30 likes, like if 30 people went
38:56
up to you and complimented on what you did, I'd feel like very happy.
39:00
I'd be like, oh my gosh, thank you so much. But I, yeah, I do
39:03
feel that way. And also like some of my mutuals, Like,
39:06
like you and other people, like, they're within the environmental sector field. And
39:09
like, I've connected, like, even like, I've connected with
39:13
people that advocate for animal
39:16
rights, like they're vegans, or some of them work in like city, city
39:20
planning, things like that. And yeah, I, it's
39:24
crazy, like who, who people like who sees and even if they
39:27
don't directly Interact or
39:31
will they do interact with let's say they repost it like a lot of people do repost my
39:37
Yep. I reposted your stuff quite a few times So
39:42
this is all good like this is great like it's interesting to see
39:45
what you've done on here and what you're sort of able to do
39:49
Do you have? Like
39:53
specific types, like you talked about your weekly positive
39:56
climate news. And that's cool. And that's comes out like, is it once
40:05
Okay. Every Monday. Yeah. Cause it's Monday today. Okay, cool. Um, so you, so
40:08
you do that every Monday. Do you have other types of like, do
40:11
you say, okay, Monday's for this? Um, one,
40:17
I'm trying to. I think I have so far, but
40:21
every now and then I have like a little streak and then I don't post for
40:25
like one or two days and then I post again. But that's one
40:28
of my goals. Like I'm trying to be more consistent with posting because
40:31
that essentially is better for your performance because they get circulated more. Still
40:35
a lot of work. And also, yeah, it's a lot of work. But usually what
40:39
I do is I like bulk create. Like one day
40:42
I like make the same. I make videos
40:46
of myself and sometimes I like change my
40:51
shirt but it's the same day to make you think that it's another day Yeah,
40:59
I do that. And pattern wise, I know like
41:02
I'm trying to have more like a schedule. But I know Mondays are
41:05
weekly positive climate news. And essentially, I just look at my feed.
41:09
And I try to have a weekly positive news every now and then a Canva post,
41:13
which is like something it doesn't matter what topic it is, but it's just something I made on
41:16
Canva. Every other now and then maybe like a video to
41:19
show about me. And And
41:23
So you have kind of like pillars. So you have like the ocean positive news, like
41:27
a lifestyle thing, you know, something that you make
41:30
on, like something that you try and experiment on Canva. Usually
41:33
they have, and what you mean by that, like they have templates and you just kind of pick a template and
41:37
then use it and then kind of fit it to the
41:44
Okay, cool. So that's kind of cool. So you have those types of pillars. I
41:48
think that's, I think that's great. I mean, even posting a couple of
41:51
times a year, I'm like, is pretty cool. If you think about it,
41:54
because I'm like, wow, this is, this is pretty cool. But
41:59
so looking into the future now,
42:10
Yeah, with just science communication in general, are you gonna just
42:13
stay on TikTok mostly and build that platform out? Are
42:17
you going to, like you mentioned a little bit of maybe going back to YouTube,
42:22
I do wanna stick mainly to TikTok. I know they were saying
42:25
it might get banned and that's part of the reason why some
42:29
videos aren't performing as well as they used to. But
42:34
I do wanna stay on TikTok. Maybe more on YouTube, but Essentially,
42:38
I want to get more comfortable using the features that TikTok has.
42:42
I know TikTok Live. I've been on it for a few times, but I only
42:46
am on it for like three minutes or less because I get scared for
42:49
some reason. Is it because you're worried about running
42:55
That's what I'm worried about. Sometimes I do think about that. Especially
43:00
like because I know could I not have a little bit of free time because I haven't started
43:03
working my full-time job yet Yeah, cuz I've had like a two-week gap just
43:07
to enjoy but I'm trying to like get as
43:10
much done as possible But it is kind of hard
43:13
to do like social media while doing other stuff and
43:17
that's I like it's it's it's a skill to have like time management and
43:20
like having all that so I Props to us because we did.
43:24
Absolutely. It's difficult. I think a lot of people, they don't realize
43:29
how much time it takes to be able to get these
43:32
videos up and to edit them and whatever software you're using to edit. It
43:36
takes a long time to put it up there and make sure you do a
43:39
job that you think is a good job. That's good enough to
43:42
put out for you. It does take a long time to do, so doing it with the job.
43:46
would be good. Now, is your job aware that you have like a
43:50
TikTok account that gets some pretty good views? And do you think you'd
43:53
feel comfortable in talking about some of the work you do to make people more
44:00
Um, for sure. Yeah. And I did tell them about that. I do post on
44:04
social media as like a little hobby for environmentalism and
44:09
they know my account. So they're not stalking me, but like, and
44:14
I'm pretty sure they're gonna, they're gonna know that I'm going to talk about like what I
44:17
do and to gain more insight because I'm going to have to be doing research
44:21
and like environmental justice communities within the state. And
44:25
a lot of it has to do with like hog operations and how it affects some
44:28
water qualities or streams nearby. And yeah,
44:34
Yeah, that'll be cool. I think, I think it's great. I think more organizations that
44:38
have their, I mean, they should show off their staff in my opinion, cause
44:41
I love the people that work within the environmental field and
44:45
I find some organizations do it really, really well. And other
44:48
organizations are so tight knit that they don't want to let any information because
44:52
they want to control everything. But I like the fact that they let people talk
44:56
and let their staff talk because that's why you hire them. You hire them for their expertise and
44:59
so you let them talk on their expertise. So I love that. One
45:03
question I haven't asked and I've wanted to ask this for a while. You
45:07
post a lot, you get a lot of views, you're going to get comments. Do
45:11
you find most of your, and some people are always worried about comments,
45:14
right? Like it could be really, really great. And you've started to mention some
45:18
of them, but some of them can be like, you know, when, especially when you deal with climate, a
45:22
lot of times you get some, some, some, whether they're real people
45:25
or not, who knows, but you get some pretty harsh comments. How do you approach
45:30
How do I approach them? I usually just delete them
45:34
because I don't respond to them. Sometimes, I think
45:38
one time I do, but essentially how I see it, I'm like, wait
45:41
a minute, this is my page, get out of here. So I just delete them. But I often,
45:45
I don't really get that many negative comments. I would say I
45:48
got them more when my weekly positive climate news
45:51
were getting more traction. People would be like, they would
45:54
say stuff like, Well, what's the point? We're already dead. Or this
45:58
isn't really good climate. Like, I don't know, something like that. Or I
46:01
think I made a video maybe like last year talking about like, Oh,
46:05
did you know if we killed animals? Well, if we killed humans,
46:08
the same rate we killed animals, we'd be extinct in like, two
46:12
weeks, 14 days. And because I was talking about like, how you
46:15
can reduce your impact because I'm not a vegan, but I do my best to like, Yep,
46:19
because I don't eat pork. I don't eat seafood. I'm really just eat chicken and
46:23
and yeah people were just saying like oh I'm gonna eat like a two burgers to
46:27
like to the vegans think I'm like, you know, just to cancel like it's definitely
46:31
I'm like, yeah Right
46:34
the trolls and we've all seen it. I I find every time I post
46:38
anything on climate I get somebody that's just like I You
46:41
know, you should watch this YouTube video because this YouTube video sells everything. And I
46:44
always laugh. I respond. I'm like, oh, thank you for sharing this YouTube video. I'll
46:48
stop listening to the scientific papers that are out there
46:51
that are peer reviewed by other scientists, the top scientists to watch
46:55
this guy on this YouTube video talk about, you know, how it's, you
46:58
know, a completely different theory. I always find that I always get that every
47:01
time I post it. Right. But no, I think that I think
47:05
it's it's interesting because a lot of some people are afraid to talk on on
47:08
like these platforms because The comment so
47:11
I think if I like that approach it's like look if I see these comments, I'm just
47:15
gonna delete them They don't provide anything. I find some people
47:18
who like who respond positively Can
47:21
actually help other people when they come to the to the comments be
47:24
like, oh Like people are really enjoying it here. Like this is this
47:28
is fun. Like this is you can almost build a community Do you find you
47:31
hear from the same people or a lot of the same people? commenting on
47:35
like multiple videos like building a little bit of that audience or a community
47:39
Yeah, I do. I do feel like I have a good little community and
47:42
I do the same thing to their videos. We both do good
47:46
interactions. And yeah, like I said, that's
47:49
the thing I love about social media. You never know who's watching and some people have
47:52
the same interests connect with you or they want to learn more about XYZ
47:56
and the environmental sector. And I just feel like it's
48:01
really heartwarming. That's the thing I love about social media.
48:04
I know it can be Like, social media can have its downsides, especially
48:08
within the climate field, because I know I would
48:11
see these, like, videos that would trend and it was
48:14
just, like, all, like, negative, like. like
48:18
a video of the polar bear starving on
48:22
ice, thin ice, litter. I know what
48:25
they were trying to do, like to raise awareness, but that's not a good
48:28
approach to do it because a lot of people just see it
48:31
and they're like, oh, we're already dead, like they scroll. But
48:35
I feel like it should be a little bit of a good mix. That's why I do some environmental
48:39
awareness and I do positive climate news because I feel like hope
48:43
is the biggest thing you can have right now. Um, like,
48:46
cautious climate optimism is like, huge for me because I
48:49
know because there's toxic positivity. It's not like, oh, yeah, we're good. We're good. Whatever. Like, you
48:53
should, you should still be aware of, like, what's going on, but, you know, still
48:57
talk about, like, what's good because often, like. The news, they
49:00
hardly ever say anything about what's good, so I have to actually look
49:03
for it. It's always like, this explosion happened, this
49:08
much deforestation, it's always just, it's all negative,
49:13
They love it, because it's easy to click on, right? It's like, look at this forest, it
49:17
used to look like this, now look at it, you click on here and find out what it looks like, and people
49:21
love to hear that. I find too, one of the things that I've discovered recently, and it's
49:24
interviewing a few people, there are major projects
49:28
out there, That talk about like say the blue economy or
49:32
blue carbon or climate like you see like the you
49:35
know, the the paris accord Uh and everything like that, but
49:39
you never hear about the projects that are actually happening from that You know, they never talk
49:42
about some of the things and so some of the interviews i've been doing i've been digging deep
49:45
into like Tell me a project that's come out of this agreement Let's
49:50
talk about those." They're so cool. When
49:53
you listen to it, you're like, I get excited. I'm just like, this is a cool thing.
49:56
Why don't you talk about this? Why isn't this front page on your website
50:00
to say, look at this great thing? There was
50:05
a fishing community in the Philippines where I was talking to
50:08
the person that's from Rare. It's in the interview that
50:12
we did a couple of weeks ago. you know, they
50:15
talked about how they have this marine protected area that everybody, it's
50:19
managed by the government, but it's co-managed by the fishing
50:22
village. And they have a, so they've been all contributing to this
50:25
savings account. So like the whole village has this savings account in
50:29
case there's like a typhoon or cyclone that comes through and it destroys the
50:33
MPA. So they can't fish in the MPA because they want to
50:36
get back, but they need money. So what they do is when they get that,
50:40
they allow the MPA to recover. and they
50:43
dip into the savings and they all, they still have money to feed their families, to
50:47
send their kids to school, all that kind of stuff. So by the time that the
50:50
MPA is back and ready to go and they can start fishing again, they
50:54
don't have, they don't have to take from their savings account, but they have the savings account. I'm like, that's
50:57
a cool thing. That's like, that's a good adaptation. That's good prep. And everybody I've
51:01
told that story to is like, That's amazing. That's so cool. Why
51:04
don't we hear about this kind of stuff?" And you're like, no, because they don't get out. It's
51:08
almost like too good of news. That's what
51:11
I love about sharing news that you share, like the
51:15
weekly positive climate change news. I think that's cool because it
51:18
makes me happy when I see that because I'm like, oh, I didn't even know about this. Then
51:22
I'll go searching. I'll be like, where did she find that? But finding those
51:25
takes a long time, right? Like you said, you have to go digging a couple
51:28
of times. So how long would you spend, so you're going to do one today, say,
51:37
The way I do it, I always do them Sunday mornings and then
51:40
on Monday I look for images, the images that I
51:44
usually came from that are similar and save them and then I post them. And
51:47
I say sometimes it ranges between maybe
51:50
like 25, 30 minutes. I usually am better
51:54
now, but yeah, I usually try to do in the morning of Sunday
52:01
Well, especially now that you're going to be working, it's going to be like Sundays
52:04
are going to be the day you do it. Right
52:08
on. Erica, last question for you. If
52:12
somebody's listening to this and they've wanted to start something where they start
52:15
talking about something that's important to them, you know, from
52:18
a conservation standpoint, what would be the first recommendations that
52:22
you would say, like the first steps that you would say that they should take when they consider starting
52:27
to speak up for, say, the ocean or for just
52:32
Um, I would tell them, like, if they're nervous, just go ahead and do it
52:35
because time will pass anyway. And if it's something that matters to
52:39
you, I feel like it should, it's probably going to matter to somebody else.
52:42
You never know who also is thinking of that. And just
52:46
make sure you are getting the facts. Straight
52:50
because some people they don't mean to but sometimes they do some like a little
52:53
bit misinformation And sometimes they're light
52:56
but still some people can call you out on that and
53:00
I would just say just make sure you're doing it right but also Your
53:03
passion will show like people will know if you're passionate about it and that's gonna make them
53:06
want to hear you more like if you sound monotone or you talk about something they're probably
53:09
just gonna scroll so I would just say just just If
53:12
you love something, go for it. And don't be too nervous like
53:17
At the beginning, I was scared. But now I'm like, good. I'm good. I
53:21
Yeah. But I think it takes some time, right? It takes some time to
53:25
kind of get that confidence and to be like, no, no, I'm doing this. Now
53:28
I'm looking at other things I want to accomplish, not just getting them out there. And
53:32
I always tell people, when you do, I do the same thing. I'm like, just
53:35
record. You don't have to post it but record and
53:38
have somebody watch it be like hey What do you think like have someone close to you be like what
53:42
do you think you know? And I think that's really important to get a little
53:45
bit of that boost of confidence, but yeah, you should post this I didn't know about this and then Send
53:49
it and then you get better and better as you go through like you don't I
53:52
still mess up on words. I still do that. Yeah You know, and sometimes
53:56
you can correct this, sometimes not. We're all human. I find like social media
53:59
allows us to be human and not like the perfect, you know,
54:03
cadence or the perfect way to say the words or anything like that.
54:06
So I find that kind of nice. But anyway, love that advice.
54:10
And I want to thank you so much, Erica, for not only for the work you do, but for coming on.
54:13
of the podcast and talking about it. I think it's really great. I can't wait to
54:17
see what you're gonna create next and in the next year. Love
54:20
to have you back on to talk more about not only the TikTok, maybe
54:24
your job, and what you're up to in this wonderful field.
54:28
Thank you so much. Thank you for inviting me. This was so fun. Now I'm no longer
54:34
This was her first podcast, people, and she did a fantastic job. I
54:37
love it. So thank you so much, Eka. I really appreciate it. Thank
54:41
you, Erica, for joining me on today's episode of the How to Protect the Ocean podcast. It
54:44
was great to be able to talk to another science communicator, especially
54:48
learning some of the tips and tricks that she has used
54:53
on TikTok. And I think that's really important because TikTok is an
54:56
interesting platform. I know we know all the controversy with, you know, the app
54:59
being owned by a company in China and the way that the
55:02
US and Canada and as well as other countries have approached the
55:06
app, trying to ban it, trying to worry about your information getting
55:09
out to people who are not so in your
55:12
corner, let's just say. And so there's a lot of bad
55:17
things that get talked about the platform, but there's still a lot of
55:20
users on there. And there's people are on it each and every day. And
55:23
they watch videos for multiple hours. So imagine being able
55:27
to take up some of that time, two minutes, three minutes, one
55:30
minute, 10 minutes. I think you can now post for 60 minutes, not
55:33
many people do. But imagine if you can do that and you
55:36
can take some attention and take some attention on
55:40
the environment, right? And put us toward the environment. I think that's really important.
55:43
I think that's something that we need more of and we need more people on
55:47
TikTok, on all the different platforms talking about the environment because, you
55:51
know, my audience may not, you know, some people who listen
55:54
to my podcast may not hit the right note. It may not just be
55:57
that right connection for them. They may, you know, they
56:00
may feel more of a connection towards Erica. or towards some
56:04
other creator that is doing some kind of creation on
56:08
whatever platform that we have here on social media, YouTube, TikTok,
56:12
podcast, whatever that might be. And so I think it's important to be
56:15
able to find all these different creators and
56:18
be able to hear what they have to say and how they work. I think that's super
56:22
important. So with that said, I hope you enjoyed the
56:25
episode. I thought it was really important to be able to have Erica on,
56:29
and looking forward to having her back on. I'm going to put her link to
56:32
her TikTok. The handle is atwhales2e,
56:37
so whale, W-H-A-L-E-S. And
56:43
I'll put the link in the show notes, in the description, however you're
56:47
watching this podcast. You can watch it on Spotify, which will be video, YouTube
56:51
will be video, as well as all your podcast listening platforms,
56:55
and your favorite one at that. And those will be audio as
56:59
well. But you can leave a comment on Spotify, on YouTube, or
57:02
you can hit me up on Instagram, at howtoprotecttheocean. You
57:07
can also hit me up on TikTok, my
57:10
profile account, is, once
57:14
I find it, I don't remember what it is, it's speakup4blue, at
57:18
speakup4blue. You can check that out. I'll put a link in
57:21
the show notes as well. But thank you so much again, Erica, and thank you for
57:25
listening and letting people know that, hey, if you wanna know more about communicating
57:29
on TikTok, send them this video or send this link to this
57:32
episode, and I'd love to hear from them and hear what they think. But thank
57:35
you so much for joining me on today's episode of the How to Protect the Ocean podcast. I'm
57:38
your host, Andrew Lewin. Have a great day. We'll talk to you next time, and happy conservation.