Entrepreneurship and art have both always required that a person follow their intuition and risk to see how the world will respond to their creation. This requires courage in the face of uncertainty. There was always a sense of adventure, of casting off into the unknown guided only by what you wanted to create and what you believe the world needs. It's Robert Persig's classic quandary of "what is quality?" Now that algorithms drive distribution, creators of every kind are fooled into a believing that there is much more concrete definition of what "good" is. Both consumers' taste and artist/entrepreneurs' taste are being tuned to line up more with what algorithm rules the day.
One other issue is that the reward cycle has become shorter, which shortens time horizons. I have an older relative who is a professional artist. He makes a few commissioned pieces each year, but most of his output goes into annual gallery shows. These shows lead to a few sales, and the sales put him in touch with collectors who then commission works. That time allows him to experiment and try new things - he's always changing up his technique - on a one-year cycle.
YouTube content creators, particularly those who are pursuing it as a primary career rather than a sideline (think MrBeast versus creators making videos promote their other services), cannot act in this way. A video that gets few views after initial release will never get surfaced by the algorithm, while videos that do succeed will produce immediate rewards. A creator can log into his channel account and see the payments stacking up in a real time.
It's rapid iteration, which is good for quickly optimizing in a search space, but as we know it is for the wrong metric. The creator can find the global minimum, but then its hard to metaphorically climb out if you want to do something else.
This suggests an interesting counter metric or measurement: quality as a function of reward cycle time.
Yes great point. The rapid iteration cycle is driving this change even faster. The algorithms have taken over both the steering wheel and the gas pedal. Thinking of Youtube even 6-7 years ago feels like an eternity ago. I suppose in the terms of internet age it has been several generations.
I always find it disturbing how many people follow channels like MrBeast's. I mean, what he's doing has no long-term cultural relevance. None, zero. Nothing he makes will be relevant 30 years from now. Maybe not even 1 year from now.
His content is just completely hollow of any cultural value. A total waste of time. Pure entertainment.
I just wish people wanted better for themselves than to be entertained.
thanks - appreciate your thoughts on this document and how it relates. I agree that MrBeast lacks any goals other than "making good Youtube videos' as you say to appease the Holy Algorithm. And that is sad and means he will never create a real business.
Bezos -- even if you hate him -- you have to admit he did create an incredible business that has changed the world.
MrBeast isn't going to be doing that anytime soon. And the problem with being an "influencer" is it pigeonholes you into
As Venkatesh Rao of Ribbonfarm has put it, in the online economy you work above the API (manager, developer, data analyst) or you can work below the API (Uber driver, Doorash delivery guy, Amazon warehouse picker, YouTube content creator). Above the API, you determine how the system works. Below the API, the system determines how (and if) you work.
Seems like the older one is the more untrue that statement sounds. I'm GenX, and financed my first property at 7-5/8%, then my second house in the mid 6's. When I got 30-year money with a 3-handle a few years later, I thought I had hit the jackpot.
So...I disagree with that particular assertion about rates. But the main article was great!
I agree, it’s nuts to say that 5% is extraordinarily high, when the historical norm is closer to 7%, and we had rates in the high teens just one generation ago.
Also, Zero Interest Rate Policy is bad! That’s what created all this mess of social media and attention algorithms and everything else that made no sense except when too much money had nowhere better to go.
It’s sad and unfortunate that our economy is so fundamentally frail that we can’t even sustain 5% interest anymore. That’s a senescent economy.
Literally telling you he’s a beast in his name.. one of his sidekicks transitioned in real time for all kids to see… and has now been found to be much more of an evil human than first thought. You don’t rise to the top by playing it clean anymore
I've tried! For whatever reason, I actually find myself clicking OFF them before I get to the 15 second mark. It's like, "Dude, no. I'm not watching this." I am obviously in the minority though. Ha.
Great stuff, thank you, totally agree. Will be interesting to see what happens - the optimistic take is that people try to create content that does not submit to the algorithm. The pessimistic take is that more and more people try to get ahead by ever more fine-tuning their content for the constraints of the algorithm. Ugh. I suppose there will always be room for both, but without having read it for a long time, isn't all this content basically Soma from Huxley's Brave New World...
He’s not the best example of the “average” gen z’er. He’s an example of a successful gen z’er, and that’s because he has the same qualities every successful person of every generation has had. Every generation will continue to have successful people that overcome the average. Those qualities will always remain the same. Discipline, hard work, attention to detail, drive, passion, etc.
I wonder at what point the AI tools will also optimize videos for the MrBeast blueprint. For example, a friend showed me how to create a podcast in 15 minutes using Google Notebook LM. So I simply uploaded the MrBeast document to it, and it spit out this (I added the image of the fake podcasters I created quickly in Midjourney): https://youtu.be/p3mFQoDx_oE?si=T8rxRbCyeG7wHxsE
Even ChatGPTs top brass has admitted there is a danger in the AI tools becoming even more addictive than social media. What happens when they are combined as Google will start actually promoting for people to use their new GenAI tool on shorts next year?
The world just gets worse. We have an incompetent government that doesn't have the IQ to comprehend the damage that social media is causing so it just remains unregulated. AI is likely just injecting steroids into the toxicity. Just wait and see how crueler teenage girls get with AI.
Entrepreneurship and art have both always required that a person follow their intuition and risk to see how the world will respond to their creation. This requires courage in the face of uncertainty. There was always a sense of adventure, of casting off into the unknown guided only by what you wanted to create and what you believe the world needs. It's Robert Persig's classic quandary of "what is quality?" Now that algorithms drive distribution, creators of every kind are fooled into a believing that there is much more concrete definition of what "good" is. Both consumers' taste and artist/entrepreneurs' taste are being tuned to line up more with what algorithm rules the day.
One other issue is that the reward cycle has become shorter, which shortens time horizons. I have an older relative who is a professional artist. He makes a few commissioned pieces each year, but most of his output goes into annual gallery shows. These shows lead to a few sales, and the sales put him in touch with collectors who then commission works. That time allows him to experiment and try new things - he's always changing up his technique - on a one-year cycle.
YouTube content creators, particularly those who are pursuing it as a primary career rather than a sideline (think MrBeast versus creators making videos promote their other services), cannot act in this way. A video that gets few views after initial release will never get surfaced by the algorithm, while videos that do succeed will produce immediate rewards. A creator can log into his channel account and see the payments stacking up in a real time.
It's rapid iteration, which is good for quickly optimizing in a search space, but as we know it is for the wrong metric. The creator can find the global minimum, but then its hard to metaphorically climb out if you want to do something else.
This suggests an interesting counter metric or measurement: quality as a function of reward cycle time.
Yes great point. The rapid iteration cycle is driving this change even faster. The algorithms have taken over both the steering wheel and the gas pedal. Thinking of Youtube even 6-7 years ago feels like an eternity ago. I suppose in the terms of internet age it has been several generations.
"The Fed met yesterday and hiked rates by 50 bps, and the entire industry tuned in."
I think you meant lowered rates.
Yes i did! Thank you. I promise i knew that 😅 even made a video on it yesterday
I always find it disturbing how many people follow channels like MrBeast's. I mean, what he's doing has no long-term cultural relevance. None, zero. Nothing he makes will be relevant 30 years from now. Maybe not even 1 year from now.
His content is just completely hollow of any cultural value. A total waste of time. Pure entertainment.
I just wish people wanted better for themselves than to be entertained.
If you're keeping up on all the coffee spilling it's pretty fitting... he seems pretty hollow.
thanks - appreciate your thoughts on this document and how it relates. I agree that MrBeast lacks any goals other than "making good Youtube videos' as you say to appease the Holy Algorithm. And that is sad and means he will never create a real business.
Bezos -- even if you hate him -- you have to admit he did create an incredible business that has changed the world.
MrBeast isn't going to be doing that anytime soon. And the problem with being an "influencer" is it pigeonholes you into
1. appeasing the Holy Algorithm,
2. not being too controversial, and
3. not doing anything else of any substance.
As Venkatesh Rao of Ribbonfarm has put it, in the online economy you work above the API (manager, developer, data analyst) or you can work below the API (Uber driver, Doorash delivery guy, Amazon warehouse picker, YouTube content creator). Above the API, you determine how the system works. Below the API, the system determines how (and if) you work.
"Rates are extraordinarily high..."
Seems like the older one is the more untrue that statement sounds. I'm GenX, and financed my first property at 7-5/8%, then my second house in the mid 6's. When I got 30-year money with a 3-handle a few years later, I thought I had hit the jackpot.
So...I disagree with that particular assertion about rates. But the main article was great!
I agree, it’s nuts to say that 5% is extraordinarily high, when the historical norm is closer to 7%, and we had rates in the high teens just one generation ago.
Also, Zero Interest Rate Policy is bad! That’s what created all this mess of social media and attention algorithms and everything else that made no sense except when too much money had nowhere better to go.
It’s sad and unfortunate that our economy is so fundamentally frail that we can’t even sustain 5% interest anymore. That’s a senescent economy.
https://open.substack.com/pub/fandompulse/p/former-mrbeast-employee-gets-second?r=u16ew&utm_medium=ios
Literally telling you he’s a beast in his name.. one of his sidekicks transitioned in real time for all kids to see… and has now been found to be much more of an evil human than first thought. You don’t rise to the top by playing it clean anymore
I find myself reading about Mr. Beast so often, especially in recent months. Maybe I should actually go ahead and watch one of his videos...
I've tried! For whatever reason, I actually find myself clicking OFF them before I get to the 15 second mark. It's like, "Dude, no. I'm not watching this." I am obviously in the minority though. Ha.
Great stuff, thank you, totally agree. Will be interesting to see what happens - the optimistic take is that people try to create content that does not submit to the algorithm. The pessimistic take is that more and more people try to get ahead by ever more fine-tuning their content for the constraints of the algorithm. Ugh. I suppose there will always be room for both, but without having read it for a long time, isn't all this content basically Soma from Huxley's Brave New World...
He’s not the best example of the “average” gen z’er. He’s an example of a successful gen z’er, and that’s because he has the same qualities every successful person of every generation has had. Every generation will continue to have successful people that overcome the average. Those qualities will always remain the same. Discipline, hard work, attention to detail, drive, passion, etc.
This guy is all over the place, doesn't talk much about the topic itself
What a fantastic read, thank you Kyla!
It’s the phones.
Great piece, you inspired me to read a document I’d never have read otherwise.
I wonder at what point the AI tools will also optimize videos for the MrBeast blueprint. For example, a friend showed me how to create a podcast in 15 minutes using Google Notebook LM. So I simply uploaded the MrBeast document to it, and it spit out this (I added the image of the fake podcasters I created quickly in Midjourney): https://youtu.be/p3mFQoDx_oE?si=T8rxRbCyeG7wHxsE
Even ChatGPTs top brass has admitted there is a danger in the AI tools becoming even more addictive than social media. What happens when they are combined as Google will start actually promoting for people to use their new GenAI tool on shorts next year?
The world just gets worse. We have an incompetent government that doesn't have the IQ to comprehend the damage that social media is causing so it just remains unregulated. AI is likely just injecting steroids into the toxicity. Just wait and see how crueler teenage girls get with AI.
Uncertain and probabilistic approach to future reminds me of https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iZM_JmZdqCw
What?