What The Funk?

0:00 We are back on what the funk another in person recording, which is my favorite, you know, Jacob, I, as you know, we'll get into all of the great things that you do here. You sit behind the

0:13 scenes, but I'm like, you can't hide anymore. You got to come on my podcast. I record from my house, right? And in my office, you've given me a lot of tips like send me a better camera, tell

0:26 me like how to tilt it, put the light ring here, like all of those things. But it's, there's something that's exhausting about recording podcasts over the web, whereas if you do it in person like

0:38 this, I could bang these out all day. You know, it's just so much easier. So, um, Jacob Stiller, my man, I am really excited to have you on here. We've known each other now for probably five

0:49 years. I think digital wildcatters was tiny. I had one of the first podcasts with, with Tim Loser rest in peace. Um, and you are one of the main content guys. You probably edit like literally

1:01 listened and edited to edit a number of podcasts back in the day. I think that you had lived in Austin or you do currently live in Austin, but I want to hear your whole story. You've kind of

1:12 started to get more active on LinkedIn. I don't know if that was like the digital wildcatters team saying, hey, maybe you should like have a LinkedIn profile, be like the rest of the boomers in

1:22 our industry. But I want to get to know you a little bit. I want to hear some of your stories, understand what it is you do at digital wildcatters, your passions, like all the things that make

1:30 you tick. So I'm going to hit you with the question I hit all my guess with, which is, who are you, man? Who's Jacob Stiller? I am a stepdad, I am a creator.

1:42 I am a, that's about it.

1:48 You're a wildcat or OG wildcat. Well, they're on or off the clock. I'm always

1:53 editing something or doing whatever teaching my kids how to edit. So. Yeah. So let's let's go back then, right? When you were, I'm guessing I'm older than you. I'm not going to reveal my age.

2:05 I'm 45. Same. You are? No, I just turned 31 actually. I was going to say, if you then I feel like I look really old for the same age, or you look really young. So

2:19 like, for whatever reason, I haven't been as good at like some of the things that my kid do, like cutting up edits and shit like that and doing TikToks. Like my daughter was just doing this thing

2:28 where it's like you, you pour something in a drink and it like cuts. It's like, you know, and I'm like, God, that's so dope. How do you do that? She's like, it's so easy. It's just like this

2:36 one setting. I'm like, no, I don't know how to do it. But back in the day, 80s, early 90s, I remember like multi recording like VHS stuff, right, to like cut up some parts and like splice

2:50 things together and like doing it really manually. It's much easier now. But did Did you have a passion for a like? all kinds of editing, content, like innovation, creation, going back to your

3:01 childhood. And that's kind of like led to your career. Talk to me a little bit about like what made the young Jacob Stiller tick. Yeah, it's definitely a very clear lineage of how it's all came to.

3:12 I mean, just being an artist in general, like every elective in middle school, thriving in elementary school, like whatever art class you had in high school, like I did art all the time where

3:24 there's painting, drawing, sculpting, whatever. There's not, I mean, there's not a whole lot of options outside of art and electives. Like there was a camera class that I actually never took.

3:34 So, but I always knew, like, I love doing this and then you kind of learn in middle school or high school that like you can't be an artist and make money. Like you can't, you know, well, it is

3:46 a little different now. It's like, you can like go on Etsy and open a store and like, that's legit, like back then and 90s 2000s, to be Van Gogh or no one. Totally. Like you're not going to

3:55 even an art gallery. Like that's how you succeed as an artist and it's obviously grown. And then you realize there's other mediums like video or photo or animation, you know, so then it all it's

4:07 all it really expands from there. So I have a story that I've learned is the same as other people coming into video editing, which is what I can say I do mostly. I'm a video editor I shoot. I

4:21 first picked up a camera only 10 years ago. So it is all past high school and stuff. So I had that artist stream and then I just forgot about it and had no hobbies out there and was a bum. So

4:33 that was reignited and but it had started back like probably middle school and that story that a lot of people have gone through who are my age is that I started editing like like video games like

4:48 like the big one you hear is like halo montages or like Call of Duty stuff like that when back windows are thriving, which called it is still huge now. But regardless, there was this trend where

4:59 YouTube, it was like a combination of everything coming together. It was like kind of the first accessibility to like HD cameras, which means like 720p, like recording your like game footage on

5:11 like an Xbox, and it was like the first Xbox or like a PS2. Sure. Do like a piece of hardware that only costs like a hundred bucks. So it was kind of like a big thing. But once you had it or

5:19 borrowed a friend's like you can record yourself playing, and then you know, computers that can kind of do like basic editing. Yeah. And so I was going on this new

5:31 website called youtubecom and sharing my gameplay footage of Halo and you get all the best parts. You have to sit there and record you playing forever and wait for something cool to happen, like a

5:44 cool headshot or whatever. These days like your PS5, it like knows Don't worry, we got you. I'm like, what the hell? Yeah, we're gonna grab that shit. Yeah, like my kid's BS5. His library is

5:55 full of like videos of him doing like cool shit. And he's like, I'm like, oh, you recorded that? He's like, no, it just automatically does it. I'm like, what the hell? Anyway, so I would

6:04 just record hours of footage, games, you know, and get the rest of the clubs together going like Windows, Movie Maker, which is like, you know, comes with it or whatever. And I had a few

6:17 things I posted And so that all started as early as that, like 10 or 11 years old. And then it actually grew into like, into high school where like, we kind of had these projects where it's like,

6:27 okay, you got like, write an essay, film something, or like present like a play. And I was like, oh, let's film something. And I remember I had this cool like, Handy Cam recorder. It almost

6:40 looks like an iPod, like a classic iPod. And you can like record and record it again, HD 720 and me and my friends went out into woods and recorded. re-enacting some book, something you have to

6:52 read in high school. And it was, it was a chunky monster project. And when I was putting this like 720p hours of footage into like this, the family computer, right? Yeah. Everyone knows the

7:06 family computer. If you're not, it's like 2010. We still have the family computer and editing on there for hours. And it's finally done and like it can't export, like it can't like turn into a

7:16 project into a video. Of course. And I think what ended up happening is that we, I brought like the software onto the computer at school and just showed her to the video editor. Like I was like,

7:28 I can't export it. Like there's like, there's like enough ram in here that powers into

7:34 a Game Boy, you know, like, I just can't. I'm too ahead of my time. I'm sorry. I'm just like an innovator. What can I say? But man, we were out there. We were like doing takes and lines And

7:43 it was funny is that like that was like kind of maybe like trying to fall like a traditional film suit set. Sure, but I ended up just being like a YouTuber and like making like short form content

7:52 and not caring about like cinema or film or anything. Yeah, yeah, that's fun. I mean, you know, again, a little bit older than you guys. My dad was a college professor from Plymouth State

8:03 University and we didn't have like a lot of money or anything like that. So we didn't have like a camcorder. So he would have to like put in his name and like borrow the camcorder from the

8:12 university for the types of projects like this. And we would be going around and filming stuff And the same thing, it was super fun, right? I remember doing like a geometry project. That was a

8:24 total joke. I'm going to have to find the footage of that somewhere. I don't know how we can convert it to VHS to whatever it's on. We got the technology. All right, see, I'll just send it to

8:34 you. I don't mean literally, I mean like humankind has the technology. Oh, it's like you don't, okay, fine. You don't have it. Like Robocop, whatever that lies. But I mean, I grew up

8:41 watching like family movies. We had like family movie night, right? Where it would be like the real, you know what I mean? It was like shh. You are

8:52 45 dude. I am right on. I'm not Chuck. I'm right on the edge of millennial and and Gen Z. Oh, wow. Right. Like just right. I was born in 1979. So maybe they're like the oldest millennial ever

9:05 or like the youngest Gen Z person. Exactly. I'm just conflicted.

9:10 So did where'd you grow up? Where are you from? I'm from New Orleans, Louisiana. Nola I'm actually a Katrina victim. Okay. And I mean, yeah, I guess that's a story, huh? Yeah, let's hear it.

9:24 So it's

9:27 funny growing up and seeing people talk about evacuating in general, you know, with the California wildfires, the inevitable 20 hurricanes going through Florida. And there's always the stories of

9:39 like, you know, why aren't they evacuating or why are you staying with, you can literally see fire in a distance or you can see the projection. It's like, You don't understand people who live in

9:49 these areas, they are told to evacuate 20 times a year. And guess what? Like there's every time they decide to do it, nothing happens. They go home, they wasted their time, wasted their effort,

10:02 missed work, whatever. And so when you live in these areas, you roll your eyes. And even at Katrina was a fucking hurricane five, coming straight on, whatever, guess what? We already evacuated

10:15 twice that year Like it's August, they already rolled in the summer. It's like, this is a perspective of just anyone from New Orleans, I was 10. But you know, so even kids don't freak out. Like

10:26 the worst case scenario is like, you stay home and you put like your shoes and like all your electronics like elevated, like on a table. 'Cause you know, New Orleans is below sea level. And so

10:37 there's a lot of other places around the US. in the South and it's like, okay, it will flood and our carpet will get messed up So whatever, because like even when it rained, if it rained for like

10:47 a few hours. the streets were flooded, you know? Like the sewers were blocked up, whatever. And like, it was fun. You'd go out there and you'd swim in like, diseased water 'cause you live in a

10:55 South and that's the kind of people we are. But, so yeah, that's, I always like to start off with just being like, if you're ever confused why tens of thousands of people didn't evacuate and

11:06 ended up on their roofs, because we evacuate all the time. And we were going to be one of those people, but we left in like what, probably like a 12 hour, like definitely within like 24 hours

11:19 before it hit. It landed. So what that meant was that we were on a road evacuating

11:27 in like the worst bumper to bumper traffic I've ever witnessed in my life, which was bumper to bumper traffic to Galveston. And if you're wondering why we ended up in Galveston, which is probably

11:38 over 500 miles and like six hours on a good drive, it's because every time you stop in the next area, you see what's available, and it's all taken. Right. So you go to Baton Rouge, you go to

11:49 Lafayette, you go to Lake Charles, Beaumont, Houston, everything. Taken. New Orleans used to be one of the top 10 largest cities in the country are close to it a

11:59 few decades ago. So

12:01 there was hundreds of thousands of people there. And this is a pretty prominent time back in 2005. So that whole city empties out and spreads out. They're not going to like Mississippi and shit

12:11 either 'cause they're getting hit even worse like Biloxi. Yeah, you're going north or you're going west Right, so we went west down night 10 and just everything was just taken along the way. Some

12:20 of our family members got in early around like Zachary and I think we hitched a ride with them a couple of times but eventually we just ended up in Galveston and lived in a hotel there for like three

12:30 weeks. First time in Texas, first time obviously in Galveston and just the weirdest thing, you know, like school just started. Yeah. Sixth grade, I was in Catholic school which is incredibly

12:43 normal in New Orleans

12:46 living in a hotel, waking up, looking at the news, watching it, just crying, not understanding. Am I gonna see my friends again, my teachers, my family, whatever, like who's dead? Like it's

12:56 insane. It's awful. These days it's so, I don't even think about it, but for years after, it was pretty traumatic to think about. I would just cry randomly, like just, I don't know. Well,

13:08 it's intense and I appreciate you sharing that, actually, I didn't know that about you. So how big is your family? There are six of us It's this tattoo in my wrist that you can see. It's just

13:19 that first letter of everyone's name in my family. The J on the end, there's the last one that's me because everyone's older. So got two sisters, a brother and parents. They're actually,

13:29 everyone's currently in Texas right now. The mate, the six of us. And then literally everyone else, except a few others are like in New Orleans or around Lake Pontchartrain, Louisiana. Yeah, so,

13:41 okay, wow, yeah, that's intense, man. So you move it, so you're in one hotel room. I'm guessing. You have like a best-west experience. Still there. You can pass that and I'm like, Hmm,

13:49 it's like a little bit of a trigger reaction passing it when I go visit. Yeah, it's like something you feel like a deep pit in your stomach. You're like, Ah, God, that best-western. Yeah, I've

13:60 lived there for three weeks. So then did you like go to a new school? Did you guys like rent an apartment? You'd live in Galveston? Walk me through that 2005, 2006, whatever that was? This sort

14:11 of story gets kind of crazy when it involves digital wall catters in a way All right. And that's because, so my dad's job was, he works at Lanier. They're like a big copier company that competes

14:23 with Xerox. Yeah, and real quick comment on Lanier that they, I interviewed at Lanier, like at a college, right? And it was sort of like, we'll pay you two grand a month as like a draw on your

14:37 commission, you're gonna go around and selling copy machines. And

14:42 I didn't end up taking it. It felt a little bit like a dead-end job, but the people that crushed it there were working like 80 hour weeks. Anyways, Lanier, yes. Yeah, and I think Rico, they're

14:55 a bigger, more known company now, Japanese. They, I think they bought Lanier or their sister companies, I don't know, or if my dad just, I don't think he ever switched. And I'd like to go on a

15:05 side tangent about that, I guess. But my mom, my mom was a housewife, I mean, she had four kids. So she was the housewife and started working like very, like a few years only before Katrina.

15:16 So like up until like the early 2000s, she was working for the first time in her life. And both my parents, not in college, didn't even go. In fact, my sister is the first person of anyone in

15:29 our generation to go to college and like graduate. That's cool. Well, we're not all done, we just trade our jobs. I never said you were done, Colin never went to college. Julie's told me she

15:39 dropped out after a year I mean, and I think that, you know, the, the There's just more available to you, like, especially in the content space, right? Like if you can figure that that out,

15:47 you can, you don't need another career. Look at only fans careers. I approve. Thank going to college. We support sex workers, but there's a our generation's thriving, specifically my family's

15:59 because my, my cousin, he, he's a valedictorian at Notre Dame. And my other cousin also had high honors at LSU and then finished at Notre Dame as well. Everyone's thriving these days, but even

16:12 back then, you know, things were looking, starting to look good as we were kind of pavers, pavers, is that a word? Back in Oregon, it's pavers report. Um, so yeah, I went to college. Yeah,

16:22 I just can't create a writing. Yeah. Uh, so yeah, my dad was on the linear. My mom, she had worked some jobs, random jobs and, um, including like substitute teachers. So she'd be like my

16:33 teacher sometimes. I had that experience. So God, what did she do? She started working for in New Orleans, Jeffries. You know, Jeffries? It's like a bank, right? Investment bank? Yes, and

16:45 guess what Jeffries has an office, New Orleans and Houston. Right. So I just got refreshed on this, so I hope I don't botch it, but I can just say it confidently. So people will be like, Oh

16:55 yeah. So anyway, we got it. Lanier has some kind of office in Houston, and so does Jeffries. Yeah. I think they put it simply, and that they can actually get their same jobs and just work in

17:07 Houston. Right. And so basically we had to choose where to live based on the jobs. I guess they weren't like both downtown because we were looking in like two different parts of town basically

17:16 where to live. So I could have grown up like in Northwest Houston and Cyprus like I did, or maybe like another part like Katie, I don't know. Somewhere else. That seems to be how it was. And

17:26 basically they decided to pick, I don't even know. But anyway, because they both ended up working there at their jobs, but we lived in Cyprus. So I went to like Cypress High School and just that

17:38 whole Northwest area, really nice and simple and. represent, you know, there's Slipe time, represent. Yep, so my dad, he, whatever, at some point, transferred to Rico and he's still there

17:50 till this day. Like he's worked there like 50 years. He's only in the 60s, he'll retire soon. And my mom, she went through like a whole roller coaster with things. So, Jeffries,

18:01 I don't know, sold out, acquired, whatever, she ended up by Global Hunter I think that's another bank, and then Global Hunter turned into TPH. Ah, to pick a ring and a hole, right, right,

18:16 right, okay. I don't know how those three companies connect, whether it's acquisitions or just, they were, they know each other and like, word to mouth. Like, hey, this lady is good, hire

18:26 her, 'cause we went out of this, I don't know. So basically - She needs a job. She went from Jeffries, the Global Hunter, to TPH. And when I started working here, and I see Dan's bald head

18:36 sitting in the studio, I'm like, I gotta look so familiar. And I'm like, oh, that's my mom's old boss. And then there's Bobby Tudor, who I

18:46 would go to his Christmas parties. I have a picture, I think I put it on LinkedIn. One of the first posts I made on LinkedIn, I was like, oh, this is LinkedIn Gold. It's a picture of me

18:54 sledding down his front yard 'cause you'd every year have a winter party close down a street and have fake snow on his front yard where you can sled down. It's just so crazy. That's cool. And here

19:04 we are like at Digital Walk Adders, it's all tied together. Yeah And my mom is still currently working like similar jobs for someone else and yeah. Wow, I mean, yeah, Dan Pickering, awesome guy.

19:16 I've never met Bobby Tudor. I've seen him speak a dozen times. Seems like a bright guy. He played basketball for Rice or whatever. He played football, yeah. Chuck will know 'cause he's a Rice

19:26 Simp. Yeah, Chuck is an owl, right?

19:30 That's really interesting stuff, right? So that makes sense then, and that's really funny. You see Dan Pickering here, you're like, I've seen this, I know this guy. Wait, what's his name?

19:40 They're like, That's Dan Pickering. You're like, The Pickering and the Pickering Hole Thing. Tutor Pickering Hole, yeah, Bobby Tutor. Wait, wait, I'm in the same. So anyways, we jumped

19:51 ahead a little bit, and I love hearing the family story and the family lineage, but so that brought you to Houston, right? And then you become a Houston kid. You graduated from high school.

20:02 Sounds like outside of Houston. What did you do? Did you go to college to pursue a degree? Like what next? You knew you liked content. You knew that you're now, I guess, a Houston kid. What'd

20:14 you do? Yeah. So let me just first say that you're really good at your job because I have insane ADHD and I was just yapping and you immediately got it back on track. So that's very, that's talent

20:25 right there. Thank you. For the record, this isn't my job. I do podcasting because I love it. My job, funk, future, shout out, contract sales and recruiting for the oil and gas technology

20:33 space. Yeah, I added this so I'm gonna cut all that out. But no, for real. That's a talent, it's hard to listen and also keep track, so props. Anyway, so it's, I like, I like splitting up

20:46 my life in the eras 'cause a lot of things happen and Katrina's an obvious one. It's like, okay, 10 years old, Katrina. It's like, okay, post-Katrina, whatever. So, after high school was

20:57 definitely an end of an era,

20:60 they're, you know, I feel, I feel like there is like the stigma of like, you need to go to college, whatever And I feel like that doesn't happen anymore. I think everyone's like, yeah, like

21:11 parents in my generation are progressive enough to be like, you know, I don't care, you know, whatever. Like obviously if you have an actual profession in mind, you gotta go to college. But

21:20 like, the pressure was insane. Like, and my parents weren't like that. My parents knew I was like, very, and I don't wanna say dumb. I like calling myself dumb, but I've learned that people -

21:32 You were alternative. People don't like saying, like when I say that. And it's, I see it in my own kids. It's like, you don't, you're not dumb. You don't care or you care. And so you'll see

21:42 kids thrive at things they care about and then kids don't, you know, on the opposite. And then there's kids who are mature enough to be like, I just have to study so I can just get past this, you

21:54 know? So whatever. I was a kid who couldn't suck it up. You know, if something bored me, something didn't interest me, I just didn't care, you know? And so I had ups and downs going through

22:04 school But it was very clear to me that first off, I didn't even know what I wanted to do after, let alone just throw myself into college. Or at least around the time community college was getting

22:14 normalized. So a lot of friends I knew, like went to community college and then dropped out and their debt wasn't bad at all, you know? Right. So, but I knew the whole time, like, what, like,

22:25 why? Like, I'm not falling for this shit, you know? Like, see, I'm not dumb, I'm smart. I'm not falling for it. So I didn't even apply to a college Like there is just nothing there was

22:34 nothing I interested me like I guess earlier I talked about trying different art styles, and I said a lot of very obvious mediums, but one I did get into was architecture. We had a great

22:45 architecture elective that ended up being a double block at the end of the year, and it was because that actual architect became a teacher. And he lives here, his last name's Crowder. I don't know

22:56 his first name. And he was really cool. Producer San knows his name. I saw you shaking your head. Mr. Crowder. Mr. Crowder Mr. Crowder. Mr. Crowder. I

23:06 remember his first name. I know. He was like one of those cool teachers, you know? But like not too cool, you know? That's never good. But I think he like became an AP and everything, but like

23:16 just one of those super inspirational teachers that are like, I'm in it for the love of the game. I mean, like he had an actively running firm. Like had a brick, like his own office like was in

23:27 Midtown, super nice. We got a tour. People work for him. He'd build like crazy, huge billion, million dollar I was like, it's so super inspirational. And then you learn about going to college

23:38 for architecture. It's the same thing as like going to college for psychology. Like it's, you might as well burn money or whatever. Yeah, good luck. Like what are you gonna do when you come out?

23:47 You either start a job. So what are the career paths as if you go into college as an architecture major? I don't know. Like either start your own company or you get like a low level job drawing

23:58 like CAD designs or something like that? Exactly. Yeah. It's cool learning CAD though, auto CAD That's that software that you do 3D animation. So really cool. But yeah, even with that like

24:12 literally graduating high school after doing like double classes of that and being like, huh, maybe, you know, I looked into things. I think I learned like Texas tech is like decent for

24:20 architecture or something. But again, never applied or anything. And then by the time we're graduating like, nah, I like it's fine. I was working, I was already working in high school I was a

24:30 lifeguard when I was 16, 17 and then transition

24:36 a restaurant when I was 18. So I started off as a host and then waiter and then bartender. And this is a lot of TGI Fridays, the one in Willa Brook, or I guess anyone listening who knows up in

24:45 Northwest Houston. And that's still there? No. Yeah, Friday is still in business? A lot of them are closing. Yeah. I think the one closed down in Willa Brook, and then I live in Austin.

24:57 There's one in South Park Meadows, which is a very big mall area of South Austin, completely torn down and now it's a pluckers, which is great 'cause pluckers is amazing So it's a wing place around

25:06 here.

25:08 So that era began where I'm post high school, I'm living by myself or like with friends

25:16 'cause you know, I can make money and I wanna live with my friends and just - You're in the restaurant game. That's like Animal House. It's like Animal House. Yeah, it's got its own community too.

25:22 I work in restaurants and like that's who you hang out with. Right. So yeah, there's a bit like their generous sea, but also - Going pretty, pretty normal. Like I look back at it, I'm

25:32 definitely not like happy, but it's like. it's like I wasn't like I didn't like become like a complete frat kid or anything like it was just me and my friends hanging out trying to have parties

25:41 whenever we could but ultimately we just wilt has worked and were just knew how to care take care of herself so that was nice that lasted for years and from like right after highschool just working as

25:52 a bartender and and literally just no hobbies you know like I was in video editing I wasn't drawing painting whatever like I was I would just I would watch sports I would hang out we would I mean and

26:06 I dunno like it was I was I was just kind of like the A lost kid who just will you know whatever it I Guess Maybe I was okay with it but I definitely like got to a point where like you know I kind of

26:17 felt like I Wish I had something to do with my life whatever it was Yeah and it's so crazy reflecting on a now where like as real adults like we have an an never ending list of things to do you know

26:29 what to do lists like and so refreshing thinking back of like when you're like an adult but like with no kids and then like, when you get off, when you clock out, like you, you, nothing. That's

26:41 it. And do whatever until the next time a clock. Yeah. Your big commitment is like, what time is the sopranos on or something like that? Or what time we're going to order the pizza or who gets

26:50 the first round of Madden and who has to wait? Yeah. Right. You guys stop aging yourself, man. Sorry. It's a rest of development. You're just now I'm reflecting too. Those were good times. No,

27:02 I've thought about that too I thought that there was like stress and pressure in my life. It's much different now with kids in a mortgage and bills and responsibilities. And I want to go back to

27:11 something too that you talked about around college. So I'm Jewish and I think in the religion or at least like the cultural affiliation like education is super important, right? So for us, you

27:26 know, now having kids who are in high school seventh grade, first grade, like we're saving a lot of money putting a lot of money into the kids college accounts because It's important for us to see

27:36 them go to college and for them to go to college. And they know that it's an expectation from us. And I'm fully supportive of that, in part because I was fortunate enough to have the experience of

27:46 going before your school and all that stuff happening. And I think it's less like, yes, you're right. Going into college and not having an idea of what you wanna do from a professional track

27:57 could be a waste of money. But what was really positive for me was the socialization aspect I was forced to live with people that I didn't know. I was forced to take classes and learn about things

28:09 that didn't always make a ton of sense to me. But later on, you understand why they're important and why they're applied. And I think ultimately like the biggest thing, and I've said this on

28:19 podcast before, is I was like a small town, New Hampshire kid, class president, captain of sports, seems high achiever type, big fish, small pond I get to Brandeis where I'm like, Oh shit.

28:33 not only are these people really smart, a lot of them come from more opportunity and like have a real path in direction. So they're smarter than me, they come from more money and they have a better

28:42 work ethic. Like I'm really gonna need to step up my game if I wanna compete in the same like world as them, whether it be business or law or you name it. So my view on it is I do think it's

28:55 important from the socialization aspect, but I also think that it's become a little bit more culturally acceptable to just build your own career outside of it and not shunned upon to not go to

29:06 college. Yeah. I mean, it's such an easy talking head, talking point to be like, you know, yeah, at least you get the experience to friends, you know, maybe a professor does something on the

29:19 side, you know, like you just can't beat it. Like it just makes too much sense. Yeah.

29:25 I mean, I feel like I was just so sure. Like I feel like I have friends who felt like, they

29:33 had pressure, they were pressured themselves, their parents pressured them and like, I think of all of my friends who I still am with and like they're like, they just do like normal jobs. Like no

29:42 one's like doing crazy high professional things and it's totally fine. Like I don't know what I would describe I'm at on that level but it's definitely not there either. Like well, I mean, you're

29:51 a, well, you're an entrepreneur. Right? I mean, yeah, I mean, now obviously you have a job. You work for digital lock adders, but you know, talk a little bit about the path that got you to

30:01 digital lock adders 'cause at first when I made you were a content house, right? Is that what it was? Yeah, we had a company called Creator House Me. Creator House, Creator House. It still

30:10 exists, technically. Okay. So talk me through like, how did this whole web start to interweave with the digital lock adders fam? Yeah, so we continue where we left off. Yeah. So if I graduated

30:22 2012,

30:25 this only happened three years later. that whole just void of like no hobbies working whatever that we might as well has just been my college you might as well as has been my experience like living

30:35 on your own seeing what it's like to have roommates not live with your parents like so it was a night is actually a nice amount of time where I was able to learn and grow my own until I transition to

30:47 twenty fifteen and that's when that's when I found a hobby i guess and that that leads us to you know pretty much where we are now besides family Jacob having a family Jacob but so Yeah you call me an

31:04 entrepreneur but I was handheld to disposition I've always stayed a creative and an artist and it was thanks to my two partners that are entrepreneurs that we've combined to make what we are created

31:18 to this day so it didn't all start with content creation it started with travel so I've been I've been to like a bunch of countries, I've been almost every state in the US and I've been on a plane

31:33 more than 100 times probably. And 10 years ago, I took my first flight. Nice. So, and it was to Cancun with my aunt 'cause she has a timeshare. Oh, hell yeah. And I feel like people might

31:44 cringe when I say timeshare, but I feel like my aunt, Shadow and Tracy, has a great relationship with whatever timeshares are. It seems like everyone gets scammed into doing it and it seems like

31:57 most of them are horror stories, but it seems like she genuinely, like, utilizes the process correctly. She goes every other year and brings friends and stuff. I think, so we have a

32:09 timeshare, we have a timeshare. So let me talk about this. I think - Glad I didn't roast you. No, no, no, no, this is the thing though. We were the couple in the family that almost did get

32:21 suckered into other timeshares and they're like, Totally see how it happens, and then they give you something to drink and you're like, Fuck, what did we just sign up for? Like, so when we

32:30 decided to get a timeshare about 10 years ago, also in Cancun, we were like, we actually asked them, typically, they suck you in with like, we'll give you like200 and like a free meal and a

32:41 massages or something to take this tour. And then that's how they get like 90 of their clients. But for this one, we actually turned down the tour and we liked this resort so much that we went up

32:52 to the front desk for like, all right, fine. Like you don't even have to give us anything, but we think that we wanna do like a timeshare thing I mean, if you wanna like comp us a meal. There's

32:60 a perfect client. And we're like, we think we would do it. So there's a lot of fine print on the timeshare shit, right? So we actually went in and we're like, okay, we get it. And we sort of

33:12 like did the math. We're like, for this to make sense, for us, like we're gonna have to come and forget about like the trading it and exchanging it for other places. That's like very complicated.

33:22 And most people don't know how to figure that out. Point systems Like if we come to this place. right? And they say they're growing more, you know, one of them is going to be in Cabo on here,

33:32 can't coom port of my arta, use some of Harris, whatever. If we come here like seven times, like it's well worth it. Yeah. So I would say in the call, I called out the six flags theory. Yeah.

33:45 You go twice or to call a car wash theory. For the subscription. The second time, do you go to second time in the same season? You made your money back. Got it. Right. This was a lot of car

33:55 washes So I'm like, are we going to do that? And really, we had a young family at the time, right? I'm like, yeah, like if we take the kids and we do this, we've probably gone at this point

34:07 like 10 times, right? So now I actually like I'm on Anttracy side with this where like we've actually, we probably wouldn't be able to stay at this place if we just did a trip every year, every

34:17 other year to this type of resort. But now we have this like super fancy dope resort. We don't have to pay a ton of money to do it because we spent that money up front So the time sure thing for me

34:25 worked, for most people it doesn't. and there's a lot of fine print and reasons why that it turns into a nightmare. Sorry, keep going. I mean, you're also locked in for like decades, right? Oh,

34:34 it's like a 40-year - I think that's the worst part. Yeah. Unless you like it, 'cause I see, I mean - And then that's the thing, the systemic issue with it, is that that person dies, the

34:45 relative has to take over it and has to go, or like has to pay for it. And there's this monthly payment, so what, it's January, so we're probably gonna get hit pretty soon with our annual fees

34:53 That increased way too high percentage each year. That started low. They were like430, and now it's like a thousand bucks. Yeah, it's crazy. I remember John Oliver did a piece on it and, it's

35:04 systemically created to just absolutely - Dabilitate you. Yeah, you and your families, families. So fucked up, and still, we're like, okay, cool, we did it. Now we're not gonna have to do

35:17 any more of these stories. They still hit you right away. They're like, oh, so now you get the special members So we're like, What? Like, we already signed up. They're like, But, you know,

35:25 we have promotions. Now, four existing members only, we're like, we're not doing that.

35:30 Yep. You know, so we're good about it now. Yep. So that was my first trip. Sorry, sorry, well, it's not a bad place to go on your first trip. Well, it's funny 'cause it's an international

35:41 flight. So the first time you're getting on a flight, you're going through like customs and stuff. Even though it's Mexico, it's still, you know, as intense as it is, you're gonna stay up,

35:49 you're like, you go to the window, they're like, are you terrorists? And you're like, I guess not, no. Are you sure? And you're like, ah, the fine terrorists. I don't think so, you don't

35:60 think so. Backroom.

36:04 So yeah,

36:07 I mean, that's pretty funny, but soon after, a couple of times, 2015, 2016, I got a go and I scratched that itch that I've developed. Even I, you know, it's, the first trip is a resort, all

36:17 inclusive resort, I'm like not leaving the area. The first thing I did was like, oh, let's go out and like go to a restaurant. I was like, no, no, no, you don't do that here. You sit on your

36:25 ASS Yeah and you get everything for free and you Shut up Rats i Guess Yes Okay Thank You Thank You Tracy Yeah

36:32 and So I had to I developed a good relationship with My My Friend Mac Mac Share and he was a friend throughout high school and stuff but we really thrived right after high school because I left his

36:47 part out of the story but the first year out of high school actually went to San Marcus delivered my sister who was finishing at Texas state that's like thirty minutes south of Austin beautiful little

36:56 town one of my favorite spots and a MAC graduated with me he was doing his freshman year and up you know with my literal no hobbies no whatever I was like Lol transfer to a different Friday's the one

37:06 that's closer on a plug years now and I'll just work and live life here now it's like it's it's like it's so liberating or like I can I can just nothing transfer to a different restaurant and work and

37:16 do continue where I left off in a different place really cool the A year later moved back and just that and that's the story there but that year there with mac You know it was like I wasn't there with

37:26 my other friends that I graduated with you know I was always clocking in all my time in Mac so we really bonded and got to know each other a lot more and he finishes up his second year at Texas state

37:38 and then he's back in Houston Authority or to start nursing school and stuff there so of course there's like twenty fifteen it all lines up and I'm Right off My first flight he's back in town getting

37:49 like these nice few weeks at a time off of nursing school year or however that works and I'm bartending at a new place it's great very flexible and he's looking for something to do and on his free

38:03 time and he's like let's travel you know somewhere I don't even I I'm I'm I'm not even Gonna try to go to detail I dunno how any of this happened because it's it's not even the same person I am now

38:13 because what we did was we booked a flight to Denver because the flights were like thirty four Bucks center like Spirit you know experience Frontier spirit like we've gone to we've gone to Vegas and

38:24 Denver for like literally 30, 40 or 50 bucks, like multiple times. And like, I think the, you can still find these deals. Like at least like 60, 70, 80 bucks, you'll see them. Whatever's

38:34 happening with spirit, I don't know. Wait, then you have to pay to like actually get in the seat and pay for a bag. Yeah, you don't pay for the bags. You squeeze everything in that suitcase. I

38:42 see you know. Or you share the suitcase or you squeeze everything in the bag. I have a 40 liter hiking bag I take on every flight and like very rarely are they like, bro, that doesn't fit. And

38:52 it's like, oh, well, it's on my back. So I'm gonna keep walking That's okay. It works.

38:57 So what's so crazy about the story in general for me is that we didn't rent a car. We didn't have a place to stay. We literally were like, let's get on this34 flight and just land and see what

39:08 happens. Like, what the fuck? Who does that? Not to mention like the Denver airport of all places. Like it's like in fucking West Kansas. Yeah. You know? Yeah. It's crazy So just, just the

39:22 preface like these days now, like. I, my Google Maps is like covered with pins and I plan everything and I literally make content on the side I'll talk about later. Like how I literally make

39:32 guides, city guides to like what things that do in cities. That's cool. So this is, so I went to Denver being like, let's go climb the first mountain we see. Like I don't care about restaurants.

39:41 I'm not like a foodie and stuff. Like I just want to go like see pretty things. Like it was so primitive. Like it's so crazy how we got back. After we hit the dispensary. Right. Oh yeah. I did

39:52 smoke weed for the first time there In Colorado? Well it was legal. I legally smoked for the first time. And it was like just freshly new. Like it was just freshly legal in 2015. Yeah.

40:04 Yeah, which by the way, I avoided weed like my whole life and I finally smoked it and I like hallucinated. I was like, well, I'm like one of those guys who like trips on acid when I smoke weed.

40:12 So yeah. You're like, well, this is maybe a little bit too fast. Never became a potted because of that. But anyway, so first off we go to a car dealership like from the airport obviously.

40:24 We need a car, you know? What do we do? We're like 22 years old. So we already have to pay like the fees. I don't know if we know like, maybe we looked into

40:35 the due diligence and we knew that you could be under 25, but you just pay a fee. Yeah. 'Cause that's how it still works, right? You have to be 25 or higher. Right. We ended up getting a car

40:44 like that's barely available. They must have like felt for us 'cause we got that fucking, at the time 2016 Chevy Tahoe. Woo! This thing was like a UFO It was like fully specked out too, like

40:53 fully trimmed. And it had like lane assist and it was 2015. It was crazy. It was like driving a Tesla. And so we had that, good start. We had sleep in it. Yeah, right. It was definitely the

41:04 plan. Like, okay, we'll sleep in here. Yeah. We go, bro, what did we do? Like night one, what the hell do we do? Yeah, we must have like just driven to like Boulder or somewhere a little

41:16 bit outside of Denver and just up in a car. Yeah

41:21 up dude what what I don't know anyway We're a we're like the Red Rock little area by not like like by Boulder. We're like those isn't it called like Red Rocks? It's fine. I like Flagstaff flat iron.

41:34 Yes like that. Yeah, so we're in that area and we're climbing a mountain because that's what we did Also, we have like a GoPro. So we are kind of like shooting content right here. Sorry awful

41:44 storyteller We have a GoPro and this is how we start like making content to like post on an Instagram. It's like oh my god I skipped over a whole section. Okay so Our goal is just to like get

41:56 whatever looks cool on our GoPro, right? So we're literally like dumb caveman like mountain go on top like inner jeans Tennis shoes no hiking shoes. It's not like winter, but it's not summer. So

42:09 there's like snow, but like not really we get to the top of like just part of the bottle flat irons and there's a girl up there and We start talking to her and she's like, oh, you know, I got a

42:21 the college year and stuff and We're just talking and I guess we just asked her, Hey, can we sleep at your house? Could we just crash at your place?

42:30 And she said, Yes. And we just hung out, we got dinner, they let us sleep there, she had some roommates. And like we all got along and it was just like, it all just worked out, like just so

42:40 privileged and lucky and just so stupid. And that's, you know, we went the next few days, like doing whatever and then went home. And they're like, That's cool, let's do that again forever And

42:53 we went on more and more trips. And we had this GoPro this whole time, we updated to like an actual DSLR camera. And we started sharing things like on YouTube and Instagram and stuff. And

43:05 the part I left out is that basically for a few months before that, we started filming stuff, but just like in Austin. And so we go to, 'cause we live in Houston, we go to Austin, we like to

43:14 cliff jumping and stuff and like go to Barn Springs and all just on a GoPro. Like it was waterproof, you know. And we could do all this cool shit.

43:24 It was all love of the game like you know we're just getting where we actually were like getting followers for whatever we were doing I was learning how to edit and things like that and so we started

43:33 going on trips every time you know I can get some time off MAc and get some time off and we clocked in you know like a dozen trips over a year to mom and

43:45 so in twenty seventeen we you know this is our this is what we do an aside zero money like just off of it this is just instagram we get to like ten thousand followers so like it's it's a cool channel

43:57 and stuff but it's like it just doesn't do anything we like at the end of the day I need a barton and mac needs to become a nurse and so he is getting at the end of that I'm thriving I love it I'm

44:07 like I remember having conversations with my friends at a time like Ila I could use for like I'm going to work and then take a week off and go travel and then repeat the unlike I thought that was so

44:16 Cool I do I Guess I still think that's cool place with other ADS or whatever Yeah I mean it sounds cool but I'm like In retrospect like okay good based you know whatever so twenty seventeen rolls

44:29 around and do you know maybe max wondering what to do with nursing maybe he kind of hates nursing because nursing schools hard as fuck but maybe I'm sitting there twiddling my thumbs being like

44:42 whatever he you know he or he starts talking to our soon to be third partner Tim Tim Della for sale and buy these two guys still very close with partners with an eleven houston they talked to colin

44:56 and they worked here and helped out too but Oh yeah there were there were like with you just constantly filming stopped setting up microphones doing anything content related for DW Yeah so mac he must

45:08 have been like backing up his ideas of what to do with his life like his like I might want a job at a nursing school maybe I don't want to do the travel thing like Jacob does but I do want to be an

45:18 entrepreneur and like do my own thing no Anna it all came together because while him and timber kind of talking and may they were coming up with some kind of entrepreneurial ideas ventures and I was

45:31 just there bartending and you know we had our camera and we were into like you know people online were inspired by other video creators doing very similar things you know it was the travel influencers

45:44 that's it that's the word right there to travel influences we were one of them an era of some very big ones who are very famous and it was very inspirational and cool to be like them and other

45:54 inspirational guy in two thousand and seventeen everyone loved was Gary Vaynerchuk and in retrospect you know not a bad person like he so weird he's like he's like almost scammy but not he's like Tai

46:08 Lopez it's like at the end of the day he was he was just like you need a hustle and money Yeah it's a hustle poorness but it is he invented it and still does it to this day and it's so Funny I like

46:21 open up YouTube and he's on one page and it's like Six hundred views two days ago like he's just he doesn't care anymore and like he doesn't get views anymore but he doesn't care like how interesting

46:31 a psycho

46:33 he was he was killing it back in the day he was hitting our demographic like have like a truck man like he was getting Us all I had friends who I remember this one friend from highschool like he must

46:45 have went to one of his events he's like wearing a suit and tie and stuff and like what is this this is like hustle culture being born it was and grant cardone Yeah Cardone Yeah I don't think that

46:56 Guy's good I think out of all the Guys gary is like the safest one all the other ones are gone a little too far with like maybe Crypto Scams rise stuff like that I know Gary's done it too so fuck them

47:07 all anyway anyway this is back when he was purely just you Gotta Hustle Yeah Jorge Live in your Parents' basement I drove your possession dropship job ship everything Amazon Yeah I can create

47:24 something if you're feeling sad just you know don't drink a beer get back up to calea like the dumbest comment we were driving back as

47:33 coded man okay so we are inspired by that guy so he would do these pop ups where he would just go to a city and be like yo show up I'm going to start walking the street everyone fled Street whatever I

47:47 Dunno Mario Hustler show up in downtown Houston this afternoon Florida would go up to them like touching like fucking Jesus like Jesus Christ Superstar entrepreneur virility it was crazy and so he was

47:59 doing in Houston there was an announcement on Twitter or whatever back when that wasn't like a not Nazi platform cesspool sorry our entire community sorry boss

48:13 of theirs are people yeah he's Jewish I'm Leaving I Didn't

48:22 now my daughters think that's like the Funniest Thing Too they're like and we just wanted to say we love you so much Mom and Dad I'm Like Cat Thanks Y'all need to thrive it's it's your It's Your

48:31 Moment for gesture

48:35 and so he's having US meet up in Houston Mack knows about it and he has one of his camera guys who follows them all around he's like I guess he tweets at he's like I'm not going to be in Houston so

48:48 Whoever DMs in Wednesday's contest can go and like okay whatever tem is all our MAc has all over it and it's only he goes I think maybe tim joined them I wasn't there and he goes downtown and I guess

49:02 he used his entrepreneur brain and he just he knows the hotel he is and he goes into the lobby he sees them he goes up to him and goes OH Hey Gary I'm the Guy who's going to film you Today Oh you know

49:12 not like Oh you want to call that Nope just Hey I'm the Guy and of Course Garry's like Cocaine Brain is like Yeah let's Go You know it's like like like Nope like I like it as we Gotta get started

49:22 right now Yeah exactly so he's just starts like following him and like filming them and he's in the middle of the crowd and everyone's giving them space cause he looks like he's the guy the access

49:31 that and I dunno this just a dumb video is just he's just like answer People's questions and like saving them and kissing her feet turning bread and the wine or whatever the fuck deserted and oH man

49:42 it's so crazy to think about there's only eight years ago GAC that this is really really funny so so then what about the produced content they actually produce it or anything we just like put together

49:52 like a minute video of like highlights of just like music I don't really think there was like words we shared online on Twitter the coping like they see it so they reshared an air thing for I don't

50:05 think that happens but what hap what did happen is that some guy in Houston saw it and he was like this is Awesome Y'all should work for Us and just like that we landed the first client so this we got

50:19 hired by a chiropractor up in the woodlands fine and he had a practice and he would and he he wanted to be like gary Vee this is back when like all these rich dudes they'd buy Lambo get ripped there

50:33 have cool houses and be like look at my life Bro Anyway and had really just yet this up last week my Boobs exact dude spot on he would so we would we would follow him around his house a few times a

50:46 week and just shoot him and then flip Fogg's and it was like alright so it's you know it's it's literally like five am wake -up protein six am eat three pounds of Lamb La insulted sit in the Sauna for

50:59 three hours thinking about God and then time for some workout it's like literally that content which unfortunately still exists today we are ahead of the game and unfortunately this it's crazy how

51:12 actually like we put effort into this I'm surprised it didn't grow because people AtE that shit and they still do to this day lamb or the content

51:21 the content but we did that for a couple of years until we just kind of broke it off and so that's like you know twenty seventeen eighteen and we know he we got he got us travelling and stuff you do

51:33 motivational speaking while it was actually really cool story and I'm going to not say his name for not no reason in particular I mean we could find him I'm sure he can be found and let's just say we

51:44 checked in on him a few years ago and there's a video of him inside of a Mexican prison but I dunno maybe like a jail like a holding cell but it was something weird and not like incarcerated I dunno I

51:57 didn't ask and a lot of questions were telling me and I was like I'm good there is good for him or not I dunno Yeah right enough that's a good thing it's like hustling in a jail that sounds like a

52:08 good youtube video these days like you know Anyway I don't even know where we're at at some point Judge Wildcatter Sims in the picture says so now you have a company right so you're out here vlogging

52:19 for this fuckin hustle porn creator or chiropractor dude out of the woodlands going around doing motivational speaking you're so incorporating some of this travel stuff and then at some point covet

52:30 hits and you meet con Yeah so

52:35 so eat we were he was our only client for a year and then once daughters know the chiropractic therapy seventy m debt and in twenty eighteen twenty nineteen twenty twenty we freelance ended things and

52:46 so we had all kinds of clients from like helping out like influence or people here in Houston to like big companies traveling whatever it was really like all over the place it was events it was social

52:59 media it was like in -house training videos it was anything you could do with a mic and a camera we were doing it beer and you should not drink till the cheek when you're in a podcast I'm like burning

53:11 bubbles like crazy going on right now right I do like top Chico Laptop Chico but I drink so much every day of this and I'm like oh Yeah maybe not maybe just incorporate some you know regular water at

53:23 some point yeah now it has it has to burn

53:28 we don't support coke or topo soma turn us around

53:32 so

53:35 that it was really all over the place freelancing but our biggest client that we had for pretty much the the industry or periods was we work and everyone knows we work as the company that was what UPS

53:48 burn cash write like a motherfucker and throw parties for no reason and we were hired to film all that cool so we we started filming it I don't even understand he would have it was almost like a happy

54:02 hour like they would just they were there are popping up all over the place all over America Oliver the world literally South America Asia the Middle East they were everywhere and was so cool cause

54:13 When we were like a member there were like able to like I would like go to New York and I have to pee and go inside of we work and just go Pina we work like the bathroom like paying for a bathroom

54:22 yeah fright which is a thing right I think they have there well especially in like internationally the thing for sure Yeah I'm talking about like like a subscription the bathrooms as it has I think

54:33 that is it I dunno it sounds like it i've actually was thinking about this as I was driving home from denver the other day so I'm like I can make it home but I really have to use the Bathroom I don't

54:42 want to have to like go into a fucking walgreens or something like that I was like how dope would it be if there was like a place where you could like swipe your credit card financial Yeah imagine

54:52 you're like in Manhattan or like L A where like the they will burn you if you try to use their bathroom without buying something or even like no public restrooms period like even if you buy something

55:04 my biggest fear the worst so is this the thing I Dunno maybe I just Wonder if it's like if you actually can monetize the real estate enough for it to happen Yeah but I thought about it that's another

55:16 conversation that is or is it do we look it up right now Chuck chuck we need you to invest in Something Chuck Gates have probably knows the CEO of the Guy who this will come out so anyway let's move

55:27 on is called bathroom breaks bathroom breaks dotcom say we work they were hemorrhaging money and they would have these parties it's like you know if you don't know we work at there's a lobby and

55:38 enters coworking space around and now co -working spaces to to stay or driving and are normal and not so insane and they would just have these things all the time what was happening I dunno was a DJ

55:49 everyone's drinking free booze and eating free food and I was it there was no speakers there was no nothing it was just it was just everyone hey show up in the community and we would film that in

55:58 Houston all the time downtown gallery or whatever we'd got sent out to L A and San Francisco shoot there were they would have actually more of like an actual focused thing like some keynote or

56:07 something of whoever talking They had these huge award events. It was insane and we were there half the time filming it. And that all kind of fills it out 2018, 2019, 2020. And we were kind of

56:22 floating about in 2020, but we were making a big move to Austin to a work with Capital Factory, which I think a lot of people who listening might actually know who that is. Oh yeah, yeah. They're

56:32 like a startup accelerator. Right. And they're still thriving to this day and they're a great company And we had worked with them very occasionally in that three year period. And it looked like

56:46 they were gonna take us on like full time to like shoot everything they do in house basically or like any kind of event. And we were gonna have an office there, whatever. So we moved to Austin and

56:57 that's what we started. Except that the month was March, 2020. And something happened that month. That may have eliminated parties. Yeah so I'm in my New rented house in Austin love it excited

57:14 we're going to have like consistent work because it's always a struggle when this is like peak Austin to like the tech scenes just blowing up their ride people are moving their real estates gone crazy

57:26 anyway so your peak Austin and you're bad to get your apartment you're good Yeah so we're we're hanging out and covert hits and we're screwed you know no events no filming capital factory has nothing

57:38 for us to do and I guess I guess things kind of didn't seem too bad because of the PPP loans came pretty fast the stipends came and personally and maybe I didn't have to pay rent and I remember I got

57:53 my wrenches wasn't a lot surprisingly for being in Austin

57:57 and just a few months in of just chilling and I mean we we absolutely went covert degeneracy like partying every Night Right. With our bubble, like not inviting friends over, like it was just the

58:09 same five of us just getting drunk, playing games, repeat, watching movies. Like, God, just what a time. Few months go in and Colin and Jake are hitting me up to help with some footage. You

58:20 know, they send me some footage to edit, whatever. Well, how'd they find you? Just 'cause you guys had a presence at that point? When we were at WeWork, they had a WeWork office. Right. And

58:30 we would just, the cool thing about working at WeWork is that, you're surrounded by small businesses. You need help with footage and stuff. It's like, it's a breeding ground for getting work.

58:44 And so Colin and Jake were one of them 'cause they were doing all kinds of ventures. They had like this clothing brand called Fit and Wealthy. They were trying to grow. They went down the

58:53 Guadalajara. Like they were actually getting it like manufactured. It wasn't like merch. Like it was actually pretty cool, but they just, they just quit that and they did a couple of other things.

59:00 And then they were, they were working on their oil and gas community. their OGGS, wherever to hell, back in the day. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And like eventually, you know, monetizing the,

59:10 hey, show up to a pizza and beer and a lobby and we'll have some people talk and you just get the network. And you know, we did that in that we work lobby and we did that in other places. And,

59:23 you know, as that grew and as Colin and Jake decided to go all in and do podcasting, whatever, that just grew and grew and grew. So I was pretty much like freelancing for them. Like anytime they

59:32 had some footage, they went out and like vlogged something or had a podcast, they gave it to me. And that eventually they brought me on full-time and I was employee number one. Wow. Yeah. Nice.

59:42 And now you guys are doing big things. Now you're like a software company or so. You're a tech company with Collide, right? And you still got events and you still got podcasts like this. But you

59:51 said there's less of them. So I do feel like I'm an honored guest, a show up here. I've been doing this for five years. This is really cool So then, you know, the energy tech nights. That then

1:00:03 creates like a perfect opportunity for you to film and cut up content, the Bitcoin mining events, right? You guys going around and shooting stuff and cutting it up. It's like, you love it, right?

1:00:14 I mean, do you love it? This is what you love to do. I've been doing it for 10 years. I don't get sick of it. That's incredible. Whatever it is, I'll cut it. I mean, so do you think the

1:00:23 digital lock adders are gonna go away from content and events? Because like, if you think about fundamentally, like software companies don't really do the type of content and events that digital

1:00:35 lock adders has traditionally done. Or do you think that it's just always gonna be a core component of like what this company does? 'Cause that's how you built community and how you built the brand.

1:00:44 Man, I really like to give a nice, articulated pitch of the future of digital lock adders to make everyone proud. If you

1:00:55 pay attention, you know, like we were like this event company basically, and now we're a tech company. if you really paid attention You'd know that was happening in the background the time

1:01:03 absolutely and but you know I kind of dig it blindsided I was like you know I was like Oh man the future is like I'm going to have to be like someone's boss and hire all these little editors to edit

1:01:12 my edits and Yadda Yadda I was like oh wait no that's not really where it's heading you know and you're right like being a tech company we there's not much we need to do on the content side and all I

1:01:24 need to do is make great content for whatever it is to spread awareness to get people on collide Yeah and to just give the community whatever they want and we're always going to grow and adapt and do

1:01:37 a lot of cool shit I think that's yeah evolve or die Sri Baby I was outside

1:01:46 I mean you know so so if you think about it fundamentally it's it's like content marketing just more of an emphasis now on marketing than content Yeah right like I mean the content you create will be

1:01:57 marketing toward a product so I mean it's still sweet spot stuff for you but does it fill the etch the same way that like the event stuff did and the like it sounds awesome you explain this story to

1:02:07 somebody who's like to yourself fifteen years ago you'd be like this is dope like I lived the life that I wanted to do you miss that kind of stuff or is it like the the company's evolving and now

1:02:16 you're also heading to this like next stage of your life too I think so much is changing that it stays fresh and I love that and that's why I like traveling and you know whatever like there's always

1:02:26 time to look forward to and there's always something changing then I'm on board and this company is always changing and there's always something look forward to and and like I said in the beginning

1:02:36 like I'm always working on something you know outside of this I edit my own travel stuff on YouTube or and like I said my Me Mackintosh's company is still around we have all clients hit US up all the

1:02:46 time as long we just say no you know whatever I'm too busy but like sometimes are like we need something that's like quick or easy or it's like night we needed in like six months it's like okay like I

1:02:55 can dabble away at This Yeah. So I'll work on like a thing or two a year, just 'cause the emails still come in. So I have all these like things I'm working on at all times that I can or can choose

1:03:08 and it's, it doesn't get old, even at, it's all just sitting on the computer, I guess at the end of the day, I don't know. But that's how you know when you love something, like you're 10, 000

1:03:16 hours in and you're like, okay, what's next, you know? Yeah, well what do the next 10, 000 look like? Well, this was a blast, man I really, really appreciate you coming on. Jacob Stiller,

1:03:28 you are a killer, it's Ben. There it is, wait for that. Fun, yeah, of course. But no, truly it's been a blast to get to know you better, to see you like, you know, jump into the LinkedIn

1:03:37 stuff. I was like, all right. 'Cause instead of just beating the guy behind the camera now, like you're letting your personality shine. So I wanted you to - This is an exposite or whatever. Like

1:03:46 - Yeah, man. You're exposing me. I don't know if that's the same thing. It's an exposite Thank you for listening to The What The Funk Ex-Bose,