don’t miss our next WatchMojo live event
broadcasting from YouTube spaces London
on July 12 2017 ladies and gentlemen
please welcome WatchMojo founder and CEO
ashcan kar bass version already so hello
everyone and welcome to the first ever
watch module live at YouTube space and
what better place to kick off this
global and ambitious initiative than in
New York City so here we are today at
Chelsea Market which is one of the two
spaces in the USA and there’s nine of
them around the world in far-off places
such as Tokyo Mumbai Berlin Paris London
Toronto Sao Paulo and of course Los
Angeles now you may not know this but
watch mojo on YouTube are both kind of
industry veterans right I mean YouTube
launched in 2005 they registered their
URL in May of that year and we launched
the next month in June but of course
within 18 months YouTube had become the
second largest search engine in the
world and the largest video platform as
well and it basically eclipsed as you
all know platforms like revver Guba
Metacafe dailymotion as well as the
incumbent portals like yahoo msn end of
a o L now before long Google recognized
the promise potential and presence that
YouTube had and by 18 months later by
October of 2006 acquired it for 1.65
billion dollars which at the time seemed
crazy to some but today it actually
comes across as quite the bargain so on
that note we’re going to take a look at
the confidential financial statements on
YouTube I’m just kidding we’re not going
to do that anyway so meanwhile the
original founders of YouTube is funny
when we started off I would send emails
to kind of get answers to how we could
optimize for the platform and literally
their founders would be replying to us
now they went off afterwards and bought
their private islands meanwhile we were
basically in Montreal in the trenches
trying to figure out this thing called
web video we tried publishing videos on
our owned and operated website and that
didn’t really go anywhere and we fire
sprayed them across the web and again
that didn’t necessarily lead
to build a business and there was one
platform however that was very different
one platform was unique one platform was
growing like crazy and to quote Jack
Walsh the chairman of GE one platform
was boundary-less
that platform of course was YouTube and
it occurred an era of production
democratization embeddable distribution
and eventually baked in monetization
that really have obviously radically
disrupted and altered the media
landscape and it wasn’t so much that
user-generated content or UGC was going
to change the rules of publishing
altogether brand safe quality content
remains essential for marketers but it’s
more that YouTube changed the rules of
engagement so we tracked along from 2006
to 2012 we produce how to’s we produce
celebrity interviews we did it all
biographies profiles and at some point
circa 2012 we said look if we’re going
to package WatchMojo as a consumer
facing brand it’s got to mean something
to the audience and that’s when we said
we looked at the team and we looked at
the marketplace and we said we should
really focus on what we’re most
passionate about and basically produce
factual top 10 countdown lists curating
pop culture and infotainment so after
the vloggers the let’s do it sorry the
do-it-yourselfers the let’s play gamers
but before the unboxers we basically
caught the listicle lightning in a
bottle and the rest as they say is
history
our success didn’t happen overnight we
built this one subscriber at a time and
we never raised any capital which is
kind of weird we’ve never raised a
single dollar a venture or angel
investment nothing and frankly with
venture capitalist growth requirements
it’s really really difficult to build
something like watch module from scratch
the reality is you just can’t build an
engaged and sustainable audience in a
hurry it’s like the famous will famous
the successful venture capitalist Mark
Schuster who is behind maker said you
can’t put 9 woman in a room and say
could you give birth in a month it just
doesn’t work like that so this process
takes time now if you fast-forward four
years our top ten lists have been seen
eight billion times and they’ve
generated over 50 billion minutes of
watch time now just to give you a sense
of how big that is that is ninety five
thousand years and it’s all organic some
of you in the audience may be part of
that 15 million subscriber base that
watches over a billion minutes of watch
time each month
who enjoy our top 10 list and a few of
you may be the ones who are a bit more
cynical who say we’re running out of
ideas even though we will never run out
of ideas but the most exciting part of
my job and my reality is like there’s
there’s like a billion of you out there
that don’t know yet about WatchMojo and
who have yet to become mojo Holland’s
and that’s really what kind of drives us
every day so what’s our formula for
success what’s the recipe the truth is
there’s no silver bullet there is you
know anybody that tells you like there’s
an algorithm and there’s kind of a
playbook to build a content successful
content business is lying
the reality is first and foremost you’ve
got to be passionate and you hear that
in so cliche I tell people you got it if
you’re going to be in the content
business you almost want to be focusing
on something that you would do for free
if there was no money in it but the
reality is if you’re persistent and you
just kind of improve and iterate then
the sky is the limit in the age of the
global stage and that stage being
YouTube 3 years ago at brandcast which
is YouTube’s upfront event I sat in the
audience and I heard a frank talk about
his vision for BuzzFeed BuzzFeed video
in the future then two years ago I saw
fellow Montreal entrepreneur and
executives Shane Smith take us through
the future of vice and how it was going
to be this new news gathering operation
those are two brands companies that have
built companies with valuations that
overshadow media companies that have
been in business for decades and that’s
been fueled obviously by the insatiable
insatiable appetite of audiences for
online video now to start to connect the
bridge between watch modules past and
present and the future I was born in
Iran you’re wondering what ash can carve
extrusion the origins are so I was born
in Iran but since 1983 I’ve called
Montreal my home as a Canadian
entrepreneur I basically you know I set
out to build the next edition of let’s
say a juice pool just for laughs Cirque
du Soleil or vice media basically the
next great media entertainment brand
export out of the city and frankly I
think we’ve accomplished that right and
you have to bear in mind that with
YouTube now surpassing a billion hours
of video each day it’s on pace to
replace television as the leading
consumption platform so as WatchMojo is
one if not the most successful you know
YouTube centric media brand out there
it’s not driven by like a personality
then I like to think we’re actually on
our way to draw that parallel
into building the next ESPN the next mtv
of the millennial generation and
daunting as it seemed over like the 11
years this journey of trying to like
take an idea and build a business around
it I knew that it was possible largely
because of YouTube’s boundary-less
platform an audience of billions and
today there’s really only nine channels
that have more subscribers and all-time
views than us and six of them are vevo
channels like Eminem Taylor Swift and
whatnot and then the other three are
basically the WWE Ellen and of course
PewDiePie let’s not forget every
PewDiePie so at a time when politicians
who are elected are calling to erect
walls we thought it was important to say
wait a second this is the new normal
YouTube is where society and life is
going which is basically its
boundary-less
a creator from Montreal can create
content inform entertain and engage
audiences from Manila Madrid Mumbai and
basically the sky’s the limit
tomorrow’s world especially in the
creative space won’t have any borders
because creativity travels and it brings
together audiences and yes that includes
the trolls and we do love the trolls
they do Drive a lot of watch time when
they complain so a few years ago we
launched topics and topics really was
intended to curate and highlight the
best of YouTube and today we’re excited
to kick off watch mantra live at YouTube
space which is basically a global
initiative celebrating diversity and
creativity around the world and
basically we’re going to be focusing on
spaces such as this one but rolling
around the world where YouTube and
Google have invested millions in and
it’s kind of our way basically to give
back how so watch module is a 10-year
overnight success and with this new
initiative we’re looking at the next 10
years of our evolution and basically we
want to showcase local musicians local
creators in cities around the world and
basically we’re recognizing that YouTube
has kind of ushered in this revolution
in media and entertainment and make no
mistake about it our objective with
watch module live is basically to give
back to the the up-and-coming creators
so that their trajectory doesn’t take
them 10 years to build their own success
stories so on that note we hope you
enjoy this first watch module live at
YouTube space
and we’ll be at Kings Cross station in
London on July 12 which is in five weeks
to do this again with a UK British
flavour over over the pond so we’re
going to cut now to a video more
propaganda for watching morale I guess
is that what we’re doing
if you’ve ever fallen down the rabbit
hole that is YouTube you’ve seen one of
watch mojos twelve thousand videos but
you may not have been formally
introduced to watch mojos extended
family of channels miss mojo is the
go-to source for female millenials who
love all things celebrity TV film
lifestyle and pop culture with
viewership at 60% female aged 18 to 34
600,000 subs and Counting tune in to
miss mojo to see everything from
shocking red-carpet outfits to
underrated Disney songs to the funniest
ways TV shows hit actresses pregnancies
junior mojo connects with six to twelve
year olds through original animated
programming as well as educational and
crafty videos less than two years in and
WatchMojo espanol has built a fanbase of
roughly 1 million followers thanks to
its mix of original and translated
Spanish content watch mojo UK is the
newest member of the family a channel
full of content specific to the United
Kingdom and our other international
channels target fans in countries across
the globe with original and translated
content syndicated in multiple languages
from French Portuguese and German and we
plan to keep growing the family so watch
this space for more little bundles of
joy
not that we’re counting but since this
video wasn’t it done we did surpass a
million and with WatchMojo espanol as
well all right on that note help me
welcome Anthony bat co-founder of Weaver
firs keynote the new reality virtual and
augmented storytelling thank you – so
I’m Anthony batt let’s see if I get the
slides to come up are we gonna go live
with the slides keynote there we go so
um as I said manthan e bat I’m the
founder of a company in Venice
California called Weaver and we focus on
making immersive content at the same
time we’re building a distribution
platform for creators that are trying to
get their work out so we have transport
running in every headset as well as a
YouTube channel that’s gonna be
launching very shortly I’m stoked to be
here talking to the WatchMojo audience
and I hope to inspire them to like think
about what VRS is today and what its
going to become in the future so I’m a
part of this you know global creative
community right now that are actually
the you know making VR so I’m working
with you know top a-list Hollywood
directors all the way down to um you
know YouTube channels like so crispy or
just you know college interns that are
making videos with me so it’s like a
really broad spectrum but it’s this
global creative communities actually
really focused on sort of reimagining
gaming and entertainment storytelling
and also really talking about the sort
of the spatial miss of VR and not and
what I’ll do is I’m going to introduce
several videos and kind of set them up
and kind of explain what we were doing
and why we’re doing them hopefully this
could be more of a learning thing than
me just talking about my company so
again one more on one side of the
spectrum we see VR which is very
immersed and then AR which is partially
immersed and I’ll talk about both of
those but right now a lot of people ask
me like why we are now and kind of like
um you know the the way to kind of set
that up is you know what I think reality
is sort of virtualized in a sense
because we’re all sort of seeing things
and hearing things that we want to hear
and so every perspective
is our own personal perspective so we’re
used to sort of telling our own stories
to ourselves we’re used to we’re all
always hearing what we want to hear and
when I was working with um Deepak Chopra
we had him in the headset and he checked
out some stuff and he was he kind of
took it off and he’s pretty quiet and he
said now I can explain to people that
were all living in the simulation and it
really didn’t occur to me what he was
meaning by that until I worked in the
medium probably a year longer so I spent
I’ve been doing it for three years and
at about a year into it after seeing so
many people spending time in virtual
reality that you can sort of tell that
they are not in their real space that
are in this virtual space and that
they’re what they’re what they’re seeing
and what they’re doing is really quite
foreign and interesting and so he talks
about real real reality being what you
make it and when you put it on it’s
another virtual world which is pretty
pretty impressive so right now we’re in
real reality and in virtual reality all
it is is essentially you’re wearing a
headset and there’s computer imagery
that are completely surrounding your
vision and so the reason why we have
that ability today is really on one side
compute power so our cell phones which
is one way that you can see virtual
reality content you can wear a Samsung
or a Google product and you can put your
phone into it now that phone and that
compute power has gotten so
sophisticated that it can actually play
back video or CG content at the frame
rate that actually allows you to see
everything right when you move your head
in it and it’s actually it’s getting
better so the fidelity is actually
increasing so we have compute power I
like to think that that’s cool but I
actually like to think about that we’re
creatively pushing past our capability
of storytelling with a with a 16 by 9
screen and so our stories have gotten
too complex and too cool and too
interesting that the sixteen by nine
screen is really not enough for us to
tell our stories so now we’re moving
into this idea of like what does it like
to tell story in a spatial way how do we
choreograph
that story and so virtual reality kind
of gives you that capability and it’s
growing very rapidly it’s very early I
was doing Internet when people had to
unplug their fax machines and plug in
their modem and that’s kind of where we
are right now but it’s actually
happening everywhere in the world I’ve
been in China Japan and they’re actually
growing very healthy VR businesses now
and so you know we were thinking about
VR we’re kind of thinking along kind of
like it’s not a game it’s it’s a story
and it also has a puzzle piece into it
and so it’s not classic cinema story
cinema allows you to like be the
director and you get to cut over
shoulders and do various techniques that
allow you to really force the story
along in VR you have to sort of give up
some of that control and so that’s where
the puzzle piece comes in and that’s
where you have to like I’ll let the user
to find the story and so I’ll get into
some examples and show you some video
clips which is a lot better so I’m going
to talk about stuff that I am that I
actually worked on I often hear a lot of
people talk about VR but when you really
look at what they’re talking about is
they’ve never actually really made
anything so I my company my team we’ve
made over 30 pieces and so I’m going to
kind of give you a deep dive on some of
them but it goes from like working with
Jon Favreau who is a film director who
did jungle book to like Reggie Watts
who’s a comedian musician I think he’s
just a musical talent all the way to
like deep top Deepak Chopra and an
artist named David Cho who is really
talented and artistic and he he we just
sent him out into the into a jungle and
Africa with a tribe and he’s you know
putting up big spray-painted pieces on
there in their cave and stuff it’s
really it’s far out we’re going to be
doing that we’re gonna be releasing that
shortly but so I the point is is that
I’ve spent a lot of time making and I
feel like actually as a result of making
all this content and working with
creators it’s important for me to share
as much as I can because I want to
inspire people actually take on this
medium because it’s early and you can
really make it make a big splash by
getting
early so let’s see here so I had this
opportunity to work with this amazing
hip-hop group called run the jewels and
I liked them for various reasons but
most most mostly I just think that they
stand for a lot of what I believe in in
sort of hip-hop and so what we did is we
had four or five hours with them which
means that we had to like limit the
scope of shooting and really just focus
on how do we tell a story how do we get
the artists as close as to the to the
viewer as possible now when you’re
seeing this stuff you’re going to see on
the far left and the far right are are
actually what’s behind you so this is
designed to actually played in a headset
so it’s going to look odd but actually
still looks really cool even on a
sixteen by nine screen so I’m going to
roll this clip but we had three hours we
had their song crown and I’ll let you
take a listen he’s laid out a total
salary for council a thousand you pay
causing me pain
to leadership mm right
Oh
a bishop of our original senators have
I found the Christ whatever
now finding my
everyone in you man
Oh
Collin was owning kids from the crimes
he was open
teacher them without mercy and give you
the tool to go after the causes of her
you’ll become dead you will take bread
this is for everything you’ve ever I’m
running low on time so I’m gonna kind of
have to speed through these things but
when you’re in the headset killer mics
is right in front of you he’s he feels
like he’s right in your face singing and
no matter where you look there’s acting
out the verses so it was really sort of
powerful we wanted to go with black and
white who’s we wanted we wanted to
actually be very stark and very
to-the-point and we wanted to sort of
see what black and white would look like
in VR because we hadn’t seen any so we
just went for it so here is a friend and
a creative genius Reggie Watts in the
back and this is Natalie Emmanuelle she
might know her from Game of Thrones or
fast and furious but what we did here is
a Ben Dickinson the director and Reggie
sort of wrote this piece about being in
multiple levels of VR and I hope I have
enough time to talk about what that
means in the future and sort of he
created an 18-minute sort of adventure
this piece is consequential because we
released this at Sundance of 2016 it’s
still sort of the gold standard of
mixing live action video with CG and and
it’s it’s an 18 minute piece I’ve got a
couple Clips here I’ll just show you
really quick the entertainment module
yes the entertainment module would you
like to try the entertainment module
okay yes all the greatest people have
used it Bob Denver wrote a Sinclaire
felf carpenter batcher tap Oh pat grin
smirk culprit everything you believe in
waste pushing to access paper backing
off you talk too much
um so
[Music]
like wait
now that you’re mastering your
biomechanical consciousness transport
system we can enter the realm of
possibilities
[Music]
so I mean this is 18 minutes long it’s
like taking a trip without taking a trip
you know the whole idea there is when
Natalie’s putting the helmet on that’s
like the second version of VR that
you’re going into and so at the very end
you sort of come out of this sleep on
this Beach and it’s very peaceful it was
an amazing piece to make we use sort of
every technique back in we did this
about two years ago so we used sort of
every technique known in the VR language
to develop it and regi really sort of
pushed us to the limit so like in that
scene where he’s flying around in a jet
pack like you’re sort of in this space
and then he has a he has a battle with a
Godhead and so it’s just amazing and a
lot of fun so a lot of people were
making very serious VR we decided to
really pay attention to the creatives
comedy music so in this piece this is um
we’re working at the band called future
Island I’m not sure if any of you guys
know them but um they’re one of our
favorites at the office and this artist
Tyler Hurd developed this like really
like another like taking a trip without
taking a trip pieces like you can see
the mountains are smiling the clouds are
smiling and these characters are dancing
around you and so what happens is like
what happened was HTC and released these
things called VR controllers so allowed
you to hold your hands and you could you
could eventually sort of see where your
hands are what he did when we got them
is he just connected arms so when you’re
moving your arms they just sort of
wiggle around like a cartoon and so he
made this piece set the future Island
I’ll let you see it it’s it’s a blast
[Music]
crushing whale
[Music]
screams while I’m
like
cherish my time here
so run a little running a little short
on time but you might have saw some
people dancing inside that so we kind of
do this thing called mix reality where
we’re filming people inside of
virtuality and then compositing them but
the whole idea is that this piece by
future Islands and with Tyler Hurd is
all about joy producing and dancing and
when people go into it it’s like we’ve
had room full of we have these things
rooms full of ad executives come by to
check out VR and all of them are sort of
like tired and they’ve been seeing many
companies and they come to our company
and they do that and they’re all sort of
buzz they’re all super happy so we think
VR can bring happiness to you and that
kind of Tyler hood really brought it so
this one we just released at Tribeca
this is again a total this synthetic
environment so everything you saw seeing
this is made by the artist he made the
music and what he wanted to do was try
to Telegraph the idea of like immense
energy and power and if you’re thinking
about it as a filmmaker or as a novelist
there’s certain ways you can do that he
actually puts you in the middle of it
this guy his name’s are zombie
fanmeeting he lives in Denmark and he’s
an artist and I want to give you a
couple a couple minutes of this and
we’ll see what you think
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
[Music]
so hopefully that kind of gives you a
bit of a sample of it like you’re you’re
in that space like when you’re watching
on a screen it’s kind of like that’s
cool but when you’re standing in it it’s
really mind-blowing it’s there’s you
know you see the depth and scale of
everything and you know we when we see
people viewing it there
they’re crouching there holding their
bodies and the reason why I mentioned
that is that we start thinking about
this medium it really sort of affects
people in a profound way
just like when you we see kids dancing
in the Tyler herd piece they’re really
there and so when they’re in this piece
they’re in somewhere else and it and
that piece is really powerful so to sort
of wrap it up on VR I’m going to talk a
few minutes on a are i fellow a Kris her
stick over si Sports Illustrated called
me up and said hey what do you think
about VR and Sports Illustrated Swimsuit
Edition I was like I don’t know I mean
sounds interesting like what are you
thinking and he was like his idea was
like ha for 50 years we’ve been showing
people a cover and you know what can you
do with that I said well what would it
be like to stand in it you know and so
we went into an island in the Caribbean
with three models and they shot Sports
Illustrated and what we did is we just
snuck in our VR cameras what’s
interesting there is that I’ve never
been on a photo shoot like that what the
photographer and the videographer are
really coaching the model they’re
telling her to do all these things and
then when we come in we’re like okay
we’re just sorry to interrupt you know
we’re gonna put this camera here and
then we’re going to strike the set and
we’ll come back in five minutes and
they’re just like what like they have no
they’re like freaked out and so we got a
different performance because they’re
all by themselves usually there’s a
whole team so I’ll just run this and see
what you guys think so that’s us
standing on the sides trying to coax her
into like this is gonna be okay trust us
you know and she’s like no this is gonna
suck but uh you know and then there we
go we disappear and she’s just left
there with no camp like our camera is
really small and so she’s you get this
whole different level of performance and
you know we when this is in the headset
the whole scene is stunningly beautiful
and it’s pretty interesting so it’s also
a little racy so we we’re cutting it
right there
well yeah watch the WatchMojo tans we’ll
get that up for you guys later so what
we’re talking about a are it’s really
just sort of a partial it’s using
computer imagery to partially paint out
what you’re seeing right now we’re using
we see a are in in like you know
snapchat right it’s like we’re familiar
with like hey they’ve the you know we
have computer vision we’re able to like
do facial recognition and then we can
actually paint the tongue and then we
have the world lenses so this is the
precursor to like real AR but it’s the
idea that like the computer is able to
actually use machine vision techniques
which is to basically sort of map the
space and then you could play stuff on
it and so the phone right now is the
main interface for that we think that
the the both for VR and AR we’re going
to see that holding the phone will be
and putting in headsets will go away and
we’ll see more modern headsets come out
and when more modern headsets come out
this artist really sort of says we’re
going to paint a lot of stuff onto the
screens and so this person is going
through a market and they’re getting
they have like you know multiple
realities going on at the same time you
know they’re on the bus and they’re
seeing a lot of stuff and so that’s sort
of as we think about how computing is
progressed again in you know 93 92 91
not a lot of people even have laptops
and no one had modems and now everyone
has a phone with a very sophisticated
modem so we think that headsets will
mature and they’ll give us a level of
fidelity to do both VR and AR and we
think it will be pretty profound it will
reshape the way you tell stories the way
you think about communication the way
apps work and everything like that so
which brings me to one minute and 33
seconds and I’ll just say everything
reality so with that I think that as if
you sort of look out into you know 10 or
15 years as the computing industry
pushes into a screen ‘less society with
basically headset systems
you will see yourselves or you see
yourself today already spending ten
hours looking at a screen just do the
math ten hours easy so in 15 years
you’ll be spending ten hours in an
immersive based screen that will both
the AR and VR and so what I what we
believe and we think will happen is like
you’ll be able to live you’ll have
multiple realities concurrent all at the
same time you’ll move from real reality
to a virtual reality set take care of
business and virtual reality move into
an AR version move back into real real
reality move back into VR
all at the same time just like how when
you’re out to dinner you’re texting five
friends eating dinner with a friend
talking to mom and dad back and forth
back and forth that all sort of moves
into what I just call XR everything is
reality and it becomes very powerful my
my feeling is is that it’s it’s right
now it’s very much an artist medium it
requires the creative talents to think
about what is totally impossible make it
possible the computer scientists have
already figured all a lot of the Machine
visioning out and how to push pixels to
the screens but it’s really the artist
thing to push the medium and that’s
where we are today and that’s why I
focus almost all my talks on about the
global creative community that’s
developing that’s already working on
this with one second left this is all
about you what you can imagine and
create thank you
[Applause]
so thank you much Anthony as we set up
for the for the next panel just want to
thank you all for coming again and a
reminder that we have a few more panels
and keynotes discussions whatnot 5:00
p.m. we’ll be serving some cocktails and
refreshments and then I am in your way I
see par for the course and then tonight
lots of musical performances as you
could tell it’s going to get loud in
here and we’re very very psyched about
that cool so thank you everybody having
fun this is a live stream so believe it
or not just to as we’re setting up this
literally went from concept to reality
in a hundred days we came here from
Montreal we sponsor one of the sports
teams in the city and we came down with
the executive team to watch it and I
sent a few of the my colleagues here
just to check out space and I’m like
there’s something there I’m like we
should start using this we’re a big
channel we have access YouTube is so
gracious they let all their creators use
it proportionally to how many
subscribers they have I believe and one
of my colleagues who Kevin who is on the
way from LaGuardia now that Montreal
LaGuardia flight is 55 minutes but a cab
ride from LaGuardia is about you know an
hour and 55 minutes
so Kevin they know at the end after the
game we’re sitting in the hotel he’s
like you know what we should just throw
a party at YouTube space I’m like that’s
a great idea but only then he goes and
we should hire a band I’m like love it
let’s do it then I’m like you know what
I pretty much think that it’s not just
for parties they probably also want us
to produce content so we’re like let’s
record it and then after that they’re
like let’s livestream it and then a week
later I visited London and I was walking
around London space and I kind of
concocted this whole global series and
then so that’s kind of how this idea
came to be anyway so hopefully some of
you will be joining us in London where
else London where else would we go we
would obviously do Los Angeles for sure
Toronto and I believe YouTube is opening
one in Rio so if you twist my arm hard
enough we may have to go to Rio for that
one cool I’ll go to that one you’ll go
to that one all right excellent so the
rest of
the panel’s should be coming out any
minute now I believe is that fake news
it’s happening yes they are coming so
just want to introduce the moderators so
heel Patel here we go writer at digit a
it takes away thank you
well thanks everyone I like to also to
choose or to other panelists Anthony
thank you thanks John Hamilton was a
filmmaker and an added factor was a
president of global innovation at PMX
not reject as much as I can that way it
is an interesting set up so that was
great presentation Anthony uh I’d love
to kind of start with sort of yeah I’m
not gonna apologize for this joke the
reality of virtual reality right now so
like what is the actual we know that
brands are playing in the space we know
that a lot of creators are playing in
the space and want to play in this space
but ultimately what do people need to
know or be aware of or even just do so
it’s not so gimmicky because it can so
easily just be something that like we
did it because that’s the thing to do
now right I’d love to weather let’s
start on the brand side action trap sure
why I think one of the challenges they
mentioned with gimmicks is the episodic
nature of what we’re used to in video
whether for television to to shorts to
to YouTube is something that has yet to
translate to VR we haven’t found a way
yet to use it fast enough to you’re not
rapidly enough and make it as accessible
as all these other channels and
platforms are and I think from a Fran
standpoint there’s an apprehension to
dive all the way in because it’s there’s
so much unknown and there’s so much that
has yet to be defined by the same ray
that makes it a great opportunity to go
out and define it and experiment and
create what this platform could be or
tap into the potential of it even if we
are the super early stages so at this
early stage Jonathan you guys obviously
have been doing a lot of work in this
field are there things that seem to work
better or just resonate more both in the
creative sense and just the very simple
fact that people who actually want to
put on a headset and watch it what have
you guys found so far well for me I
think people want to be in I mean sighs
present space you know like I think that
they want to go somewhere where they
can’t go so totally fake fake worlds on
the other spectrum they want to actually
go where they can’t go because it’s
dangerous so they want to actually see
something and have the perspective of
the of the place in its scale and so you
know you see a lot of the stuff that was
produced by the UN on what’s going on
with refugees when you actually put the
headset on and and are there you get a
whole different sort of visceral set of
feelings about what’s going on there
verse a little picture in your feed
saying yeah there’s refugees in Syria
you know it’s it’s way more profound and
so we see that when peep you know that
there are a lot of gimmicks yes but
there’s also the medium itself is so
profoundly a special that creative
people can actually tell a story far
more richer and give a higher sense of
feeling and emotional connection of the
media than other mediums Jon would you
yeah I think I think one of the one of
the things been doing really well is
documentary and I think what’s really
interesting about VR one of the first
questions that we sort of as creators
all face was can you edit in VR and I
remember when we first started doing
experiences back in 2014 people like you
can’t edit or can’t you can’t make cuts
you can’t do
cuts maybe were like well why not let’s
try doing cuts so I think what’s really
interesting about documentary VR is that
in a sense and particularly interactive
documentary we are the people who are
watching actually can be their own
editor so it’s not being filtered
through a news organization in certain
ways of course if you do edit you know
it can be filtered and editorialized the
same way so I think that’s that sort of
something that I think is really
exciting and I think as well as what
Anthony was saying in terms of
projecting or transporting us to new
worlds I think one of the other things
too and this goes to a document a
documentary like Syria is proximity to
to the actual subject whether it’s was
whether it’s an experience like you know
something we did with like with fifty
shades darker where you’re right next to
Christian Grey and you have that
proximity close to him or whether it’s
actually a dog one to them okay well I
think a lot of people do clearly a lot
of people do by the box office but I
think that’s the that’s that those are
the two most powerful things I think
what Anthony said which is really
transporting us to places that we we
cannot really be transported to and also
proximity and an intimacy with the
subject they you just normally wouldn’t
get with with standard 2d television now
that makes no sense right it’s as you
kind of like reference like it’s a lot
easier to understand what might be going
on in Syria or other parts of the world
when you can actually see it in a more
immersive environment than reading about
in an article or slideshow maybe um but
I think there’s also this and I’m
assuming it’s more coming from the
journalism side there’s this dismissive
notion about like all it can be is an
empathy machine okay great like you
showed me how this this situation is
like on the new side or it could be
reasonably oh no I know how skydiving is
without actually skydiving like great
are is that in any way limiting if
that’s what people say about it in terms
of like it’s not the only way VR can
work or are there other areas that this
medium can go to words goes beyond
simply just saying oh we can show you
worlds or environments that you might
normally not be able to go to for sure
so I think that the the journalist tribe
that
discussing VR often finds themselves in
a situation where they haven’t actually
tried enough VR to actually have a very
formed an opinion no offense
um so so they’re doing the best you can
I doubt it when he goes okay so so to
their defense I think that they’re just
trying to get there they’re trying to
understand it and so poking at it as
some sort of way to find it it’s been
described as an empty machine I don’t
necessarily totally agree I actually
just think that it’s a it’s a new medium
that that is a you know developing and
everyone wants higher result in returns
way too early even though if you
actually really do this the math on it
it’s actually providing returns to folks
financially now and I think it’s going
to increase noted the heart of the
matter I think that as a result of being
a new medium you know all of it will
affect everything it’s a wedge
technology so just like how the internet
affected everything and there’s lots of
gimmicks in the very early days you will
see medical travel retail all these
things actually training education not
to mention gaming and entertainment will
all be affected by this technology push
of being more immersed into something
and so I think you’ll have profound ways
of companies and brands and
entertainment companies to actually
produce VR whether it’s the central
piece that they’re doing or whether it’s
shoulder content and so I think it will
affect the spectrum how are you seeing
sort of this across the the advertising
world how how it’s being implemented so
far at least what I think we’re still in
the age of defining what advertising is
in beer is VR content itself serving as
an advertisement is the experience I’m
creating that’s meant to help someone
get immersed in a retail environment or
in the inside of a car or an airplane or
a property that they might be booking a
stay at is that advertising itself and
frankly maybe it is or maybe it could be
or it should be in addition to what sort
of we think of as a concept of
advertising in these digital in video
and immersive worlds that’s one area
that a lot of brands have gone because
they’ve created a space or an experience
that
transports people or brings people in
something they ordinarily couldn’t have
access to however if someone was
creating that sort of absent of a brand
and we just stuck an ad in that’s
probably not the right experience for
for VR as we know it today I think
creating some standards with the major
media companies and the different trade
boards now to start to experiment with
what the right formats might be is
important I think we have a lot of
clients who we work with that have an
appetite for that because they
understand what the power of these
immersive experiences can be I think
they just have a hard time figuring out
how does advertising as they understand
it today fit in and we probably don’t
want to make the same mistakes that
we’ve made with certain digital media
with new digital media knowing that
banner ads aren’t going to work pre-roll
advertising probably is I’m going to
work product placement maybe in the
right environment yeah I think in AR I
look at VR na are being in same
immersive category I mean I think you’re
seeing the snapchat making you know
lenses AR lenses they’re playing with
that spectrum right now because they
know that they can get the reach I think
you’ll see Facebook do the same thing
and so when you start thinking about it
from that perspective
and move it forward into fully immersed
I think you can start seeing how brands
can participate yeah that’s right and
whether it’s creating sort of additive
experiences that enhance it work or
actually creating the experience itself
is really up to what’s the role of the
brand right on what’s what what is the
product or experience that they are
actually bringing to you and ultimately
like I said earlier if we can find a way
to scale that whether it’s in
distribution across different platforms
whether it’s headsets or you know
through the lens of your phone in the AR
case and/or just make it easier to
produce you’ll start to see brands
experiment more and probably see them
start to embrace it more as central to
their plans instead of maybe something
that gets added on or maybe something in
the innovation realm that
maybe more experimental maybe doesn’t
fun let’s look at look at it from both
perspectives so who should be or who is
going to be driving sort of on the first
end just that pure adoption whether it’s
getting more headsets into the hands of
people getting more content in front of
people like who who do you guys see
actually leaving that charge these days
or over the next few years I think it’s
creators really because I think that’s
the that’s the thing is anything was
saying in this keynote you there’s a
language that needs to be developed and
we’re at such early stages right now in
involved er na our content that that
people you know creators need to develop
language you need to understand the
language I think we also need like a
headset that’s as easy as a mobile phone
just to turn on and go which I think
we’re probably less than two years away
from really and that a headset that will
be ubiquitous and I think that’s going
to that’s going to be huge as well but
but honestly I really do believe that
it’s going to be the creators who are
going to come out the technology is
there right now and it’s really just we
need we need more really compelling
content to come out whether it whether
and whether it’s it’s
business-to-business content or whether
it’s actual creative fiction or whether
it’s documentary we just need you know
we need to we need creators we need
creatives have access to the tools and
to really actually start creating that
goal so let’s go into that a little bit
like how much access to you know when we
talk about creators we can it can be
major media companies they’re going to
be someone more independent more of an
independent filmmaker what sort of
access is available to people who don’t
have you know massive revenue lines that
they can sort of you know put the money
down towards making the investments in
the technology and everything that’s
kind of need to shoot this stuff like
how expensive is it today for more
independent filmmakers creators that can
you know be responsible for creating all
this type of content to get this
technology yeah I’ll give a shot of that
so I think that it’s it’s not as
expensive everyone thinks ok ok so
although if you go I showed some full
synthetic environments those tend to be
very expensive although both of the two
of them that I produced were made by
individuals and so is there their time
we had an in
earn and spend a couple months of this
last summer we lent them a camera it’s a
it’s a YouTube camera a Google camera so
if you had to go buy it it was $15,000
if he he borrowed it was $0 but he made
his whole film for five thousand dollars
and it wanna just want an award for Best
Film and so you know it is as cheap as
you think making a regular video is now
when you’re starting to move into
synthetics we’re using 3d systems such
as unity or unreal the the expense
really goes to like do you have that
team in talent if you don’t have that
team in talent you’re paying them and
that becomes expensive and so that’s
where the work where you start to see
the expense or you’re doing stereoscopic
special effects so that tends to be more
expensive but I did something with a
channel called so crispy it’s to YouTube
creators they did all that themselves
and it was aired at Google i/o last just
a couple weeks ago so it doesn’t have to
be expensive now if you go with the
brand’s I think that you you you’re
gonna want to spend the money on it and
so you’re looking at budgets from sort
of north of 250 you know to two million
dollars I don’t know if that’s
consistent I think it’s I think that’s
accurate and it’s like with any new
technology it gets it improves over time
the costs come down the scale you know
start starts to ramp up and it becomes
as it becomes more accessible to
consumers and there’s more of an
expectation that these experiences are
out there there are places that they can
more easily discover them and interact
with them it starts to push the
boundaries of what one what’s possible
to be created and to it what what brands
and and creators themselves are going to
be willing to do and do more frequently
and I think we’re barely scratching the
surface as it exists today for one
because the limitation of experience is
people have so they don’t know what’s
possible or what they think is possible
and then ultimately what what might get
produced in a more diluted sort of
watered-down version which turns into
like 360 oh and stuff that’s accessible
through a mobile phone only because
that’s sort of the broadest spectrum
that they can reach consumers with but
at least it’s starting to become easier
to produce and at least people are
willing to take that step versus
sit back with our arms crossed and say
no there’s no way that this is going to
fit into our plans for our world that we
can’t appreciate you know the impact of
it before we get into a little bit or
the the creative aspects of it we’re
gonna take we’re at the halfway point so
I think we’re gonna take a little bit of
a break John you have a trailer to show
us right could you set it up a little
bit before we play yeah sure Trinity its
trailer for it’s actually a 2d trailer
it’s not a 360 trailer but we actually
took images from from the shoot and and
it’s got some b-roll in it to just give
you an idea of the scope of the project
but Trinity is an interactive it’s a
pilot for an interactive series that
we’re doing and the goal of it was to do
basically big movie big-budget
special-effects sci-fi sci-fi kind of
cool fun fun approval serious so it’s to
cool
[Music]
[Music]
[Music]
in the beginning
man-made code into flash and code made
God
and then God brought down hell
on earth
[Music]
in the beginning that was great
two questions for you John one of what’s
it about and two why did it this this
experience need to be told in
interactive virtual reality why could
not why could not that have been done in
2d well basically it’s a story set 2,000
years in the future
humans are either extinct or have fled
the planet and basically it’s a war
between the remaining Androids on the
planet and the singularity which sort of
becomes their God and the war is
essentially that singularity wants them
to give up their mechanical bodies and
join you know the internet join me the
singularity and so basically it’s a
religious parable and why interactive
well the funny thing is that when we
actually started one of the main reasons
is that one of our main financier years
in this is the Canadian media fund and
we got our funding through the
experimental side of the media fund
which one of the requirements was that
it was had to be interactive and
originally this was supposed to be just
a linear virtual reality experience and
once we got funding we decided to make
it interactive and then we got into
which I’m sure you guys have probably
experienced as well once you start doing
interactive VR you start you’re trying
to fight against if you’re not doing a
game you’re actually fighting against
actually becoming a game so it
interactively ends up sort of being
puzzle solving or or you know
first-person shooter type stuff and so
what we did as we’ve been developing
this is we actually decided to go in a
different direction with our
interactivity and and use interactivity
to actually make the experience more
immersive as opposed to sort of puzzle
solving getting to a next day of an
example of how that works um yeah for
instance what the the sort of the story
is we really need to discover you know
who we are
and through discovering who we are we
gain certain abilities like the ability
to fly we gain the ability to move
through certain spaces that help us
discover parts of the story but then
what we decided to do at times was give
people interactivity and then at certain
times take it away from them as well
with that really them being aware so the
fact that you know VR really does you
know heighten the immersive nature of it
we wanted to actually use interactivity
as well giving it to people and actually
taking away from people to help heighten
that sort of immersive nature of the
experience so uh that’s a happy actually
played that then because one of the
things I want to speak to the group
about was sort of for a lot of the
things that we’ve seen out today in
virtual reality is very much in the
nonfiction or documentary sense
experiential sense but that can be very
broad I’d love to get the the group’s
thoughts on sort of how do we see this
playing out in the other area the
scripted and the narrative kind of
storytelling that can happen because I
mean the idea is VR can also work within
the within those mediums as well within
those formats as what right yeah I mean
what we were trying to do and again
we’re sort of struggling to figure out
what the what the sort of language is
and I think interactivity you know or
interacting or eventually once we start
bringing AI actually into our AR and and
VR experiences interactivity for me is a
is a fundamental part of the future of
storytelling in VR Anthony I know I
don’t know if you’d agree with that but
yeah I think that um we did a hundred
minute series on a capture of a child
abduction and we really wanted to do so
we did 10 episodes 10 minutes each 10
minutes long with the guys that created
the Walking Dead so we had some really
great talent the writing side but the
way that we founded the interactivity
was like okay if this child got abducted
and you didn’t see it who else saw it
and so that forces you to change points
of view so we shot all hundred minutes
from essentially three points multiple
points of view and so as you’re going
through the story on a universal
timeline
you can just watch it one way and be
immersed in it or you could say I wonder
what that person was seeing and you can
sort of just see various points of view
so we think that the interactivity and
narrative it’s very subtle because if
you’re watching a narrative like if I’m
watching blood line on Netflix I don’t
really want to work I just want to kick
back and watch and so I think that that
we adopt that same strategy if it’s a
game then I want to play I want to craft
but if I so there’s this middle ground
where it’s like it’s ever so subtle like
I just want to just want to see from
over there can I do that boom yes you
can but it doesn’t change the story so
we’re really sort of like learning what
that’s gonna be like now in the future
when you have ultimate agency and
control I think that that’s gonna change
like hyperlinks on webpages was a new
idea
now we want lots of them and we want to
be up you know we want to be able to
anywhere at anytime so I think that
that’s what’s gonna change the
narratives
yes we’re saying is also like in many
ways VR might be limited by what we have
come to know and understand about video
about 2d video that’s a phenomena King
yeah there’s a familiarity there’s a
deep familiarity with gaming and and
classic storytelling which is like video
let’s say and I think in this new medium
we’re pulling in parts of it but at some
point we’re gonna reject all of it and
just have our own medium yeah and I
think also you know so many people are
saying well you know VR you know an AR
will potentially replace replace movies
and TV and YouTube or whatever but
that’s just not the case I think it’s
just going to be something different I
know you know there’s certain movies
that I don’t want to go home and watch
at night afters because they’re too
intense or they’re too dark or too
whatever and then sometimes I don’t want
to play a video game because it is as
Anthony says it’s just it’s just you
have to interact with it and sometimes
you just wanna you just not you don’t
want to do anything even straightforward
just immersive linear VR requires more
work than just watching a movie because
you’re in it your body and your brain is
reacting differently to the environment
that you’re in
so I think that’s actually a huge thing
you know VR AR and
makes reality and it’s all it’s really
just going to sort of take its place
next to you know movies TV the internet
Facebook whatever you know it’s going to
be so they have to serve some some real
purpose and add some real value to and
otherwise sort of know and experience
right so the reason I know they’ll be
success in this it’s because I watch my
kids and I watch what they do and the
first time they put a cardboard to their
face to watch something that wasn’t shot
in VR but it was shot in 360 the
virtualization if the experience that
they had if that’s the right way to
think about it was amazing to watch
their reaction to they couldn’t believe
where they were and looking around
things that they could kind of reach out
in almost touch even though they
couldn’t so suddenly they have this
expectation and they take it off like
what why can’t I grab that I’m like this
the whole reason it’s a one day you
might be able to it’s a very important
point you’re bringing up because there’s
probably tens of millions of children
growing up sort of crafting in Minecraft
and they have agency and they have 3d
lamp depth and they’re all going to come
of age and either we’re gonna say okay
that was all been now you’re just gonna
look at this screen that’s it that’s the
that’s how we developed our storytelling
you did that when you’re a kid now here
who are I actually think that that’s not
going to happen I think that tens of
millions of kids are going to be
crafting and they’re going to move right
into some sort of VR a our state and
they are going to actually create the
new form of storytelling in a way that’s
way way richer more profound than we
currently are I I would agree and it
probably won’t resemble the headset
cardboard world that or mobile world
that we live in today in fact I hope it
doesn’t because to a certain extent that
kind of takes people out of one world
completely and I believe again when you
get to accessibility people probably
don’t want to be as isolated as some of
these experiences feel today but at the
same rate every time someone has wonder
every time we have clients go through a
demo they’re all wow you know I want
more of that or I want it to be more
sort of like easily
at my fingertips and it gets people’s
creative juices flowing about what the
possibilities are which a couple years
ago it was really just people dreaming
it up and in fact in very much resembled
gameplay kind of almost exclusively
which I think also made it somewhat
prohibitive for certain Brandt said
think about like well how could I
possibly fit into this world I don’t
have a place here versus a lot of the
sort of stories that we’ve seen come to
life now opening up a whole new world of
possibilities for for brands to play
alright so we have like a minute left I
think we were going to leave some time
for questions right does anyone have a
question in the room or do we have some
social questions that are coming in we’d
love to make sure people had a chance to
ask that anyone rounds to get just um
well it’s because it’s something that’s
sort of new I mean we can definitely
distill the story down and people
understand what we’re doing but because
I think it really is kind of a new
platform in the new medium sometimes
people do have a hard time getting it
but yeah most people most people do
really understand where we’re headed
with the with what we’re trying to do
yeah we’re literally five four three two
one hitting our hitting our limits so I
want to thank the panel for for having
this wonderful conversation and for all
of you for listening thank you so much
alright alright alright so I thank you
very much gentlemen it’s crazy so yeah
WatchMojo based in Montreal we have
about like 55 full-time employees 100
plus freelancers it’s a big operation by
YouTube channel standards and what’s
funny is so yeah wave we have maybe 10
20 of our team here and the last five
six people just arrived from LaGuardia
and it’s crazy just what world we live
in they were watching a live stream on
their phones in a taxi coming here like
just think of that you know like I
remember 2005 when I saw a live 8 on AOL
and I was like wait a second this is
pretty cool like the world changing but
like now you can watch a live stream on
your phone in a cab I don’t know I find
that pretty cool but it maybe it’s just
me alright a serious question before I
hand off the mic to the executive
producer of the Daejeon Mackerras
serious matter here who saw America’s
Got Talent last night show of hands
anybody this isn’t to kick TV and stress
that the ratings are going down so I saw
a little bit of puddles afterwards if
you did you may have seen a 8 foot for
now I’m kidding a 6 foot 7 giant clown
puddles performing and so we have them
later on again just to remind you all
there’s some musical performances coming
madam yesterday great guy very gracious
very humble very modest but at some
point later on you’re going to see a
giant clown on stage hopefully that
doesn’t throw anybody off just want to
put it out there all right on that note
mr. John Mackerras was joined WatchMojo
the past few months and we started to
brainstorm around this idea the
executive producer join us on stage
thank you John alright thank you I’m
done thank you this has been an amazing
show I produced a lot of things but
seeing that Viera content and all we see
so much about VR we hear so much about
VR and AR and just learning what the
difference is it’s important but until
you see the content you really don’t get
it at least in my case so that was
fantastic thanks to that group of folks
and particularly the Anthony and John
for bringing great creative and on that
note I’m super excited about our next
speaker she’s a creative director at
Google Zoo which is Google’s in-house
agency she’s also been part of a small
team
from the zoo that broke off to start
something called unskipable labs and
unskipable labs focuses on new content
formats and to share a little bit more
of what they’re doing what they’re
working on please welcome kim snow Thank
You Johnny appreciate that so yes my
name is Kim and I’m here to tell you a
little bit about in skippable labs
unskipable had very humble easy
beginnings really what happened is our
brands and our agencies would come to us
and say oh my god please just tell me
why people are paying attention to what
they’re paying attention to what are
they watching our content why are they
looking at our ads how can you help us
do a better job at it and so lucky for
us we work at Google and so what we were
able to do is kind of put on our
engineering mindset which is actually
harder than you would think from a
creative perspective because what you’re
actually doing is putting the user first
you’re putting the human first you’re
actually saying what are people doing
and observing and thinking out in the
world which PS is what we are one or not
at work and we’re actually trying to be
very experimental be wrong not be sure
have a hypothesis have something that
you think could be right you’re not sure
put it out there quickly and then get
results and that’s super hard for
creative because you want to put out the
best thing in the whole world that you
know is right all the time right away
and so this freedom to put out different
pieces of content and then test them
against something that’s already out
there that we know is doing really well
and learning from that is great it’s
quick it’s fast and it gives you a lot
to think about makes us very very brave
so before I get into the actual
experiments in what we’ve learned let me
tell you a little bit about the state of
the state what’s going out there in
society as we start to do these tests
and as we ask ourselves these questions
so welcome to abundance world I was
probably about five years ago that we as
marketers start to freak out that there
was so much content out there and per
usual we didn’t give our fans and our
users enough credit we thought oh god
they’re drinking from a firehose it’s
going to be horrible they’re gonna drown
no one’s gonna be able to look at
anything we’re not gonna be able to make
stuff the same way and instead people
are in a room that’s totally flooded and
they’re swimming and they want more and
the panic set setting in is actually on
our side cuz we’re
like oh my god there’s so much out there
how do we compete how do we go out in
the world because the key thing that we
want to think about and I’m just going
to say if at home you’ve turned this
into a drinking game anytime I say
choice or choose that’d be a good time
to drink because that’s probably the key
to this is it’s all about being chosen
we’re not used to having to fight to be
chosen we’re kind of used to putting our
ads out in the world and people watch
them but our audience you know drinking
from the fire hose in this room full of
water
they’re so savvy so savvy about what
they want to watch what they want to see
what they like where to find it what
they don’t like that actually there’s no
more clutter silently within your heart
think about the last time you were in
anywhere and someone told you to make
something that breaks through the
clutter and there’s not any anymore
because we’ve already gotten rid of this
stuff we don’t like and that’s very
scary to us it’s a very scary world if
you think about it at home of course
that’s what you do but for us how do we
make ourselves seen and heard and chosen
and who once you are chosen it better be
good we were just talking about the
pages with those hyperlinks and how we
find time in our busy days to deep dive
on something that we find very important
very interesting god forbid you’re
chosen and there’s nothing good there
we’ll remember that so you have to keep
that in mind as well and then finally
the dance of attention is that there is
no one answer there is no one thing
that’s going to solve all this messaging
and you think about even the way our
attention works which is anything in
front of you is skippable anything
you’re looking at is skippable really I
mean you can be running between devices
and between content and you don’t even
think twice about it
and so the same is true when we’re
telling stories from a brand side you
know I mean six seconds might be perfect
for something a true be unit might be
perfect for something else one thing
that’s very interesting
when we think about choice drink is that
one of the things that’s going away is
the 30 second forced ad now as marketers
we love that stuff because we need to
take our TV ad and throw it in there
it’s awesome and you have to watch it
have your eyeballs but it’s actually
going away because there’s no choice you
have to watch it I was on reddit the
other day purely for work purposes I
assure you and somebody had posted this
thing which is you don’t understand the
length of a second until you’re forced
to watch an ad you don’t want to watch
and it’s so true and so what you really
have to think about
is what you’re gonna is how we’re going
to put these things out there for people
to actually enjoy watching and the one
of the main reasons the 32nd forest is
going away is because YouTube creators
are like I don’t think I really want
this on my channel it makes people leave
they’ll actually walk away he’ll go away
instead of waiting for my content and so
it’s super important to think so we must
be chosen and we must make something
lovely when we get there all right oh
right away so now let’s get into some of
the experiments and some of the things
we’ve learned and of course even though
we’ve been doing this for over a year
there’s still so much to learn so I’m
just get some little pieces for you some
of the more interesting things okay so I
go through the ABCD I don’t think we go
further than um d don’t worry so the
first one is definitely attract and I
think it’s one of the more interesting
ones which is you’ve got to give
somebody a reason to watch they’re
itching to leave you’ve got to really
hook them in and you really have five
seconds if it’s a true V unit yes you do
only have five seconds in real life you
probably only have five seconds to so
picture this the movie Bridget Jones’s
baby’s coming out and they’ve asked us
to do an experiment with them so we go
and we’re talking about kind of what’s
their best spot they have now the
control is we’ll call it the trailer and
we’re thinking what can we test and the
creative director on the project who is
working with the team said I have an
idea let’s totally just get him real
quick and then see how long they’ll
watch let’s put an entire scene from the
movie in the unit and they all laughed
at him they’re like that’s ridiculous
why would we do it it doesn’t make sense
never done it before this sounds
ridiculous by the way we just put a
whole scene up there and that is how you
know you’re onto something that’s
something you want to test because no
one was sure no one did know what would
happen if we tried it and they said go
ahead give it a go so I’m just going to
show you a little bit of what that looks
like and then tell you how it did dear
diary I’m absolutely loving life just
one tiny development I’m pregnant
hey it’s the father of your child I’ve
been doing a lot of thinking Bridget
this whole baby situation threw me
initially we was squashed an entire
relationship into one night
get straight to starting a family face
we never even had a real second day just
you know if we did I would have taken
you to Auto lanky oh you would have had
the grilled salmon and pine nut salsa
unbelievable
oh and healthy and we would have come
back here had incredible sex spent the
next couple days sending each other
filthy texts oh I would not have let you
do that on a second date
why not why not you let me do it on the
first crazy
so this goes on a little bit longer but
what happened is that it outperformed
the control by like 400% it was crazy
the attention that people paid for this
paid to this and what I thought was
interesting my hypothesis was when I
first kind of saw this I was like it
feels like you’re getting away with
something it feels like somebody
somewhere screwed up and put the ad put
like an entire scene in there and giving
they’re giving something away that you
shouldn’t have had and so you feel a
little bit more like you’re kind of
getting something instead of watching an
ad even though that first kind of few
seconds was a little bit more like a
traditional trailer with some quick cuts
with the name of the movie just so you
know so this is an inter this is
probably one of the most interesting
things that we’ve seen it we’ll get back
to it in just a heartbeat when I get to
one of the other things that we’ve
learned but keep this in mind because
this is something absurd in a lot of
ways that you would put a whole scene
from a movie out and people would choose
to watch it and that’s what’s the most
important thing you’ve got their
attention and then you gave them the
gift of the scene of the actual movie
we’ve been using this hypothesis a lot
for some other things which brings me to
the other thing another important thing
which you just brought up which is brand
we get this question all the time where
do I put my logo what if they don’t
watch past the first screen how will
they know it’s me
etc etc so this is a little bit tricky
because if you do have the brand in than
early that’s a good thing
but if it’s forced in there it can be
kind of detrimental and so we had to
kind of figure out what that meant and
one of the things that we realized is
when it’s forced in there and it feels
just kind of like a watermark that
doesn’t have any
thing to do with the story or something
that you’re learning or that’s a part of
the bigger narrative that’s when it kind
of feels like it’s in the way feels like
it doesn’t belong there when it feels
like a natural part of the story or it
feels like it’s helping you like for
example with Bridget Jones it helped to
know oh I’m watching this movie okay
make sense thank you even though it
wasn’t a part of what was happening in
the main screen it helped to know what
that story was so one of the things that
we always like to say is if you’re gonna
be an adman just go for it be an ad
that’s fine ads are great but are going
to be content be content and try to
figure out the balance between that and
this is a great example of an ad that’s
truly an ad that puts its product in
there early and often but in a way
that’s part of the story hello Lee is
what we would say smart people use back
[Music]
trees and sticks no thanks
keep the respect you deserve we’re
bearglove and if you knock of business
um be quiet painting we’re playing chess
checkmate timber so it doesn’t feel like
you’re being tricked like oh god I
thought it was something else and it’s
an act like missiles into a doll the way
and it feels supernatural and it feels
right and it feels good and so that
brand is in there the whole time
good little homework assignment for you
to pay attention the next time you see
ads when you’re like I know it’s an ad
and I feel okay about it where do they
put their brand in that how does it play
into the bigger story alright this is
another one that we actually think at
this point in time we’ll be like we
don’t even really need to test this one
anymore and this is all about audio does
sound matter hell yeah matters make sure
they’re sound if there can be sound I
know people for a long time sound wasn’t
an automatic thing that happened now
it’s starting to be but definitely
definitely get your noise in there and
here’s just an example actually that’s
combining this insight with the last
insight getting your brand in there
naturally and then having something
catchy – remember boys are in the front
yard chillin with the chest medicai
brought his dog that he’s trying to play
fetch with dog ran off and brought back
yeah
that’s easy that’s totally easy so you
can totally see it’s already an earwig
in your head and you get the brand in
there right away so that one’s kind of
hitting all the bases so connecting
create a human connection this one came
out of a lot of our mobile studies and
it’s probably one of the biggest pieces
of feedback that we’ll give when people
are like what do you think about this
how can we improve this and it’s like
well most people are probably going to
watch this on their phones at some point
so make sure that you don’t have these
big faraway landscape scenes make sure
that you’re not someone’s trying to
figure out what they’re even looking at
and I think that’s why this is so
specific is that I want a human face I
want to see a person I want to connect
now personally I love that there is an
influencer and kind of like female spin
to it and I would like to know if that’s
going to always be the case to me that’s
something more to test on but right now
that’s a thing so here’s another example
and this one is an interesting example
because the human connection actually
happens more than once
[Music]
never gonna get it never gonna get it
look at him we laughed at this one
because we’re like can you imagine like
the creative session that’s like alright
we’re gonna show something great and
then we’re gonna show it again no but it
works it kind of hooks you in and you
kind of want to see what comes next and
it gave them the opportunity to put the
brand in there in a way that didn’t feel
in the way because the music was
carrying you through but that’s a face
you definitely want to see early and
often now this is kind of our aha moment
I have a slide later that’s got kind of
the key learnings that I’ll talk about
but the watch time because how many
times has everyone been talking about I
need someone to watch the whole thing
the whole thing or it doesn’t count
we’re finding out that watch time is
actually the more powerful thing and
let’s go back to that word choice watch
time is important because what you’re
saying is I’m putting something out
there and I’m letting people choose how
long they want to watch it giving them
the opportunity to do that and so how
can you even play with that how can you
put stuff out there that’s actually
pretty long just to see how long is too
long how long it will somebody engage
and just be excited that they’re
watching something and we’re going back
to our friend here Bridget Jones’s baby
because that whole add itself was I
believe 2 minutes 12 seconds and the
average person watched it for a minute
46 that’s amazing
but if you’re like well they didn’t
finish it you’re going to miss out on
this amazing opportunity and it also is
tied directly to people being more
interested in wanting to see the movie
so it is this ability to say I opted in
to see this you’re letting me consume
more content awesome and that makes me
like you more it’s a pretty basic way to
say it but it’s definitely a hypothesis
that we are continuing to test in
different ways experimenting with how
long is too long and seeing the
different opportunities we can give
people for choice and then finally kind
of direct people give them something to
do choice guys are all wasted that’s
great which is just say that I did stay
tuned I did watch this and I want more
like I want to see more don’t leave me
hanging tell me what to do next and I
know for a long time it’s like the
beginning of the early days in the
internet everything was called action
and then like it seemed a little weird
but like oh ho we’d only be in
everyone’s face they’re so savvy and for
for video ads like this yeah tell me
what to do I want to learn stuff
and so the example that I have here is
actually for a movie called Ouija and
the problem that they wanted to solve
was how do we make sure that people who
don’t like horror movies still watch
this and are still kind of interested
and so this was a whole experiment we
did also use a scene but we didn’t say
it was a horror movie we didn’t give the
name of it at first it just kind of
played out and people were like I don’t
know what I’m watching it’s kind of
weird but they didn’t default to say I
know it’s something I don’t like
and so here’s you can see for the calls
to action for non-fans
keeping it kind of general just the name
of the movie but for horror actually a
call to action goes search for this go
search for kind of this creepy weird
sentence and we’ll have stuff there
waiting for you so actually sending
people on their way to do more which i
think is kind of lovely all right here
are the findings doo doo doo here I’ll
just fill up the whole screen because
it’s a lot of words and I will just kind
of give you the cliff notes of it and
the most surprising insight that we’ve
got is what I told you it’s that watch
time is so important and not as
important as seeing the whole damn thing
through gives you a lot of freedom for
storytelling it gives you a lot of
things to think about about what you’re
unraveling and who’s choosing to see
what most unsure and Riaan site which is
ads are not the enemy we always thought
they were
everyone wants content not true we love
a great ad bad ads are the enemy don’t
make a bad ad more tests on that coming
soon the low is taking fruit is still
these small little edits you can make
when I was telling the example of how to
cut something for mobile so that you’re
more zoomed in on faces or not these big
faraway scenes and even the pacing to
pick up the pacing that is a big thing
to do that makes a huge difference on
that smaller screen can make a huge
difference on berates
most consistent finding choice that’ll
be the last time I say it biggest
opportunity is knowing this kind of
dance of attention we’ve been talking
about when does a true view unit work
wonders a really long unit work when
does six seconds work what medium in my
end what media am I using all these
things work together in a way that’s
like that we do on our own at home
constantly don’t they twice about
bouncing around all these places and
consuming stuff in different ways we
have to get better about it at work in
the marketing space to think about how
to orchestrate all of that and finally
with the thing were most worried about
probably what you guys are worried about
which is who knows if this is all going
to be valid in six months like our
audiences are getting savvy and smarter
and smarter we are getting smarter and
smarter but we’re still kind of tied to
a lot of the same traditions and goals
that we have in this world
so how can we keep up with the way
people are behaving and so as long as
we’re open to the fact that we should
constantly be experimenting and
constantly relearning and constantly
kind of testing it being very brave
we’ll be in a good place and finally
I’ve always wanted to use this quote
presentation it works so great here
which is true remember if you’re gonna
get somebody’s curiosity and you’re
gonna poke them and really look at me
look at me a bit of thing make sure
you’re there to really keep their
attention going and really reward them
for being there with you and that’s it
for me so just don’t be afraid to say
yes thank you sure – first of all for
those who are thinking oh we see
research all the time you know when
Google does research with all the data
they have around issues that are
important to advertisers you tend to get
a heck of a lot of attention and so this
is important research and obviously for
us at WatchMojo the fact that Google
also independently is starting to zero
in on the concept of watch time is
really important as well because
WatchMojo actually is very focused on
watch time and has one of the longest
average video links on the editorial
side on the YouTube platform and one of
the top three highest average watch
watch times on YouTube so where do you
think watch time stands you know in the
in the scheme of things is that like a
big news item for you guys when you
figure that out I guess it shouldn’t
have been so surprising again it’s
probably one of the best things that I
always say is that it’s so easy for us
to forget that we’re actual human beings
who consume content like as much as
anyone else and so when you think about
yeah when I opt into something I want to
kind of get the most I can out of it so
that makes sense it was kind of on the
other side of the house where you’re
like oh my god I need numbers I need
charts I need to tell people that this
is working then it really started to
challenge us so I would like to say that
the I guess maybe we were happily
surprised I feel like it frees us all up
from a lot of the constraints we’ve been
giving ourselves to really experiment
and see what people will want to choose
and opt into I mean think about it Game
of Thrones is ending in two years
everyone’s already mad about it I mean
that’s like making
time for all this stuff and I will say
no matter how busy you are you will find
the time to dig into what you want so I
think watch time is only going to become
more important it’s great and it just
disapproves disproves the whole concept
of thinking that shorter is better on
digital video or on your phone people
are watching longer and longer video
longer and longer content just make
great content that’s exactly right and
that’s where that dance of attention
comes in because six seconds will serve
you very well in some cases possibly
even targeted to something and connected
to something longer and so just to think
about how those pieces and stories play
out together as a family gives you the
freedom I think to stick with watch time
is great well thank you again for
joining thanks everyone thanks John so
we’re gonna we’re gonna break for ten
minutes and give everybody in the
Chancellor room to reset and for those
of you on the livestream you’ll get a
taste of something upcoming in about 20
minutes or so which is some really cool
content that frito-lay did for ruffles
and if you’re a fan of the show hit show
Silicon Valley on HBO it’s with one of
the stars Martin Starr so give it a look
and we’ll be right back
thanks I was trapped I couldn’t move
as the minutes tick by I thought I’d
never escape plus I had to pee pretty
bad kinda have to pee again actually
where’s the bathroom
day was going pretty good so far and a
good flight to look forward to I breezed
through security and I had gotten a seat
in Economy Comfort comfort all caps but
then I get to my seat it’s a middle seat
between two other people comfort gone I
mean it was the worst thing that’s ever
happened to anyone ever
planet Earth police or in the air
around the planet Earth after the going
with any meat muscle bread sandwich
there was one possibly shook a shining
to me she kept coming by and saying hi
how are you that’s about five or six to
press the fill button five six times and
I had to tell her no you can’t change
seats and you have to share those are
nurse are forever now he even asked if
he could sit in the front of the captain
after the holiday though that was and
the reason I had one
laso my phone oh my faithful trusty
phone out of bed
no music no podcast no free games I mean
let’s be honest are there free games
nowadays they all make you buy coins or
gems or candy or whatever I you have pop
testability laughter patrick all hope
hope something oh I’m getting out from
deep in singing and acting over the
place sorry
[Music]
spoiler alert it did work to muscley
arms turned into wonderful giant eagle
wings to soar me through the air oh my
this is the best flight of my life
it was the best flight of my life it was
the worst flight of my life darkness
fire and it looked like I was gonna make
out with my cousin
I think when people talk about going
through hell so annoying and
self-indulgent like your problems are so
whatever but in my case it’s true
there I was my cousin Jana was in town
visiting she doesn’t have a lot of
interests or hobbies so you know we were
just hanging out at my place chillin
I had really been hoping to visit some
museums or see some shows but Martin was
insistent that we stay home well the
problem was I just got in one of these
like universal remote controls the ones
that like control every electronic in
your house it’s awesome it’s like super
awesome when other people use it I don’t
know how to use it so I’m just so
complicated like the buttons why can’t
they just make it obvious which button
does why why does it have to be so
complicated I mean I feel like that’s
one of the reasons we’re doomed as a
species he was talking about human
extinction but then things started
getting really weird so here I am
pushing the buttons and trying to just
get the TV to turn on the lights dimmed
not fully off but just that romantic
level of dimness a fireplace comes on
didn’t even know I had a fireplace it
was so awkward all in all it really
wasn’t so bad until the slow jam started
then it felt like a middle school
makeout party
I think I never was invited to one so I
don’t actually know
[Music]
I used to be kind of a hard it was like
he was trying to make it
romantic so I said I said to her I’m not
making out with you cousin I didn’t
point out her that was just for emphatic
purposes but I was definitive I wasn’t
doing it it was so weird and then he
started leaning towards me I was trapped
I had never been in the situation before
I did the only thing I can think of I
[Music]
walked all the way around the room and
turned off everything by hand manually
it was exhausting but at least I didn’t
have to kiss my cousin
success he said that why would he think
you would have to kiss me so she left
and I spend the rest of the day chillin
watching the boob tube we were running
out of time
the flames were rising Sun was going
down hunger was at an all-time high
the burgers we’re a little well-done
I love barbecues and barbecues love me
we’ve always had a good rapport but this
terrible day almost ruined our love love
relationship with each other
there I was chiseled as always hosting
the biggest Hollywood barbecue of the
barbecue season seth was there Franco
had just arrived
Seth Fishman my neighbor he’s why my
neighbor and Frank is my super anyway
they were all there and we were all
having an amazing time we were having an
average time oh man I was so excited for
everyone to try my burgers I said I’m so
excited for everyone to try my burgers
and they were pretty psyched too I mean
my star burgers they’re world-famous
well their neighborhood they’re famous
to the people I’ve told them to they all
like the idea of them they’re shaped
like stars and the low points stick out
makes it hard eat sometimes then as I
was grilling a horrible realization hit
me I had no buns no brioche no potato no
whole week to hold me did you even count
that as a bun that’s not even it’s
barely good on sandwiches all I had was
hot dog buns what
not hamburgers it was getting late by
then
in retrospect maybe I had spent a little
too much time talking up to the burgers
but they’re worth talking about that’s
the thing I mean the burgers are that
good but without buns like what do you I
thought maybe just maybe we could get
some buns delivered but I wasn’t sure
the grocery store would still be open
you got a man from the grocery on the
phone I guess he didn’t like what he
heard because he started yelling I hope
you’re okay watching a man drown because
that is what you’re doing then he goes
through true true truths in the air
tonight it’s a drum solo is what the
song is about it’s not a legend that’s
true that’s where are you getting your
information there we were the burgers
were getting crispy too crispy time was
running out
and then suddenly I had a revolutionary
idea burger dogs a culinary breakthrough
Franco loved them think we’re okay
[Music]
[Applause]
on 8th on jr. mojo as the host kids
watching right now what this is because
this is something they can get involved
with yeah junior mojo comm JRM Oh Jo is
my new show where me and my friends go
lots of adventures and we use the
internet to be cool and creative and try
all kinds of new things I’m really I’m
just learning I’m still new but yeah I’m
gonna try to do everything I could do
and show kids that there’s no limits
that the internet could be such a cool
place you can do whatever you want
hey the sloth is this your first TV
appearance yeah but I’ve been practicing
it ain’t taught a story everybody hug it
sky this day
ladies and gentlemen please welcome to
of watch mojos most interesting voices
once been with us for a long time the
other is a relative newcomer it’s dad
parody and the Slough Hey hi everybody
hi everybody
Hey I’m Dan I’d the slots from Jude your
abode oh yeah soif I didn’t know you
were on the news that was really cool
yeah it’s pretty cool I’m pretty much
getting out there you know yeah yeah I
mean was that that was your first time
on the news yeah yeah at first ty but
you know I think I did okay were you
nervous a little bit you though but I
was okay first time in New York – hi do
York hi hi everybody get the practice e
for that – it’s actually also my I used
to take the train through New York but I
never I’ve never actually been to New
York in the traditional sense
so is new for both of us I think yeah
live from New York it’s the sloth from
jr. Bojo and Dan and Dan yeah he’s here
too uh so what have you been up to here
in New York anyway oh you though I uh
Clyde the Empire State Building wait
from the inside or the outside outside
guerilla-style
sweet yeah and i’m i gotta go soon cuz
I’m auditioning for Hamilton yeah oh
that’s amazing what part Hamilton
oh I mean that makes sense ready to take
my shot yeah okay yeah so you were on
the news talking about junior mojo yeah
junior beau chose my new world on the
Internet
your new world I mean what so but I
didn’t quite get what that was all about
can you give us a little bit more about
that well it’s about a badger nation and
it’s about fun and it’s about making the
internet a safe and fun place for kids
like the streets of New York absolutely
right
I mean you’re so good I mean you were
really good on TV and I’ve seen a few of
your videos do you have any tips for
someone who kind of wants to break into
that uh well oh you’ve been at it for
awhile dad but uh yeah but I’ve been
sort of behind the camera yeah we’re in
a closet swish – microphone warm-ups you
know like bubble bath
what’s bubble bath bubble bubble bubble
bubble bath bubble bubble bubble bad
words up The Voice does it yeah you got
to do robot boobs and dance to warm up
the body try a robot okay try later yeah
baby I’m at a camera okay yeah die
you got to research lots of research you
know we don’t just do top
and lists we got to do a lot more work –
you guys don’t even do top ten list are
you really fives you do five yeah I keep
it keep it simple but you know I
research whether I’m interviewing Justin
Trudeau Prime Minister okay or a cow at
the farm
I still do research is your research
yeah like I look up jokes you want to
hear what sure I would love to hear a
joke
where does the cow go on vacation where
does the cow go on vacation Moo York ah
pretty good right it’s pretty awesome I
googled that so I don’t know if you kind
of got my hints here but do you think I
might be able to go on Jr mojo ah you
like to be a host you know oh you want a
host yeah like what we’re doing now I
think this we got chemistry right like
we’re doing that’s been okay I guess uh
well the thing is dead you know yet you
kind of talk too much with your hands
you know it’s a lot of hands I mean I
very hand we can police the hand
gestures yeah I don’t have to talk with
my hands that’s I can work on that is
that all well also I’ve been reading the
comments from the trolls right but the
trolls are trolls you don’t yeah you
don’t necessarily jizz and they’ve been
saying that you look tired like all the
time we look tired did you even sleep
last night I slept beautifully we have a
great hotel yeah New York has been very
accommodating I you’re a SWOT and I look
tired yeah well you got to make it work
for you you know I guess so ah okay you
could be on the show okay you could be
on the show oh if you insist okay I
guess we could make it work I’d really
like to make it work I promise I’ll do
well okay we’ll try it out okay
so now coming up next we were Tama Karis
our own John Mackerras it’s probably
gonna be talking to some people who they
help infinity with marketing I believe
infinity like the cars yeah
oh you don’t like a car then I do drive
a car what kind of car um it’s a Honda
Accord
oh wait year 2000 ah that’s what I
thought it was a good year good year for
the Honda ten life goals for dad for
WatchMojo
haha just Katy Danny that’s enough in
the slaughter hey buddy my John take it
away
[Applause]
[Music]
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
[Music]
[Music]
infinity empower the drive so first of
all before I get to that video which is
very very cool just thanks to Dan and
the sloth for writing down here on a toy
train from Montreal it took about a week
super excited about the project that we
have with the sloth he’s doing an
amazing job and you’re going to see some
great content from jr. mojo love that
puppet so what you just saw on the
screen was a really cool intro video
that involved infinity which they talked
a little bit about and it’s regarding a
project that our next guests are
responsible for who are a really amazing
duo true creatives and I love talking to
creatives and I get a chance to talk to
them here and moderate this so please
welcome Pierre Tremblay and patrick
rossol thanks for coming alright so
thank you guys for being here I know you
know we’ve talked a lot about what
you’ve been doing and you know when we
first got the idea to have you on watch
mojo live we were like what is a light
painter and I just think the first thing
we have to kind of get out here is with
this with this audience tell me what is
that what does that mean well to be a
light painter is to actually paint with
light I mean it’s that simple how do you
paint with light it’s through doing a
long exposure photograph in the dark and
then to be in front of the land in front
of the camera and then to use a light
tool and then to move the light tool
just like you do with paints so then the
the exposure can last as long as you
want and as long as in complete darkness
so we have a little bit of a film that
shows you doing this right performing
your craft right here are you gonna roll
them yeah yeah I prepared that just just
fresh for the show awesome and that’s
the zone like a practice in daily so
what you’re going to see is just mean my
systems let’s start with that so we know
what we’re
talking about here and then we can go
from there okay
that’s not the video
McClung video on video strike the bid
[Music]
okay so what we did have we had a really
cool demo of you basically practicing
your craft in the dark and at least you
have the tool here so maybe if we can
cue that up again guys it’s in the key
nodes is the first one in the key not on
the key note so let’s see if we can find
that but in the meantime just talking
through how did you guys you know get
together in the first place and tell us
about you know a little bit more about
the craft that you do and you know how
it comes to life
well this craft started in the
underground like years ago and it’s only
in the last since I would say 2002
thousand thirteen that really started
picking up through the internet because
of digital media I’ve been practicing it
since 1992 but back then didn’t know
that a would become what it is today so
it’s really been an adventure of
discovery and learning and how did you
guys get together you you and Pierre
yeah basically you know much well being
a very creative city full of artists we
all end up in the same parties in same
places and then ice appears visuals in
the party Pierre was doing a VJ in the
party and I loved what he was playing
and then I went to talk to him
afterwards because I actually never seen
something like that before
so you thought finding him to bring your
craft to the big screen or into film in
a new way would be a B be the perfect
partnership right exactly because he’s a
storyteller Sarah was there a commercial
intent envisioned at that point or was
it just like let’s has two creatives
let’s working exactly exactly do we are
we able to cue that that film or no
let’s take a look
yes oops nope that’s the one before yes
we have done it with the attitude I’ve
had excellent just the ones or anything
our understanding yeah it’s the one that
you first queued up if we can see that
that’d be great
right there there you go
[Music]
Wow well before we get to the commercial
application for this you know when you
to map here and you and you were
entertaining this idea what was going
through your mind in terms of how you
would bring this to life like what was
the the creative journey that you took
well when we met that was doing visuals
at a party and it was nothing
I was mashing up old silent film stock
from the 1800s late 1800s so it had to
have nothing to do with that but I
discovered Patrick’s work and and he
approached me and I’m like wow how can
we translate and incorporate as vision
which is photography but also in video
because it’s it’s it’s already pretty
hard to do in photography but in video
it’s almost impossible to do so that’s
that’s kind of a technique we developed
together over the years and when you
guys you know you work together how long
now five six years five six years yeah
yeah okay and so as you start to evolve
to to more of you know the commercial
potential here I mean when I first saw
that film I you know it’s hard to
imagine like how does a brand engage you
and and how do they see themselves
together with you because it’s just so
it’s it’s incredibly creative and it’s
beautiful
and in a way you have to have a brand
that can stand up to that right so when
you guys are thinking about you know how
to work with brands are you you know D
what how much of the business do you
understand do you understand you know
the consumer target you know in the
audience and you know how would you how
would you see yourselves as business
people and that part of it given that
you know you have both the art and you
know the art of the art piece and then
also the brand piece that need to come
together well I think it’s really
important to understand the basics as an
artist if you want to work with clients
you do have to understand at least the
minimum of their world and what
advertising is and what they’re trying
to reach without being an expert in
advertising if you get what the target
is or what’s it then and
and behind it then it’s much easier as
ours to contribute to to to hit that
target I mean it’s all about
communication any communications for me
starts with listening you have to listen
to the client what their needs are where
their visions are how they’re going to
communicate it what the target audience
is where’s it going to be used what’s
the product all of that it’s fine so
it’s by communicating talking to the
client asking them questions that we we
get to know what they want and how we
can bring what we can bring to them but
that said not every artist can
understand you know how to bridge that
gap right I mean we hear a lot of talk
these days about this relationship
between you know art and science data
and and art and you know it one thing
that I do think is true is you can
certainly make an artist smarter but you
can’t turn a scientist into an artist
overnight right just by informing them
so there’s this whole issue of like the
data and how much data do we really need
to understand before we’re not creative
in the way that we had hoped we would be
do you see that as a conflict or is it
just all come together and in a better
collaboration it’s a bit like left-brain
right-brain you know it takes both to
make one person so I think is the same
thing when we work in collaboration in
projects it’s really about making a
center where all the minds and the
hearts of the people connected and then
we’re all focused in the same place you
know very cool well listen I know we
have a video that we’re gonna see about
your your work with infinity let’s take
a look at that and then I have a bunch
of questions where shall we try tonight
we have partnered with the access
Patrick Roshan showcasing our
understanding of our audience Infiniti
q50 was built to deliver a driving
experience which is both inspiring and
captivating and this is what tonight is
all about through Patrick and his light
are painting the tension of a Patrick a
great service performance is a
celebration of the infiniti q40 design a
masterpiece of fluidity and emotion
ultimately what we want to create a
night is a visual expression of what q40
represents a bold and airy statement
tonight we wanted to offer our guests a
truly unique and artistic experience to
capture who they really are being human
is at the core of who we are as a brand
and having Patrick express himself
through light painting is the one in a
lifetime opportunity and when you see
everything coming together that’s when
magic happen my name is Patrick Roshan
and I’m a professional light painter
I’ve been given the challenge to launch
the new Infiniti q30 live on stage in
Beirut
[Music]
the idea is to reveal the car using
light I created a character in a costume
that reflects light and this character
slowly shows the audience the car
through the movement of his light
[Music]
three two one go
perfect okay well do another one and you
live it copy that
how close to camera when we jump off yes
you know to about two meters or three
meters copy I copy that it that’s really
beautiful we’re creating light right now
all of us are created light we’re
creating a trail of light in the
universe and I think that’s what light
painting is about and I think that’s
what the project would infinity
represent like making beautiful light
and creating something remarkable bad
light is projected into space
to infinity infinity empower the drive
just such beautiful stuff I have a lot
of technical questions for how this
happens I mean you look at that video
and it’s like oh my gosh but first of
all tell tell us how did how did you
find each other how did you and infinity
find each other this is have it I mean
in the Middle East your your I mean look
the answer as simple as it is is true
and and the answer is YouTube I mean
that’s that’s really how a lot of the
working through that’s how a lot of
connection and that’s how a lot of
people saw the work and got the idea so
maybe some creative directors you know
for infinity saw your your your work on
line and said Wow because we’ve got to
figure out how to work with these guys
exactly yeah I mean there were other
videos before and then they saw it and
it was like which we have to do this
with the cars and then they approached
us through the TV WH which is the agency
in the Middle East that that just sent
us an email and the conversation started
it’s very cool guys I think in the
keynote there’s some still images
following that video if we could put
those off as a background but you know
talk to us now a little bit about the
just the technical aspects and if you
can control it there you go yeah good
well as soon as the project came through
I I called a friend in Florida that I
met through
snap Orlando I did an exhibition over
there and he’s a brilliant man with a
great mind designer engineer and he was
the first person I reached out to to get
support to build the rig and build the
system that would light up the car in
the way that the car would become a
light painting tool brush like it we
didn’t want the light to shoot at the
cameras we wanted the light to highlight
their arms an engineer that’s right and
a designer and so on so then we worked
like they night and he figured one on
the trio so to speak all right yeah
exactly yeah exactly
well they I mean that project the first
one we did in Dubai was huge we had a
lot of collaborators from all over the
world we’ll maybe we’ll have a chance to
show some of the collaborators a big
team we had people flying from all over
to make this happen and in this project
there’s a few aspect because there’s the
live show there’s a video and then there
are the photographs also so we have to
produce all of those within a time
period yeah because for the client is
always important we do a live show but
it’s also we have we produce behind the
scene where there’s storytelling about
about what we’re doing how it’s made and
all that so that’s a big component of
the of the deliverables also now mind
you the client was supposed to be here
but she had a prior commitment and ended
up having to you know to cancel her trip
but one of the main goals I assume would
be to try to get test drives going on in
these vehicles so you have these events
with these people being stunned by these
amazing images and then what they’re
signing up to drive the car and
hopefully buy the car well it’s not only
our performance most of the time it’s a
whole-day event where if we’re on the
right track they’ll have race car
drivers good doing speed laps with
people and then people can can try the
car things like that so it’s it’s a
whole day event organized around around
this and in what we do is the either the
launch or the live event at night which
is the the pinnacle of tonight so so and
your first event was was enormous right
in terms of size and financial
commitment for
everybody and time on your part tell us
about how do you build a good
relationship with a client you know what
made this work with the client like
infinity and you know we all have worked
with brands that understand this and
brands at struggle to understand this
you know where it where did infinity
fall what do you think came together
that that allowed this to happen in such
a compelling way well what’s interesting
is like the agency told us first of all
that they love their client so right
there they set a tone with us that’s
like oh wow there’s already a good a
good healthy relationship happening
there and it brings us in tune into that
good healthy relationship and I think
the you know compassion and like
understanding is first like you have to
get into their worlds and understand
that their worlds is is as complex as
our world and they’re also trying to
push new things open new doors and
there’s also battles on their ends that
they’re trying to do that they go
through to make these projects happened
we all fight together to make to make
something like that and and and how did
your creative freedom carry over in this
process how did you feel like you
retained your creative freedom
throughout this and but for me it’s not
the question of like I need to express
myself I I I practice daily I am
expressing myself blaney the idea for me
is to like hit the target what is the
target here what are we trying to do and
then how do I make this wow it’s really
where I stand is like so to create a
while I have plenty of challenges and
that’s where I thrive is with those kind
of challenges but we’re lucky it’s a
it’s a very it’s an amazing client that
that is open to suggestions and and so
as long as we make it look good as well
as long as we inspire people with our
images and we bring passion to it and
there’s storytelling into it too then it
brings the brand it brings the content
higher right but we hear a lot about you
know brands and clients or brands and
creators that work together that you
know have struggles you know the Creator
sometimes will say you know I I just
don’t feel like they’re understand
my art or giving me enough freedom to do
what I know I can do for them
and so that communication you know it
all comes down to that in the end right
and so this is this is a you know a very
common battle on YouTube with brands
wanting to work with creators to try to
figure out how to how to do it in a way
that everybody can win this this trust
has been established and also in light
painting they can control it all because
they don’t know how the light paint so
they have to trust me and I have to
understand them yeah so that
relationship has to go both ways
and and if you were to give one piece of
advice to other brands who are trying to
figure out you know how to be creative
and engage you know completely new
partners as they go to market what what
would what would that advice be well I
think it’s important that we make that
step that everyone collaborates and open
new doors I mean that’s how we give
birth and new things right so for the
brand is like opening up to new ideas I
think is important and then creating a
dialogue not preparing everything in
advance in a presentation saying this is
said before they meet the artist meet
the artist first and brainstorm together
to make the project stronger makes total
sense PR anything that what you can’t
have your final product done before it’s
actually shot very often now they want
to have two completely the highly
detailed storyboard and images and all
that on the projects like that project
like that you can’t do that it’s
impossible we give them an idea what
it’s going to be like but there has to
be a trust a trust both ways that we’re
going to have the creative freedom and
they gave us the creative leeway to to
deliver something me exception it makes
it makes total sense well listen thank
you so much both for being here I you
know given that this is a create a forum
on global creativity as you look through
this content you can’t help but think
that you know it’s very topical for what
we’re trying to cover today with you
know all these global partners coming
together and doing something
extraordinary so thank you appreciate it
thank you
so thank you you guys can head off
either way so that was that was amazing
I hope you enjoyed it and that content
will be available on the live stream and
banked on video on demand on WatchMojo
for some time to come and so for those
of you who want to share this with
people that miss the live stream today I
hope you’ll be able to let other people
know that they can go to watchmojo.com
and get a chance to see this so now
we’re going to switch it up a little bit
and talk with now that we’ve been
talking about ad agency folks now we’re
going to talk to some ad agency folks
and talk to some creatives about in this
case how they sell stuff to guys and so
this is going to be a two-part
conversation
the first being with the executive
creative director for one of the most
progressive ad agencies in the business
an agency called deep focus please join
me in welcoming Matt steinwald
my pleasure alright so thank you for the
introduction I work at deep focus we we
definitely are an ad agency we’re not a
traditional attitude you see we don’t
look at TV as the the end-all be-all we
see every channel as an opportunity to
to reach our our consumers and we were
born in digital we’re born in social so
we think a little bit differently and
hopefully this is a good example of how
that goes so if you’re if you’re
interested in advertising thinking of a
career in advertising don’t do it but
here you go we’re going to take I’m
going to take you through about nine
months of work in about 18 minutes
I got bonus minutes here we go this is
about ruffles would I click that so
we’re going to learn about ruffles we’re
going to shift gears from cars to potato
chips and basically everything you need
to learn about ruffles potato chips is
contained in this 30-year old TV
commercial so if you haven’t seen this
enjoy
Horton’s talking come on honey come on
come on what ruffles potato chips
ruffles have ridges orgies are what make
them so good well that’s a funny thing
to say honey
it’s printed right on the back yeah but
why can’t I just say mom and dad huh
because that’s not all bad okay ruffles
have ridges like cars have wheels I
guess so one thing to note here is that
was obviously a commercial that was
targeted at mom now the brand team at
ruffles this is brand that’s been around
since 1956 and it had become the kind of
the tried and true brand for Mom and
even your mom’s mom too to buy when you
had a dip at home because it had of
course the ridges the marketing team
wanted to shift its focus from shopper
moms to millennial Mail so there’s
basically no bigger challenge for an ad
agency than to become to try and make
this guy want to buy what his mom or his
mom’s mom would buy so that was the
challenge whenever we do these kind of
challenges I love to start thinking
about the brand this is my favorite
definition of what a brand is a brand is
a promise delivered I like this because
it begs two questions right what are you
promising and how are you delivering it
so the delivery part really is on the
brand side on their side what they did
do which was cool is they created a
bunch of new flavors that were really
targeted to men so hot-wing flavored
ruffles or bacon cheddar fully loaded
potato skin ruffles I don’t know why you
need a potato skin flavored chip but
this was not my decision but at least
that part of the equation was done so
now we had to figure out what are we
going to promise this guy who basically
hates advertising doesn’t trust
corporations we had to get to know him
so so we did a lot of work we had a
great account team
Katie Shady and Michelle Raley let our
strategy on this
we learned that these guys like their
phones I know this is groundbreaking
stuff guys they like watching videos on
phones think porn and oh my kids are
actually watching this you’re muffs
you’re mus and
and and funny videos on on phones really
really just work with this target so we
had to be funny
our plan was to be funny we were trying
to break through to this guy so we had a
bit of a three-part plan I’ll take you
through it before we even got to
thinking of ideas one thing we knew is
we didn’t want to act like a brand we
did not want to be a brand we actually
wanted to be a friend we wanted to
almost be like half of this relationship
this was a clip that we played when we
did this work and we just saw ourselves
as a brand as half of this relationship
why are you looking at me like that
you’re falling for this broad no I just
met her exactly I’m gonna go
you can’t go watch me watch me take this
on down the road look you leave Gloria
is gonna freak out and go a bit and
it’s gonna go into crisis lockdown Lodha
here at the house I don’t give a famous
I just have my own sock tape into
my mouth that’s like what yeah but the
stuff that I wore around all day playing
football in pouring sweat in was shoved
into my mouth and then was duct tape
over it let’s talk about I’m a good
listener I’m a good listener so we love
we love that obviously very funny movie
very funny dynamic and we wanted to see
if we couldn’t emulate some of that the
second part of our plan here is don’t
act in our own best interest in our own
self-interest we know that our clients
want to self sell chips but the last
thing to do is sell chips is to put that
in the front so we we actually wanted to
be very self-aware so a lot of great
content and great work was just being
honest about what was going on in the
world this is this is great Super Bowl
actually it was a Super Bowl hack done
by by Drogo 5 for Newcastle who could
not afford to compete with the
Budweiser’s of the world and basically
got
a won the Superbowl battle a few years
ago um I was really excited to make us
commercial with Newcastle but then turns
out they don’t even have the money or
permission to make us a commercial they
can’t even say the words just salute I
don’t even think they can say like aim
in I don’t think you can in football
like in any capacity how are you gonna
make us commercial without saying the
words alright so self awareness and then
the last thing of our plan here is we
didn’t want to be too serious serious
isn’t funny we want to be ridiculous
this is uh this is a fun some fun work
where we there’s a brand truth this is
for GE smart lightbulbs for a smart home
and basically Jeff Goldblum is is
attributing all of his success to the
lighting the lighting just makes him
successful and and clearly pushes the
bounds of what’s ridiculous for an
embarrassingly small amount of money you
can kiss your horribly lit non
successful life goodbye but don’t take
my word for it ask this unremarkable
nobody they used to hate to go home to a
dark house and an unfamous non celebrity
husband but now that I can control my
lighting I’m seeing things to go okay so
that that’s a plan I mean is it a good
plan who knows stay tuned so we wanted
to be friendly self-aware and ridiculous
and right and the bullseye of all of
these things what we discovered were
first world problems right first of all
problems are problems that are not
problems they’re privileged problems I’m
going outside I have to put on pants
that’s the first role problem I find it
impossible to say no to stake 50 in
France 50 of stake first world problem I
should be working on college stuff but
Internet’s much more fun and this great
story from the New York Times my wealthy
parents well many wealthy parents find
it hard to talk to their kids about the
millions of dollars they will inherit so
these are first real problems and and I
think this whole challenge this whole
marketing challenge that we were facing
is perfectly summed up
bye-bye your friend and mine mr. Luisi
feel that we now in the 21st century we
take technology for grandpa yeah because
now we live in an amazing amazing world
and its wasted on the on the crappiest
generation of just spoiled idiots that
don’t care because this is what people
like now they got their phone no uh-uh
it won’t give it a second it’s going to
space can you give it a second to get
back from space is the speed of light
I was on I was on an airplane and there
was internet high-speed Internet on the
airplane that’s the newest thing that I
know exists and I’m sitting on the plane
they go open up your laptop you can go
on the internet and it’s fast and I’m
watching YouTube clips it’s a me I’m in
an airplane and then it breaks down and
they apologize the Internet’s not
working the guy next to me goes bolt
like how quickly the world owes him
something yes he knew existed only 10
seconds ago right right so what’s what’s
great about this is everyone’s laughing
at the right times they’re all mostly
he’s making fun of the people who are
laughing so there’s a great
self-awareness and obviously he’s
describing some some great first real
problems and you really know that first
world problems is a thing when when
weird al’ turns it into a song what she
did
all right so there’s that I’m going to
I’m going to speed up a little bit here
so what on earth do first world problems
have to do with ruffles potato chips you
ask or you should ask because this is an
ad for there’s a campaign for ruffles
and the answer is actually they have
everything to do with ruffles ruffles
this is an actual patent to cut a potato
in zigzags I’m not joking 1956 – Bernard
stammered and I quote and figure five a
modified form of the sliced potato
product is shown and the modification
resides and the fact that the ridges on
one side of the potato product in the
ridges on the other side of the potato
product are arcuate and extend in
parallelism on opposite sides of the
product so they actually patented this
silly thing and why do they do it
because the potato the ruffles chip is
actually stronger these ridges make it
stronger so it cannot break in the dip
if there’s ever been a first-world
problem it’s when your chips break in
the dip so now’s the time for for my
favorite Venn diagrams we’re playing
advertising I love Venn diagrams this
one’s easy to follow so we know the guys
like first world problems we know that
we as a brand are in fact the solution
to a first real problem so our big
campaign platform for ruffles was that
ruffles are built for the rough life
rough life is just another way of saying
first world problem sounds more like
ruffles get it advertising so so this
brilliant campaign is is going to live
across some channels but to make sure
that everyone’s on the same page
including our amazing producer Melissa
our creative team Mike Boyce and Matt
Sylvester who came up with this we we do
we do write mantras it kind of ensures
that all creative partners are on the
same page and here’s what this one
sounds like so pretend your clients and
I’m pitching to you sometimes you
finally sink in your couch with a cold
beer and realize it’s not a twist-off or
your iPad is out of battery and your
cord won’t reach the bed but few things
are more devastating than when a regular
potato chip breaks in the dip if you’ve
suffered through these kinds of problems
then you know life can get rough
we ruffles hereby swear to raise
awareness of rough life problems to
provide you with comfort and strength
just as we’ve done for over 50 years to
present solutions to these tragic
problems if solutions exist and to
always keep it real even when life is at
its most unreal your friend through
thick dip it’s always hard to say that
part you don’t want to say it the other
way and and thin-skinned ruffles built
for the rough life alright thank you my
best Don Draper so so here we go let’s
let’s look at some of the work we wanted
to show how this could work across any
channel so we had an NFL partnership we
wanted to work with Eric Decker those of
you guys who know Eric Decker he’s a
he’s a wide receiver he was traded from
the Broncos to the Jets he is a living
first role problem he’s actually like a
professional football player worth
millions of dollars and at the same time
he looks like a model so life is rough
when you’re Eric Decker but anyway
here’s how he helped us launch the
campaign even when you’re snuggling up
with Eric Decker life can get rough
thankfully there’s ruffles built for the
ruffle life follow ruffles on twitter
for more rough life stories so we’re
asking people to to activate our Twitter
channel we’re act we’re actually asking
for stories for them to share their
stories with us life can be rough like
when date night interferes with draft
night but if there were two of you you
could be in two places at the same time
Decker suit up
yes get in there
surprise it’s a win-win for everyone
maybe even you if you don’t want a
chance to win sweet NFL gear just tweet
your rough life story at ruffles ruffles
built for the rough life Wow
okay so we’re asking people to share
their rough life stories with us we know
that conversation is already happening
in social they’re already using that
hashtag so we’re able to jump in on
those conversations but we also wanted
to share some of our own rough life
stories so we made some animations we
actually used a vendor clambake who does
a lot of animations for Adult Swim so
again we’re kind of stacking the deck in
our favor to make sure that we’re going
to be funny in the way that the
Millennial men you know appreciate humor
so here’s a couple of first world
problems the first one is about the big
challenge in applying sunscreen when
you’re at the beach and then the second
one of course is when you’re when you’re
in your cell service is not allowing you
to tell the world how much fun you’re
having so enjoy these two
firstworldproblems ruffles presents
ruffles rough life stories brought to
you by ruffles
just think if your friends would help
you put on sunscreen
then you’d all have perfect tans people
would be impressed and tell you that you
have a perfect tans
yes perfect but your friends would not
help you put on sunscreen and now you
all look like cow people that’s rough
thankfully there’s ruffles built for the
rough life okay one more and now a
ruffles rough life story just think if
you had a personal satellite then you’d
always have Wi-Fi you’d bring happiness
everywhere you went
you’d be a Wi-Fi magnet and you could
always prove to everyone how much fun
you’re having but you do not have a
personal satellite and now you must
actually talk to people that’s rough
thankfully there’s truffles built for
the rough life okay so we also worked
with the moment studio and an led by
Christina cook she and Ken Kramer and
Ashley Tyra
Kyle Brody and and Franklin DeFelice we
created some trend based content context
based content for a you know across
channel so we’ll go through some of this
we were this is uh this is a hangout
hack where we’re helping you if you’re
stuck grilling on a hot day how to stay
cool you can put your feet in the cooler
which is which is growth but look how
happy he looks we you know this is a
tweet when you treated your priceless
comic like it was worth 40 cents rough
life when you have to wait a whole other
year to find out who’s going to sit on
the throne all men must dip brilliant
and the tweets came to us also when you
try to send a text to Daniel but it went
to dad rough life when it’s too cold for
a t-shirt but too warm for a sweatshirt
rough life and you know when Starbucks
wants to talk about pumpkin spice
life is rough when you want pumpkin
spice flavored ruffles chips because
those are not real things rough life
we created a pandora ad that pissed
people off which was awesome
they actually tweeted us a rough life
story about listening to our own Pandora
commercial ruffles commercial on Pandora
makes me want to throw my phone at the
wall I don’t want to hear a guy eating
chips in my ear this is awesome this was
intentional we did want to do this and
here it is and of course the rough life
situation here is you get free music but
you have to listen to ads so
contextually aware life is rough when
you hear an ad instead of music
luckily deep Ridge classic hot wings
ruffled sound delicious hmm so when life
gets rough got ruffles all right and
then calls you me you saw some of the
Martin Starr content that we showed so
we won’t play that again I have 20
seconds WatchMojo was our gracious host
so I’m going to rattle through a very
quick top 10 ways to make good ads
number one remember you’re a potato
don’t try to change the world if you’re
a potato be a potato there’s no problem
there stand for one thing if you have a
really good big idea it can live across
the channels it doesn’t have to be
completely separate campaigns based on
the channels I think that was a good
demonstration of that ask people to do
nothing literally no one wants to do it
they don’t care they just if you can fit
into their life
you’re better off take many swings this
is one of the things we do really well
at deep focus is that we don’t see we
don’t put all our eggs in one basket one
big TV commercial we will create a lot
of content see what works and put our
media dollars behind what works we’re
going for humor smiles laughs shares
that kind of thing humor is currency if
you’re stuck what would Vince Vaughn do
choose funny partners choose your
celebrities with purpose obviously Eric
Decker is a pretty good example of that
he was a first-world problem when
chose him customized your creative to
the context in which it lives and trust
your gut don’t have to test everything
be brave we had it we had a brilliant
client on this Jeff Klein who was
basically empowering us and his people
to take take a chance take a risk and we
really appreciated it thank you thank
you sir I was curious the top the top
ten things you should remember about
advertising also in a way maybe I was
going to ask some of the women the
audience’s that also feel like good
advice for how to land a guy other than
the number one which was you know
remember the Europe potato the other
nine might actually work not bad
that was so in Atlanta guys no not
trying to land a guy um millions of
people just yeah yeah but in any event
listen we’re gonna have a few folks
joining for the rest of this
conversation and while we’re getting the
chair set up we have any questions from
the audience
anybody anything for Matt James did we
do UGC for this we’ve done UGC and when
we when we do UGC we really I mean that
whole like nobody wants to do anything
is extremely true but what was great
about this is that because because rough
life was already a hashtag it was
already out there people were already
using it so when we jumped into that
conversation and we started tweeting
about first world problems it was very
natural for them to do it so we got a
lot of actual conversation and we also
were prising things out for like at the
NFL Draft and we didn’t show everything
but for example we thought it was a
first world problem to have to wait in
line for your tickets to go and see your
players get drafted and so we were
activating the draft and we would have
people tweet using our hashtag and then
we would pull them out of line put them
to the front we give them VIP access so
we did we did stuff like that for this
campaign but yeah UGC is really
interesting because if you just ask
people to do it and they’re not
compelled to then it’s a disaster good
good advice good and thanks for the
question so listen I will also now want
to
welcome to the stage Josh Cohen from to
filter along with Ian Shafer who’s the
CEO of deep focus and also rich
Antonella the CEO of complex media which
is like a huge guy focus media
enterprise thanks guys thanks for being
here
absolutely thank you very much thanks
John thank you so we’ve heard a lot
about WatchMojo today at WatchMojo has
this unique proposition where they’re
targeting this increasingly elusive kind
of young male demographic in an age
where that audience is there’s a it’s
basically a diaspora they’re all over
the place now we’re used to be able to
target them in these finite specific
places in different entertainment and
media locations now they’re all over the
place and watch much is done a really
good job of kind of finding a niche that
really appeals to them and gets them
engaged on YouTube so we have a bunch of
people on here we have we have a great
panel today with Matt rich Indian and
wanted to kind of get into how in your
own work and with some of the other
clients you guys work with and brands
you guys work with how kind of the best
practices and the ways in which you guys
are appealing to that same demo today
and rich I wanna start with you you know
you’ve been a come near the sea of
complex networks complex is obviously
bound for a while
how is kind of like appealing to this
demo for you different now from them
when you started complex over a decade
ago uh you know the beautiful part for
us we’re very lucky in that when we
started out as a magazine 16 years ago
so we’ve been multiple iterations of
this business the one thing that hasn’t
changed is the topics we cover so what’s
really interesting is when we started we
were a small little magazine it was
about 275,000 circ right like and which
by the way is laughable now from a scale
perspective but um you know we were
always founded upon these verticalized
kind of subcultures at that point and
this was out 2002 so sneakers hip hop
art and design basically what is defined
youth culture today kind of was on the
peripheral at that point so we really
haven’t changed what we’ve done we’ve
just grown in all those mediums as
although as the number one authoritative
brand
within each of those topics and as those
topics have become organically more
important and move to the middle to
influence everybody else we’ve just
basically scaled organically so we
haven’t chased anything we haven’t
changed our business we’ve just kind of
embraced multiple platforms and where
people are consuming around those topics
and did you kind of get lucky in the
fact that no what we don’t get lucky
what was considered niche culture 16
years ago when you started or kind of
mesh culture is now more into the
mainstream well I don’t think it’s luck
I mean we were talking about it I mean I
believed in concentric circles at that
point and if you think the Trent if you
looked at the trend back then I was at
Saatchi a long time ago I won’t age
myself out but early 90s and we you know
we used to be able to buy it was really
easy when I was 22 23 years old
you bought ESPN and like NFL football
and you had 95 percent of the target
covered right and it was super simple
and by the time the early 2000s rolled
around it became very obvious that all
of the large ubiquitous reach plays and
scale plays to me we’re all going to be
deteriorating because you saw the
interests start you know it’s not just
the platforms that are disparate
it’s actually even more so it’s the
topics that drive that and those
platforms just enable those topics to
actually garner large audiences that’s I
mean I’d people think about it the wrong
way I think that’s it’s an easier way
that people default ooh and go oh the
platforms are really what’s fragmenting
everything no it’s the interest that
fragmented it they just found homes on
those platforms does that make sense yes
okay
lucky kind of way maybe for other than
sure it’s all gone
and so um going on all these different
fragments of platforms how are you like
you have any strategies or thesis in
order to reach this kind of demo in this
audience
yeah it’s really easy you buy you buy
them um and you buy complex yeah but
you’re like oh um the UH and I see that
like I’m serious about that I you know
you said they’re elusive I think you
know they’re elusive if you’re used to
advertising on television they’re not
elusive if you’re if you’re buying you
know access to them on the internet and
most likely you’re buying them from one
of three places and
that’s either Google Facebook or
everybody else and I think what’s what
the challenge for marketers is not
reaching them I think my audience in
general guys/girls everything it’s
almost like everything’s a commodity
because it’s bought sold and traded on
exchanges I think that what’s scarce
still is relevance and I think that’s
where that’s where it’s getting harder
not easier I mean it’s easier to figure
out what’s relevant it’s harder to
attach yourself to it it used to be like
you could be adjacent to it and that was
enough it used to be that you could you
know tweet about a topic and you were
seem to be cool now it’s like the more
that you you try to do it the as the
kids say the thirstier you look you know
and like that some and yet you have to
be careful about that right and so it’s
it’s not as easy anymore to appeal to
people or to actually be respected by
people anymore because the benefit the
benefit of the doubt for most brands has
gone away you know at least for legacy
brands modern brands newer brands were
like essences at the core they’re built
into the lives of people as opposed to
trying to interrupt them I mean those
they’re having an easier time but you
know the brands have been around for a
long time we’re trying to have to
retrofit everything that they’ve learned
and it’s not that easy
well you bring up an interesting point
though sorry but it’s like you know
everything you just talked about is that
is the shift from display and
programmatic and automated to really
branded and sponsored and yet
disproportionately branded yeah and
what’s funny is everybody’s running
towards branded from like a like the
media brand side of things but so few
people have a deep enough connection
with their audience that they can
actually do it yeah because you don’t
have to have such a deep connection with
your audience but when you integrate an
advertiser in if you have a dotted line
relationship you can’t integrate an
advertiser into that so I think you have
a lot of people trying to solve for a
solution for a problem that they
actually cannot fundamentally solve with
that as a solution yeah and it enough
people employ that as the solution they
actually the ad economy will be smaller
that’s right and there would be fewer
publishers and nobody really wants that
but I think that i think it’s it’s
inevitable
using some paralysis with some of the
companies you work with we’re because
because consumers are so savvy right now
and because they can see through
and because like you said like
if you’re late they’re not cutting
brands lots of slack do is there a
threshold that the campaigns need to hit
that is getting more difficult and more
difficult and is there some paralysis of
companies like wanting to kind of dive
into this space there is a there’s a
there’s a very large reliance on data
mostly because the industrial complex
says that that is what you should be
obsessive obsessive about I just don’t
think I think there’s a lot of analysis
paralysis that happens with all having
access to all that data
it’s like water water everywhere right
like that that’s that’s the situation a
lot of advertisers are in there they’re
they have access to all this data but
you know only a small percentage of it
is actually actionable nor should you
know the majority of it shouldn’t be
actionable it should be you know a
lesson that you learn and things that
you process but I mean I I’m a firm
believer that data like again is like
works very well at the bottom of the
funnel it’s fine it’ll help move product
it’ll help do that and at the end of the
day if that’s what you’re responsible
for as a marketer is selling product
then I guess you can rely on it I happen
to think marketing marketing and brands
there’s there’s just a higher calling
that’s also about building a brand for
the long term and actually creating
benefit of the doubt in people’s minds
that you know where they see the value
of a brand in a case of similar products
they’re going to choose one brand over
another not because they got a coupon
that might happen once but not over the
long term and so there is value in that
brand and I think that you know when you
pair that with content it makes an
argument for for brands the future of
advertising maybe becoming with brands
being more of the patrons of content
kind of the way it used to be with like
Texaco Star Theater and things like that
you know bringing people to stuff that
they wouldn’t get access to otherwise
and I think the more that your the the
television packages get unbundled and it
gets more and more expensive to watch
what you want to watch that might be a
place where where brands ultimately play
but it’s more likely to be again like
newer brands making newer decisions
about the older brands making the same
old
Matt so for people like you that are
invested in this industry is that it is
what Yen said is this a super exciting
time for you in kind of gone is the
these display ads and it’s more about
being creative and working with
different distributors and platforms and
figuring out things that might work on
these native platforms to these specific
audiences yeah I didn’t understand a
word you said oh that’s cuz you’re
Canadian
yesterday even I’ve worked together for
five years but no I I think there is no
more exciting time I think I think
agencies that creatively open let go a
little bit think differently and and and
treat every channel like like an
opportunity every publisher every
platform has creative within it right
they’re creative directors and creators
that know their audience they’re making
incredible content for their audience
already and so the the the advertising
agency I think has to come in and know
their brand and have the trust of their
client and earn the trust of their
client come into these opportunities and
collaborate and be open minded and
understand that if you come in and just
try to push your message through to an
audience that has an expectation from a
platform it’s going to fail so you have
to stop you have to collaborate you have
to listen to first of all listen to your
publishing partners because that is an
incredible way to reach an audience in
an authentic way and that’s that’s I
think that’s why I think it’s more
exciting is that yeah you can create
your own videos you can tell your own
stories that’s great but stories that
are coming from the brand to people are
going to be shot down much more than new
ways to kind of collaborate and actually
add true value to someone’s life I think
that’s maybe a new way of thinking it’s
not about you it’s totally about it it’s
and you’re not this is rare by the way
you’re hearing people talk about running
away from traditional kind of false
attribution like act the attribution
model is still very heavily relied upon
yeah um and in the bottom of the funnel
that you referred to is you know that
last click and
all of that in an addiction yeah I mean
look it automated anything has never
enough luck I’m a big ol gali fan so
it’s all about changing hearts and minds
I have news for you programmatic
advertising is not changing anybody’s
heart or anybody’s mind and you know you
have some people who understand it’s got
it
and you have look this performance
metrics that you actually have to have
fundamentally but there’s a lot of
different ways to get there and you
better you better start if you want to
build a long-term successful brand you
better start at the top of the funnel
having a very deep conversation with
people that’s that’s the key and you’re
not seeing yeah not a lot of people are
thinking that some things haven’t
changed though right so like what is a
brand believe in well you know what are
their true values what’s true to a brand
all of those things that are haven’t
changed it’s still important it’s maybe
just finding a new twist in a new way to
to kind of bridge what’s important to a
brand to what’s important to its
consumer to its fans find that new
bridge and that all happens that all
happens at the top that all happens with
a lot of thinking a lot of time a lot of
understanding a lot of research and a
lot of collaboration right in order to
change the hearts and minds of guys and
particularly young guys a particular on
the internet these days are there is
there anything in particular that that
you think they’re looking for they want
the differs from potentially other demos
yeah I mean I think I think guys want
hey what’s funny is you know you used to
used to thirst for you know sports stats
and other things like that I think
that’s that’s so commoditized and it’s
it’s so everywhere that’s not really
what guys are searching out it’s also
just it’s everywhere so I think now it’s
like people and not just guys but I
think disproportionate on the guy side
you see it in the conversations they
have on social platforms are looking for
very strong opinions right they’re
looking for an angle they want a brand
that does it’s not just a service play
there’s a lot of people that just are
service right and I think you know ESPN
is trying to move away from that not to
make that like as a correlate what we
were talking about is you know like
SportsCenter is now ubiquitous right
like highlight shows but first take is
well now everybody’s doing that too but
you start
going down a certain Road of opinions
and other things and that’s where you
can the the voice of a brand comes out
when the opinion comes out not not from
a service perspective because then
you’re just a commodity right so I think
I think a lot of people if you really
want to make a difference forget about
just the like look we’re very
differentiated on the topics we cover we
still do in the max scale versus
everybody else but for us it’s it’s how
do you inject that next layer of why
your think why these things are
important um and and kind of like tell
those stories behind the stories and I
think that’s excuse me I think that’s a
lot of it for us at least let’s see that
trend I mean if you’re if your brand and
your target is guys I mean you’re not
cutting deep enough alright like there’s
not like that can’t be your target I
mean guys I mean there’s a lot of
subsets within the guy category you know
and and you know so to you know make
generalizations about what it is that
guys like like it’s not even a generally
generalization to say guys like I mean
it’s not a fair generalization make to
say that guys like girls right we’re
sports or any of that stuff and you
could get away with making that general
generalization like 10-15 years ago
because we didn’t have the ability to
reach people with particular mindsets
other than you know finding the content
that it is they watch but then even if
you did find that content it would be
such at such small scale that you can do
anything but you know with like a you
know thing like Facebook out there you
know I can find guys that love Depeche
Mode I don’t you know like there’s
there’s and cut further they’re like
Depeche Mode and Morrissey like you know
there’s there’s this there’s a the big
cross so that’s a that’s a but overlap
you know but the fact is is like you can
you slice a lot of different ways and so
I think there of targeting guys is over
at this point I mean I think it’s more
about you know interests to your point
culture you know all those kinds of
things that get people you know to forge
some kind of association between what
your brand you know wants to be and what
people will accept it and with that
ability to to be more targeted I think
it just lends itself perfectly to making
more pieces of content like if you do
want to reach a larger audience in fact
don’t just say one thing don’t tell one
story tell specific story stories that
are actually gonna going to have some of
that deeper insight behind them same
touchstone on a general they put all the
different angles and perspectives okay
Richie you’ve had a couple breakout hits
on complex network this past six nine
twelve months or so like what what are
they and what do you think they have in
common that is speaking to the audience
you know it’s funny it you’ll hear
sounds like I’m very informal but I’m
actually painfully consistent about
things as well is you know everything
from like a show like everyday struggle
which basically was launched six weeks
ago today yesterday’s episode did seven
point nine million views in 24 hours um
we we had we have a show called hot ones
which is an interview show where we do
ten wings and ten tough questions and
have celebrities come on that is a great
little interview show right rebooting
like a Charlie Rose type format in a
really cool young way we have a show
called sneaker shopping with Joe liPuma
what’s interesting all you know they’re
all related to our topics but the one
thing that in common across all those is
they’re very opinionated there’s a lot
of flavor and there’s a lot of culture
there those formats are the backdrops
the topics are the backdrops it’s a it’s
a real play to be able to bring culture
in without being scripted is the real
magic right like that’s where a lot of
brands fall down is they try and just
throw a camera up in front of somebody
on a live basis and think that it’s
going to come across and it doesn’t it’s
just flat it could be any brand right
the one thing I love about our content
is you strip away complex and you still
know you’re watching complex and I don’t
just mean them on the topic I mean that
with the talent I mean that with the
vibe I mean that with the words they’re
saying and what it means and I
definitely mean it when it comes to like
the the numbers were posting against it
as well so that’s that’s the coming out
for brands to want to do that to take
that risk
to let go a little bit that I think that
onus I think falls mostly on on the
agency the agency has to
develop the trust with their clients
that that ultimately the content that
we’re going to create together if we let
go if we if we trust a little bit we’ll
protect some of your sensitive you know
kind of areas that but that’s that’s not
important we’ll get those out there and
and every partner is going to take in a
brief like that and understand where
where they can’t go and find a great
place where they can go and if you let
go then the content that you create
there is completely different than than
a TV commercial and there are really
employment even the audience the
audience appreciates that so much more
they feel like you’re catering to them
you’re like you’re not pandering but
you’re catering to them I think that’s
the big thing – yeah I mean we we would
look at you know I think I think there’s
you know you can make a TV commercial or
make pre-roll that’s brilliant that
people will like and appreciate you
would go about it a little bit
differently creatively but you know that
that’s that’s what I mean there’s
there’s great I mean this this Lysol
protect protect like a mother you seen
this it’s just absolutely brilliant and
it’s just old school television
commercial a great insight a nice twist
I think McCann did that work and it
feels like all of a sudden Lysol is
relevant giving mom’s goosebumps so you
can make really amazing work no doubt
but this is just these these other
channels feel like they’re untapped and
we have to learn as an agency and as
clients how do you get to how do you
create branded content or content on
behalf of brands that is going to be
that’s going to help you know tell tell
your brand story yeah I think the the
approach there that yet that everyone
has to take is I think it’s very easy
and obvious for brands to do cultural
appropriation yeah even for publishers
to write industry in it that is that has
historically been the easy way to do it
just reappropriation or just steal from
culture I think even something like like
that Lysol campaign or you know so like
a girl
you know there’s I’m sure there a guy
related campaigns out there as well even
if they’re just humor right there and
look at a Super Bowl spot you know
they’re I used to say that that’s a
that’s like
relevance tax like if you’re not
relevant a Super Bowl spot is the price
you have to pay to be relevant you know
for at least a couple of minutes but you
have to instead look at that as like
cultural contribution like that is a
contribution you’re making to culture
it’s up to you what you do at that time
on the stage but I think that at a time
when everyone’s watching the same thing
that is a shortcut to you know injecting
yourself into culture but I think that’s
a responsibility you know especially in
the world we live in where everyone’s
getting to choose whatever they want to
watch as opposed to having to sit
through commercial well that’s the other
thing people don’t like that you just
hit on the most important point is look
a lot of like most digital content is on
demand yeah right I mean it’s not pushed
out to you the way commercial is so that
you’re putting the choice in the
consumers hands so you damn well better
be producing pull oriented stuff versus
pushing it out and I don’t think a lot
of people consider that to that degree I
mean it’s a real it’s a challenge but
it’s an opportunity because if they’ve
chosen to pull that content to them
you’re already now you’re running
downhill right yeah there’s a reason
like and you get to the contribution
part there’s a reason why
puppymonkeybaby worked and Budweiser
America Cannes didn’t that’s right even
though they’re doing it again
for some reason for so so that you know
so that’s yeah again I think it’s a lot
lessons to be learned those two things
especially we got to marketing the guys
and like kind of must-see TV or we had a
point now where must-see TV is obviously
way smaller than it was years ago are we
at a point out where we’re less and less
people gonna see these kind of
television commercials like the last one
that I remember having kind of ubiquity
was the Darth Vader uh low VOC
Volkswagen Camaro
there you go I bore the more that God
created the farmer um are we past that
point now so I was talking to somebody
that was watching the hand man
Handmaid’s Tale on who they saw the same
spot the entire like the entire but at
the tire time they were watching this
show knew there was only one spot
playing sponsorship working for you so
you can achieve the desired frequency
and you could overdo the frequency so I
I don’t think I don’t
I feel
I still think you can get you know a
performance like a commercial seen by a
lot of people at the same time if you
spend enough money or if you spend
enough money in the right places so I
think that’ll still be there now will
everybody be watching NBC Thursday
nights the way they did The Cosby Show
like I know yeah well they’re not gonna
watch it at the same time they’re not
going to watch it on the same device on
the same screen like and the experience
is not going to be the same but again I
go back it literally the bigger problem
is it’s an on-demand right it’s Pole
versus push I think the onus is on us as
public content creators and the agencies
and the clients to appreciate and
realize that it’s not an iteration of a
30-second spot it’s a massive rethink
and I think that’s where not a lot of
people are not having enough of a
discussion around it because I think
that’s so dead it’s not even funny
that to me is like where I come battle
that people are not much more aggressive
around rethinking that’s that’s what I’m
shocked that we’re about out of time but
thank you guys so much you can find Ian
and Matt stuff over at deep focus net
and richest stuff over at complex comm
appreciate it thank you thank you thank
you thanks thank you very much thank you
man thanks Josh thank you John
so we’ve had an amazing day we’ve had
some incredible speakers that was an
amazing conversation around marketing to
guys and all the new challenges and
opportunities that we have and obviously
here at WatchMojo we care a lot about
guys and we have fortunately for us a
lot of guys that that watch our content
before we break for tonight’s showcase
around music and you’ve heard a little
bit about what we’re going to do tonight
we have Huddle’s pity party who debuted
on America’s Got Talent last night and
blew up the Internet we also have Dan
Deacon who’s a really talented musician
and has been on a lot of great programs
and also bringing up the third act we
have caveman which is an amazing local
band from Brooklyn they’re going to be
here with us tonight we have a whole
bunch of stuff happening as well and all
that kicks off at 6 o’clock but before
that super important we have somebody
who is an amazing speaker and
friend and he is a breakthrough
innovator please welcome Chris baron who
is the founder and general manager of a
great big story and it is really CNN’s
transformative team in social content
that is helping that brand really move
to a whole new place so please welcome
Chris okay good afternoon this is the
first time I’ve been in the lineup with
a guy named puddles and Capeman
yeah that’s so I think maybe I’m moving
up in the world before I get in I’m
going to actually do for a person who
lives in video I’m going to do a
somewhat bright thing and actually limit
a little bit of the video but I’m going
to show you sort of what we think we’ve
accomplished from inside a news
organization to do something a little
bit or very much outside the news before
I dive in just a little bit about Who I
am and what I do all day so I am the
senior vice president of global video
for CNN so that means on any given day I
have a lot of incredibly talented
colleagues that are really focused on
today’s news and tomorrow’s news and the
news after that as you might imagine
it’s an incredible time to be in the
news it’s an invigorating time to be in
the news you just don’t sleep very much
in addition to that I also oversee our
emerging brands at which great big story
really is the biggest one and the one
that’s off to the fastest start so I’d
like to talk to you about that before I
get in let me talk to you about how it
came to be really quickly this is a time
before Trump it’s before the election it
is towards the middle of 2015 we were
already gearing up for the election we
were hiring like crazy on the politics
side we were hiring like crazy on the on
the digital side and certainly video was
a huge part of that my boss and I Andrew
Morris walked into Jeff Zucker who’s our
president
he’s the president of the world’s
biggest news organization literally the
world’s biggest news organization and we
walked in and said we have this big idea
we think it’s gonna be great it’s gonna
be a little expensive and it has nothing
to do with the news and he just stared
us for a couple seconds and he said okay
come on and then we gave him the world’s
worst
keynote presentation and I’m not going
to show it to you because it’s awful but
I have to tell you everything that I
show you all the success I show you is
actually because one single person at
the very top said yes and continues to
say yes and supports it I’m not saying
that because I don’t think he’s
listening right now but it isn’t
important people ask me how we did this
and we did it with buy-in and we did it
from the very top so this is great big
story we focus on cinematic storytelling
we think we tell stories that make the
world a smaller place that’s a really
important thing especially in today’s
news climate when we think about who we
are and what we aspire to be and what we
the feelings that we want to evoke both
in our audiences and in our partners we
believe that the quality that you get
with HBO and Netflix and the cinematic
narrative nature of deep engaged
storytelling belongs on mobile devices
certainly belongs on OTT it belongs in
all forms not just a series of hour-long
documentaries or fiction we think about
Ted a lot not from a guy on a stage he’s
better than me giving really smart
advice but from the notion of connecting
the world having a global outlook and
also leading with thought really really
thinking through issues and through
dynamics and through geographies and
then BuzzFeed which ends up sort of
being the the placeholder for what we
all sort of shorthand as the magic of
audience science and the magic of off
platform and social media and what you
can do in that space so we had this
premise what if we get actually combine
all these three CNN by nature for more
than three decades is a video company we
have more cameras there are cameras
around the world than anyone else in the
world what if we could actually access
that what if we could turn that on and
play and really take advantage of that
infrastructure so this is what we came
up with
we’re a global media company dedicated
to cinematic storytelling over the past
year and a half and actually these
numbers are a little bit almost dated as
of last Friday it’s actually closer to
80 now in the last year and a half we’ve
been to nearly 80 countries we have told
stories in 80 countries in a year and a
half that’s not something that a social
video startup does it’s not something
that a publisher whose has a video
department does this is what a global
media company does we have incredibly
big ambitions and they’re beginning to
pay off we’ve also been built and
incredibly engaged and loyal endemic
audience we have over you’ll see these
numbers in a second we have over four
four and a half million Facebook
subscribers we’re actually about to
throw a party here in a week or so you
guys are all invited because they’re
about to hit a million YouTube
subscribers more than half of which have
actually showed up over the past three
months all of its organic we think we’re
on to something really special
all of it starts with storytelling it
starts with video we’re a video only
company every one of these stories sort
of has their own tastes we do things in
a studio we do things out in the wild we
do things that are said what do things
that are happy but there are real life
stories that we think we are uniquely
positioned to discover so here’s a
little bit of a taste of what that looks
like let’s take a break for a second
great big story is the home of amazing
people doing improbable things like this
architect building an Arctic skyscraper
with his bare hands for this father and
son racing tiny drones and impossible
speeds
and this fighter who’s crushed every
stereotype on her way to being the
fattest in the world get away with these
stories and more every day at great big
story on Apple TV Roku YouTube Facebook
and great big story calm so one of the
things that we really looked at when we
decided to do this was it’s one thing to
have a really creative idea and have it
instinct about avoid in the creative
marketplace in the audience marketplace
but we really took a look inward and
said what have we built as a news
organization then we can actually
translate into a new be new business I’m
not talking about an experiment I’m not
talking about again a social video
department I’m talking about a brand new
standalone business I spoke to you about
the video infrastructure we have we just
have cameras and reach everywhere we
know what to do with video where the
we’re on the first the list of first
partners when new video platforms launch
when new camera companies launch when
read as new camera they call us so the
video infrastructure was already a given
advantage the speed and quality one of
the things that great big story we
published about three stories per day
three really really high-quality stories
per day shot from all over the world it
may not sound like a lot in the context
of cnn.com which publishes 300 stories
per day but when you’re talking about
the premium level of storytelling that
we do 3 is a lot
the reason we’re able to do that is
because the ideas keep coming the
stories that we find keep coming I’ve
been in a lot of different organizations
in my career and I can tell you one of
the hardest things to do is actually
pitch ideas and to receive pitches of
ideas and there are a lot of really good
ideas and a lot of really bad ideas they
get pitched and they never hear back the
person pitching them never hears
anything that’s a death knell for ideas
you will never get another idea out of
that person again we actually review
pitches every single day if you pitch
something you know that you’re going to
get feedback it may not be a feedback
you like but you’re going to get
feedback and you’re gonna get it quickly
that encourages more ideas that is a
newsroom mentality newsrooms don’t sit
on things for very long they have to
keep moving so that’s one of the things
that we transmitted from a newsroom the
other advantage we have is that we own
everything we literally own everything
we make we own every picture we’re also
not making things that are tied to the
news as I said we’re making things that
actually basically last a lifetime out
of the thousand or so stories we’ve done
so far I would say nine hundred and
ninety of them would be relevant five
years from now if you think about the
exploitable quality of all that video
and all those hours and hours of video
we’ve made it’s relevant forever and can
be repackaged and exploited that’s a
huge advantage and then the fourth is
audience data so CNN is obviously a
really big platform we are across our
digital portfolio the biggest name in
digital news period bigger the new york
times bigger than washington post’s
bigger than Fox News in addition to that
across the Turner portfolio Turner owns
CNN you’re looking at another more than
500 million social followers in addition
to that you have Time Warner and you
have places like HBO we have access to
all of that data so when we make
something that we think someone who’s a
really big fan of Game of Thrones and
Adult Swim is going to like we actually
have a pretty good shot at getting it
directly to those people that’s the
advantage of being part frankly of a
really big place it doesn’t weigh its
down it actually helps us be incredibly
precise so this is creatively sort of
where we think we are now this is super
subjective and you guys may disagree
with half of it and I think I made up
half of it and somebody else made up
half of it but I think it’s right we
really look at the news environment that
we all live in think about your Facebook
feed and it basically looks the same
every single day think about your
Twitter feed and it’s all about Donald
Trump every single day I don’t really
use snapchat
guys can tell me what’s on your snapchat
[Applause]
we think great big story fits in a nice
niche we we we looked at everything that
was out there from the highly
sensationalized good but highly
sensationalized content such as vice to
the overly earnest to the frankly just
sort of silly and we realized there was
a giant thing in the middle there was a
giant space in the middle for people who
really loved storytelling
we’re incredibly curious we’re educated
we’re busy that didn’t necessarily want
to give up
BuzzFeed because we all like BuzzFeed it
tastes good but it’s pretty low-calorie
a lot of us don’t just really identify
it with Vice but we get it to good brand
we thought and we still believe and the
evidence shows and I’ll show you that
there was a giant giant audience in the
middle of 26 to 27 year olds who live in
a city or on their second job live on
their phones watch a ton of video and
it’s proven to be right so this is a
little bit to give you like a this is an
average week in the life of great big
story I told you like these things the
variety is sort of all over the place
there’s this one this this Indian woman
I think she was like 84 years old she’s
basically the world’s best sharpshooter
we went in his story on her right
there’s another piece just right next to
her there’s this amazing craftsman
around pasta halfway across the world in
Italy that we actually did with Genesis
a Korean car brand we’re doing stories
on wildlife but not your average
wildlife story this is actually these
are that little monkey right there is
actually a robot
we found a roboticist in England who
makes fake animals to go out and
actually study endangered species he’s
the guy that made all the Penguins they
went into penguin film so this is an
average week what we’re doing we’re not
making lists
we’re not doing one thing over and over
and over again we’re creating an entire
world that we believe and our audience
is telling us is incredibly
serendipitous and that promotes a lot of
loyalty and excitement and discovery so
what the kinds of the kinds of things we
make so I would say that our bread and
butter is in that somewhere between that
two to four-minute range we have
incredible incredible engagement time
especially on YouTube in this building
that we’re sitting today most people who
watch our videos on YouTube watch three
and four of them at a time on Apple TV
which I think you’ll see in a second
some of the stats around that we’re
giving it getting an average dwell time
with almost an hour so if you think
about three minute videos I’m bad at
math but that’s more than 10 that’s our
bread and butter every day but we also
do longer things I was talking to say
heal from digiday and we were talking
about how publishers are because
everybody’s getting video capability
they’re starting to sort of like try a
lot of things and they’re becoming
production companies we’re actually
doing that from a very legit place we do
short films we partner with CNN films we
went out we’ve done probably nearly a
dozen short film so far the one you see
a capture of there is a true story about
the last mission to space by a little
and an Academy award-winning
documentarian we have big big
storytelling ambitions and we big we
bring big stories with those ambitions
this is where the name actually sort of
lives up to the product and then series
we actually with the within three months
of launching this thing we got an email
to our general inbox hey a great big
story calm and it came from some friends
of ours at The Weather Channel and they
said hey we know you’re just like
launched this thing or whatever but you
guys have you ever made a TV show I said
actually yeah a lot of our staff have
and exactly how to make TV shows six
months later
we’re delivering eight hours of
prime-time television for The Weather
Channel for at the time a brand for us
that had only been alive for around nine
nine to twelve months so we’re
functioning in a lot of different
formats in a lot of different places it
all goes back to our discovery no
storytelling this is just a little bit
about where we are or everywhere
basically if you’re watching a video I
do believe that connected TVs are going
to be an enormous future for us and we
have a lot of very big plans around that
and you’re going to hear a lot over the
next two to three months about our
investments in that space YouTube has
been a huge huge thing for our brand
Facebook is sort of like the beast you
have to keep keeping up with and we all
know the excitement of it and also the
downfalls of it YouTube is the place
where we’re finding incredible loyalty
incredible engagement and incredible
feedback so it’s also a place you’re
going to see us Double Down doubling
down on in fact I think it’s been taken
down but we actually created a fake
submarine in this very studio space that
was totally awesome and we used for a
shoot with the guys at YouTube spaces
we’ve reached who we thought we were
going to reach so it turns out our hunch
was true there’s a lot of 26 year-olds
who watch our videos and they’re
basically exactly we thought they were
going to be a little bit male mostly us
pretty much straight down the middle and
nearly all of them are on their phones
it’s an incredibly coveted demographic
both by publishers producers advertisers
platforms
everybody wants these guys and we
managed to build tens and tens and
millions of them this is an eye chart
the thing that you have to really
understand is really this bottom here
around January of this year
we started to see growth see growth on
YouTube that was incredibly impactful it
actually raised the boat of everything
else we did it raised the boat of our
entire brand one of the things that we
did do is we started being not afraid to
go longer
one of the biggest complaints we get
from our audience is that our videos
they want more of it they wish we could
make that story longer so we decided to
indulge that and that’s been a boon for
our presence on YouTube it’s been
incredibly incredibly powerful we had
tens of millions of dedicated fans like
when you might talk about as unique
viewers whether that’s a subscriber on
YouTube or Facebook follower but our
reach goes way way past that
every single day and then these are some
of the faces but we’ve had very little
marketing that’s the other thing we
didn’t do we basically said like we want
to have this big idea and Jeff that’s
gonna be great and we’re gonna make this
big investment in it and we actually
don’t want to scream about it we don’t
want to do a big ad campaign because we
don’t think it’s gonna work we actually
don’t think advertising a nutritional
way is gonna work for this we did invest
in marketing around our content on the
platforms but you didn’t see a giant TV
campaign or a giant prank campaign and
what happened was partners started
coming to us TIFF the Toronto
International Film Festival came to us
and said we love what you’re doing can
we do something together
Bleacher Report is a corporate cousin of
ours did the same thing Ted did the same
thing Madonna like reached out musicians
artists we’ve had more than 3000 earned
media mentions since we launched some of
that is because we have incredible
publicists but it’s also because the
content is just it’s just sort of catnip
for everybody so really quickly how we
make money like how do you actually turn
all this into a business this is the
part that that my bosses are most
interested in and I think is is critical
we are not we did not launch this
company to sell it like a lot of
startups we did not launch the company
as a project like a lot of media
companies do we actually launched it as
a standalone business so it has a legit
revenue model we sell sponsorships
that’s a huge piece of what we do and
you’ll see some of those brands we do
editorial series
six eight ten part series that we put
brands against we also take that into
more overly branded content we have a
branded content studio courageous that
is fantastic
so brands can be either really really
heavily involved in what we’re doing or
they can be associated with it and that
carries a lot of our business we also do
custom production which is basically
another word for saying when we make
stuff for other people just like The
Weather Channel or some of the streaming
services that you’ll see our stuff pop
up on over the next few months and then
content licensing I mentioned you guys
we own everything
it also means we can keep monetizing it
over and over and over and over again we
have packages of just food storytelling
that we can sell everywhere we can sell
it to an airline we can sell it to some
TV station and Japan which has happened
we keep monetizing and exploding our
video these are good names on this list
on our brand partner list the thing that
I think you should take away from it
that I’m I’m most excited about a is the
caliber these aren’t this isn’t your
local mattress shop or a car dealer it’s
also global about half of our
sponsorship business comes from outside
the United States the advertising market
outside the United States is incredibly
complicated and different and in some
ways easier in some ways there are fewer
go-betweens every place has its own its
own special circumstances but it’s an
incredibly powerful portfolio of brands
and they’ve been in a critical part of
how we’ve actually grown we’ve learned a
lot from brands we actually go inside
around when we do a partnership with a
brand we don’t just slap their logo on
it we actually go inside that company we
went inside Hewlett Packard Enterprise
which gave us this challenge like we
sell big boxes how do you story tell
around that and so we actually literally
went inside their company and talk to
their scientists
found stories that’s how we work with
brands and that’s been beneficial to to
us as well
the last thing I would sort of leave you
guys with is I get asked all the time
how on earth did you basically launch a
startup within a huge company and how on
earth are you still here number one
there’s some things we did in the
beginning to make it real and I talked
about a business plan earlier and this
is not the creative part but it’s the it
is a meaningful part we actually put a
real business targets on it if I was a
startup out in the outside world I would
take VC money and I would say you guys
let’s go build audiences and a platform
and we’re going to worry about revenue
later right let’s go get a ton of
Facebook views let’s go drive up all of
our numbers make us really attractive
and let’s sell it let’s exit out of this
thing that’s not what that’s not what
our aim has ever been we’re actually
building a real business and we signed
up for real metrics around the business
it made us accountable
it made us actually have to learn how to
sell it learn how to build it and
operate it that’s number one and the
second piece is and it’s worth repeating
is that we actually got buy-in from the
very very top in the very beginning it
was never framed as an experiment that
one department of the company was doing
we actually didn’t waste time trying to
compartmentalize it the idea was big to
begin with we went to our president with
it he endorsed it and then we put real
deliverables around it and that’s how we
built it inevitably it comes back to the
creative and the stories are fantastic I
encourage you guys to go check them out
but when you combine that creativity
with a lot of real acumen and
accountability I think you potentially
have something special so thank you very
much
thank you Chris so that’s a wrap for the
first half of the day I just want to
make a quick comment which is uh you
know you’ll never see at a tech
conference let’s use the example you’ll
never see Google putting on a conference
and then saying hey let’s give a call to
Facebook and Microsoft and have them
come and talk about how great they are
who’s ever seeing that that’s kind of
rare but that’s the beautiful thing
about the content industry is like it’s
not really a zero-sum game we’ve always
said that you know actually seeing other
creators come up with great content
actually helps you in a weird way
because so long as you get people back
on a platform like like figma like
YouTube or just the Internet then you
all benefit so when John and I start to
talk about this event as weird as it was
we’re like you know what we don’t really
want this to be so much about WatchMojo
we want it to be more about other
content creators big and small so
there’s a particular pride for me as an
entrepreneur to put up this event be
part of the team that puts up this event
and then have complex acquired by
Verizon or CNN’s latest project come up
and speaker and share the spotlight so
that’s one thing that I particularly we
love about the content industry and now
we want to kind of put a spotlight on on
the creators that are going to be the
next big brands so okay finally uh
that’s a wrap we’re going to have
cocktails and musical performances
including kilojoule caveman Dan Deacon
and puddles and on that note guys
puddles last night was on America’s Got
Talent
which launched anybody want to take a
guess 2006 also launched in 2006
WatchMojo I think we’ve solved the
mysteries of life we could go home
alright thank you very much
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broadcasting from YouTube spaces London
on July 12 2017 ladies and gentlemen
please welcome WatchMojo founder and CEO
ashcan kar bass version already so hello
everyone and welcome to the first ever
watch module live at YouTube space and
what better place to kick off this
global and ambitious initiative than in
New York City so here we are today at
Chelsea Market which is one of the two
spaces in the USA and there’s nine of
them around the world in far-off places
such as Tokyo Mumbai Berlin Paris London
Toronto Sao Paulo and of course Los
Angeles now you may not know this but
watch mojo on YouTube are both kind of
industry veterans right I mean YouTube
launched in 2005 they registered their
URL in May of that year and we launched
the next month in June but of course
within 18 months YouTube had become the
second largest search engine in the
world and the largest video platform as
well and it basically eclipsed as you
all know platforms like revver Guba
Metacafe dailymotion as well as the
incumbent portals like yahoo msn end of
a o L now before long Google recognized
the promise potential and presence that
YouTube had and by 18 months later by
October of 2006 acquired it for 1.65
billion dollars which at the time seemed
crazy to some but today it actually
comes across as quite the bargain so on
that note we’re going to take a look at
the confidential financial statements on
YouTube I’m just kidding we’re not going
to do that anyway so meanwhile the
original founders of YouTube is funny
when we started off I would send emails
to kind of get answers to how we could
optimize for the platform and literally
their founders would be replying to us
now they went off afterwards and bought
their private islands meanwhile we were
basically in Montreal in the trenches
trying to figure out this thing called
web video we tried publishing videos on
our owned and operated website and that
didn’t really go anywhere and we fire
sprayed them across the web and again
that didn’t necessarily lead
to build a business and there was one
platform however that was very different
one platform was unique one platform was
growing like crazy and to quote Jack
Walsh the chairman of GE one platform
was boundary-less
that platform of course was YouTube and
it occurred an era of production
democratization embeddable distribution
and eventually baked in monetization
that really have obviously radically
disrupted and altered the media
landscape and it wasn’t so much that
user-generated content or UGC was going
to change the rules of publishing
altogether brand safe quality content
remains essential for marketers but it’s
more that YouTube changed the rules of
engagement so we tracked along from 2006
to 2012 we produce how to’s we produce
celebrity interviews we did it all
biographies profiles and at some point
circa 2012 we said look if we’re going
to package WatchMojo as a consumer
facing brand it’s got to mean something
to the audience and that’s when we said
we looked at the team and we looked at
the marketplace and we said we should
really focus on what we’re most
passionate about and basically produce
factual top 10 countdown lists curating
pop culture and infotainment so after
the vloggers the let’s do it sorry the
do-it-yourselfers the let’s play gamers
but before the unboxers we basically
caught the listicle lightning in a
bottle and the rest as they say is
history
our success didn’t happen overnight we
built this one subscriber at a time and
we never raised any capital which is
kind of weird we’ve never raised a
single dollar a venture or angel
investment nothing and frankly with
venture capitalist growth requirements
it’s really really difficult to build
something like watch module from scratch
the reality is you just can’t build an
engaged and sustainable audience in a
hurry it’s like the famous will famous
the successful venture capitalist Mark
Schuster who is behind maker said you
can’t put 9 woman in a room and say
could you give birth in a month it just
doesn’t work like that so this process
takes time now if you fast-forward four
years our top ten lists have been seen
eight billion times and they’ve
generated over 50 billion minutes of
watch time now just to give you a sense
of how big that is that is ninety five
thousand years and it’s all organic some
of you in the audience may be part of
that 15 million subscriber base that
watches over a billion minutes of watch
time each month
who enjoy our top 10 list and a few of
you may be the ones who are a bit more
cynical who say we’re running out of
ideas even though we will never run out
of ideas but the most exciting part of
my job and my reality is like there’s
there’s like a billion of you out there
that don’t know yet about WatchMojo and
who have yet to become mojo Holland’s
and that’s really what kind of drives us
every day so what’s our formula for
success what’s the recipe the truth is
there’s no silver bullet there is you
know anybody that tells you like there’s
an algorithm and there’s kind of a
playbook to build a content successful
content business is lying
the reality is first and foremost you’ve
got to be passionate and you hear that
in so cliche I tell people you got it if
you’re going to be in the content
business you almost want to be focusing
on something that you would do for free
if there was no money in it but the
reality is if you’re persistent and you
just kind of improve and iterate then
the sky is the limit in the age of the
global stage and that stage being
YouTube 3 years ago at brandcast which
is YouTube’s upfront event I sat in the
audience and I heard a frank talk about
his vision for BuzzFeed BuzzFeed video
in the future then two years ago I saw
fellow Montreal entrepreneur and
executives Shane Smith take us through
the future of vice and how it was going
to be this new news gathering operation
those are two brands companies that have
built companies with valuations that
overshadow media companies that have
been in business for decades and that’s
been fueled obviously by the insatiable
insatiable appetite of audiences for
online video now to start to connect the
bridge between watch modules past and
present and the future I was born in
Iran you’re wondering what ash can carve
extrusion the origins are so I was born
in Iran but since 1983 I’ve called
Montreal my home as a Canadian
entrepreneur I basically you know I set
out to build the next edition of let’s
say a juice pool just for laughs Cirque
du Soleil or vice media basically the
next great media entertainment brand
export out of the city and frankly I
think we’ve accomplished that right and
you have to bear in mind that with
YouTube now surpassing a billion hours
of video each day it’s on pace to
replace television as the leading
consumption platform so as WatchMojo is
one if not the most successful you know
YouTube centric media brand out there
it’s not driven by like a personality
then I like to think we’re actually on
our way to draw that parallel
into building the next ESPN the next mtv
of the millennial generation and
daunting as it seemed over like the 11
years this journey of trying to like
take an idea and build a business around
it I knew that it was possible largely
because of YouTube’s boundary-less
platform an audience of billions and
today there’s really only nine channels
that have more subscribers and all-time
views than us and six of them are vevo
channels like Eminem Taylor Swift and
whatnot and then the other three are
basically the WWE Ellen and of course
PewDiePie let’s not forget every
PewDiePie so at a time when politicians
who are elected are calling to erect
walls we thought it was important to say
wait a second this is the new normal
YouTube is where society and life is
going which is basically its
boundary-less
a creator from Montreal can create
content inform entertain and engage
audiences from Manila Madrid Mumbai and
basically the sky’s the limit
tomorrow’s world especially in the
creative space won’t have any borders
because creativity travels and it brings
together audiences and yes that includes
the trolls and we do love the trolls
they do Drive a lot of watch time when
they complain so a few years ago we
launched topics and topics really was
intended to curate and highlight the
best of YouTube and today we’re excited
to kick off watch mantra live at YouTube
space which is basically a global
initiative celebrating diversity and
creativity around the world and
basically we’re going to be focusing on
spaces such as this one but rolling
around the world where YouTube and
Google have invested millions in and
it’s kind of our way basically to give
back how so watch module is a 10-year
overnight success and with this new
initiative we’re looking at the next 10
years of our evolution and basically we
want to showcase local musicians local
creators in cities around the world and
basically we’re recognizing that YouTube
has kind of ushered in this revolution
in media and entertainment and make no
mistake about it our objective with
watch module live is basically to give
back to the the up-and-coming creators
so that their trajectory doesn’t take
them 10 years to build their own success
stories so on that note we hope you
enjoy this first watch module live at
YouTube space
and we’ll be at Kings Cross station in
London on July 12 which is in five weeks
to do this again with a UK British
flavour over over the pond so we’re
going to cut now to a video more
propaganda for watching morale I guess
is that what we’re doing
if you’ve ever fallen down the rabbit
hole that is YouTube you’ve seen one of
watch mojos twelve thousand videos but
you may not have been formally
introduced to watch mojos extended
family of channels miss mojo is the
go-to source for female millenials who
love all things celebrity TV film
lifestyle and pop culture with
viewership at 60% female aged 18 to 34
600,000 subs and Counting tune in to
miss mojo to see everything from
shocking red-carpet outfits to
underrated Disney songs to the funniest
ways TV shows hit actresses pregnancies
junior mojo connects with six to twelve
year olds through original animated
programming as well as educational and
crafty videos less than two years in and
WatchMojo espanol has built a fanbase of
roughly 1 million followers thanks to
its mix of original and translated
Spanish content watch mojo UK is the
newest member of the family a channel
full of content specific to the United
Kingdom and our other international
channels target fans in countries across
the globe with original and translated
content syndicated in multiple languages
from French Portuguese and German and we
plan to keep growing the family so watch
this space for more little bundles of
joy
not that we’re counting but since this
video wasn’t it done we did surpass a
million and with WatchMojo espanol as
well all right on that note help me
welcome Anthony bat co-founder of Weaver
firs keynote the new reality virtual and
augmented storytelling thank you – so
I’m Anthony batt let’s see if I get the
slides to come up are we gonna go live
with the slides keynote there we go so
um as I said manthan e bat I’m the
founder of a company in Venice
California called Weaver and we focus on
making immersive content at the same
time we’re building a distribution
platform for creators that are trying to
get their work out so we have transport
running in every headset as well as a
YouTube channel that’s gonna be
launching very shortly I’m stoked to be
here talking to the WatchMojo audience
and I hope to inspire them to like think
about what VRS is today and what its
going to become in the future so I’m a
part of this you know global creative
community right now that are actually
the you know making VR so I’m working
with you know top a-list Hollywood
directors all the way down to um you
know YouTube channels like so crispy or
just you know college interns that are
making videos with me so it’s like a
really broad spectrum but it’s this
global creative communities actually
really focused on sort of reimagining
gaming and entertainment storytelling
and also really talking about the sort
of the spatial miss of VR and not and
what I’ll do is I’m going to introduce
several videos and kind of set them up
and kind of explain what we were doing
and why we’re doing them hopefully this
could be more of a learning thing than
me just talking about my company so
again one more on one side of the
spectrum we see VR which is very
immersed and then AR which is partially
immersed and I’ll talk about both of
those but right now a lot of people ask
me like why we are now and kind of like
um you know the the way to kind of set
that up is you know what I think reality
is sort of virtualized in a sense
because we’re all sort of seeing things
and hearing things that we want to hear
and so every perspective
is our own personal perspective so we’re
used to sort of telling our own stories
to ourselves we’re used to we’re all
always hearing what we want to hear and
when I was working with um Deepak Chopra
we had him in the headset and he checked
out some stuff and he was he kind of
took it off and he’s pretty quiet and he
said now I can explain to people that
were all living in the simulation and it
really didn’t occur to me what he was
meaning by that until I worked in the
medium probably a year longer so I spent
I’ve been doing it for three years and
at about a year into it after seeing so
many people spending time in virtual
reality that you can sort of tell that
they are not in their real space that
are in this virtual space and that
they’re what they’re what they’re seeing
and what they’re doing is really quite
foreign and interesting and so he talks
about real real reality being what you
make it and when you put it on it’s
another virtual world which is pretty
pretty impressive so right now we’re in
real reality and in virtual reality all
it is is essentially you’re wearing a
headset and there’s computer imagery
that are completely surrounding your
vision and so the reason why we have
that ability today is really on one side
compute power so our cell phones which
is one way that you can see virtual
reality content you can wear a Samsung
or a Google product and you can put your
phone into it now that phone and that
compute power has gotten so
sophisticated that it can actually play
back video or CG content at the frame
rate that actually allows you to see
everything right when you move your head
in it and it’s actually it’s getting
better so the fidelity is actually
increasing so we have compute power I
like to think that that’s cool but I
actually like to think about that we’re
creatively pushing past our capability
of storytelling with a with a 16 by 9
screen and so our stories have gotten
too complex and too cool and too
interesting that the sixteen by nine
screen is really not enough for us to
tell our stories so now we’re moving
into this idea of like what does it like
to tell story in a spatial way how do we
choreograph
that story and so virtual reality kind
of gives you that capability and it’s
growing very rapidly it’s very early I
was doing Internet when people had to
unplug their fax machines and plug in
their modem and that’s kind of where we
are right now but it’s actually
happening everywhere in the world I’ve
been in China Japan and they’re actually
growing very healthy VR businesses now
and so you know we were thinking about
VR we’re kind of thinking along kind of
like it’s not a game it’s it’s a story
and it also has a puzzle piece into it
and so it’s not classic cinema story
cinema allows you to like be the
director and you get to cut over
shoulders and do various techniques that
allow you to really force the story
along in VR you have to sort of give up
some of that control and so that’s where
the puzzle piece comes in and that’s
where you have to like I’ll let the user
to find the story and so I’ll get into
some examples and show you some video
clips which is a lot better so I’m going
to talk about stuff that I am that I
actually worked on I often hear a lot of
people talk about VR but when you really
look at what they’re talking about is
they’ve never actually really made
anything so I my company my team we’ve
made over 30 pieces and so I’m going to
kind of give you a deep dive on some of
them but it goes from like working with
Jon Favreau who is a film director who
did jungle book to like Reggie Watts
who’s a comedian musician I think he’s
just a musical talent all the way to
like deep top Deepak Chopra and an
artist named David Cho who is really
talented and artistic and he he we just
sent him out into the into a jungle and
Africa with a tribe and he’s you know
putting up big spray-painted pieces on
there in their cave and stuff it’s
really it’s far out we’re going to be
doing that we’re gonna be releasing that
shortly but so I the point is is that
I’ve spent a lot of time making and I
feel like actually as a result of making
all this content and working with
creators it’s important for me to share
as much as I can because I want to
inspire people actually take on this
medium because it’s early and you can
really make it make a big splash by
getting
early so let’s see here so I had this
opportunity to work with this amazing
hip-hop group called run the jewels and
I liked them for various reasons but
most most mostly I just think that they
stand for a lot of what I believe in in
sort of hip-hop and so what we did is we
had four or five hours with them which
means that we had to like limit the
scope of shooting and really just focus
on how do we tell a story how do we get
the artists as close as to the to the
viewer as possible now when you’re
seeing this stuff you’re going to see on
the far left and the far right are are
actually what’s behind you so this is
designed to actually played in a headset
so it’s going to look odd but actually
still looks really cool even on a
sixteen by nine screen so I’m going to
roll this clip but we had three hours we
had their song crown and I’ll let you
take a listen he’s laid out a total
salary for council a thousand you pay
causing me pain
to leadership mm right
Oh
a bishop of our original senators have
I found the Christ whatever
now finding my
everyone in you man
Oh
Collin was owning kids from the crimes
he was open
teacher them without mercy and give you
the tool to go after the causes of her
you’ll become dead you will take bread
this is for everything you’ve ever I’m
running low on time so I’m gonna kind of
have to speed through these things but
when you’re in the headset killer mics
is right in front of you he’s he feels
like he’s right in your face singing and
no matter where you look there’s acting
out the verses so it was really sort of
powerful we wanted to go with black and
white who’s we wanted we wanted to
actually be very stark and very
to-the-point and we wanted to sort of
see what black and white would look like
in VR because we hadn’t seen any so we
just went for it so here is a friend and
a creative genius Reggie Watts in the
back and this is Natalie Emmanuelle she
might know her from Game of Thrones or
fast and furious but what we did here is
a Ben Dickinson the director and Reggie
sort of wrote this piece about being in
multiple levels of VR and I hope I have
enough time to talk about what that
means in the future and sort of he
created an 18-minute sort of adventure
this piece is consequential because we
released this at Sundance of 2016 it’s
still sort of the gold standard of
mixing live action video with CG and and
it’s it’s an 18 minute piece I’ve got a
couple Clips here I’ll just show you
really quick the entertainment module
yes the entertainment module would you
like to try the entertainment module
okay yes all the greatest people have
used it Bob Denver wrote a Sinclaire
felf carpenter batcher tap Oh pat grin
smirk culprit everything you believe in
waste pushing to access paper backing
off you talk too much
um so
[Music]
like wait
now that you’re mastering your
biomechanical consciousness transport
system we can enter the realm of
possibilities
[Music]
so I mean this is 18 minutes long it’s
like taking a trip without taking a trip
you know the whole idea there is when
Natalie’s putting the helmet on that’s
like the second version of VR that
you’re going into and so at the very end
you sort of come out of this sleep on
this Beach and it’s very peaceful it was
an amazing piece to make we use sort of
every technique back in we did this
about two years ago so we used sort of
every technique known in the VR language
to develop it and regi really sort of
pushed us to the limit so like in that
scene where he’s flying around in a jet
pack like you’re sort of in this space
and then he has a he has a battle with a
Godhead and so it’s just amazing and a
lot of fun so a lot of people were
making very serious VR we decided to
really pay attention to the creatives
comedy music so in this piece this is um
we’re working at the band called future
Island I’m not sure if any of you guys
know them but um they’re one of our
favorites at the office and this artist
Tyler Hurd developed this like really
like another like taking a trip without
taking a trip pieces like you can see
the mountains are smiling the clouds are
smiling and these characters are dancing
around you and so what happens is like
what happened was HTC and released these
things called VR controllers so allowed
you to hold your hands and you could you
could eventually sort of see where your
hands are what he did when we got them
is he just connected arms so when you’re
moving your arms they just sort of
wiggle around like a cartoon and so he
made this piece set the future Island
I’ll let you see it it’s it’s a blast
[Music]
crushing whale
[Music]
screams while I’m
like
cherish my time here
so run a little running a little short
on time but you might have saw some
people dancing inside that so we kind of
do this thing called mix reality where
we’re filming people inside of
virtuality and then compositing them but
the whole idea is that this piece by
future Islands and with Tyler Hurd is
all about joy producing and dancing and
when people go into it it’s like we’ve
had room full of we have these things
rooms full of ad executives come by to
check out VR and all of them are sort of
like tired and they’ve been seeing many
companies and they come to our company
and they do that and they’re all sort of
buzz they’re all super happy so we think
VR can bring happiness to you and that
kind of Tyler hood really brought it so
this one we just released at Tribeca
this is again a total this synthetic
environment so everything you saw seeing
this is made by the artist he made the
music and what he wanted to do was try
to Telegraph the idea of like immense
energy and power and if you’re thinking
about it as a filmmaker or as a novelist
there’s certain ways you can do that he
actually puts you in the middle of it
this guy his name’s are zombie
fanmeeting he lives in Denmark and he’s
an artist and I want to give you a
couple a couple minutes of this and
we’ll see what you think
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
[Music]
so hopefully that kind of gives you a
bit of a sample of it like you’re you’re
in that space like when you’re watching
on a screen it’s kind of like that’s
cool but when you’re standing in it it’s
really mind-blowing it’s there’s you
know you see the depth and scale of
everything and you know we when we see
people viewing it there
they’re crouching there holding their
bodies and the reason why I mentioned
that is that we start thinking about
this medium it really sort of affects
people in a profound way
just like when you we see kids dancing
in the Tyler herd piece they’re really
there and so when they’re in this piece
they’re in somewhere else and it and
that piece is really powerful so to sort
of wrap it up on VR I’m going to talk a
few minutes on a are i fellow a Kris her
stick over si Sports Illustrated called
me up and said hey what do you think
about VR and Sports Illustrated Swimsuit
Edition I was like I don’t know I mean
sounds interesting like what are you
thinking and he was like his idea was
like ha for 50 years we’ve been showing
people a cover and you know what can you
do with that I said well what would it
be like to stand in it you know and so
we went into an island in the Caribbean
with three models and they shot Sports
Illustrated and what we did is we just
snuck in our VR cameras what’s
interesting there is that I’ve never
been on a photo shoot like that what the
photographer and the videographer are
really coaching the model they’re
telling her to do all these things and
then when we come in we’re like okay
we’re just sorry to interrupt you know
we’re gonna put this camera here and
then we’re going to strike the set and
we’ll come back in five minutes and
they’re just like what like they have no
they’re like freaked out and so we got a
different performance because they’re
all by themselves usually there’s a
whole team so I’ll just run this and see
what you guys think so that’s us
standing on the sides trying to coax her
into like this is gonna be okay trust us
you know and she’s like no this is gonna
suck but uh you know and then there we
go we disappear and she’s just left
there with no camp like our camera is
really small and so she’s you get this
whole different level of performance and
you know we when this is in the headset
the whole scene is stunningly beautiful
and it’s pretty interesting so it’s also
a little racy so we we’re cutting it
right there
well yeah watch the WatchMojo tans we’ll
get that up for you guys later so what
we’re talking about a are it’s really
just sort of a partial it’s using
computer imagery to partially paint out
what you’re seeing right now we’re using
we see a are in in like you know
snapchat right it’s like we’re familiar
with like hey they’ve the you know we
have computer vision we’re able to like
do facial recognition and then we can
actually paint the tongue and then we
have the world lenses so this is the
precursor to like real AR but it’s the
idea that like the computer is able to
actually use machine vision techniques
which is to basically sort of map the
space and then you could play stuff on
it and so the phone right now is the
main interface for that we think that
the the both for VR and AR we’re going
to see that holding the phone will be
and putting in headsets will go away and
we’ll see more modern headsets come out
and when more modern headsets come out
this artist really sort of says we’re
going to paint a lot of stuff onto the
screens and so this person is going
through a market and they’re getting
they have like you know multiple
realities going on at the same time you
know they’re on the bus and they’re
seeing a lot of stuff and so that’s sort
of as we think about how computing is
progressed again in you know 93 92 91
not a lot of people even have laptops
and no one had modems and now everyone
has a phone with a very sophisticated
modem so we think that headsets will
mature and they’ll give us a level of
fidelity to do both VR and AR and we
think it will be pretty profound it will
reshape the way you tell stories the way
you think about communication the way
apps work and everything like that so
which brings me to one minute and 33
seconds and I’ll just say everything
reality so with that I think that as if
you sort of look out into you know 10 or
15 years as the computing industry
pushes into a screen ‘less society with
basically headset systems
you will see yourselves or you see
yourself today already spending ten
hours looking at a screen just do the
math ten hours easy so in 15 years
you’ll be spending ten hours in an
immersive based screen that will both
the AR and VR and so what I what we
believe and we think will happen is like
you’ll be able to live you’ll have
multiple realities concurrent all at the
same time you’ll move from real reality
to a virtual reality set take care of
business and virtual reality move into
an AR version move back into real real
reality move back into VR
all at the same time just like how when
you’re out to dinner you’re texting five
friends eating dinner with a friend
talking to mom and dad back and forth
back and forth that all sort of moves
into what I just call XR everything is
reality and it becomes very powerful my
my feeling is is that it’s it’s right
now it’s very much an artist medium it
requires the creative talents to think
about what is totally impossible make it
possible the computer scientists have
already figured all a lot of the Machine
visioning out and how to push pixels to
the screens but it’s really the artist
thing to push the medium and that’s
where we are today and that’s why I
focus almost all my talks on about the
global creative community that’s
developing that’s already working on
this with one second left this is all
about you what you can imagine and
create thank you
[Applause]
so thank you much Anthony as we set up
for the for the next panel just want to
thank you all for coming again and a
reminder that we have a few more panels
and keynotes discussions whatnot 5:00
p.m. we’ll be serving some cocktails and
refreshments and then I am in your way I
see par for the course and then tonight
lots of musical performances as you
could tell it’s going to get loud in
here and we’re very very psyched about
that cool so thank you everybody having
fun this is a live stream so believe it
or not just to as we’re setting up this
literally went from concept to reality
in a hundred days we came here from
Montreal we sponsor one of the sports
teams in the city and we came down with
the executive team to watch it and I
sent a few of the my colleagues here
just to check out space and I’m like
there’s something there I’m like we
should start using this we’re a big
channel we have access YouTube is so
gracious they let all their creators use
it proportionally to how many
subscribers they have I believe and one
of my colleagues who Kevin who is on the
way from LaGuardia now that Montreal
LaGuardia flight is 55 minutes but a cab
ride from LaGuardia is about you know an
hour and 55 minutes
so Kevin they know at the end after the
game we’re sitting in the hotel he’s
like you know what we should just throw
a party at YouTube space I’m like that’s
a great idea but only then he goes and
we should hire a band I’m like love it
let’s do it then I’m like you know what
I pretty much think that it’s not just
for parties they probably also want us
to produce content so we’re like let’s
record it and then after that they’re
like let’s livestream it and then a week
later I visited London and I was walking
around London space and I kind of
concocted this whole global series and
then so that’s kind of how this idea
came to be anyway so hopefully some of
you will be joining us in London where
else London where else would we go we
would obviously do Los Angeles for sure
Toronto and I believe YouTube is opening
one in Rio so if you twist my arm hard
enough we may have to go to Rio for that
one cool I’ll go to that one you’ll go
to that one all right excellent so the
rest of
the panel’s should be coming out any
minute now I believe is that fake news
it’s happening yes they are coming so
just want to introduce the moderators so
heel Patel here we go writer at digit a
it takes away thank you
well thanks everyone I like to also to
choose or to other panelists Anthony
thank you thanks John Hamilton was a
filmmaker and an added factor was a
president of global innovation at PMX
not reject as much as I can that way it
is an interesting set up so that was
great presentation Anthony uh I’d love
to kind of start with sort of yeah I’m
not gonna apologize for this joke the
reality of virtual reality right now so
like what is the actual we know that
brands are playing in the space we know
that a lot of creators are playing in
the space and want to play in this space
but ultimately what do people need to
know or be aware of or even just do so
it’s not so gimmicky because it can so
easily just be something that like we
did it because that’s the thing to do
now right I’d love to weather let’s
start on the brand side action trap sure
why I think one of the challenges they
mentioned with gimmicks is the episodic
nature of what we’re used to in video
whether for television to to shorts to
to YouTube is something that has yet to
translate to VR we haven’t found a way
yet to use it fast enough to you’re not
rapidly enough and make it as accessible
as all these other channels and
platforms are and I think from a Fran
standpoint there’s an apprehension to
dive all the way in because it’s there’s
so much unknown and there’s so much that
has yet to be defined by the same ray
that makes it a great opportunity to go
out and define it and experiment and
create what this platform could be or
tap into the potential of it even if we
are the super early stages so at this
early stage Jonathan you guys obviously
have been doing a lot of work in this
field are there things that seem to work
better or just resonate more both in the
creative sense and just the very simple
fact that people who actually want to
put on a headset and watch it what have
you guys found so far well for me I
think people want to be in I mean sighs
present space you know like I think that
they want to go somewhere where they
can’t go so totally fake fake worlds on
the other spectrum they want to actually
go where they can’t go because it’s
dangerous so they want to actually see
something and have the perspective of
the of the place in its scale and so you
know you see a lot of the stuff that was
produced by the UN on what’s going on
with refugees when you actually put the
headset on and and are there you get a
whole different sort of visceral set of
feelings about what’s going on there
verse a little picture in your feed
saying yeah there’s refugees in Syria
you know it’s it’s way more profound and
so we see that when peep you know that
there are a lot of gimmicks yes but
there’s also the medium itself is so
profoundly a special that creative
people can actually tell a story far
more richer and give a higher sense of
feeling and emotional connection of the
media than other mediums Jon would you
yeah I think I think one of the one of
the things been doing really well is
documentary and I think what’s really
interesting about VR one of the first
questions that we sort of as creators
all face was can you edit in VR and I
remember when we first started doing
experiences back in 2014 people like you
can’t edit or can’t you can’t make cuts
you can’t do
cuts maybe were like well why not let’s
try doing cuts so I think what’s really
interesting about documentary VR is that
in a sense and particularly interactive
documentary we are the people who are
watching actually can be their own
editor so it’s not being filtered
through a news organization in certain
ways of course if you do edit you know
it can be filtered and editorialized the
same way so I think that’s that sort of
something that I think is really
exciting and I think as well as what
Anthony was saying in terms of
projecting or transporting us to new
worlds I think one of the other things
too and this goes to a document a
documentary like Syria is proximity to
to the actual subject whether it’s was
whether it’s an experience like you know
something we did with like with fifty
shades darker where you’re right next to
Christian Grey and you have that
proximity close to him or whether it’s
actually a dog one to them okay well I
think a lot of people do clearly a lot
of people do by the box office but I
think that’s the that’s that those are
the two most powerful things I think
what Anthony said which is really
transporting us to places that we we
cannot really be transported to and also
proximity and an intimacy with the
subject they you just normally wouldn’t
get with with standard 2d television now
that makes no sense right it’s as you
kind of like reference like it’s a lot
easier to understand what might be going
on in Syria or other parts of the world
when you can actually see it in a more
immersive environment than reading about
in an article or slideshow maybe um but
I think there’s also this and I’m
assuming it’s more coming from the
journalism side there’s this dismissive
notion about like all it can be is an
empathy machine okay great like you
showed me how this this situation is
like on the new side or it could be
reasonably oh no I know how skydiving is
without actually skydiving like great
are is that in any way limiting if
that’s what people say about it in terms
of like it’s not the only way VR can
work or are there other areas that this
medium can go to words goes beyond
simply just saying oh we can show you
worlds or environments that you might
normally not be able to go to for sure
so I think that the the journalist tribe
that
discussing VR often finds themselves in
a situation where they haven’t actually
tried enough VR to actually have a very
formed an opinion no offense
um so so they’re doing the best you can
I doubt it when he goes okay so so to
their defense I think that they’re just
trying to get there they’re trying to
understand it and so poking at it as
some sort of way to find it it’s been
described as an empty machine I don’t
necessarily totally agree I actually
just think that it’s a it’s a new medium
that that is a you know developing and
everyone wants higher result in returns
way too early even though if you
actually really do this the math on it
it’s actually providing returns to folks
financially now and I think it’s going
to increase noted the heart of the
matter I think that as a result of being
a new medium you know all of it will
affect everything it’s a wedge
technology so just like how the internet
affected everything and there’s lots of
gimmicks in the very early days you will
see medical travel retail all these
things actually training education not
to mention gaming and entertainment will
all be affected by this technology push
of being more immersed into something
and so I think you’ll have profound ways
of companies and brands and
entertainment companies to actually
produce VR whether it’s the central
piece that they’re doing or whether it’s
shoulder content and so I think it will
affect the spectrum how are you seeing
sort of this across the the advertising
world how how it’s being implemented so
far at least what I think we’re still in
the age of defining what advertising is
in beer is VR content itself serving as
an advertisement is the experience I’m
creating that’s meant to help someone
get immersed in a retail environment or
in the inside of a car or an airplane or
a property that they might be booking a
stay at is that advertising itself and
frankly maybe it is or maybe it could be
or it should be in addition to what sort
of we think of as a concept of
advertising in these digital in video
and immersive worlds that’s one area
that a lot of brands have gone because
they’ve created a space or an experience
that
transports people or brings people in
something they ordinarily couldn’t have
access to however if someone was
creating that sort of absent of a brand
and we just stuck an ad in that’s
probably not the right experience for
for VR as we know it today I think
creating some standards with the major
media companies and the different trade
boards now to start to experiment with
what the right formats might be is
important I think we have a lot of
clients who we work with that have an
appetite for that because they
understand what the power of these
immersive experiences can be I think
they just have a hard time figuring out
how does advertising as they understand
it today fit in and we probably don’t
want to make the same mistakes that
we’ve made with certain digital media
with new digital media knowing that
banner ads aren’t going to work pre-roll
advertising probably is I’m going to
work product placement maybe in the
right environment yeah I think in AR I
look at VR na are being in same
immersive category I mean I think you’re
seeing the snapchat making you know
lenses AR lenses they’re playing with
that spectrum right now because they
know that they can get the reach I think
you’ll see Facebook do the same thing
and so when you start thinking about it
from that perspective
and move it forward into fully immersed
I think you can start seeing how brands
can participate yeah that’s right and
whether it’s creating sort of additive
experiences that enhance it work or
actually creating the experience itself
is really up to what’s the role of the
brand right on what’s what what is the
product or experience that they are
actually bringing to you and ultimately
like I said earlier if we can find a way
to scale that whether it’s in
distribution across different platforms
whether it’s headsets or you know
through the lens of your phone in the AR
case and/or just make it easier to
produce you’ll start to see brands
experiment more and probably see them
start to embrace it more as central to
their plans instead of maybe something
that gets added on or maybe something in
the innovation realm that
maybe more experimental maybe doesn’t
fun let’s look at look at it from both
perspectives so who should be or who is
going to be driving sort of on the first
end just that pure adoption whether it’s
getting more headsets into the hands of
people getting more content in front of
people like who who do you guys see
actually leaving that charge these days
or over the next few years I think it’s
creators really because I think that’s
the that’s the thing is anything was
saying in this keynote you there’s a
language that needs to be developed and
we’re at such early stages right now in
involved er na our content that that
people you know creators need to develop
language you need to understand the
language I think we also need like a
headset that’s as easy as a mobile phone
just to turn on and go which I think
we’re probably less than two years away
from really and that a headset that will
be ubiquitous and I think that’s going
to that’s going to be huge as well but
but honestly I really do believe that
it’s going to be the creators who are
going to come out the technology is
there right now and it’s really just we
need we need more really compelling
content to come out whether it whether
and whether it’s it’s
business-to-business content or whether
it’s actual creative fiction or whether
it’s documentary we just need you know
we need to we need creators we need
creatives have access to the tools and
to really actually start creating that
goal so let’s go into that a little bit
like how much access to you know when we
talk about creators we can it can be
major media companies they’re going to
be someone more independent more of an
independent filmmaker what sort of
access is available to people who don’t
have you know massive revenue lines that
they can sort of you know put the money
down towards making the investments in
the technology and everything that’s
kind of need to shoot this stuff like
how expensive is it today for more
independent filmmakers creators that can
you know be responsible for creating all
this type of content to get this
technology yeah I’ll give a shot of that
so I think that it’s it’s not as
expensive everyone thinks ok ok so
although if you go I showed some full
synthetic environments those tend to be
very expensive although both of the two
of them that I produced were made by
individuals and so is there their time
we had an in
earn and spend a couple months of this
last summer we lent them a camera it’s a
it’s a YouTube camera a Google camera so
if you had to go buy it it was $15,000
if he he borrowed it was $0 but he made
his whole film for five thousand dollars
and it wanna just want an award for Best
Film and so you know it is as cheap as
you think making a regular video is now
when you’re starting to move into
synthetics we’re using 3d systems such
as unity or unreal the the expense
really goes to like do you have that
team in talent if you don’t have that
team in talent you’re paying them and
that becomes expensive and so that’s
where the work where you start to see
the expense or you’re doing stereoscopic
special effects so that tends to be more
expensive but I did something with a
channel called so crispy it’s to YouTube
creators they did all that themselves
and it was aired at Google i/o last just
a couple weeks ago so it doesn’t have to
be expensive now if you go with the
brand’s I think that you you you’re
gonna want to spend the money on it and
so you’re looking at budgets from sort
of north of 250 you know to two million
dollars I don’t know if that’s
consistent I think it’s I think that’s
accurate and it’s like with any new
technology it gets it improves over time
the costs come down the scale you know
start starts to ramp up and it becomes
as it becomes more accessible to
consumers and there’s more of an
expectation that these experiences are
out there there are places that they can
more easily discover them and interact
with them it starts to push the
boundaries of what one what’s possible
to be created and to it what what brands
and and creators themselves are going to
be willing to do and do more frequently
and I think we’re barely scratching the
surface as it exists today for one
because the limitation of experience is
people have so they don’t know what’s
possible or what they think is possible
and then ultimately what what might get
produced in a more diluted sort of
watered-down version which turns into
like 360 oh and stuff that’s accessible
through a mobile phone only because
that’s sort of the broadest spectrum
that they can reach consumers with but
at least it’s starting to become easier
to produce and at least people are
willing to take that step versus
sit back with our arms crossed and say
no there’s no way that this is going to
fit into our plans for our world that we
can’t appreciate you know the impact of
it before we get into a little bit or
the the creative aspects of it we’re
gonna take we’re at the halfway point so
I think we’re gonna take a little bit of
a break John you have a trailer to show
us right could you set it up a little
bit before we play yeah sure Trinity its
trailer for it’s actually a 2d trailer
it’s not a 360 trailer but we actually
took images from from the shoot and and
it’s got some b-roll in it to just give
you an idea of the scope of the project
but Trinity is an interactive it’s a
pilot for an interactive series that
we’re doing and the goal of it was to do
basically big movie big-budget
special-effects sci-fi sci-fi kind of
cool fun fun approval serious so it’s to
cool
[Music]
[Music]
[Music]
in the beginning
man-made code into flash and code made
God
and then God brought down hell
on earth
[Music]
in the beginning that was great
two questions for you John one of what’s
it about and two why did it this this
experience need to be told in
interactive virtual reality why could
not why could not that have been done in
2d well basically it’s a story set 2,000
years in the future
humans are either extinct or have fled
the planet and basically it’s a war
between the remaining Androids on the
planet and the singularity which sort of
becomes their God and the war is
essentially that singularity wants them
to give up their mechanical bodies and
join you know the internet join me the
singularity and so basically it’s a
religious parable and why interactive
well the funny thing is that when we
actually started one of the main reasons
is that one of our main financier years
in this is the Canadian media fund and
we got our funding through the
experimental side of the media fund
which one of the requirements was that
it was had to be interactive and
originally this was supposed to be just
a linear virtual reality experience and
once we got funding we decided to make
it interactive and then we got into
which I’m sure you guys have probably
experienced as well once you start doing
interactive VR you start you’re trying
to fight against if you’re not doing a
game you’re actually fighting against
actually becoming a game so it
interactively ends up sort of being
puzzle solving or or you know
first-person shooter type stuff and so
what we did as we’ve been developing
this is we actually decided to go in a
different direction with our
interactivity and and use interactivity
to actually make the experience more
immersive as opposed to sort of puzzle
solving getting to a next day of an
example of how that works um yeah for
instance what the the sort of the story
is we really need to discover you know
who we are
and through discovering who we are we
gain certain abilities like the ability
to fly we gain the ability to move
through certain spaces that help us
discover parts of the story but then
what we decided to do at times was give
people interactivity and then at certain
times take it away from them as well
with that really them being aware so the
fact that you know VR really does you
know heighten the immersive nature of it
we wanted to actually use interactivity
as well giving it to people and actually
taking away from people to help heighten
that sort of immersive nature of the
experience so uh that’s a happy actually
played that then because one of the
things I want to speak to the group
about was sort of for a lot of the
things that we’ve seen out today in
virtual reality is very much in the
nonfiction or documentary sense
experiential sense but that can be very
broad I’d love to get the the group’s
thoughts on sort of how do we see this
playing out in the other area the
scripted and the narrative kind of
storytelling that can happen because I
mean the idea is VR can also work within
the within those mediums as well within
those formats as what right yeah I mean
what we were trying to do and again
we’re sort of struggling to figure out
what the what the sort of language is
and I think interactivity you know or
interacting or eventually once we start
bringing AI actually into our AR and and
VR experiences interactivity for me is a
is a fundamental part of the future of
storytelling in VR Anthony I know I
don’t know if you’d agree with that but
yeah I think that um we did a hundred
minute series on a capture of a child
abduction and we really wanted to do so
we did 10 episodes 10 minutes each 10
minutes long with the guys that created
the Walking Dead so we had some really
great talent the writing side but the
way that we founded the interactivity
was like okay if this child got abducted
and you didn’t see it who else saw it
and so that forces you to change points
of view so we shot all hundred minutes
from essentially three points multiple
points of view and so as you’re going
through the story on a universal
timeline
you can just watch it one way and be
immersed in it or you could say I wonder
what that person was seeing and you can
sort of just see various points of view
so we think that the interactivity and
narrative it’s very subtle because if
you’re watching a narrative like if I’m
watching blood line on Netflix I don’t
really want to work I just want to kick
back and watch and so I think that that
we adopt that same strategy if it’s a
game then I want to play I want to craft
but if I so there’s this middle ground
where it’s like it’s ever so subtle like
I just want to just want to see from
over there can I do that boom yes you
can but it doesn’t change the story so
we’re really sort of like learning what
that’s gonna be like now in the future
when you have ultimate agency and
control I think that that’s gonna change
like hyperlinks on webpages was a new
idea
now we want lots of them and we want to
be up you know we want to be able to
anywhere at anytime so I think that
that’s what’s gonna change the
narratives
yes we’re saying is also like in many
ways VR might be limited by what we have
come to know and understand about video
about 2d video that’s a phenomena King
yeah there’s a familiarity there’s a
deep familiarity with gaming and and
classic storytelling which is like video
let’s say and I think in this new medium
we’re pulling in parts of it but at some
point we’re gonna reject all of it and
just have our own medium yeah and I
think also you know so many people are
saying well you know VR you know an AR
will potentially replace replace movies
and TV and YouTube or whatever but
that’s just not the case I think it’s
just going to be something different I
know you know there’s certain movies
that I don’t want to go home and watch
at night afters because they’re too
intense or they’re too dark or too
whatever and then sometimes I don’t want
to play a video game because it is as
Anthony says it’s just it’s just you
have to interact with it and sometimes
you just wanna you just not you don’t
want to do anything even straightforward
just immersive linear VR requires more
work than just watching a movie because
you’re in it your body and your brain is
reacting differently to the environment
that you’re in
so I think that’s actually a huge thing
you know VR AR and
makes reality and it’s all it’s really
just going to sort of take its place
next to you know movies TV the internet
Facebook whatever you know it’s going to
be so they have to serve some some real
purpose and add some real value to and
otherwise sort of know and experience
right so the reason I know they’ll be
success in this it’s because I watch my
kids and I watch what they do and the
first time they put a cardboard to their
face to watch something that wasn’t shot
in VR but it was shot in 360 the
virtualization if the experience that
they had if that’s the right way to
think about it was amazing to watch
their reaction to they couldn’t believe
where they were and looking around
things that they could kind of reach out
in almost touch even though they
couldn’t so suddenly they have this
expectation and they take it off like
what why can’t I grab that I’m like this
the whole reason it’s a one day you
might be able to it’s a very important
point you’re bringing up because there’s
probably tens of millions of children
growing up sort of crafting in Minecraft
and they have agency and they have 3d
lamp depth and they’re all going to come
of age and either we’re gonna say okay
that was all been now you’re just gonna
look at this screen that’s it that’s the
that’s how we developed our storytelling
you did that when you’re a kid now here
who are I actually think that that’s not
going to happen I think that tens of
millions of kids are going to be
crafting and they’re going to move right
into some sort of VR a our state and
they are going to actually create the
new form of storytelling in a way that’s
way way richer more profound than we
currently are I I would agree and it
probably won’t resemble the headset
cardboard world that or mobile world
that we live in today in fact I hope it
doesn’t because to a certain extent that
kind of takes people out of one world
completely and I believe again when you
get to accessibility people probably
don’t want to be as isolated as some of
these experiences feel today but at the
same rate every time someone has wonder
every time we have clients go through a
demo they’re all wow you know I want
more of that or I want it to be more
sort of like easily
at my fingertips and it gets people’s
creative juices flowing about what the
possibilities are which a couple years
ago it was really just people dreaming
it up and in fact in very much resembled
gameplay kind of almost exclusively
which I think also made it somewhat
prohibitive for certain Brandt said
think about like well how could I
possibly fit into this world I don’t
have a place here versus a lot of the
sort of stories that we’ve seen come to
life now opening up a whole new world of
possibilities for for brands to play
alright so we have like a minute left I
think we were going to leave some time
for questions right does anyone have a
question in the room or do we have some
social questions that are coming in we’d
love to make sure people had a chance to
ask that anyone rounds to get just um
well it’s because it’s something that’s
sort of new I mean we can definitely
distill the story down and people
understand what we’re doing but because
I think it really is kind of a new
platform in the new medium sometimes
people do have a hard time getting it
but yeah most people most people do
really understand where we’re headed
with the with what we’re trying to do
yeah we’re literally five four three two
one hitting our hitting our limits so I
want to thank the panel for for having
this wonderful conversation and for all
of you for listening thank you so much
alright alright alright so I thank you
very much gentlemen it’s crazy so yeah
WatchMojo based in Montreal we have
about like 55 full-time employees 100
plus freelancers it’s a big operation by
YouTube channel standards and what’s
funny is so yeah wave we have maybe 10
20 of our team here and the last five
six people just arrived from LaGuardia
and it’s crazy just what world we live
in they were watching a live stream on
their phones in a taxi coming here like
just think of that you know like I
remember 2005 when I saw a live 8 on AOL
and I was like wait a second this is
pretty cool like the world changing but
like now you can watch a live stream on
your phone in a cab I don’t know I find
that pretty cool but it maybe it’s just
me alright a serious question before I
hand off the mic to the executive
producer of the Daejeon Mackerras
serious matter here who saw America’s
Got Talent last night show of hands
anybody this isn’t to kick TV and stress
that the ratings are going down so I saw
a little bit of puddles afterwards if
you did you may have seen a 8 foot for
now I’m kidding a 6 foot 7 giant clown
puddles performing and so we have them
later on again just to remind you all
there’s some musical performances coming
madam yesterday great guy very gracious
very humble very modest but at some
point later on you’re going to see a
giant clown on stage hopefully that
doesn’t throw anybody off just want to
put it out there all right on that note
mr. John Mackerras was joined WatchMojo
the past few months and we started to
brainstorm around this idea the
executive producer join us on stage
thank you John alright thank you I’m
done thank you this has been an amazing
show I produced a lot of things but
seeing that Viera content and all we see
so much about VR we hear so much about
VR and AR and just learning what the
difference is it’s important but until
you see the content you really don’t get
it at least in my case so that was
fantastic thanks to that group of folks
and particularly the Anthony and John
for bringing great creative and on that
note I’m super excited about our next
speaker she’s a creative director at
Google Zoo which is Google’s in-house
agency she’s also been part of a small
team
from the zoo that broke off to start
something called unskipable labs and
unskipable labs focuses on new content
formats and to share a little bit more
of what they’re doing what they’re
working on please welcome kim snow Thank
You Johnny appreciate that so yes my
name is Kim and I’m here to tell you a
little bit about in skippable labs
unskipable had very humble easy
beginnings really what happened is our
brands and our agencies would come to us
and say oh my god please just tell me
why people are paying attention to what
they’re paying attention to what are
they watching our content why are they
looking at our ads how can you help us
do a better job at it and so lucky for
us we work at Google and so what we were
able to do is kind of put on our
engineering mindset which is actually
harder than you would think from a
creative perspective because what you’re
actually doing is putting the user first
you’re putting the human first you’re
actually saying what are people doing
and observing and thinking out in the
world which PS is what we are one or not
at work and we’re actually trying to be
very experimental be wrong not be sure
have a hypothesis have something that
you think could be right you’re not sure
put it out there quickly and then get
results and that’s super hard for
creative because you want to put out the
best thing in the whole world that you
know is right all the time right away
and so this freedom to put out different
pieces of content and then test them
against something that’s already out
there that we know is doing really well
and learning from that is great it’s
quick it’s fast and it gives you a lot
to think about makes us very very brave
so before I get into the actual
experiments in what we’ve learned let me
tell you a little bit about the state of
the state what’s going out there in
society as we start to do these tests
and as we ask ourselves these questions
so welcome to abundance world I was
probably about five years ago that we as
marketers start to freak out that there
was so much content out there and per
usual we didn’t give our fans and our
users enough credit we thought oh god
they’re drinking from a firehose it’s
going to be horrible they’re gonna drown
no one’s gonna be able to look at
anything we’re not gonna be able to make
stuff the same way and instead people
are in a room that’s totally flooded and
they’re swimming and they want more and
the panic set setting in is actually on
our side cuz we’re
like oh my god there’s so much out there
how do we compete how do we go out in
the world because the key thing that we
want to think about and I’m just going
to say if at home you’ve turned this
into a drinking game anytime I say
choice or choose that’d be a good time
to drink because that’s probably the key
to this is it’s all about being chosen
we’re not used to having to fight to be
chosen we’re kind of used to putting our
ads out in the world and people watch
them but our audience you know drinking
from the fire hose in this room full of
water
they’re so savvy so savvy about what
they want to watch what they want to see
what they like where to find it what
they don’t like that actually there’s no
more clutter silently within your heart
think about the last time you were in
anywhere and someone told you to make
something that breaks through the
clutter and there’s not any anymore
because we’ve already gotten rid of this
stuff we don’t like and that’s very
scary to us it’s a very scary world if
you think about it at home of course
that’s what you do but for us how do we
make ourselves seen and heard and chosen
and who once you are chosen it better be
good we were just talking about the
pages with those hyperlinks and how we
find time in our busy days to deep dive
on something that we find very important
very interesting god forbid you’re
chosen and there’s nothing good there
we’ll remember that so you have to keep
that in mind as well and then finally
the dance of attention is that there is
no one answer there is no one thing
that’s going to solve all this messaging
and you think about even the way our
attention works which is anything in
front of you is skippable anything
you’re looking at is skippable really I
mean you can be running between devices
and between content and you don’t even
think twice about it
and so the same is true when we’re
telling stories from a brand side you
know I mean six seconds might be perfect
for something a true be unit might be
perfect for something else one thing
that’s very interesting
when we think about choice drink is that
one of the things that’s going away is
the 30 second forced ad now as marketers
we love that stuff because we need to
take our TV ad and throw it in there
it’s awesome and you have to watch it
have your eyeballs but it’s actually
going away because there’s no choice you
have to watch it I was on reddit the
other day purely for work purposes I
assure you and somebody had posted this
thing which is you don’t understand the
length of a second until you’re forced
to watch an ad you don’t want to watch
and it’s so true and so what you really
have to think about
is what you’re gonna is how we’re going
to put these things out there for people
to actually enjoy watching and the one
of the main reasons the 32nd forest is
going away is because YouTube creators
are like I don’t think I really want
this on my channel it makes people leave
they’ll actually walk away he’ll go away
instead of waiting for my content and so
it’s super important to think so we must
be chosen and we must make something
lovely when we get there all right oh
right away so now let’s get into some of
the experiments and some of the things
we’ve learned and of course even though
we’ve been doing this for over a year
there’s still so much to learn so I’m
just get some little pieces for you some
of the more interesting things okay so I
go through the ABCD I don’t think we go
further than um d don’t worry so the
first one is definitely attract and I
think it’s one of the more interesting
ones which is you’ve got to give
somebody a reason to watch they’re
itching to leave you’ve got to really
hook them in and you really have five
seconds if it’s a true V unit yes you do
only have five seconds in real life you
probably only have five seconds to so
picture this the movie Bridget Jones’s
baby’s coming out and they’ve asked us
to do an experiment with them so we go
and we’re talking about kind of what’s
their best spot they have now the
control is we’ll call it the trailer and
we’re thinking what can we test and the
creative director on the project who is
working with the team said I have an
idea let’s totally just get him real
quick and then see how long they’ll
watch let’s put an entire scene from the
movie in the unit and they all laughed
at him they’re like that’s ridiculous
why would we do it it doesn’t make sense
never done it before this sounds
ridiculous by the way we just put a
whole scene up there and that is how you
know you’re onto something that’s
something you want to test because no
one was sure no one did know what would
happen if we tried it and they said go
ahead give it a go so I’m just going to
show you a little bit of what that looks
like and then tell you how it did dear
diary I’m absolutely loving life just
one tiny development I’m pregnant
hey it’s the father of your child I’ve
been doing a lot of thinking Bridget
this whole baby situation threw me
initially we was squashed an entire
relationship into one night
get straight to starting a family face
we never even had a real second day just
you know if we did I would have taken
you to Auto lanky oh you would have had
the grilled salmon and pine nut salsa
unbelievable
oh and healthy and we would have come
back here had incredible sex spent the
next couple days sending each other
filthy texts oh I would not have let you
do that on a second date
why not why not you let me do it on the
first crazy
so this goes on a little bit longer but
what happened is that it outperformed
the control by like 400% it was crazy
the attention that people paid for this
paid to this and what I thought was
interesting my hypothesis was when I
first kind of saw this I was like it
feels like you’re getting away with
something it feels like somebody
somewhere screwed up and put the ad put
like an entire scene in there and giving
they’re giving something away that you
shouldn’t have had and so you feel a
little bit more like you’re kind of
getting something instead of watching an
ad even though that first kind of few
seconds was a little bit more like a
traditional trailer with some quick cuts
with the name of the movie just so you
know so this is an inter this is
probably one of the most interesting
things that we’ve seen it we’ll get back
to it in just a heartbeat when I get to
one of the other things that we’ve
learned but keep this in mind because
this is something absurd in a lot of
ways that you would put a whole scene
from a movie out and people would choose
to watch it and that’s what’s the most
important thing you’ve got their
attention and then you gave them the
gift of the scene of the actual movie
we’ve been using this hypothesis a lot
for some other things which brings me to
the other thing another important thing
which you just brought up which is brand
we get this question all the time where
do I put my logo what if they don’t
watch past the first screen how will
they know it’s me
etc etc so this is a little bit tricky
because if you do have the brand in than
early that’s a good thing
but if it’s forced in there it can be
kind of detrimental and so we had to
kind of figure out what that meant and
one of the things that we realized is
when it’s forced in there and it feels
just kind of like a watermark that
doesn’t have any
thing to do with the story or something
that you’re learning or that’s a part of
the bigger narrative that’s when it kind
of feels like it’s in the way feels like
it doesn’t belong there when it feels
like a natural part of the story or it
feels like it’s helping you like for
example with Bridget Jones it helped to
know oh I’m watching this movie okay
make sense thank you even though it
wasn’t a part of what was happening in
the main screen it helped to know what
that story was so one of the things that
we always like to say is if you’re gonna
be an adman just go for it be an ad
that’s fine ads are great but are going
to be content be content and try to
figure out the balance between that and
this is a great example of an ad that’s
truly an ad that puts its product in
there early and often but in a way
that’s part of the story hello Lee is
what we would say smart people use back
[Music]
trees and sticks no thanks
keep the respect you deserve we’re
bearglove and if you knock of business
um be quiet painting we’re playing chess
checkmate timber so it doesn’t feel like
you’re being tricked like oh god I
thought it was something else and it’s
an act like missiles into a doll the way
and it feels supernatural and it feels
right and it feels good and so that
brand is in there the whole time
good little homework assignment for you
to pay attention the next time you see
ads when you’re like I know it’s an ad
and I feel okay about it where do they
put their brand in that how does it play
into the bigger story alright this is
another one that we actually think at
this point in time we’ll be like we
don’t even really need to test this one
anymore and this is all about audio does
sound matter hell yeah matters make sure
they’re sound if there can be sound I
know people for a long time sound wasn’t
an automatic thing that happened now
it’s starting to be but definitely
definitely get your noise in there and
here’s just an example actually that’s
combining this insight with the last
insight getting your brand in there
naturally and then having something
catchy – remember boys are in the front
yard chillin with the chest medicai
brought his dog that he’s trying to play
fetch with dog ran off and brought back
yeah
that’s easy that’s totally easy so you
can totally see it’s already an earwig
in your head and you get the brand in
there right away so that one’s kind of
hitting all the bases so connecting
create a human connection this one came
out of a lot of our mobile studies and
it’s probably one of the biggest pieces
of feedback that we’ll give when people
are like what do you think about this
how can we improve this and it’s like
well most people are probably going to
watch this on their phones at some point
so make sure that you don’t have these
big faraway landscape scenes make sure
that you’re not someone’s trying to
figure out what they’re even looking at
and I think that’s why this is so
specific is that I want a human face I
want to see a person I want to connect
now personally I love that there is an
influencer and kind of like female spin
to it and I would like to know if that’s
going to always be the case to me that’s
something more to test on but right now
that’s a thing so here’s another example
and this one is an interesting example
because the human connection actually
happens more than once
[Music]
never gonna get it never gonna get it
look at him we laughed at this one
because we’re like can you imagine like
the creative session that’s like alright
we’re gonna show something great and
then we’re gonna show it again no but it
works it kind of hooks you in and you
kind of want to see what comes next and
it gave them the opportunity to put the
brand in there in a way that didn’t feel
in the way because the music was
carrying you through but that’s a face
you definitely want to see early and
often now this is kind of our aha moment
I have a slide later that’s got kind of
the key learnings that I’ll talk about
but the watch time because how many
times has everyone been talking about I
need someone to watch the whole thing
the whole thing or it doesn’t count
we’re finding out that watch time is
actually the more powerful thing and
let’s go back to that word choice watch
time is important because what you’re
saying is I’m putting something out
there and I’m letting people choose how
long they want to watch it giving them
the opportunity to do that and so how
can you even play with that how can you
put stuff out there that’s actually
pretty long just to see how long is too
long how long it will somebody engage
and just be excited that they’re
watching something and we’re going back
to our friend here Bridget Jones’s baby
because that whole add itself was I
believe 2 minutes 12 seconds and the
average person watched it for a minute
46 that’s amazing
but if you’re like well they didn’t
finish it you’re going to miss out on
this amazing opportunity and it also is
tied directly to people being more
interested in wanting to see the movie
so it is this ability to say I opted in
to see this you’re letting me consume
more content awesome and that makes me
like you more it’s a pretty basic way to
say it but it’s definitely a hypothesis
that we are continuing to test in
different ways experimenting with how
long is too long and seeing the
different opportunities we can give
people for choice and then finally kind
of direct people give them something to
do choice guys are all wasted that’s
great which is just say that I did stay
tuned I did watch this and I want more
like I want to see more don’t leave me
hanging tell me what to do next and I
know for a long time it’s like the
beginning of the early days in the
internet everything was called action
and then like it seemed a little weird
but like oh ho we’d only be in
everyone’s face they’re so savvy and for
for video ads like this yeah tell me
what to do I want to learn stuff
and so the example that I have here is
actually for a movie called Ouija and
the problem that they wanted to solve
was how do we make sure that people who
don’t like horror movies still watch
this and are still kind of interested
and so this was a whole experiment we
did also use a scene but we didn’t say
it was a horror movie we didn’t give the
name of it at first it just kind of
played out and people were like I don’t
know what I’m watching it’s kind of
weird but they didn’t default to say I
know it’s something I don’t like
and so here’s you can see for the calls
to action for non-fans
keeping it kind of general just the name
of the movie but for horror actually a
call to action goes search for this go
search for kind of this creepy weird
sentence and we’ll have stuff there
waiting for you so actually sending
people on their way to do more which i
think is kind of lovely all right here
are the findings doo doo doo here I’ll
just fill up the whole screen because
it’s a lot of words and I will just kind
of give you the cliff notes of it and
the most surprising insight that we’ve
got is what I told you it’s that watch
time is so important and not as
important as seeing the whole damn thing
through gives you a lot of freedom for
storytelling it gives you a lot of
things to think about about what you’re
unraveling and who’s choosing to see
what most unsure and Riaan site which is
ads are not the enemy we always thought
they were
everyone wants content not true we love
a great ad bad ads are the enemy don’t
make a bad ad more tests on that coming
soon the low is taking fruit is still
these small little edits you can make
when I was telling the example of how to
cut something for mobile so that you’re
more zoomed in on faces or not these big
faraway scenes and even the pacing to
pick up the pacing that is a big thing
to do that makes a huge difference on
that smaller screen can make a huge
difference on berates
most consistent finding choice that’ll
be the last time I say it biggest
opportunity is knowing this kind of
dance of attention we’ve been talking
about when does a true view unit work
wonders a really long unit work when
does six seconds work what medium in my
end what media am I using all these
things work together in a way that’s
like that we do on our own at home
constantly don’t they twice about
bouncing around all these places and
consuming stuff in different ways we
have to get better about it at work in
the marketing space to think about how
to orchestrate all of that and finally
with the thing were most worried about
probably what you guys are worried about
which is who knows if this is all going
to be valid in six months like our
audiences are getting savvy and smarter
and smarter we are getting smarter and
smarter but we’re still kind of tied to
a lot of the same traditions and goals
that we have in this world
so how can we keep up with the way
people are behaving and so as long as
we’re open to the fact that we should
constantly be experimenting and
constantly relearning and constantly
kind of testing it being very brave
we’ll be in a good place and finally
I’ve always wanted to use this quote
presentation it works so great here
which is true remember if you’re gonna
get somebody’s curiosity and you’re
gonna poke them and really look at me
look at me a bit of thing make sure
you’re there to really keep their
attention going and really reward them
for being there with you and that’s it
for me so just don’t be afraid to say
yes thank you sure – first of all for
those who are thinking oh we see
research all the time you know when
Google does research with all the data
they have around issues that are
important to advertisers you tend to get
a heck of a lot of attention and so this
is important research and obviously for
us at WatchMojo the fact that Google
also independently is starting to zero
in on the concept of watch time is
really important as well because
WatchMojo actually is very focused on
watch time and has one of the longest
average video links on the editorial
side on the YouTube platform and one of
the top three highest average watch
watch times on YouTube so where do you
think watch time stands you know in the
in the scheme of things is that like a
big news item for you guys when you
figure that out I guess it shouldn’t
have been so surprising again it’s
probably one of the best things that I
always say is that it’s so easy for us
to forget that we’re actual human beings
who consume content like as much as
anyone else and so when you think about
yeah when I opt into something I want to
kind of get the most I can out of it so
that makes sense it was kind of on the
other side of the house where you’re
like oh my god I need numbers I need
charts I need to tell people that this
is working then it really started to
challenge us so I would like to say that
the I guess maybe we were happily
surprised I feel like it frees us all up
from a lot of the constraints we’ve been
giving ourselves to really experiment
and see what people will want to choose
and opt into I mean think about it Game
of Thrones is ending in two years
everyone’s already mad about it I mean
that’s like making
time for all this stuff and I will say
no matter how busy you are you will find
the time to dig into what you want so I
think watch time is only going to become
more important it’s great and it just
disapproves disproves the whole concept
of thinking that shorter is better on
digital video or on your phone people
are watching longer and longer video
longer and longer content just make
great content that’s exactly right and
that’s where that dance of attention
comes in because six seconds will serve
you very well in some cases possibly
even targeted to something and connected
to something longer and so just to think
about how those pieces and stories play
out together as a family gives you the
freedom I think to stick with watch time
is great well thank you again for
joining thanks everyone thanks John so
we’re gonna we’re gonna break for ten
minutes and give everybody in the
Chancellor room to reset and for those
of you on the livestream you’ll get a
taste of something upcoming in about 20
minutes or so which is some really cool
content that frito-lay did for ruffles
and if you’re a fan of the show hit show
Silicon Valley on HBO it’s with one of
the stars Martin Starr so give it a look
and we’ll be right back
thanks I was trapped I couldn’t move
as the minutes tick by I thought I’d
never escape plus I had to pee pretty
bad kinda have to pee again actually
where’s the bathroom
day was going pretty good so far and a
good flight to look forward to I breezed
through security and I had gotten a seat
in Economy Comfort comfort all caps but
then I get to my seat it’s a middle seat
between two other people comfort gone I
mean it was the worst thing that’s ever
happened to anyone ever
planet Earth police or in the air
around the planet Earth after the going
with any meat muscle bread sandwich
there was one possibly shook a shining
to me she kept coming by and saying hi
how are you that’s about five or six to
press the fill button five six times and
I had to tell her no you can’t change
seats and you have to share those are
nurse are forever now he even asked if
he could sit in the front of the captain
after the holiday though that was and
the reason I had one
laso my phone oh my faithful trusty
phone out of bed
no music no podcast no free games I mean
let’s be honest are there free games
nowadays they all make you buy coins or
gems or candy or whatever I you have pop
testability laughter patrick all hope
hope something oh I’m getting out from
deep in singing and acting over the
place sorry
[Music]
spoiler alert it did work to muscley
arms turned into wonderful giant eagle
wings to soar me through the air oh my
this is the best flight of my life
it was the best flight of my life it was
the worst flight of my life darkness
fire and it looked like I was gonna make
out with my cousin
I think when people talk about going
through hell so annoying and
self-indulgent like your problems are so
whatever but in my case it’s true
there I was my cousin Jana was in town
visiting she doesn’t have a lot of
interests or hobbies so you know we were
just hanging out at my place chillin
I had really been hoping to visit some
museums or see some shows but Martin was
insistent that we stay home well the
problem was I just got in one of these
like universal remote controls the ones
that like control every electronic in
your house it’s awesome it’s like super
awesome when other people use it I don’t
know how to use it so I’m just so
complicated like the buttons why can’t
they just make it obvious which button
does why why does it have to be so
complicated I mean I feel like that’s
one of the reasons we’re doomed as a
species he was talking about human
extinction but then things started
getting really weird so here I am
pushing the buttons and trying to just
get the TV to turn on the lights dimmed
not fully off but just that romantic
level of dimness a fireplace comes on
didn’t even know I had a fireplace it
was so awkward all in all it really
wasn’t so bad until the slow jam started
then it felt like a middle school
makeout party
I think I never was invited to one so I
don’t actually know
[Music]
I used to be kind of a hard it was like
he was trying to make it
romantic so I said I said to her I’m not
making out with you cousin I didn’t
point out her that was just for emphatic
purposes but I was definitive I wasn’t
doing it it was so weird and then he
started leaning towards me I was trapped
I had never been in the situation before
I did the only thing I can think of I
[Music]
walked all the way around the room and
turned off everything by hand manually
it was exhausting but at least I didn’t
have to kiss my cousin
success he said that why would he think
you would have to kiss me so she left
and I spend the rest of the day chillin
watching the boob tube we were running
out of time
the flames were rising Sun was going
down hunger was at an all-time high
the burgers we’re a little well-done
I love barbecues and barbecues love me
we’ve always had a good rapport but this
terrible day almost ruined our love love
relationship with each other
there I was chiseled as always hosting
the biggest Hollywood barbecue of the
barbecue season seth was there Franco
had just arrived
Seth Fishman my neighbor he’s why my
neighbor and Frank is my super anyway
they were all there and we were all
having an amazing time we were having an
average time oh man I was so excited for
everyone to try my burgers I said I’m so
excited for everyone to try my burgers
and they were pretty psyched too I mean
my star burgers they’re world-famous
well their neighborhood they’re famous
to the people I’ve told them to they all
like the idea of them they’re shaped
like stars and the low points stick out
makes it hard eat sometimes then as I
was grilling a horrible realization hit
me I had no buns no brioche no potato no
whole week to hold me did you even count
that as a bun that’s not even it’s
barely good on sandwiches all I had was
hot dog buns what
not hamburgers it was getting late by
then
in retrospect maybe I had spent a little
too much time talking up to the burgers
but they’re worth talking about that’s
the thing I mean the burgers are that
good but without buns like what do you I
thought maybe just maybe we could get
some buns delivered but I wasn’t sure
the grocery store would still be open
you got a man from the grocery on the
phone I guess he didn’t like what he
heard because he started yelling I hope
you’re okay watching a man drown because
that is what you’re doing then he goes
through true true truths in the air
tonight it’s a drum solo is what the
song is about it’s not a legend that’s
true that’s where are you getting your
information there we were the burgers
were getting crispy too crispy time was
running out
and then suddenly I had a revolutionary
idea burger dogs a culinary breakthrough
Franco loved them think we’re okay
[Music]
[Applause]
on 8th on jr. mojo as the host kids
watching right now what this is because
this is something they can get involved
with yeah junior mojo comm JRM Oh Jo is
my new show where me and my friends go
lots of adventures and we use the
internet to be cool and creative and try
all kinds of new things I’m really I’m
just learning I’m still new but yeah I’m
gonna try to do everything I could do
and show kids that there’s no limits
that the internet could be such a cool
place you can do whatever you want
hey the sloth is this your first TV
appearance yeah but I’ve been practicing
it ain’t taught a story everybody hug it
sky this day
ladies and gentlemen please welcome to
of watch mojos most interesting voices
once been with us for a long time the
other is a relative newcomer it’s dad
parody and the Slough Hey hi everybody
hi everybody
Hey I’m Dan I’d the slots from Jude your
abode oh yeah soif I didn’t know you
were on the news that was really cool
yeah it’s pretty cool I’m pretty much
getting out there you know yeah yeah I
mean was that that was your first time
on the news yeah yeah at first ty but
you know I think I did okay were you
nervous a little bit you though but I
was okay first time in New York – hi do
York hi hi everybody get the practice e
for that – it’s actually also my I used
to take the train through New York but I
never I’ve never actually been to New
York in the traditional sense
so is new for both of us I think yeah
live from New York it’s the sloth from
jr. Bojo and Dan and Dan yeah he’s here
too uh so what have you been up to here
in New York anyway oh you though I uh
Clyde the Empire State Building wait
from the inside or the outside outside
guerilla-style
sweet yeah and i’m i gotta go soon cuz
I’m auditioning for Hamilton yeah oh
that’s amazing what part Hamilton
oh I mean that makes sense ready to take
my shot yeah okay yeah so you were on
the news talking about junior mojo yeah
junior beau chose my new world on the
Internet
your new world I mean what so but I
didn’t quite get what that was all about
can you give us a little bit more about
that well it’s about a badger nation and
it’s about fun and it’s about making the
internet a safe and fun place for kids
like the streets of New York absolutely
right
I mean you’re so good I mean you were
really good on TV and I’ve seen a few of
your videos do you have any tips for
someone who kind of wants to break into
that uh well oh you’ve been at it for
awhile dad but uh yeah but I’ve been
sort of behind the camera yeah we’re in
a closet swish – microphone warm-ups you
know like bubble bath
what’s bubble bath bubble bubble bubble
bubble bath bubble bubble bubble bad
words up The Voice does it yeah you got
to do robot boobs and dance to warm up
the body try a robot okay try later yeah
baby I’m at a camera okay yeah die
you got to research lots of research you
know we don’t just do top
and lists we got to do a lot more work –
you guys don’t even do top ten list are
you really fives you do five yeah I keep
it keep it simple but you know I
research whether I’m interviewing Justin
Trudeau Prime Minister okay or a cow at
the farm
I still do research is your research
yeah like I look up jokes you want to
hear what sure I would love to hear a
joke
where does the cow go on vacation where
does the cow go on vacation Moo York ah
pretty good right it’s pretty awesome I
googled that so I don’t know if you kind
of got my hints here but do you think I
might be able to go on Jr mojo ah you
like to be a host you know oh you want a
host yeah like what we’re doing now I
think this we got chemistry right like
we’re doing that’s been okay I guess uh
well the thing is dead you know yet you
kind of talk too much with your hands
you know it’s a lot of hands I mean I
very hand we can police the hand
gestures yeah I don’t have to talk with
my hands that’s I can work on that is
that all well also I’ve been reading the
comments from the trolls right but the
trolls are trolls you don’t yeah you
don’t necessarily jizz and they’ve been
saying that you look tired like all the
time we look tired did you even sleep
last night I slept beautifully we have a
great hotel yeah New York has been very
accommodating I you’re a SWOT and I look
tired yeah well you got to make it work
for you you know I guess so ah okay you
could be on the show okay you could be
on the show oh if you insist okay I
guess we could make it work I’d really
like to make it work I promise I’ll do
well okay we’ll try it out okay
so now coming up next we were Tama Karis
our own John Mackerras it’s probably
gonna be talking to some people who they
help infinity with marketing I believe
infinity like the cars yeah
oh you don’t like a car then I do drive
a car what kind of car um it’s a Honda
Accord
oh wait year 2000 ah that’s what I
thought it was a good year good year for
the Honda ten life goals for dad for
WatchMojo
haha just Katy Danny that’s enough in
the slaughter hey buddy my John take it
away
[Applause]
[Music]
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
[Music]
[Music]
infinity empower the drive so first of
all before I get to that video which is
very very cool just thanks to Dan and
the sloth for writing down here on a toy
train from Montreal it took about a week
super excited about the project that we
have with the sloth he’s doing an
amazing job and you’re going to see some
great content from jr. mojo love that
puppet so what you just saw on the
screen was a really cool intro video
that involved infinity which they talked
a little bit about and it’s regarding a
project that our next guests are
responsible for who are a really amazing
duo true creatives and I love talking to
creatives and I get a chance to talk to
them here and moderate this so please
welcome Pierre Tremblay and patrick
rossol thanks for coming alright so
thank you guys for being here I know you
know we’ve talked a lot about what
you’ve been doing and you know when we
first got the idea to have you on watch
mojo live we were like what is a light
painter and I just think the first thing
we have to kind of get out here is with
this with this audience tell me what is
that what does that mean well to be a
light painter is to actually paint with
light I mean it’s that simple how do you
paint with light it’s through doing a
long exposure photograph in the dark and
then to be in front of the land in front
of the camera and then to use a light
tool and then to move the light tool
just like you do with paints so then the
the exposure can last as long as you
want and as long as in complete darkness
so we have a little bit of a film that
shows you doing this right performing
your craft right here are you gonna roll
them yeah yeah I prepared that just just
fresh for the show awesome and that’s
the zone like a practice in daily so
what you’re going to see is just mean my
systems let’s start with that so we know
what we’re
talking about here and then we can go
from there okay
that’s not the video
McClung video on video strike the bid
[Music]
okay so what we did have we had a really
cool demo of you basically practicing
your craft in the dark and at least you
have the tool here so maybe if we can
cue that up again guys it’s in the key
nodes is the first one in the key not on
the key note so let’s see if we can find
that but in the meantime just talking
through how did you guys you know get
together in the first place and tell us
about you know a little bit more about
the craft that you do and you know how
it comes to life
well this craft started in the
underground like years ago and it’s only
in the last since I would say 2002
thousand thirteen that really started
picking up through the internet because
of digital media I’ve been practicing it
since 1992 but back then didn’t know
that a would become what it is today so
it’s really been an adventure of
discovery and learning and how did you
guys get together you you and Pierre
yeah basically you know much well being
a very creative city full of artists we
all end up in the same parties in same
places and then ice appears visuals in
the party Pierre was doing a VJ in the
party and I loved what he was playing
and then I went to talk to him
afterwards because I actually never seen
something like that before
so you thought finding him to bring your
craft to the big screen or into film in
a new way would be a B be the perfect
partnership right exactly because he’s a
storyteller Sarah was there a commercial
intent envisioned at that point or was
it just like let’s has two creatives
let’s working exactly exactly do we are
we able to cue that that film or no
let’s take a look
yes oops nope that’s the one before yes
we have done it with the attitude I’ve
had excellent just the ones or anything
our understanding yeah it’s the one that
you first queued up if we can see that
that’d be great
right there there you go
[Music]
Wow well before we get to the commercial
application for this you know when you
to map here and you and you were
entertaining this idea what was going
through your mind in terms of how you
would bring this to life like what was
the the creative journey that you took
well when we met that was doing visuals
at a party and it was nothing
I was mashing up old silent film stock
from the 1800s late 1800s so it had to
have nothing to do with that but I
discovered Patrick’s work and and he
approached me and I’m like wow how can
we translate and incorporate as vision
which is photography but also in video
because it’s it’s it’s already pretty
hard to do in photography but in video
it’s almost impossible to do so that’s
that’s kind of a technique we developed
together over the years and when you
guys you know you work together how long
now five six years five six years yeah
yeah okay and so as you start to evolve
to to more of you know the commercial
potential here I mean when I first saw
that film I you know it’s hard to
imagine like how does a brand engage you
and and how do they see themselves
together with you because it’s just so
it’s it’s incredibly creative and it’s
beautiful
and in a way you have to have a brand
that can stand up to that right so when
you guys are thinking about you know how
to work with brands are you you know D
what how much of the business do you
understand do you understand you know
the consumer target you know in the
audience and you know how would you how
would you see yourselves as business
people and that part of it given that
you know you have both the art and you
know the art of the art piece and then
also the brand piece that need to come
together well I think it’s really
important to understand the basics as an
artist if you want to work with clients
you do have to understand at least the
minimum of their world and what
advertising is and what they’re trying
to reach without being an expert in
advertising if you get what the target
is or what’s it then and
and behind it then it’s much easier as
ours to contribute to to to hit that
target I mean it’s all about
communication any communications for me
starts with listening you have to listen
to the client what their needs are where
their visions are how they’re going to
communicate it what the target audience
is where’s it going to be used what’s
the product all of that it’s fine so
it’s by communicating talking to the
client asking them questions that we we
get to know what they want and how we
can bring what we can bring to them but
that said not every artist can
understand you know how to bridge that
gap right I mean we hear a lot of talk
these days about this relationship
between you know art and science data
and and art and you know it one thing
that I do think is true is you can
certainly make an artist smarter but you
can’t turn a scientist into an artist
overnight right just by informing them
so there’s this whole issue of like the
data and how much data do we really need
to understand before we’re not creative
in the way that we had hoped we would be
do you see that as a conflict or is it
just all come together and in a better
collaboration it’s a bit like left-brain
right-brain you know it takes both to
make one person so I think is the same
thing when we work in collaboration in
projects it’s really about making a
center where all the minds and the
hearts of the people connected and then
we’re all focused in the same place you
know very cool well listen I know we
have a video that we’re gonna see about
your your work with infinity let’s take
a look at that and then I have a bunch
of questions where shall we try tonight
we have partnered with the access
Patrick Roshan showcasing our
understanding of our audience Infiniti
q50 was built to deliver a driving
experience which is both inspiring and
captivating and this is what tonight is
all about through Patrick and his light
are painting the tension of a Patrick a
great service performance is a
celebration of the infiniti q40 design a
masterpiece of fluidity and emotion
ultimately what we want to create a
night is a visual expression of what q40
represents a bold and airy statement
tonight we wanted to offer our guests a
truly unique and artistic experience to
capture who they really are being human
is at the core of who we are as a brand
and having Patrick express himself
through light painting is the one in a
lifetime opportunity and when you see
everything coming together that’s when
magic happen my name is Patrick Roshan
and I’m a professional light painter
I’ve been given the challenge to launch
the new Infiniti q30 live on stage in
Beirut
[Music]
the idea is to reveal the car using
light I created a character in a costume
that reflects light and this character
slowly shows the audience the car
through the movement of his light
[Music]
three two one go
perfect okay well do another one and you
live it copy that
how close to camera when we jump off yes
you know to about two meters or three
meters copy I copy that it that’s really
beautiful we’re creating light right now
all of us are created light we’re
creating a trail of light in the
universe and I think that’s what light
painting is about and I think that’s
what the project would infinity
represent like making beautiful light
and creating something remarkable bad
light is projected into space
to infinity infinity empower the drive
just such beautiful stuff I have a lot
of technical questions for how this
happens I mean you look at that video
and it’s like oh my gosh but first of
all tell tell us how did how did you
find each other how did you and infinity
find each other this is have it I mean
in the Middle East your your I mean look
the answer as simple as it is is true
and and the answer is YouTube I mean
that’s that’s really how a lot of the
working through that’s how a lot of
connection and that’s how a lot of
people saw the work and got the idea so
maybe some creative directors you know
for infinity saw your your your work on
line and said Wow because we’ve got to
figure out how to work with these guys
exactly yeah I mean there were other
videos before and then they saw it and
it was like which we have to do this
with the cars and then they approached
us through the TV WH which is the agency
in the Middle East that that just sent
us an email and the conversation started
it’s very cool guys I think in the
keynote there’s some still images
following that video if we could put
those off as a background but you know
talk to us now a little bit about the
just the technical aspects and if you
can control it there you go yeah good
well as soon as the project came through
I I called a friend in Florida that I
met through
snap Orlando I did an exhibition over
there and he’s a brilliant man with a
great mind designer engineer and he was
the first person I reached out to to get
support to build the rig and build the
system that would light up the car in
the way that the car would become a
light painting tool brush like it we
didn’t want the light to shoot at the
cameras we wanted the light to highlight
their arms an engineer that’s right and
a designer and so on so then we worked
like they night and he figured one on
the trio so to speak all right yeah
exactly yeah exactly
well they I mean that project the first
one we did in Dubai was huge we had a
lot of collaborators from all over the
world we’ll maybe we’ll have a chance to
show some of the collaborators a big
team we had people flying from all over
to make this happen and in this project
there’s a few aspect because there’s the
live show there’s a video and then there
are the photographs also so we have to
produce all of those within a time
period yeah because for the client is
always important we do a live show but
it’s also we have we produce behind the
scene where there’s storytelling about
about what we’re doing how it’s made and
all that so that’s a big component of
the of the deliverables also now mind
you the client was supposed to be here
but she had a prior commitment and ended
up having to you know to cancel her trip
but one of the main goals I assume would
be to try to get test drives going on in
these vehicles so you have these events
with these people being stunned by these
amazing images and then what they’re
signing up to drive the car and
hopefully buy the car well it’s not only
our performance most of the time it’s a
whole-day event where if we’re on the
right track they’ll have race car
drivers good doing speed laps with
people and then people can can try the
car things like that so it’s it’s a
whole day event organized around around
this and in what we do is the either the
launch or the live event at night which
is the the pinnacle of tonight so so and
your first event was was enormous right
in terms of size and financial
commitment for
everybody and time on your part tell us
about how do you build a good
relationship with a client you know what
made this work with the client like
infinity and you know we all have worked
with brands that understand this and
brands at struggle to understand this
you know where it where did infinity
fall what do you think came together
that that allowed this to happen in such
a compelling way well what’s interesting
is like the agency told us first of all
that they love their client so right
there they set a tone with us that’s
like oh wow there’s already a good a
good healthy relationship happening
there and it brings us in tune into that
good healthy relationship and I think
the you know compassion and like
understanding is first like you have to
get into their worlds and understand
that their worlds is is as complex as
our world and they’re also trying to
push new things open new doors and
there’s also battles on their ends that
they’re trying to do that they go
through to make these projects happened
we all fight together to make to make
something like that and and and how did
your creative freedom carry over in this
process how did you feel like you
retained your creative freedom
throughout this and but for me it’s not
the question of like I need to express
myself I I I practice daily I am
expressing myself blaney the idea for me
is to like hit the target what is the
target here what are we trying to do and
then how do I make this wow it’s really
where I stand is like so to create a
while I have plenty of challenges and
that’s where I thrive is with those kind
of challenges but we’re lucky it’s a
it’s a very it’s an amazing client that
that is open to suggestions and and so
as long as we make it look good as well
as long as we inspire people with our
images and we bring passion to it and
there’s storytelling into it too then it
brings the brand it brings the content
higher right but we hear a lot about you
know brands and clients or brands and
creators that work together that you
know have struggles you know the Creator
sometimes will say you know I I just
don’t feel like they’re understand
my art or giving me enough freedom to do
what I know I can do for them
and so that communication you know it
all comes down to that in the end right
and so this is this is a you know a very
common battle on YouTube with brands
wanting to work with creators to try to
figure out how to how to do it in a way
that everybody can win this this trust
has been established and also in light
painting they can control it all because
they don’t know how the light paint so
they have to trust me and I have to
understand them yeah so that
relationship has to go both ways
and and if you were to give one piece of
advice to other brands who are trying to
figure out you know how to be creative
and engage you know completely new
partners as they go to market what what
would what would that advice be well I
think it’s important that we make that
step that everyone collaborates and open
new doors I mean that’s how we give
birth and new things right so for the
brand is like opening up to new ideas I
think is important and then creating a
dialogue not preparing everything in
advance in a presentation saying this is
said before they meet the artist meet
the artist first and brainstorm together
to make the project stronger makes total
sense PR anything that what you can’t
have your final product done before it’s
actually shot very often now they want
to have two completely the highly
detailed storyboard and images and all
that on the projects like that project
like that you can’t do that it’s
impossible we give them an idea what
it’s going to be like but there has to
be a trust a trust both ways that we’re
going to have the creative freedom and
they gave us the creative leeway to to
deliver something me exception it makes
it makes total sense well listen thank
you so much both for being here I you
know given that this is a create a forum
on global creativity as you look through
this content you can’t help but think
that you know it’s very topical for what
we’re trying to cover today with you
know all these global partners coming
together and doing something
extraordinary so thank you appreciate it
thank you
so thank you you guys can head off
either way so that was that was amazing
I hope you enjoyed it and that content
will be available on the live stream and
banked on video on demand on WatchMojo
for some time to come and so for those
of you who want to share this with
people that miss the live stream today I
hope you’ll be able to let other people
know that they can go to watchmojo.com
and get a chance to see this so now
we’re going to switch it up a little bit
and talk with now that we’ve been
talking about ad agency folks now we’re
going to talk to some ad agency folks
and talk to some creatives about in this
case how they sell stuff to guys and so
this is going to be a two-part
conversation
the first being with the executive
creative director for one of the most
progressive ad agencies in the business
an agency called deep focus please join
me in welcoming Matt steinwald
my pleasure alright so thank you for the
introduction I work at deep focus we we
definitely are an ad agency we’re not a
traditional attitude you see we don’t
look at TV as the the end-all be-all we
see every channel as an opportunity to
to reach our our consumers and we were
born in digital we’re born in social so
we think a little bit differently and
hopefully this is a good example of how
that goes so if you’re if you’re
interested in advertising thinking of a
career in advertising don’t do it but
here you go we’re going to take I’m
going to take you through about nine
months of work in about 18 minutes
I got bonus minutes here we go this is
about ruffles would I click that so
we’re going to learn about ruffles we’re
going to shift gears from cars to potato
chips and basically everything you need
to learn about ruffles potato chips is
contained in this 30-year old TV
commercial so if you haven’t seen this
enjoy
Horton’s talking come on honey come on
come on what ruffles potato chips
ruffles have ridges orgies are what make
them so good well that’s a funny thing
to say honey
it’s printed right on the back yeah but
why can’t I just say mom and dad huh
because that’s not all bad okay ruffles
have ridges like cars have wheels I
guess so one thing to note here is that
was obviously a commercial that was
targeted at mom now the brand team at
ruffles this is brand that’s been around
since 1956 and it had become the kind of
the tried and true brand for Mom and
even your mom’s mom too to buy when you
had a dip at home because it had of
course the ridges the marketing team
wanted to shift its focus from shopper
moms to millennial Mail so there’s
basically no bigger challenge for an ad
agency than to become to try and make
this guy want to buy what his mom or his
mom’s mom would buy so that was the
challenge whenever we do these kind of
challenges I love to start thinking
about the brand this is my favorite
definition of what a brand is a brand is
a promise delivered I like this because
it begs two questions right what are you
promising and how are you delivering it
so the delivery part really is on the
brand side on their side what they did
do which was cool is they created a
bunch of new flavors that were really
targeted to men so hot-wing flavored
ruffles or bacon cheddar fully loaded
potato skin ruffles I don’t know why you
need a potato skin flavored chip but
this was not my decision but at least
that part of the equation was done so
now we had to figure out what are we
going to promise this guy who basically
hates advertising doesn’t trust
corporations we had to get to know him
so so we did a lot of work we had a
great account team
Katie Shady and Michelle Raley let our
strategy on this
we learned that these guys like their
phones I know this is groundbreaking
stuff guys they like watching videos on
phones think porn and oh my kids are
actually watching this you’re muffs
you’re mus and
and and funny videos on on phones really
really just work with this target so we
had to be funny
our plan was to be funny we were trying
to break through to this guy so we had a
bit of a three-part plan I’ll take you
through it before we even got to
thinking of ideas one thing we knew is
we didn’t want to act like a brand we
did not want to be a brand we actually
wanted to be a friend we wanted to
almost be like half of this relationship
this was a clip that we played when we
did this work and we just saw ourselves
as a brand as half of this relationship
why are you looking at me like that
you’re falling for this broad no I just
met her exactly I’m gonna go
you can’t go watch me watch me take this
on down the road look you leave Gloria
is gonna freak out and go a bit and
it’s gonna go into crisis lockdown Lodha
here at the house I don’t give a famous
I just have my own sock tape into
my mouth that’s like what yeah but the
stuff that I wore around all day playing
football in pouring sweat in was shoved
into my mouth and then was duct tape
over it let’s talk about I’m a good
listener I’m a good listener so we love
we love that obviously very funny movie
very funny dynamic and we wanted to see
if we couldn’t emulate some of that the
second part of our plan here is don’t
act in our own best interest in our own
self-interest we know that our clients
want to self sell chips but the last
thing to do is sell chips is to put that
in the front so we we actually wanted to
be very self-aware so a lot of great
content and great work was just being
honest about what was going on in the
world this is this is great Super Bowl
actually it was a Super Bowl hack done
by by Drogo 5 for Newcastle who could
not afford to compete with the
Budweiser’s of the world and basically
got
a won the Superbowl battle a few years
ago um I was really excited to make us
commercial with Newcastle but then turns
out they don’t even have the money or
permission to make us a commercial they
can’t even say the words just salute I
don’t even think they can say like aim
in I don’t think you can in football
like in any capacity how are you gonna
make us commercial without saying the
words alright so self awareness and then
the last thing of our plan here is we
didn’t want to be too serious serious
isn’t funny we want to be ridiculous
this is uh this is a fun some fun work
where we there’s a brand truth this is
for GE smart lightbulbs for a smart home
and basically Jeff Goldblum is is
attributing all of his success to the
lighting the lighting just makes him
successful and and clearly pushes the
bounds of what’s ridiculous for an
embarrassingly small amount of money you
can kiss your horribly lit non
successful life goodbye but don’t take
my word for it ask this unremarkable
nobody they used to hate to go home to a
dark house and an unfamous non celebrity
husband but now that I can control my
lighting I’m seeing things to go okay so
that that’s a plan I mean is it a good
plan who knows stay tuned so we wanted
to be friendly self-aware and ridiculous
and right and the bullseye of all of
these things what we discovered were
first world problems right first of all
problems are problems that are not
problems they’re privileged problems I’m
going outside I have to put on pants
that’s the first role problem I find it
impossible to say no to stake 50 in
France 50 of stake first world problem I
should be working on college stuff but
Internet’s much more fun and this great
story from the New York Times my wealthy
parents well many wealthy parents find
it hard to talk to their kids about the
millions of dollars they will inherit so
these are first real problems and and I
think this whole challenge this whole
marketing challenge that we were facing
is perfectly summed up
bye-bye your friend and mine mr. Luisi
feel that we now in the 21st century we
take technology for grandpa yeah because
now we live in an amazing amazing world
and its wasted on the on the crappiest
generation of just spoiled idiots that
don’t care because this is what people
like now they got their phone no uh-uh
it won’t give it a second it’s going to
space can you give it a second to get
back from space is the speed of light
I was on I was on an airplane and there
was internet high-speed Internet on the
airplane that’s the newest thing that I
know exists and I’m sitting on the plane
they go open up your laptop you can go
on the internet and it’s fast and I’m
watching YouTube clips it’s a me I’m in
an airplane and then it breaks down and
they apologize the Internet’s not
working the guy next to me goes bolt
like how quickly the world owes him
something yes he knew existed only 10
seconds ago right right so what’s what’s
great about this is everyone’s laughing
at the right times they’re all mostly
he’s making fun of the people who are
laughing so there’s a great
self-awareness and obviously he’s
describing some some great first real
problems and you really know that first
world problems is a thing when when
weird al’ turns it into a song what she
did
all right so there’s that I’m going to
I’m going to speed up a little bit here
so what on earth do first world problems
have to do with ruffles potato chips you
ask or you should ask because this is an
ad for there’s a campaign for ruffles
and the answer is actually they have
everything to do with ruffles ruffles
this is an actual patent to cut a potato
in zigzags I’m not joking 1956 – Bernard
stammered and I quote and figure five a
modified form of the sliced potato
product is shown and the modification
resides and the fact that the ridges on
one side of the potato product in the
ridges on the other side of the potato
product are arcuate and extend in
parallelism on opposite sides of the
product so they actually patented this
silly thing and why do they do it
because the potato the ruffles chip is
actually stronger these ridges make it
stronger so it cannot break in the dip
if there’s ever been a first-world
problem it’s when your chips break in
the dip so now’s the time for for my
favorite Venn diagrams we’re playing
advertising I love Venn diagrams this
one’s easy to follow so we know the guys
like first world problems we know that
we as a brand are in fact the solution
to a first real problem so our big
campaign platform for ruffles was that
ruffles are built for the rough life
rough life is just another way of saying
first world problem sounds more like
ruffles get it advertising so so this
brilliant campaign is is going to live
across some channels but to make sure
that everyone’s on the same page
including our amazing producer Melissa
our creative team Mike Boyce and Matt
Sylvester who came up with this we we do
we do write mantras it kind of ensures
that all creative partners are on the
same page and here’s what this one
sounds like so pretend your clients and
I’m pitching to you sometimes you
finally sink in your couch with a cold
beer and realize it’s not a twist-off or
your iPad is out of battery and your
cord won’t reach the bed but few things
are more devastating than when a regular
potato chip breaks in the dip if you’ve
suffered through these kinds of problems
then you know life can get rough
we ruffles hereby swear to raise
awareness of rough life problems to
provide you with comfort and strength
just as we’ve done for over 50 years to
present solutions to these tragic
problems if solutions exist and to
always keep it real even when life is at
its most unreal your friend through
thick dip it’s always hard to say that
part you don’t want to say it the other
way and and thin-skinned ruffles built
for the rough life alright thank you my
best Don Draper so so here we go let’s
let’s look at some of the work we wanted
to show how this could work across any
channel so we had an NFL partnership we
wanted to work with Eric Decker those of
you guys who know Eric Decker he’s a
he’s a wide receiver he was traded from
the Broncos to the Jets he is a living
first role problem he’s actually like a
professional football player worth
millions of dollars and at the same time
he looks like a model so life is rough
when you’re Eric Decker but anyway
here’s how he helped us launch the
campaign even when you’re snuggling up
with Eric Decker life can get rough
thankfully there’s ruffles built for the
ruffle life follow ruffles on twitter
for more rough life stories so we’re
asking people to to activate our Twitter
channel we’re act we’re actually asking
for stories for them to share their
stories with us life can be rough like
when date night interferes with draft
night but if there were two of you you
could be in two places at the same time
Decker suit up
yes get in there
surprise it’s a win-win for everyone
maybe even you if you don’t want a
chance to win sweet NFL gear just tweet
your rough life story at ruffles ruffles
built for the rough life Wow
okay so we’re asking people to share
their rough life stories with us we know
that conversation is already happening
in social they’re already using that
hashtag so we’re able to jump in on
those conversations but we also wanted
to share some of our own rough life
stories so we made some animations we
actually used a vendor clambake who does
a lot of animations for Adult Swim so
again we’re kind of stacking the deck in
our favor to make sure that we’re going
to be funny in the way that the
Millennial men you know appreciate humor
so here’s a couple of first world
problems the first one is about the big
challenge in applying sunscreen when
you’re at the beach and then the second
one of course is when you’re when you’re
in your cell service is not allowing you
to tell the world how much fun you’re
having so enjoy these two
firstworldproblems ruffles presents
ruffles rough life stories brought to
you by ruffles
just think if your friends would help
you put on sunscreen
then you’d all have perfect tans people
would be impressed and tell you that you
have a perfect tans
yes perfect but your friends would not
help you put on sunscreen and now you
all look like cow people that’s rough
thankfully there’s ruffles built for the
rough life okay one more and now a
ruffles rough life story just think if
you had a personal satellite then you’d
always have Wi-Fi you’d bring happiness
everywhere you went
you’d be a Wi-Fi magnet and you could
always prove to everyone how much fun
you’re having but you do not have a
personal satellite and now you must
actually talk to people that’s rough
thankfully there’s truffles built for
the rough life okay so we also worked
with the moment studio and an led by
Christina cook she and Ken Kramer and
Ashley Tyra
Kyle Brody and and Franklin DeFelice we
created some trend based content context
based content for a you know across
channel so we’ll go through some of this
we were this is uh this is a hangout
hack where we’re helping you if you’re
stuck grilling on a hot day how to stay
cool you can put your feet in the cooler
which is which is growth but look how
happy he looks we you know this is a
tweet when you treated your priceless
comic like it was worth 40 cents rough
life when you have to wait a whole other
year to find out who’s going to sit on
the throne all men must dip brilliant
and the tweets came to us also when you
try to send a text to Daniel but it went
to dad rough life when it’s too cold for
a t-shirt but too warm for a sweatshirt
rough life and you know when Starbucks
wants to talk about pumpkin spice
life is rough when you want pumpkin
spice flavored ruffles chips because
those are not real things rough life
we created a pandora ad that pissed
people off which was awesome
they actually tweeted us a rough life
story about listening to our own Pandora
commercial ruffles commercial on Pandora
makes me want to throw my phone at the
wall I don’t want to hear a guy eating
chips in my ear this is awesome this was
intentional we did want to do this and
here it is and of course the rough life
situation here is you get free music but
you have to listen to ads so
contextually aware life is rough when
you hear an ad instead of music
luckily deep Ridge classic hot wings
ruffled sound delicious hmm so when life
gets rough got ruffles all right and
then calls you me you saw some of the
Martin Starr content that we showed so
we won’t play that again I have 20
seconds WatchMojo was our gracious host
so I’m going to rattle through a very
quick top 10 ways to make good ads
number one remember you’re a potato
don’t try to change the world if you’re
a potato be a potato there’s no problem
there stand for one thing if you have a
really good big idea it can live across
the channels it doesn’t have to be
completely separate campaigns based on
the channels I think that was a good
demonstration of that ask people to do
nothing literally no one wants to do it
they don’t care they just if you can fit
into their life
you’re better off take many swings this
is one of the things we do really well
at deep focus is that we don’t see we
don’t put all our eggs in one basket one
big TV commercial we will create a lot
of content see what works and put our
media dollars behind what works we’re
going for humor smiles laughs shares
that kind of thing humor is currency if
you’re stuck what would Vince Vaughn do
choose funny partners choose your
celebrities with purpose obviously Eric
Decker is a pretty good example of that
he was a first-world problem when
chose him customized your creative to
the context in which it lives and trust
your gut don’t have to test everything
be brave we had it we had a brilliant
client on this Jeff Klein who was
basically empowering us and his people
to take take a chance take a risk and we
really appreciated it thank you thank
you sir I was curious the top the top
ten things you should remember about
advertising also in a way maybe I was
going to ask some of the women the
audience’s that also feel like good
advice for how to land a guy other than
the number one which was you know
remember the Europe potato the other
nine might actually work not bad
that was so in Atlanta guys no not
trying to land a guy um millions of
people just yeah yeah but in any event
listen we’re gonna have a few folks
joining for the rest of this
conversation and while we’re getting the
chair set up we have any questions from
the audience
anybody anything for Matt James did we
do UGC for this we’ve done UGC and when
we when we do UGC we really I mean that
whole like nobody wants to do anything
is extremely true but what was great
about this is that because because rough
life was already a hashtag it was
already out there people were already
using it so when we jumped into that
conversation and we started tweeting
about first world problems it was very
natural for them to do it so we got a
lot of actual conversation and we also
were prising things out for like at the
NFL Draft and we didn’t show everything
but for example we thought it was a
first world problem to have to wait in
line for your tickets to go and see your
players get drafted and so we were
activating the draft and we would have
people tweet using our hashtag and then
we would pull them out of line put them
to the front we give them VIP access so
we did we did stuff like that for this
campaign but yeah UGC is really
interesting because if you just ask
people to do it and they’re not
compelled to then it’s a disaster good
good advice good and thanks for the
question so listen I will also now want
to
welcome to the stage Josh Cohen from to
filter along with Ian Shafer who’s the
CEO of deep focus and also rich
Antonella the CEO of complex media which
is like a huge guy focus media
enterprise thanks guys thanks for being
here
absolutely thank you very much thanks
John thank you so we’ve heard a lot
about WatchMojo today at WatchMojo has
this unique proposition where they’re
targeting this increasingly elusive kind
of young male demographic in an age
where that audience is there’s a it’s
basically a diaspora they’re all over
the place now we’re used to be able to
target them in these finite specific
places in different entertainment and
media locations now they’re all over the
place and watch much is done a really
good job of kind of finding a niche that
really appeals to them and gets them
engaged on YouTube so we have a bunch of
people on here we have we have a great
panel today with Matt rich Indian and
wanted to kind of get into how in your
own work and with some of the other
clients you guys work with and brands
you guys work with how kind of the best
practices and the ways in which you guys
are appealing to that same demo today
and rich I wanna start with you you know
you’ve been a come near the sea of
complex networks complex is obviously
bound for a while
how is kind of like appealing to this
demo for you different now from them
when you started complex over a decade
ago uh you know the beautiful part for
us we’re very lucky in that when we
started out as a magazine 16 years ago
so we’ve been multiple iterations of
this business the one thing that hasn’t
changed is the topics we cover so what’s
really interesting is when we started we
were a small little magazine it was
about 275,000 circ right like and which
by the way is laughable now from a scale
perspective but um you know we were
always founded upon these verticalized
kind of subcultures at that point and
this was out 2002 so sneakers hip hop
art and design basically what is defined
youth culture today kind of was on the
peripheral at that point so we really
haven’t changed what we’ve done we’ve
just grown in all those mediums as
although as the number one authoritative
brand
within each of those topics and as those
topics have become organically more
important and move to the middle to
influence everybody else we’ve just
basically scaled organically so we
haven’t chased anything we haven’t
changed our business we’ve just kind of
embraced multiple platforms and where
people are consuming around those topics
and did you kind of get lucky in the
fact that no what we don’t get lucky
what was considered niche culture 16
years ago when you started or kind of
mesh culture is now more into the
mainstream well I don’t think it’s luck
I mean we were talking about it I mean I
believed in concentric circles at that
point and if you think the Trent if you
looked at the trend back then I was at
Saatchi a long time ago I won’t age
myself out but early 90s and we you know
we used to be able to buy it was really
easy when I was 22 23 years old
you bought ESPN and like NFL football
and you had 95 percent of the target
covered right and it was super simple
and by the time the early 2000s rolled
around it became very obvious that all
of the large ubiquitous reach plays and
scale plays to me we’re all going to be
deteriorating because you saw the
interests start you know it’s not just
the platforms that are disparate
it’s actually even more so it’s the
topics that drive that and those
platforms just enable those topics to
actually garner large audiences that’s I
mean I’d people think about it the wrong
way I think that’s it’s an easier way
that people default ooh and go oh the
platforms are really what’s fragmenting
everything no it’s the interest that
fragmented it they just found homes on
those platforms does that make sense yes
okay
lucky kind of way maybe for other than
sure it’s all gone
and so um going on all these different
fragments of platforms how are you like
you have any strategies or thesis in
order to reach this kind of demo in this
audience
yeah it’s really easy you buy you buy
them um and you buy complex yeah but
you’re like oh um the UH and I see that
like I’m serious about that I you know
you said they’re elusive I think you
know they’re elusive if you’re used to
advertising on television they’re not
elusive if you’re if you’re buying you
know access to them on the internet and
most likely you’re buying them from one
of three places and
that’s either Google Facebook or
everybody else and I think what’s what
the challenge for marketers is not
reaching them I think my audience in
general guys/girls everything it’s
almost like everything’s a commodity
because it’s bought sold and traded on
exchanges I think that what’s scarce
still is relevance and I think that’s
where that’s where it’s getting harder
not easier I mean it’s easier to figure
out what’s relevant it’s harder to
attach yourself to it it used to be like
you could be adjacent to it and that was
enough it used to be that you could you
know tweet about a topic and you were
seem to be cool now it’s like the more
that you you try to do it the as the
kids say the thirstier you look you know
and like that some and yet you have to
be careful about that right and so it’s
it’s not as easy anymore to appeal to
people or to actually be respected by
people anymore because the benefit the
benefit of the doubt for most brands has
gone away you know at least for legacy
brands modern brands newer brands were
like essences at the core they’re built
into the lives of people as opposed to
trying to interrupt them I mean those
they’re having an easier time but you
know the brands have been around for a
long time we’re trying to have to
retrofit everything that they’ve learned
and it’s not that easy
well you bring up an interesting point
though sorry but it’s like you know
everything you just talked about is that
is the shift from display and
programmatic and automated to really
branded and sponsored and yet
disproportionately branded yeah and
what’s funny is everybody’s running
towards branded from like a like the
media brand side of things but so few
people have a deep enough connection
with their audience that they can
actually do it yeah because you don’t
have to have such a deep connection with
your audience but when you integrate an
advertiser in if you have a dotted line
relationship you can’t integrate an
advertiser into that so I think you have
a lot of people trying to solve for a
solution for a problem that they
actually cannot fundamentally solve with
that as a solution yeah and it enough
people employ that as the solution they
actually the ad economy will be smaller
that’s right and there would be fewer
publishers and nobody really wants that
but I think that i think it’s it’s
inevitable
using some paralysis with some of the
companies you work with we’re because
because consumers are so savvy right now
and because they can see through
and because like you said like
if you’re late they’re not cutting
brands lots of slack do is there a
threshold that the campaigns need to hit
that is getting more difficult and more
difficult and is there some paralysis of
companies like wanting to kind of dive
into this space there is a there’s a
there’s a very large reliance on data
mostly because the industrial complex
says that that is what you should be
obsessive obsessive about I just don’t
think I think there’s a lot of analysis
paralysis that happens with all having
access to all that data
it’s like water water everywhere right
like that that’s that’s the situation a
lot of advertisers are in there they’re
they have access to all this data but
you know only a small percentage of it
is actually actionable nor should you
know the majority of it shouldn’t be
actionable it should be you know a
lesson that you learn and things that
you process but I mean I I’m a firm
believer that data like again is like
works very well at the bottom of the
funnel it’s fine it’ll help move product
it’ll help do that and at the end of the
day if that’s what you’re responsible
for as a marketer is selling product
then I guess you can rely on it I happen
to think marketing marketing and brands
there’s there’s just a higher calling
that’s also about building a brand for
the long term and actually creating
benefit of the doubt in people’s minds
that you know where they see the value
of a brand in a case of similar products
they’re going to choose one brand over
another not because they got a coupon
that might happen once but not over the
long term and so there is value in that
brand and I think that you know when you
pair that with content it makes an
argument for for brands the future of
advertising maybe becoming with brands
being more of the patrons of content
kind of the way it used to be with like
Texaco Star Theater and things like that
you know bringing people to stuff that
they wouldn’t get access to otherwise
and I think the more that your the the
television packages get unbundled and it
gets more and more expensive to watch
what you want to watch that might be a
place where where brands ultimately play
but it’s more likely to be again like
newer brands making newer decisions
about the older brands making the same
old
Matt so for people like you that are
invested in this industry is that it is
what Yen said is this a super exciting
time for you in kind of gone is the
these display ads and it’s more about
being creative and working with
different distributors and platforms and
figuring out things that might work on
these native platforms to these specific
audiences yeah I didn’t understand a
word you said oh that’s cuz you’re
Canadian
yesterday even I’ve worked together for
five years but no I I think there is no
more exciting time I think I think
agencies that creatively open let go a
little bit think differently and and and
treat every channel like like an
opportunity every publisher every
platform has creative within it right
they’re creative directors and creators
that know their audience they’re making
incredible content for their audience
already and so the the the advertising
agency I think has to come in and know
their brand and have the trust of their
client and earn the trust of their
client come into these opportunities and
collaborate and be open minded and
understand that if you come in and just
try to push your message through to an
audience that has an expectation from a
platform it’s going to fail so you have
to stop you have to collaborate you have
to listen to first of all listen to your
publishing partners because that is an
incredible way to reach an audience in
an authentic way and that’s that’s I
think that’s why I think it’s more
exciting is that yeah you can create
your own videos you can tell your own
stories that’s great but stories that
are coming from the brand to people are
going to be shot down much more than new
ways to kind of collaborate and actually
add true value to someone’s life I think
that’s maybe a new way of thinking it’s
not about you it’s totally about it it’s
and you’re not this is rare by the way
you’re hearing people talk about running
away from traditional kind of false
attribution like act the attribution
model is still very heavily relied upon
yeah um and in the bottom of the funnel
that you referred to is you know that
last click and
all of that in an addiction yeah I mean
look it automated anything has never
enough luck I’m a big ol gali fan so
it’s all about changing hearts and minds
I have news for you programmatic
advertising is not changing anybody’s
heart or anybody’s mind and you know you
have some people who understand it’s got
it
and you have look this performance
metrics that you actually have to have
fundamentally but there’s a lot of
different ways to get there and you
better you better start if you want to
build a long-term successful brand you
better start at the top of the funnel
having a very deep conversation with
people that’s that’s the key and you’re
not seeing yeah not a lot of people are
thinking that some things haven’t
changed though right so like what is a
brand believe in well you know what are
their true values what’s true to a brand
all of those things that are haven’t
changed it’s still important it’s maybe
just finding a new twist in a new way to
to kind of bridge what’s important to a
brand to what’s important to its
consumer to its fans find that new
bridge and that all happens that all
happens at the top that all happens with
a lot of thinking a lot of time a lot of
understanding a lot of research and a
lot of collaboration right in order to
change the hearts and minds of guys and
particularly young guys a particular on
the internet these days are there is
there anything in particular that that
you think they’re looking for they want
the differs from potentially other demos
yeah I mean I think I think guys want
hey what’s funny is you know you used to
used to thirst for you know sports stats
and other things like that I think
that’s that’s so commoditized and it’s
it’s so everywhere that’s not really
what guys are searching out it’s also
just it’s everywhere so I think now it’s
like people and not just guys but I
think disproportionate on the guy side
you see it in the conversations they
have on social platforms are looking for
very strong opinions right they’re
looking for an angle they want a brand
that does it’s not just a service play
there’s a lot of people that just are
service right and I think you know ESPN
is trying to move away from that not to
make that like as a correlate what we
were talking about is you know like
SportsCenter is now ubiquitous right
like highlight shows but first take is
well now everybody’s doing that too but
you start
going down a certain Road of opinions
and other things and that’s where you
can the the voice of a brand comes out
when the opinion comes out not not from
a service perspective because then
you’re just a commodity right so I think
I think a lot of people if you really
want to make a difference forget about
just the like look we’re very
differentiated on the topics we cover we
still do in the max scale versus
everybody else but for us it’s it’s how
do you inject that next layer of why
your think why these things are
important um and and kind of like tell
those stories behind the stories and I
think that’s excuse me I think that’s a
lot of it for us at least let’s see that
trend I mean if you’re if your brand and
your target is guys I mean you’re not
cutting deep enough alright like there’s
not like that can’t be your target I
mean guys I mean there’s a lot of
subsets within the guy category you know
and and you know so to you know make
generalizations about what it is that
guys like like it’s not even a generally
generalization to say guys like I mean
it’s not a fair generalization make to
say that guys like girls right we’re
sports or any of that stuff and you
could get away with making that general
generalization like 10-15 years ago
because we didn’t have the ability to
reach people with particular mindsets
other than you know finding the content
that it is they watch but then even if
you did find that content it would be
such at such small scale that you can do
anything but you know with like a you
know thing like Facebook out there you
know I can find guys that love Depeche
Mode I don’t you know like there’s
there’s and cut further they’re like
Depeche Mode and Morrissey like you know
there’s there’s this there’s a the big
cross so that’s a that’s a but overlap
you know but the fact is is like you can
you slice a lot of different ways and so
I think there of targeting guys is over
at this point I mean I think it’s more
about you know interests to your point
culture you know all those kinds of
things that get people you know to forge
some kind of association between what
your brand you know wants to be and what
people will accept it and with that
ability to to be more targeted I think
it just lends itself perfectly to making
more pieces of content like if you do
want to reach a larger audience in fact
don’t just say one thing don’t tell one
story tell specific story stories that
are actually gonna going to have some of
that deeper insight behind them same
touchstone on a general they put all the
different angles and perspectives okay
Richie you’ve had a couple breakout hits
on complex network this past six nine
twelve months or so like what what are
they and what do you think they have in
common that is speaking to the audience
you know it’s funny it you’ll hear
sounds like I’m very informal but I’m
actually painfully consistent about
things as well is you know everything
from like a show like everyday struggle
which basically was launched six weeks
ago today yesterday’s episode did seven
point nine million views in 24 hours um
we we had we have a show called hot ones
which is an interview show where we do
ten wings and ten tough questions and
have celebrities come on that is a great
little interview show right rebooting
like a Charlie Rose type format in a
really cool young way we have a show
called sneaker shopping with Joe liPuma
what’s interesting all you know they’re
all related to our topics but the one
thing that in common across all those is
they’re very opinionated there’s a lot
of flavor and there’s a lot of culture
there those formats are the backdrops
the topics are the backdrops it’s a it’s
a real play to be able to bring culture
in without being scripted is the real
magic right like that’s where a lot of
brands fall down is they try and just
throw a camera up in front of somebody
on a live basis and think that it’s
going to come across and it doesn’t it’s
just flat it could be any brand right
the one thing I love about our content
is you strip away complex and you still
know you’re watching complex and I don’t
just mean them on the topic I mean that
with the talent I mean that with the
vibe I mean that with the words they’re
saying and what it means and I
definitely mean it when it comes to like
the the numbers were posting against it
as well so that’s that’s the coming out
for brands to want to do that to take
that risk
to let go a little bit that I think that
onus I think falls mostly on on the
agency the agency has to
develop the trust with their clients
that that ultimately the content that
we’re going to create together if we let
go if we if we trust a little bit we’ll
protect some of your sensitive you know
kind of areas that but that’s that’s not
important we’ll get those out there and
and every partner is going to take in a
brief like that and understand where
where they can’t go and find a great
place where they can go and if you let
go then the content that you create
there is completely different than than
a TV commercial and there are really
employment even the audience the
audience appreciates that so much more
they feel like you’re catering to them
you’re like you’re not pandering but
you’re catering to them I think that’s
the big thing – yeah I mean we we would
look at you know I think I think there’s
you know you can make a TV commercial or
make pre-roll that’s brilliant that
people will like and appreciate you
would go about it a little bit
differently creatively but you know that
that’s that’s what I mean there’s
there’s great I mean this this Lysol
protect protect like a mother you seen
this it’s just absolutely brilliant and
it’s just old school television
commercial a great insight a nice twist
I think McCann did that work and it
feels like all of a sudden Lysol is
relevant giving mom’s goosebumps so you
can make really amazing work no doubt
but this is just these these other
channels feel like they’re untapped and
we have to learn as an agency and as
clients how do you get to how do you
create branded content or content on
behalf of brands that is going to be
that’s going to help you know tell tell
your brand story yeah I think the the
approach there that yet that everyone
has to take is I think it’s very easy
and obvious for brands to do cultural
appropriation yeah even for publishers
to write industry in it that is that has
historically been the easy way to do it
just reappropriation or just steal from
culture I think even something like like
that Lysol campaign or you know so like
a girl
you know there’s I’m sure there a guy
related campaigns out there as well even
if they’re just humor right there and
look at a Super Bowl spot you know
they’re I used to say that that’s a
that’s like
relevance tax like if you’re not
relevant a Super Bowl spot is the price
you have to pay to be relevant you know
for at least a couple of minutes but you
have to instead look at that as like
cultural contribution like that is a
contribution you’re making to culture
it’s up to you what you do at that time
on the stage but I think that at a time
when everyone’s watching the same thing
that is a shortcut to you know injecting
yourself into culture but I think that’s
a responsibility you know especially in
the world we live in where everyone’s
getting to choose whatever they want to
watch as opposed to having to sit
through commercial well that’s the other
thing people don’t like that you just
hit on the most important point is look
a lot of like most digital content is on
demand yeah right I mean it’s not pushed
out to you the way commercial is so that
you’re putting the choice in the
consumers hands so you damn well better
be producing pull oriented stuff versus
pushing it out and I don’t think a lot
of people consider that to that degree I
mean it’s a real it’s a challenge but
it’s an opportunity because if they’ve
chosen to pull that content to them
you’re already now you’re running
downhill right yeah there’s a reason
like and you get to the contribution
part there’s a reason why
puppymonkeybaby worked and Budweiser
America Cannes didn’t that’s right even
though they’re doing it again
for some reason for so so that you know
so that’s yeah again I think it’s a lot
lessons to be learned those two things
especially we got to marketing the guys
and like kind of must-see TV or we had a
point now where must-see TV is obviously
way smaller than it was years ago are we
at a point out where we’re less and less
people gonna see these kind of
television commercials like the last one
that I remember having kind of ubiquity
was the Darth Vader uh low VOC
Volkswagen Camaro
there you go I bore the more that God
created the farmer um are we past that
point now so I was talking to somebody
that was watching the hand man
Handmaid’s Tale on who they saw the same
spot the entire like the entire but at
the tire time they were watching this
show knew there was only one spot
playing sponsorship working for you so
you can achieve the desired frequency
and you could overdo the frequency so I
I don’t think I don’t
I feel
I still think you can get you know a
performance like a commercial seen by a
lot of people at the same time if you
spend enough money or if you spend
enough money in the right places so I
think that’ll still be there now will
everybody be watching NBC Thursday
nights the way they did The Cosby Show
like I know yeah well they’re not gonna
watch it at the same time they’re not
going to watch it on the same device on
the same screen like and the experience
is not going to be the same but again I
go back it literally the bigger problem
is it’s an on-demand right it’s Pole
versus push I think the onus is on us as
public content creators and the agencies
and the clients to appreciate and
realize that it’s not an iteration of a
30-second spot it’s a massive rethink
and I think that’s where not a lot of
people are not having enough of a
discussion around it because I think
that’s so dead it’s not even funny
that to me is like where I come battle
that people are not much more aggressive
around rethinking that’s that’s what I’m
shocked that we’re about out of time but
thank you guys so much you can find Ian
and Matt stuff over at deep focus net
and richest stuff over at complex comm
appreciate it thank you thank you thank
you thanks thank you very much thank you
man thanks Josh thank you John
so we’ve had an amazing day we’ve had
some incredible speakers that was an
amazing conversation around marketing to
guys and all the new challenges and
opportunities that we have and obviously
here at WatchMojo we care a lot about
guys and we have fortunately for us a
lot of guys that that watch our content
before we break for tonight’s showcase
around music and you’ve heard a little
bit about what we’re going to do tonight
we have Huddle’s pity party who debuted
on America’s Got Talent last night and
blew up the Internet we also have Dan
Deacon who’s a really talented musician
and has been on a lot of great programs
and also bringing up the third act we
have caveman which is an amazing local
band from Brooklyn they’re going to be
here with us tonight we have a whole
bunch of stuff happening as well and all
that kicks off at 6 o’clock but before
that super important we have somebody
who is an amazing speaker and
friend and he is a breakthrough
innovator please welcome Chris baron who
is the founder and general manager of a
great big story and it is really CNN’s
transformative team in social content
that is helping that brand really move
to a whole new place so please welcome
Chris okay good afternoon this is the
first time I’ve been in the lineup with
a guy named puddles and Capeman
yeah that’s so I think maybe I’m moving
up in the world before I get in I’m
going to actually do for a person who
lives in video I’m going to do a
somewhat bright thing and actually limit
a little bit of the video but I’m going
to show you sort of what we think we’ve
accomplished from inside a news
organization to do something a little
bit or very much outside the news before
I dive in just a little bit about Who I
am and what I do all day so I am the
senior vice president of global video
for CNN so that means on any given day I
have a lot of incredibly talented
colleagues that are really focused on
today’s news and tomorrow’s news and the
news after that as you might imagine
it’s an incredible time to be in the
news it’s an invigorating time to be in
the news you just don’t sleep very much
in addition to that I also oversee our
emerging brands at which great big story
really is the biggest one and the one
that’s off to the fastest start so I’d
like to talk to you about that before I
get in let me talk to you about how it
came to be really quickly this is a time
before Trump it’s before the election it
is towards the middle of 2015 we were
already gearing up for the election we
were hiring like crazy on the politics
side we were hiring like crazy on the on
the digital side and certainly video was
a huge part of that my boss and I Andrew
Morris walked into Jeff Zucker who’s our
president
he’s the president of the world’s
biggest news organization literally the
world’s biggest news organization and we
walked in and said we have this big idea
we think it’s gonna be great it’s gonna
be a little expensive and it has nothing
to do with the news and he just stared
us for a couple seconds and he said okay
come on and then we gave him the world’s
worst
keynote presentation and I’m not going
to show it to you because it’s awful but
I have to tell you everything that I
show you all the success I show you is
actually because one single person at
the very top said yes and continues to
say yes and supports it I’m not saying
that because I don’t think he’s
listening right now but it isn’t
important people ask me how we did this
and we did it with buy-in and we did it
from the very top so this is great big
story we focus on cinematic storytelling
we think we tell stories that make the
world a smaller place that’s a really
important thing especially in today’s
news climate when we think about who we
are and what we aspire to be and what we
the feelings that we want to evoke both
in our audiences and in our partners we
believe that the quality that you get
with HBO and Netflix and the cinematic
narrative nature of deep engaged
storytelling belongs on mobile devices
certainly belongs on OTT it belongs in
all forms not just a series of hour-long
documentaries or fiction we think about
Ted a lot not from a guy on a stage he’s
better than me giving really smart
advice but from the notion of connecting
the world having a global outlook and
also leading with thought really really
thinking through issues and through
dynamics and through geographies and
then BuzzFeed which ends up sort of
being the the placeholder for what we
all sort of shorthand as the magic of
audience science and the magic of off
platform and social media and what you
can do in that space so we had this
premise what if we get actually combine
all these three CNN by nature for more
than three decades is a video company we
have more cameras there are cameras
around the world than anyone else in the
world what if we could actually access
that what if we could turn that on and
play and really take advantage of that
infrastructure so this is what we came
up with
we’re a global media company dedicated
to cinematic storytelling over the past
year and a half and actually these
numbers are a little bit almost dated as
of last Friday it’s actually closer to
80 now in the last year and a half we’ve
been to nearly 80 countries we have told
stories in 80 countries in a year and a
half that’s not something that a social
video startup does it’s not something
that a publisher whose has a video
department does this is what a global
media company does we have incredibly
big ambitions and they’re beginning to
pay off we’ve also been built and
incredibly engaged and loyal endemic
audience we have over you’ll see these
numbers in a second we have over four
four and a half million Facebook
subscribers we’re actually about to
throw a party here in a week or so you
guys are all invited because they’re
about to hit a million YouTube
subscribers more than half of which have
actually showed up over the past three
months all of its organic we think we’re
on to something really special
all of it starts with storytelling it
starts with video we’re a video only
company every one of these stories sort
of has their own tastes we do things in
a studio we do things out in the wild we
do things that are said what do things
that are happy but there are real life
stories that we think we are uniquely
positioned to discover so here’s a
little bit of a taste of what that looks
like let’s take a break for a second
great big story is the home of amazing
people doing improbable things like this
architect building an Arctic skyscraper
with his bare hands for this father and
son racing tiny drones and impossible
speeds
and this fighter who’s crushed every
stereotype on her way to being the
fattest in the world get away with these
stories and more every day at great big
story on Apple TV Roku YouTube Facebook
and great big story calm so one of the
things that we really looked at when we
decided to do this was it’s one thing to
have a really creative idea and have it
instinct about avoid in the creative
marketplace in the audience marketplace
but we really took a look inward and
said what have we built as a news
organization then we can actually
translate into a new be new business I’m
not talking about an experiment I’m not
talking about again a social video
department I’m talking about a brand new
standalone business I spoke to you about
the video infrastructure we have we just
have cameras and reach everywhere we
know what to do with video where the
we’re on the first the list of first
partners when new video platforms launch
when new camera companies launch when
read as new camera they call us so the
video infrastructure was already a given
advantage the speed and quality one of
the things that great big story we
published about three stories per day
three really really high-quality stories
per day shot from all over the world it
may not sound like a lot in the context
of cnn.com which publishes 300 stories
per day but when you’re talking about
the premium level of storytelling that
we do 3 is a lot
the reason we’re able to do that is
because the ideas keep coming the
stories that we find keep coming I’ve
been in a lot of different organizations
in my career and I can tell you one of
the hardest things to do is actually
pitch ideas and to receive pitches of
ideas and there are a lot of really good
ideas and a lot of really bad ideas they
get pitched and they never hear back the
person pitching them never hears
anything that’s a death knell for ideas
you will never get another idea out of
that person again we actually review
pitches every single day if you pitch
something you know that you’re going to
get feedback it may not be a feedback
you like but you’re going to get
feedback and you’re gonna get it quickly
that encourages more ideas that is a
newsroom mentality newsrooms don’t sit
on things for very long they have to
keep moving so that’s one of the things
that we transmitted from a newsroom the
other advantage we have is that we own
everything we literally own everything
we make we own every picture we’re also
not making things that are tied to the
news as I said we’re making things that
actually basically last a lifetime out
of the thousand or so stories we’ve done
so far I would say nine hundred and
ninety of them would be relevant five
years from now if you think about the
exploitable quality of all that video
and all those hours and hours of video
we’ve made it’s relevant forever and can
be repackaged and exploited that’s a
huge advantage and then the fourth is
audience data so CNN is obviously a
really big platform we are across our
digital portfolio the biggest name in
digital news period bigger the new york
times bigger than washington post’s
bigger than Fox News in addition to that
across the Turner portfolio Turner owns
CNN you’re looking at another more than
500 million social followers in addition
to that you have Time Warner and you
have places like HBO we have access to
all of that data so when we make
something that we think someone who’s a
really big fan of Game of Thrones and
Adult Swim is going to like we actually
have a pretty good shot at getting it
directly to those people that’s the
advantage of being part frankly of a
really big place it doesn’t weigh its
down it actually helps us be incredibly
precise so this is creatively sort of
where we think we are now this is super
subjective and you guys may disagree
with half of it and I think I made up
half of it and somebody else made up
half of it but I think it’s right we
really look at the news environment that
we all live in think about your Facebook
feed and it basically looks the same
every single day think about your
Twitter feed and it’s all about Donald
Trump every single day I don’t really
use snapchat
guys can tell me what’s on your snapchat
[Applause]
we think great big story fits in a nice
niche we we we looked at everything that
was out there from the highly
sensationalized good but highly
sensationalized content such as vice to
the overly earnest to the frankly just
sort of silly and we realized there was
a giant thing in the middle there was a
giant space in the middle for people who
really loved storytelling
we’re incredibly curious we’re educated
we’re busy that didn’t necessarily want
to give up
BuzzFeed because we all like BuzzFeed it
tastes good but it’s pretty low-calorie
a lot of us don’t just really identify
it with Vice but we get it to good brand
we thought and we still believe and the
evidence shows and I’ll show you that
there was a giant giant audience in the
middle of 26 to 27 year olds who live in
a city or on their second job live on
their phones watch a ton of video and
it’s proven to be right so this is a
little bit to give you like a this is an
average week in the life of great big
story I told you like these things the
variety is sort of all over the place
there’s this one this this Indian woman
I think she was like 84 years old she’s
basically the world’s best sharpshooter
we went in his story on her right
there’s another piece just right next to
her there’s this amazing craftsman
around pasta halfway across the world in
Italy that we actually did with Genesis
a Korean car brand we’re doing stories
on wildlife but not your average
wildlife story this is actually these
are that little monkey right there is
actually a robot
we found a roboticist in England who
makes fake animals to go out and
actually study endangered species he’s
the guy that made all the Penguins they
went into penguin film so this is an
average week what we’re doing we’re not
making lists
we’re not doing one thing over and over
and over again we’re creating an entire
world that we believe and our audience
is telling us is incredibly
serendipitous and that promotes a lot of
loyalty and excitement and discovery so
what the kinds of the kinds of things we
make so I would say that our bread and
butter is in that somewhere between that
two to four-minute range we have
incredible incredible engagement time
especially on YouTube in this building
that we’re sitting today most people who
watch our videos on YouTube watch three
and four of them at a time on Apple TV
which I think you’ll see in a second
some of the stats around that we’re
giving it getting an average dwell time
with almost an hour so if you think
about three minute videos I’m bad at
math but that’s more than 10 that’s our
bread and butter every day but we also
do longer things I was talking to say
heal from digiday and we were talking
about how publishers are because
everybody’s getting video capability
they’re starting to sort of like try a
lot of things and they’re becoming
production companies we’re actually
doing that from a very legit place we do
short films we partner with CNN films we
went out we’ve done probably nearly a
dozen short film so far the one you see
a capture of there is a true story about
the last mission to space by a little
and an Academy award-winning
documentarian we have big big
storytelling ambitions and we big we
bring big stories with those ambitions
this is where the name actually sort of
lives up to the product and then series
we actually with the within three months
of launching this thing we got an email
to our general inbox hey a great big
story calm and it came from some friends
of ours at The Weather Channel and they
said hey we know you’re just like
launched this thing or whatever but you
guys have you ever made a TV show I said
actually yeah a lot of our staff have
and exactly how to make TV shows six
months later
we’re delivering eight hours of
prime-time television for The Weather
Channel for at the time a brand for us
that had only been alive for around nine
nine to twelve months so we’re
functioning in a lot of different
formats in a lot of different places it
all goes back to our discovery no
storytelling this is just a little bit
about where we are or everywhere
basically if you’re watching a video I
do believe that connected TVs are going
to be an enormous future for us and we
have a lot of very big plans around that
and you’re going to hear a lot over the
next two to three months about our
investments in that space YouTube has
been a huge huge thing for our brand
Facebook is sort of like the beast you
have to keep keeping up with and we all
know the excitement of it and also the
downfalls of it YouTube is the place
where we’re finding incredible loyalty
incredible engagement and incredible
feedback so it’s also a place you’re
going to see us Double Down doubling
down on in fact I think it’s been taken
down but we actually created a fake
submarine in this very studio space that
was totally awesome and we used for a
shoot with the guys at YouTube spaces
we’ve reached who we thought we were
going to reach so it turns out our hunch
was true there’s a lot of 26 year-olds
who watch our videos and they’re
basically exactly we thought they were
going to be a little bit male mostly us
pretty much straight down the middle and
nearly all of them are on their phones
it’s an incredibly coveted demographic
both by publishers producers advertisers
platforms
everybody wants these guys and we
managed to build tens and tens and
millions of them this is an eye chart
the thing that you have to really
understand is really this bottom here
around January of this year
we started to see growth see growth on
YouTube that was incredibly impactful it
actually raised the boat of everything
else we did it raised the boat of our
entire brand one of the things that we
did do is we started being not afraid to
go longer
one of the biggest complaints we get
from our audience is that our videos
they want more of it they wish we could
make that story longer so we decided to
indulge that and that’s been a boon for
our presence on YouTube it’s been
incredibly incredibly powerful we had
tens of millions of dedicated fans like
when you might talk about as unique
viewers whether that’s a subscriber on
YouTube or Facebook follower but our
reach goes way way past that
every single day and then these are some
of the faces but we’ve had very little
marketing that’s the other thing we
didn’t do we basically said like we want
to have this big idea and Jeff that’s
gonna be great and we’re gonna make this
big investment in it and we actually
don’t want to scream about it we don’t
want to do a big ad campaign because we
don’t think it’s gonna work we actually
don’t think advertising a nutritional
way is gonna work for this we did invest
in marketing around our content on the
platforms but you didn’t see a giant TV
campaign or a giant prank campaign and
what happened was partners started
coming to us TIFF the Toronto
International Film Festival came to us
and said we love what you’re doing can
we do something together
Bleacher Report is a corporate cousin of
ours did the same thing Ted did the same
thing Madonna like reached out musicians
artists we’ve had more than 3000 earned
media mentions since we launched some of
that is because we have incredible
publicists but it’s also because the
content is just it’s just sort of catnip
for everybody so really quickly how we
make money like how do you actually turn
all this into a business this is the
part that that my bosses are most
interested in and I think is is critical
we are not we did not launch this
company to sell it like a lot of
startups we did not launch the company
as a project like a lot of media
companies do we actually launched it as
a standalone business so it has a legit
revenue model we sell sponsorships
that’s a huge piece of what we do and
you’ll see some of those brands we do
editorial series
six eight ten part series that we put
brands against we also take that into
more overly branded content we have a
branded content studio courageous that
is fantastic
so brands can be either really really
heavily involved in what we’re doing or
they can be associated with it and that
carries a lot of our business we also do
custom production which is basically
another word for saying when we make
stuff for other people just like The
Weather Channel or some of the streaming
services that you’ll see our stuff pop
up on over the next few months and then
content licensing I mentioned you guys
we own everything
it also means we can keep monetizing it
over and over and over and over again we
have packages of just food storytelling
that we can sell everywhere we can sell
it to an airline we can sell it to some
TV station and Japan which has happened
we keep monetizing and exploding our
video these are good names on this list
on our brand partner list the thing that
I think you should take away from it
that I’m I’m most excited about a is the
caliber these aren’t this isn’t your
local mattress shop or a car dealer it’s
also global about half of our
sponsorship business comes from outside
the United States the advertising market
outside the United States is incredibly
complicated and different and in some
ways easier in some ways there are fewer
go-betweens every place has its own its
own special circumstances but it’s an
incredibly powerful portfolio of brands
and they’ve been in a critical part of
how we’ve actually grown we’ve learned a
lot from brands we actually go inside
around when we do a partnership with a
brand we don’t just slap their logo on
it we actually go inside that company we
went inside Hewlett Packard Enterprise
which gave us this challenge like we
sell big boxes how do you story tell
around that and so we actually literally
went inside their company and talk to
their scientists
found stories that’s how we work with
brands and that’s been beneficial to to
us as well
the last thing I would sort of leave you
guys with is I get asked all the time
how on earth did you basically launch a
startup within a huge company and how on
earth are you still here number one
there’s some things we did in the
beginning to make it real and I talked
about a business plan earlier and this
is not the creative part but it’s the it
is a meaningful part we actually put a
real business targets on it if I was a
startup out in the outside world I would
take VC money and I would say you guys
let’s go build audiences and a platform
and we’re going to worry about revenue
later right let’s go get a ton of
Facebook views let’s go drive up all of
our numbers make us really attractive
and let’s sell it let’s exit out of this
thing that’s not what that’s not what
our aim has ever been we’re actually
building a real business and we signed
up for real metrics around the business
it made us accountable
it made us actually have to learn how to
sell it learn how to build it and
operate it that’s number one and the
second piece is and it’s worth repeating
is that we actually got buy-in from the
very very top in the very beginning it
was never framed as an experiment that
one department of the company was doing
we actually didn’t waste time trying to
compartmentalize it the idea was big to
begin with we went to our president with
it he endorsed it and then we put real
deliverables around it and that’s how we
built it inevitably it comes back to the
creative and the stories are fantastic I
encourage you guys to go check them out
but when you combine that creativity
with a lot of real acumen and
accountability I think you potentially
have something special so thank you very
much
thank you Chris so that’s a wrap for the
first half of the day I just want to
make a quick comment which is uh you
know you’ll never see at a tech
conference let’s use the example you’ll
never see Google putting on a conference
and then saying hey let’s give a call to
Facebook and Microsoft and have them
come and talk about how great they are
who’s ever seeing that that’s kind of
rare but that’s the beautiful thing
about the content industry is like it’s
not really a zero-sum game we’ve always
said that you know actually seeing other
creators come up with great content
actually helps you in a weird way
because so long as you get people back
on a platform like like figma like
YouTube or just the Internet then you
all benefit so when John and I start to
talk about this event as weird as it was
we’re like you know what we don’t really
want this to be so much about WatchMojo
we want it to be more about other
content creators big and small so
there’s a particular pride for me as an
entrepreneur to put up this event be
part of the team that puts up this event
and then have complex acquired by
Verizon or CNN’s latest project come up
and speaker and share the spotlight so
that’s one thing that I particularly we
love about the content industry and now
we want to kind of put a spotlight on on
the creators that are going to be the
next big brands so okay finally uh
that’s a wrap we’re going to have
cocktails and musical performances
including kilojoule caveman Dan Deacon
and puddles and on that note guys
puddles last night was on America’s Got
Talent
which launched anybody want to take a
guess 2006 also launched in 2006
WatchMojo I think we’ve solved the
mysteries of life we could go home
alright thank you very much
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