MrBeast Shares What It Really Takes To Become THE BEST On YouTube (Interview w/ MFM & Hasan Minhaj)

The way I like to work is like, I like to go basically wake up, obsess over something, go to bed, wake up, obsess, go to bed, like every second of the day until I just have a mental breakdown. I burn out and then I like take a day off or maybe a day and a half off and I like to go right back to it. So I don't like work certain days. I just go as hard as I can, every ounce of my entire body until I just crash.

All right.

In this episode, we are gonna talk about—

wait one second. Look, we gotta let the guy, MrBeast, actually do the intro.

Guys, in this, we're gonna teach you how to make a fucking million dollars. If you don't have a million dollars, we're gonna show you in this podcast.

All right.

That was way better than us. Yeah, that's right. MrBeast, the biggest YouTuber in the world, joined us on My First Million and Hasan Minhaj, one of the biggest comedians in the world. We did a 4-person pod in person. This is kind of amazing.

Yeah. So look, check this out. I think Jon actually mentioned this on the podcast, but about 3, 4 weeks ago, he said he's gonna create this thing called Camp MFM. So basically he rented a house, a big old mansion in North Carolina, and he DM'd like 20 different people, a bunch of different founders and a bunch of interesting people. But then he also DM'd MrBeast and Hasan, and he told them to come. I didn't actually think they were going to show up. And so we were just sitting here at night recording a podcast and they walked in and joined us and it was amazing.

Yeah, it was crazy seeing one of the biggest YouTubers in the world, one of the biggest comedians in the world. They kind of interviewed each other. And they talked about their creative process, what they're self-conscious of, what it's like to work for them, how much they put into each thing that they do. It was pretty nuts.

Yeah, it was. I mean, it was amazing. They made fun of me at first because I was nervous and I was. It was awesome.

Yeah, it was a big deal.

It was awesome. So check it out.

I think you're going to dig it.

Wait, hold on.

We rolling?

We're rolling. All right. We're live. We're doing it. If it's not recording, you're just not getting it.

Yeah, you're not getting it, dude. You're not getting Jimmy.

All right.

We're live. Wait, what were you saying?

This is the most interesting crossover ever.

Yes.

Yeah.

Why are the 4 of us sitting here? I have no idea. Let's put him on the spot because he seems the most nervous.

Me?

He's like the body language doctor. He reads body language good, right?

You know why I'm nervous? It's because I'm wearing these shorts. Yeah, bro. You're wearing the short shorts. We also got a live audience here. Why? Why? What is this? Yeah. Yeah.

There's 30 men in this house.

Why? Why is there a sausage fest? Give us answers.

This is the power of Sean's ear.

So listen, here's the deal. So the story was, is that you wanted to do this. And it happened in 3 weeks.

Yeah, I just hit up a bunch of people. Actually, you know what? The way it really came together was I just tweeted it out because if you do that shit, like, you know, just it's like a luck magnet. Good things can happen. And 100-something people signed up for it. I was scrolling through the names and it's like, what's your Twitter handle? And one of them said MrBeast. And I was like, but, but I was like, it's a Google form. Anybody could write MrBeast. I was like, oh yeah, whatever, some jackass. Then he DMs me, he goes, this sounds fun. And we don't know each other.

I don't know him at all.

And he's like, I was like, oh shit, that was real. Oh shit, this is on. We're going to do it now. And then I was like, he's like, where are we doing it? And I was like, where does MrBeast live? North Carolina. I was like, yeah, we're thinking about doing it near Duke.

He's like, okay, I'll come then.

And then I got everybody else in after that.

You follow him on Twitter?

Well, Ben from How to Take Over the World, like, retweeted him and I was like, who's this guy? And I tapped and he just tweeted like 5 seconds ago, I'm hosting an NBA camp for like entrepreneurs. So I was like, oh, this looks cool. And then I just— that's how crazy life is. I don't know who this is, but I mean, basketball sounds fun.

And then he calls me last week. He's like, yo, uh, I'm coming, but like, I don't know who you are. So like, what's your deal?

And here we are.

But you do that. You just walk around and call people.

Yeah. Well, I just like learning. I mean, that's how you just—

did you hear how he got connected with Ben?

No.

All right. So Ben over here, he is our producer and he hosts this amazing podcast called How to Take Over the World. And I get— how did you find it?

Uh, bro, this is gonna get so many levels.

Someone put him on to it.

No one has any idea what we're even talking about. No, they do, because Cliff, who's sitting there, told me to listen to How to Take Over the World. So I listened to it, who retweeted his tweet about the camp, and here I am.

So you know what's funny about the story? He's like, yeah, this is dogshit content, because on YouTube you had to be on point, like in the first 10 seconds you needed to like grip people. He's like, this is their podcast.

I've already gone over 20 ways we could optimize this better in my head.

What are they?

All right, what would they be? Let's go.

Already 20 ways?

Well, that's what this podcast is, it's a brainstorm.

We've already switched topics like 5 And we didn't really hit them with like a hard one at the start. Like, what would have been better if it's like, I don't know, like we told some crazy story or something, like to hook them, or like, I don't know, or me, for the ones who don't know. So then like they're like, oh, now I know I should have listened.

Like, all right, host the podcast for a second. So do our 10-second intro.

Guys, in this we're going to teach you how to make a fucking million dollars. If you don't have a million dollars, we're going to show you in this podcast. Like something like that. Now they're going to listen.

All right, so here's what's interesting. We got me and Sam, we got Hassan Minhaj, who's a famous comedian, Netflix special.

We haven't announced it yet, but yeah, sure.

Breaking news, we got Jimmy, aka MrBeast. Craziest crossover.

Yeah, it's a while.

You guys just met tonight?

We met like an hour ago. Yeah.

All right, give me first impressions. What do you think of, uh, MrBeast? He's a cool guy.

Yeah, he seemed really cool.

What did you think coming in?

I just knew he was a big like prank stunt. He's the, he's the voice of YouTube. He's the voice of a generation.

Or he's how you thought he would be.

Yeah.

So I thought, I feel like, I feel like his, uh, you're gonna get your turn too. I feel like his like curiosity, enthusiasm, all that stuff was really cool.

Yeah.

I, I listened to him on Rogan. He was really, he was really fascinating.

And what about you? What was your first impression?

Uh, I mean, kind of the same thing. Like it was, I mean, you were just easy to talk to, which I think was very nice. Like we were talking for like an hour.

Yo, Sean, Sean just turned this into Indian matchmaking so fast.

You're like, what did you say?

What did you hold hands? Just hold, he's got that ring on his finger. Take it.

Yeah, dude, you said— so he said something really interesting to me earlier. We were just— you and I were shooting the shit.

Oh God, what is it?

And, uh, we're, uh, we were talking about, um, business. I think you said Elon Musk is like— I don't know if you said hero, but you're like, I think he's like the pinnacle of entrepreneurship.

Entrepreneurship. Yeah, sure.

And I was like, well, what do you— what's going to be your SpaceX or what's going to be your like big rocket thing, you know? And you said, well, uh, Elon had Zip2 when he was around my age. So Zip2 was like his peer filing— his peer sharing service that he sold and made like $20 or $30 million. And then he took that and he did PayPal and then whatever else he did. And you said something like, you know, I think I can build like a $100 billion company, but if I'm being modest, I'll build a couple, uh, a couple at least billion dollar companies. But, but then, but, and then you go, but I don't really care about the money. I just love winning. I just want to win. And I was like, yes, I'm about this. I like that.

I mean, like, Money is cool, but you know, I live in my studio. I don't have like a mansion. I don't drive a Lamborghini. So it's like, I like money because it can, I can hire more people and grow my business, but not so I can like increase my lifestyle or whatever. So, which, you know, most people, when you say, that's why I prefer to say I love winning because it kind of encapsulates it a little bit more. Because if you just like, you know, talk about money, then people just think you just want to buy expensive stuff.

Do your employees do?

We went to his office today, or we went to his studio and he's like, took us on tour.

Cool.

This is where we blow shit up.

This guy's—

John blew me off, by the way.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, you, you're Canada flight delays blew him off.

Yeah, yeah, kidding, kidding.

Uh, but we, we walk through, he's like, all right, yeah, this is this boardroom, this is my office. And so we go in and it's basically like, imagine like kind of like a, a gaming chair, computer, that's standard. Next to it, just like two other objects in the room, just take any guess.

Uh, that he had?

Yeah, a Nalgene water bottle and, uh, just like a mattress on the floor, a bench press directly next to the desk. And then the walls were just like a Steve Jobs quote, an Elon quote, a Steve Jobs quote. There's like a timeline, like at this age Steve Jobs was here, at this age. Holy shit, you're motivated by that shit.

Stay ahead of it. Also, some of those Elon quotes aren't even real. I love to just put fake Elon quotes so if people read it to see if they're like, oh, that's inspiring, or just completely made up.

Well, they're not that insightful. One was just the one right in front of your desk goes, work super hard, Elon Musk.

That's one of the real ones. But I have my assistant like trying to find the dumbest things Elon's ever publicly said. So I can put mixed with all the real quotes just to see if people believe them or not.

Were you good at school?

No, horrible.

Really?

God awful.

Yeah.

Okay.

Yeah.

That was like, I mean, I would act like I was studying, but you know, I was filming videos. I actually, my entire high school career, never brought my book bag home or anything. I would just like throw it under like the bleachers and then in the morning I'd just grab it.

Your first video was what, you were like 12, right? Yeah.

Oh, actually I started making when I was 11. Yeah. Wow. Holy shit. Yeah. And it's crazy cuz I see 11-year-olds now and they're like this tall and squeakers and I'm like, How was I making videos? This kid looks—

Is your first video still live?

Uh, no, because I got embarrassed because people would play it in class. So I deleted my channel and then I made a new one when I was 13. So a little—

But the 13-year-old videos are still up?

Yeah, 13 or so.

Wow.

He has one that's dope. That's like a message to myself in 5 years. Uh-huh. Colin is shocked.

Dude, you know what he's talking about? So the greatest thing I ever did in my life is when I was studying for a history test, like back in a long time ago when I had like 8,000 subscribers, I was like, screw this. I just closed my book. I threw it on the floor. and I just recorded a video. I scheduled, uploaded a video for 6 months and I go, hi, me in 6 months. I think I'll have 100,000 subscribers, whatever. Or no, 10,000 subscribers. I was like, and then I hit stop recording, then hit record. Hi, me in a year. And I schedule up cuz you can upload videos to the future, a video a year out. It's like, you better have 100,000. And I was like, hi, me in 5 years, bro, if you don't have a million subscribers, you're a fucking idiot. Uh, and I just would talk to me 5 years from now and I was just like talking about the channel. But I filmed it when I had 8,000 subscribers a long time ago. And then I did Hi Me in 10 Years, blah, blah. So 10 Years hasn't come out yet, but Hi Me in 5 Years came out. My prediction was I'd have a million subscribers. Wow. So it goes live on the channel like 2 years ago and I had like 40 million subscribers. But in the video that goes live, it's like, here's the date, here's the time. I'm like a fucking stupid teenage kid and I'm like, I hope you have at least a million subscribers and maybe you're doing this as a job.

I don't know.

I make like 10 bucks a month right now. Like, I hope you can make it a job in the next 5 years. And that went public and I completely forgot I even did that. And I just, I was like, oh shit. I opened up YouTube and I saw it. Everyone thought it was, I thought it was one of the coolest things I ever did.

Wow. And you're like a little kid in it.

Yeah. And so wow. In like 3 more years, Hi Me in 10 Years goes up and I'm like, I don't remember what's in it. It, I'm just like, I hope by now you should be outta college. Yeah, you're definitely outta college. I think that's how I started it. And you should be doing YouTube full-time. Like, there's just no world you're not after 10 years. Like, you're probably making a little bit of money. I just hope you are. Like, I hope you didn't—

and how much were you at the time?

Uh, like, I was at 8K subs, like, making $10 a month. And so my prediction in 10 years was like, I hope you're doing this as a job. And so when that goes up, I think that's gonna be crazy.

And when we were talking today, you, like, you talk with a lot of certainty about, like, where you're going, what you're doing. There's, like, very, like, If everybody's got this knob that's like doubt, your knob's set to zero on doubt. That's my, that's my, I don't know, is that accurate?

Uh, yeah. Well, the thing is we, I don't know, we probably spend like 20, 30 times longer thinking of ideas than other people. We probably film like 10 times more than other people. We probably spend 100 times for a video more than other people. So it's like we put in the effort, but I don't, I don't know how to say where it's not arrogant. I just believe in what we're doing. You know what I mean?

Um, back then, like how much do you think you believed when you, when you recorded that video that that was actually going to happen?

Oh no, I mean, those were just different times. I was in the middle of bumfuck nowhere, North Carolina. So it's like everyone, you know, constantly wanted to remind me, you're not going to be a YouTuber, grow up, be realistic.

I think it's amazing that you never left North Carolina though.

Yeah, you're still in bumfuck North Carolina.

What are you talking about?

Yeah, I'm trying to make it not bumfuck anymore, but it's a work in progress.

Do you still rep it really hard?

Uh, I mean, I just, I got a lot, I mean, some of these people over here work there. I just got a lot of people and it's too much to move.

What was, what was your metric instead of subscribers and like views? When you were younger? Because with, with business, it's like revenue or employees. You guys are both business, but you're also like a more creative thing. So what was yours?

Yeah, when I was coming up, it was probably, can you do a set on late night? Can you do like a Conan set?

Yeah.

Could you, could you be on— I'll be a, um, I'll be a cast member of SNL. Like, those were the metrics, kind of those like legacy media comedy institutions. I'll be in a movie. I want to be in a sitcom. I want to be in a TV show.

And what'd it feel like when you started actually like, you know, The Daily Show and then selling out.

Yeah, that felt like a real, like, kind of checkmark. Like, wow, you've turned the corner.

Didn't you tell me that, like, right before that happened, you were living in a basement?

I was living in an attic, bro. Yeah, yeah. Attics are actually above sea level, but basements are below sometimes, you know? So yeah, I was living like a kind of in a not a great situation though.

How—

I'm amazed at your confidence, bro. The level of, the level of confidence, like the, in the video. No, just as a sheer amount of confidence you have, because I still think maybe a downside of comedy is you have to have like a very high level of— well, comedians are using self-deprecation and self-awareness to be like, you know what I mean?

Well, you told me something because I was like trying to be funny, right? You send me these like iMessage things that are like just gold. You just send me these voice notes, and one of the things you had said—

he was trying to write— he was like trying to do kind of like a comedy monologue.

Yeah, YouTube video, it's up there, 17,000 views, no big deal. Yeah. Um, so Wow. But you gave me a little hit.

You go, enough ego on this, man.

Bro, you started at 8K. I'm at 17K. I'm at least going to be—

yeah, okay.

But he says something, you go, comedy is low status game. You start low status. And you told me, is that a trade secret?

Yeah, it's like there's high status and low status. Generally, if you're low status, they're going to empathize with you. You know what I mean?

So what's an example?

You get on stage, you being like, I got 17,000 views in front of a guy who gets like 50 million views.

And—

but we're going to empathize more with you than we are with MrBeast in that scenario because you're like, oh man, you know. And if you're, if you're like funny about it and to be confident about, um, that— well, if, if you kind of own it, people are like, oh, like I—

even just now we did like an awkward icebreakers of the group.

Yeah.

And I was thinking about this because, you know, I— my prompt was say your name and say one thing nobody in the, in the room knows about you. Yeah. Which was basically like You can't be like, I'm MrBeast, I make a bunch of YouTube videos. You know, it's like you can't use your claim to fame. You got to use something else.

Right.

And everybody was saying something interesting. And then I think Sully was the first one who was just like, I played one game of Little League baseball in my life because I shit my pants and they wouldn't let me come back.

That was really great.

Yeah. And that's low status, by the way.

100,000 people are going to listen to that one. But he did a low status one where everybody else was saying a fun fact, like a cool fact about them.

Totally.

He went low and somebody else was like, You know, I remarried my ex-wife, which makes me either the biggest idiot in the world or I guess the biggest idiot in the world. Do I still remember those?

Right? Because he's like, hey group, share something no one on the planet knows. No one. And then 5 minutes later, all right, podcast, here's what they said. Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, shitting your, shitting your pants at Little League. Pretty.

Yeah.

Pretty low status. And then, yeah, being like, all right, I doubled back and married my ex-wife again. Like, yeah.

Like no one knows this.

Jimmy, were you confident as a kid?

In the career?

Yeah, just as a kid.

Uh, no, I had fucking god-awful acne when I was younger. I still have a ton of acne scars, so it made it even worse.

What are you not confident about? So you're confident in your work and your ability to hit certain goals, whether revenue target.

Yeah, actually, it leads me into, honestly, I'm still trying to get confident speaking in front of large groups of people, which made me want to ask you a question because we were talking about stand-up. Yeah. How, um, so let's say if I dedicated my life to trying to be a stand-up comic, how long do you think it would take for me to get good at it? I mean, what's the typical curve?

Everybody says it takes you 10 years to get good, but I just think it all depends on, um, like your natural capacity and inclination for it. Like, there's some people I've seen when they're open micers, they're amazing, you know? They just have great stage presence, they have great stories, they're, they're amazing on stage. So there's people like that, comics that I've met where I'm like, the first time I saw them, they were amazing. Um, Jerrod Carmichael was like that. He was incredible. He was just incredible. He was so comfortable. We would do open mics and he would just Everybody was doing— was turning left and he was just turning right. Like, he just— his, his vulnerability, his stage presence. People would do their set, he would do things where like it'd be like a Conan showcase and everyone would do their polished material. You're like, hey, what's up, I'm Hasan, and you know, dating's hard. He would just get up and he would just off the dome like kind of do a brand new set that night. And you could tell, you could tell, you're like, oh, this is kind of crazy.

So how long do you think it would take him to get good.

I don't, I mean, it's, that's like the question you just asked is like, how long would it take me to be as good as Ariana Grande at singing? You're like, how would I even? They're like, it's not, it's not a hack. Or if you asked, if you asked like an MMA fighter, like how long would it take me to get as good as you? Like it's a, oh, thank you. Um, it's a, see, that's the low, you put them in low status. You offered the two waters to me.

Now I feel weird.

Now I got to put them on the side. No, I got to put them on the side. No, dude, low status.

I spent my whole life trying to be high status.

You guys all got water. Now we're partners. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I have to, I have to, I have to give MrBeast his water. You know what I mean? Jimmy, what are you, what are you like? You legacy media hack. I just gotta, I gotta pour the water for him and the, uh, fuck outta here.

Is your company ran like a normal company at all? Or, uh, and what would your employees say about working with you?

Uh, I mean, Twig, you wanna just come say it? Damn. I don't know.

Yeah, that's a Twig question. That's a Twig question.

I don't know.

Yeah.

Have you had like, how did you learn how to run a company? Do you ever had you, did you have to hire someone?

That's what's hard. Cause like, Yeah, sure. He wants to come on in. There's a couple questions. Yeah, you take over. So the question was like, what's it like working with him? Oh, it's great. I mean, it's always different. No, it really is. Here's the thing. Here's the thing. No, here's the thing. Here's the thing.

Here's the thing. We know it's great.

I'm fired. I'm already fired.

I'm already hot. Like, but how's Tariq gonna answer that?

But not, well, listen, he pays the bills.

Let me ask you a better question.

Yes.

So the better question is, what's the fucking employers? What's the like extreme, either extreme good part or extreme bad part about working with them? We know it's overall extreme.

Actually, I will say that right now. Yeah. So extreme good part is the experiences. Like I've done experiences that I've never could have imagined in my entire life. Like the traveling, the doing the coolest stunts that we've ever done. The worst part is, I guess, not knowing like what's next in terms of routine. And he knows this best too. Like we all kind of go through it if you work at MrBeast. So, but that comes with it, you know what I mean? And that's something that you kind of have to accept. But yeah, I think that's my answer. All right.

Well, and the reason I was asking was because you are your favorite boss.

I'm a great person. So far, 100%. Yes.

Well, no, I was, I was asking because my employees sometimes would complain that I'd be like too aggressive. Changing things too much, but you seem more aggressive than I am.

Yeah.

And for a certain type of person, they like that. But for you to achieve your goals, you're gonna have to have a lot of people. And then every once in a while, process, and every once in a while, infrastructure, and every once in a while, planning.

Are you a perfectionist?

Well, of course. Yeah. Um, I, you know, it just, I just like to make the greatest YouTube videos possible. And that's, that's literally all I want. So yeah, I mean, if it's not the greatest video, I just won't upload it. And so after you scrap a few videos, we kind of, everyone, You know, just kind of starts to figure it out.

Does it scare you that you can't stop? Do you ever feel like, damn, I'm like, I'm, I'm just throwing all these coals on the, on the embers of the algorithm.

I like to use a better analogy. It's like a treadmill. We're on like 12, like full speed. And I've been going at it a couple of years. No, it doesn't scare me. But so like I was telling him, the way I like to work is like, I like to go basically wake up, obsess over something, go to bed, wake up, obsess, go to bed. Like every second of the day. Until I just have a mental breakdown. I burn out and then I like take a day off or maybe a day and a half off and I like to go right back to it. So I don't like work certain days. I just go as hard as I can, every ounce of my entire body until I just crash. And somehow that's sustainable.

What time do you sleep?

Uh, right now, usually around 3 AM. Wow. And then, and then, and then you get up at like whenever, whenever Rohan or one of them knock on my door. Tariq will wake you up and just like, well, yeah, people will roll me out of bed. They're like, you need to go watch this video so we can submit it. Or I need help with a thumbnail or you gotta go film. It's like, I don't know. I, I'm kind of, I, they tell me what to do. I don't dictate.

Well, I'm just shocked at like the numbers. So like you're the, the, I, I don't, I'll let you reveal any numbers, but you've some big numbers for revenue for your other businesses.

Yeah.

And you have to have infrastructure for that. And so that's why I was wondering, I was like, cuz you, you are like this.

Oh, gotcha. Yeah.

So like on the stereotype, you're like this crazy creative person who's disorganized and that's perfect.

Yeah.

But to sell that much of candy and or of, uh, burgers, like you gotta be Yeah.

So those are all separate entities. So for our snack brand, we hired Jim who helped build RXBAR and we built a team around him. So that's a whole independent company that doesn't even work out of our studio. And same thing with Beast Burger. So that's the beauty. I like to just find people who are just the best in the goddamn world at their job and then just empower them and give them money and let them—

so how many people work at the studio?

Uh, in the studio, like 60, cuz we don't have enough space to fit everyone. So that's why we're trying to build more, but building things just take forever.

Do you, do people like working for you, you think? No, this is the reason I'm asking. It's like these like creative types. I'm like curious about like, because the goal is to make one of us like a big deal. Everyone is working for that. Whereas a lot of other companies it's like, no, there's like this.

It's not necessarily that either. There's also certain projects where I'd be like, I'd love to learn from you. So there's been shows and movies that I've done, like The Morning Show. Like I've never done a sexy 1-hour drama. I want to learn from Reese Witherspoon. I want to learn from Jennifer Aniston. I want to learn from the show creators. Like, how do you do that?

How do you shoot that?

What's that lens? What are you doing that? Is that a 50? Is that a 75?

How do you do that?

How did you do that tracking shot? Why did you do that tracking shot? Let me see the script. Let me see the future script. There's all these things where I'm like, I just want to absorb. I just want to see how you do the whole thing. You know what I mean? Like, and that's an additive, like, positive value for me because most people don't have that access to that.

Yeah, I mean, example is Tariq got to meet his idol today.

Oh man. Bro, Tariq, Tariq, you got to set the bar.

Yeah, we had told them that you were coming today to the thing and like the look of disappointment when they saw it was, I was the only brown guy there. They're like, that ain't Hustle.

They're like, yo, Hustle's changed, bro.

I'm not trying to be funny on top of it and they were like, what the fuck?

The camera really does that, Ted Powell, bro. Oh, don't do that, bro.

Don't do that.

Don't do that.

When we were at your office, so you have like a big Elon, Steve Jobs, Like you admire these guys. That's why you like the How to Take Over the World podcast. Cause you like learning from them. What's a story that you heard that you're like, that like stuck with you? Like you remembered, you referenced it, like kind of changed the way you were thinking.

From those two in particular, I think the biggest thing is like that Steve became a billionaire from Pixar, you know? Um, not even Apple. And so like the fact that he could go to this, just not even hardware company, more creative storytelling company. And just kick ass and create films like Toy Story and all these other bangers. Um, and just, just build that company up to whatever it was. Like then Disney buy for $7 billion. And meanwhile, Apple's just falling to the ground and about to go outta business. And they, you know, buy 'em back with NeXT and all of a sudden rebounds. And basically the way they did it, which is getting rid of 90% of products and just focusing on like 4 or 5. I mean, it just shows like the power that one individual had, even though both companies had, yeah, I don't know about Pixar, but Apple had thousands of employees and Pixar probably had at least hundreds. And despite all of that, you know, one man can make that much of a difference. Like the power of having good vision and just not relenting is like invaluable.

Do you think your, your biggest strength is probably your curiosity? You're down to do anything and try to do it.

Well, so I think what you have to do is you have to always be learning, right? That's how you can like, so like with our ideas, right? Cause we like to do original ideas that no one's ever done before. Um, and I, I might've told you this when we were talking on the phone. Thing is like, if there's a hypothetical fruit in Japan that if you eat it, makes it where you can jump 30 feet taller, right? If that exists in this world right now, you didn't know it existed. Yeah. So you couldn't come up with something around that. It's very hyper-specific, but there's like a million things like that in the world that like, if you don't know about it or you're not intaking the inspiration, you can't really come up with something. Like if I were to try again, the standup, like that's how I would try to do something different. Right. I just try to take, intake a bunch of different, uh, information and see what spawns in my head. So I try to always be learning.

Would the MrBeast version of standup be like, I'm gonna do the longest set ever. I'm gonna do the longest comedy set ever. Would it have to be— would that be the MrBeast, like, twist on it?

I would have to find something different because obviously whatever is currently out there, because I have a bunch of people on my team who are stand-ups, like, it's been done a bunch of times. So we'd have to figure out something different, which I would love to one day just because it seems fun. Because Tariq talks to me about all the time. But in general, you got to always just be in taking inspiration from different places, whether it be different podcasts, books, or different knowledge. I have people that I pay that just teach me things. Just whatever, like things that— what's that? I think I don't know.

What do you mean by that?

Like, they'll just find things that they don't think I'm aware of or show me cool things and be like, I don't think you know this is a thing here, read about it. And so that way I'm always like, what's an example?

And how many, how many of these people do you have?

This is awesome. Right now, just like 2 or 3.

Yeah, Jimmy, they call those people, those are teachers.

Yeah. Okay.

I mean, he's like, they'll sit me down for about an hour at a time. And what's wild is they'll focus on a subject and it's like, what's going on right now? You know, I never thought about that.

Pay him a couple hundred grand. That's why we keep him around. That's why I keep— no, but it's like different topics. So yeah, like the last one was like, uh, about just like crazy online, um, like which, like the, these like little things where they'll upload a file to Reddit and then like inside it's an encrypted code takes you to a website, which takes you to a book and like these little like logic puzzles and like seeing if that inspired me. I don't know. It's just random things like that.

I'm black.

So in point, I'm trying to always expand my knowledge well in my head with new things I can draw inspiration from.

I was giving him props earlier where I said so much of people who kind of rev the algorithm are usually being divisive. They're saying something that's going to make you mad, right? Like I have a joke where I make fun of MDs and DOs and DOs get really mad. And, you know, it's like that's like a niche physician's joke, but people get upset. But what I was saying was so cool about what you do is I think really what you've tapped into is joy and spectacle and wonder. Which is, which is like a counter to that. And it's very rare to see that really take off on the internet. So what made you feel like, I'm gonna do that versus do videos that, that might, that might agitate people per se?

Yeah, well, I do think in general it is a little bit easier just to piss people off and get attention.

For sure.

A lot harder to do good and get attention. So that's why I think a lot of people don't. But for me, because we just had this ability to go viral, it's just kind of like There's a world where I make videos and I don't help people, and there's a world where I make videos and I do help people. One where I do help people is just a little bit more fun, so that's why I do it. I don't— I, you know, PR-wise I should have a better answer, but that's kind of the truth. Our software is the worst.

Have you heard of HubSpot? See, most CRMs are a cobbled-together mess, but HubSpot is easy to adopt and actually looks gorgeous. I think I love our new CRM.

Our software is the best. HubSpot.

Grow better.

What creators do you guys look up to?

Oh, I'm curious to see what you say.

What creators do I look up to?

YouTubers, podcasters, comedians.

Podcasters.

I was going to say creators.

Yeah.

It could be anybody.

Anybody.

I think one of the first people that really inspired me, I think, was probably Steven Spielberg.

Really?

Yeah.

I mean, he's one of the greatest storytellers ever. What was the first movie that you saw where you're like, oh my God, I was blown away? For me, it was Jurassic Park.

Um, as a kid, I, I only watched YouTube growing up. I've seen—

that's it.

Yeah, I was made fun of all the time.

What was the last movie that you watched?

Uh, well, I watched the Spider-Man 3 one because— but I never saw the earlier ones.

Really?

Yeah.

Like you have no time for movies?

No, it's not that time. I just, I don't know. I, I need to, like, I need to go back and watch Star Wars and Harry Potter and all that stuff to get brought up on culture. But I was just like, uh, you didn't—

and so you didn't see Squid Game? You just did the Squid Game?

I watched it. Yeah, before we did it. Like, I wouldn't count that as a movie. Like, I watched a ton of anime, but yeah, movies. And weirdly enough, like, growing up, I didn't listen to music or watch movies, so I was like so out of culture.

Wow.

There's just part of why I was an introvert.

There's this Conor McGregor quote where they're like, you know, he was on BBC or something. They're like, oh, it's a bigger appearance, not just niche UFC thing.

Yeah.

They're like, what do you think about this team or this game? He's like, he's like, you know, the, uh, yeah, that one you said, they're great.

It was like Arsenal or something.

Yeah, he's like Arsenal. And they're like, you don't know anything about Arsenal, right? He's like He's like, I don't watch the news. He's like, I don't watch— I don't follow the news. I don't watch sports. I don't do anything. He goes, I have lost my mind to the game. He goes, I am obsessed with my game. I have lost my mind to it. I don't have time for anything else. I don't want to know about anything else. I only want to know about this game. When we were hanging out, I feel like you had that vibe where you were like, uh, you said a couple things. You were like, I decided I was gonna be a YouTuber and I was gonna make great videos and it didn't matter if I died the most famous YouTuber of all time or 90 years old with 1,000 subscribers. I was gonna make great YouTube videos. Like, that's— yeah, that's what I decided I was going to do. And that's all I do. I wake up and I do that thing.

What was that first YouTube video that you saw that like kind of filled you with that wonder where you're like, wow?

Oh, well, this guy actually got hacked like a very long time ago, this like Call of Duty YouTuber. And they like leaked his earnings and he had made like $100,000 a year the last few years. And I remember being like 10 and be like, what the fuck? They make that kind of— they make money doing this. And I was just so mind blown that they actually made money.

They make more than my mom.

Yeah, it was right there when I was like, okay, I'm doing this. This. Like, I just don't care. I'm being a YouTuber or I'm gonna fucking die trying. I just don't care. And that, like, the second I saw that was actually possible, that's when I was like, that's it. And it's funny also talking about like obsession and stuff like this, cuz it's funny how it changes, right? When you're like, and maybe it's different now cuz social media's a little bit cooler, but when I was younger, like no one wanted to be a YouTuber. Like most people when I was 13, 14 didn't even have phones yet. Like it was kind of like a little bit of an older thing and maybe it's just cuz where I grew up, but it's funny cuz back then people are like, get a life, stop being a fucking nerd. Like, you're too obsessive, you weirdo. And then now it's like, oh bro, he was so obsessive. He's— it's so great.

Like, right. It's seen as a positive quality.

Yeah. And it's so funny, like looking back on our life, going from a fucking loser nerd who's too obsessive and won't go anywhere to like, damn, that's really inspiring. And it's like, damn, that was very hurtful back then, but I'm glad it's inspiring now. And so it's funny to see how it changes, but I like to bring that up because if there are younger people or parents who have kids who are obsessive like this, that's typically what happens. Like younger kids don't understand that and it's different. And so you don't watch the newest South Park or the newest movie or whatever. So you don't talk about the same thing. So then people are just like, oh, well, you know, fucking sucks.

You know what I mean? How would you, how would you deal with that? Cause you have kids. I have kids. If they go, I want to be a Twitch streamer. I want to be a video gamer. You're like, let's go.

I had the same realization. I was like, oh, so wait a minute. We spend the first 18 years of our life trying to fit in. That's how I felt in school. I was trying to fit in all the time. What do people do that's cool? How do I do that thing?

Right.

And then once I was like in the adult world, it's like, oh shit, now we spend our whole life trying to stand out. Like, what was all that other shit? Why was I— why was I so focused on fitting in if the rest of your life you're trying to stand out? And I just realized like, oh shit, standing out has been the game the whole time. And the way you stand out is not by trying to figure it out. Just like whatever you're obsessed with, just let that ride because you'll go on a path that nobody else is going to copy. And then you'll, you know, you'll land in a good spot. So if my kid, like my daughter's 2 right now, right? If she was into gaming or she was trying to be a creator, all that stuff, I would be all in on it because I know even if that's not your endgame, following your obsession is like the thing to do in life. You know, that will always work out. But, you know, if you like actually go down that path, what most people do is they hedge. They like this thing, but then they see this path that's more proven or shiny. Or they don't know if it's going to work, so they only half try, right? And then it's like that hedge is actually what gets you. It's not that this career path was that hard. It's that hedging is like, you know, what was your major in college? Biology.

The ultimate hedge.

The ultimate hedge.

That was different. I just didn't know.

I know.

I didn't know what, uh, well, what I think is actually, you could be doing the like YouTube, TikTok. Sure. I feel like you can look at his videos and be like, all right, I get it. I get why people like this. I get why this pops. Probably pretty tempting to be like, could I go get 50 million views, 100 million views? That seems nice.

No, to do what he's done, what he's done. I'm not going to say I'm not allowed to say it. You said you, you spend X number of dollars every video.

Oh yeah. I'll let you start it off.

You can say, yeah, our average view is around $1.5 million.

I mean, that's—

well, he does that now. But go look at his archive, right? It's like he took a plastic knife and tried to cut a plastic table and it took him 48 hours to do that. That's a, that was, that's a $1.50 video, right? Like, that's not a 1.5 million. That's 1.5.

Counting to 100,000, zero dollars.

It's a different thing. It's a different thing. So that's like a different type of skill set and muscle. So the types of videos he's producing, standup is different. If, if, if a musician was here, if a DJ was here, it's not all the same just cuz it's on YouTube. So we all do different types of media. This is a different type of media.

Are you tempted to like, you know, dabble?

Yeah. We talked about this, right?

I mean, I, I, the only, the, the thing that I, uh, would be, um, I would be reticent of is what if I have, I have to put this thing out and I don't believe in it or I'm just doing it just to do it. That's the, that would be the problem. But I have to put up a new video every Tuesday. That's the—

just delete the video.

What do you do if you, if you—

sometimes we don't upload for 2 months. You just only upload when it's a great video.

Yeah.

That's all that matters. Yeah. So I think it's dumb when people stick to like a schedule and they're like, oh, the video is not great, but I upload every Tuesday. It's like, who cares?

What are you guys trying to figure out right now? Because I think if you watch a lot of interviews with people, it's like they— it's all buttoned up, it's all figured out, they're already successful, it's all working. And then the person who's watching these videos, typically somebody who doesn't have it all figured out, and they're just sort of like, ah, that's different, like, that'd be nice to have it all figured out. But the reality is nobody's got it all figured out, right? Like, we were in your office, the whiteboard's full because you're thinking of new— yeah, like, where are we going? What's not figured out? We got to figure it out. So what's on both y'all's plate of like, what are you still trying to figure out in your game?

I'll let you take it first.

Yeah, Sean, what are you trying to figure out?

Yeah, what are you trying to—

Yeah, come on, Sean.

I'm trying to figure out— I'll tell you, I'm trying to figure out if I want to go all in on content creating.

Wow.

Like, I basically built businesses. I have the most fun doing this, but I don't know if I had the most fun just because it's a hobby and like, you know, I only get the good. I don't put all the work in.

If you love it, then go all in. I mean, it's not going to be less.

Do you love it?

I love doing it the way we're doing it now.

Yeah.

If I was like him, obsessed every hour of every day trying to be like, how are we going to grow this channel? I might not love it as much.

Did you like doing the Twitter thing?

Uh, for a period of time. It got old. Yeah. Yeah, it was fun to chase the number. Can we get to 100,000 in like a few months? Yeah, this is fun to chase a number, but that didn't—

yeah, I got sick of it too.

That didn't last. So that gets me worried. But that's the thing I'm trying to figure out. It's like Should I go all in on content creating or should I stay with creating businesses? Which one is like, what, what do I want to be when I grow up? That's the question.

I'm asking myself that exact same question too. Cause sometimes like when you're, when you're create business first and then go to content, I'm like, oh man, am I just going to talk about doing it all the time or am I just going to fucking do it?

Yeah. So I, I know exactly what you mean.

Yeah.

I feel exactly the same way. What about you?

Uh, right, right now. I'm trying to stay loose for this game tomorrow. That's what I'm trying to do. I'm not trying to get tight, man. I'm 36, bro, pushing 37. Like, he's a young boy. Like, he might run us off the court.

Yeah, yeah. He was like, he's like, what are you gonna do tonight?

Yeah.

I was like, yo, James and me. And I'm like, dude, my L4 is hurting. Like, my hamstrings are kind of tight from this flight.

We got to his studio and he was like, he's got a hoop there.

Yeah.

He's like, oh, we got, we got 6. Let's play a game. He's wearing his like Yeezy slides. I was like, bro, I need 15 minutes of stretching and then like, you know, I need like proper medical attention.

Do you guys want to go ball?

Yeah, if there was an indoor court, we would do it. Yeah, I played, I played 21 with Jimmy right now. Yeah. Okay, that'd be a fun— that would be, that would be a fun video. That would be a fun video.

You want to make it happen? Yeah, let's do it. You can play 21, find a court somewhere around here.

We'll play 21.

Amazing.

We'll play 21 or Horse. Yeah.

We'll wrap up with this, with your answer.

Okay. Oh, what was the question?

What's not figured out? What are you trying to figure out in general?

Oh, God, everything. So I'm just going to say a funny joke to change the topic.

All right, for sure.

Basketball. How to not strain my legs tomorrow.

There you go.

There we go.