Transcript
00:00:00 Jeff Sarris
The right tools in the wrong hands are less valuable than the wrong tools in the right hands.
I just realized I don't have the intro.
Welcome back, Explorers. This is Useful Not Famous, the show where we, something, something and try to be the most useful people you know. I'm Jeff Sarris.
We changed it. I'm Amara Andrew. I literally, I always have my phone here for that exact thing.
Well, and today I was just like, "Yeah, I don't need it." And then as I was like, I was looking at something on my nail and then I was like, "Oh, no!"
Launching a Voicemail Call In Tool
So, real quick, before we get started, we now have a call-in. So, if you want to leave us a message to be featured on the show, go to call.show/usefulnotfamous. It'll be in the description and that's actually a platform that we, I, have built for all the podcasts.
Yeah, all the shows that I manage, it makes it so much easier. It is I'm actually super proud of this, little web app. So, if you have a podcast, too, call.show and you can, get one for your show.
It's a very cool app and it's beautifully designed and everything.
Like I'm excited I'm like very proud of you for it, which I know sounds so stupid, but like I know how hard you've worked Like that sounds like diminutive, but like you've worked really well on making it something and it looks absolutely stunning, cause I know what it looked like before and then what it looks like now. And it's just I don't know, it's like it's really cool to see what comes out of your out of your little noodle.
Yeah, it started as like, "Can I make this actually work?" So, it basically works like a voice memo on your phone, like as though you're using the voice memo app, but it's just a website specifically for the show. So, I don't know. Yeah, I'm I'm proud of it.
That's very cool. And it has like all the features of like, like how long it is and if this person's called I don't know, it's like it's actually really cool. I didn't know what to expect, but like I knew you were doing it, obviously, so I knew it was going to be cool.
Well, yeah. So, we've recorded hundreds of episodes, like for ourselves and other shows, of podcasts, hundreds, like literally, probably around 500 episodes of podcasts.
Let alone the ones that we've sort of been connected to elsewhere. But everything we like On so many of the shows, we like to have call-ins because it's nice to have listeners' voice on the show. It doesn't mean it'll be every episode or even frequent at all.
Maybe it's just once in a while.
Yeah, cause you have like a whole backlog for one of your shows.
But even with SPYR, like that's something that's a big anchor, a big sort of cornerstone of that show is answering listener questions in various ways. There's different mechanisms and place for that, but yeah.
Yeah. Tell us a joke, tell us a tip, ask us a question, leave a raunchy voicemail.
Okay, like this is not This is not what this is for. But call.show/usefulnotfamous.
Yeah, like don't spoil the brand new tech.
Evaluating AI Chatbots and Tool Value
But yeah, so the right tools in the wrong hands are less valuable than the wrong tools in the right hands. So, this is something that I think is pretty apt for today with AI.
But we're all trying We're all looking at all these brand new tools like call.show.
Real quick, like, "I made this because…" But no, but I made that because exactly what we needed didn't exist, so now it does.
Which it's it's very specific in what it's offering and nothing else, which makes it exciting. That's why we're doing Highway, why we're doing all these other tools to be useful to us and then other people who do things like we do.
But with AI now, we have infinite tools available, like all the chatbots for every different AI that's out there can do anything for us. It can answer any questions. It could answer our phone, reply to emails.
It can make photos, make videos, make music. It can do everything. We have all the tools we ever wanted.
But the issue is sort of the right tools in the wrong hands isn't really valuable. Like we need to build our skill set around how to create something worth creating.
So, that's what I was going to ask you, like what's your interpretation of like the wrong hands? So, like let's say, yeah, now you have access
I have a list of names. No, I'm just kidding.
Let me go grab my phone. Yeah, it's so weird not having it, but I was just like, "Yeah, I don't need it." I'm trying to just have my phone around me less and less, and I do feel so much better. Like even if it's just like a What's that called?
Psychological. Yeah, where it's like a fake out kind of thing.
What the hell did you just say? Oh, yeah, so what's your what's your definition of like the wrong hands? Cuz you can have access to basically anything now.
So, is that somebody then who's like not Well, I'm not going to put words in your mouth. What's your what's your take?
Well, I don't think there's a concrete anything. It's that we need to be capable, because then no matter what tools we're using, we can achieve greatness. We can do so much more, and this isn't just AI, it's anything, anything.
So, is that even like a character sort of thing? Like being motivated or like disciplined or looking for certain things? You're being an entrepreneur.
So, I think those can be characteristics of the person. But like these microphones, these are very nice microphones.
These are tools. Now, anyone can have this tool. Like it's the right tool for recording audio, specific versions of audio, but in the wrong hand, someone who has absolutely nothing to say, there's no reason for them to be recording audio because they haven't developed anything worth sharing.
Like that sounds like harsh, but I feel like it's a good just example. There's two cameras here recording us. These are very nice cameras.
Anyone can buy them. Everything is accessible in the world now. We can buy anything, we can get anywhere in the world within 23 hours, I think.
No matter where you live, you can get anywhere on a plane in less than 24 hours, I believe. But that doesn't mean you should.
Call in if you want to fact check him.
But it doesn't mean you should. You know what I mean? Like we can do anything.
We can buy anything. We can use any tools. But is that actually doing anything for us or anyone else?
Yeah, cuz just because you have the tools, it doesn't mean that you have the like creativity or even the drive to make something. Like how you were saying with having the mics, like we all buy gear all the time that Well, not all of us, maybe, but some of us will buy gear and then it'll just sit there, but it's because you have the intention of starting something or you really want to start something, but then it's like, "Oh, but what do I actually do with this?" Cuz like I know that's sort of a thing that we've heard from a couple people where it was like, "Oh, okay, cool.
I like bought all these things." And then it just sits in their office or in their living room or
Well, yeah, not even a couple. Like I'm I've been doing this since 2009, and I've talked to so many aspiring entrepreneurs. But the I was going to say real quick, the problem is "aspiring".
An aspiring entrepreneur is never an entrepreneur because they're always aspiring. It's like you have to start. My podcast, if I ever bring it back, has been was it called Starting Now, because it was all the origin stories of people actually starting, not aspiring to start.
Yeah. I forgot what I was going to say.
Sorry, but that was the big thing. So with the gear, so there's so many people that over the last 17 years that I've talked to, that I know, that like I want to do well. Like I'm I've pushed so as hard as I can as a friend or coach, consultant, whatever, without being like I can't make anyone do anything.
You can lead a horse to water, you can't make it drink.
They can drown in the pool. I think I said that one day and I was like, "Oh, that was dark."
But like that's something that we talk about a lot, where it's like is it the want of the actual product and like the act of like doing it, like doing the creative act? Or is it purely just having the end product, so just having it out there and having it finished, but then also wanting what people see other people who do things get and receive?
Does that make sense? So like
I think you're saying the outcomes, like money.
Exactly, yeah. Like or what they perceive as money. But really, it's the core tenet of Useful Not Famous where, yeah, they have fame, but they're probably not making money from it.
Or they're making money from something completely different and then this is the platform. But they have the two things in place.
Social Media Follower Earnings and Monetization Reality
Yeah, statistically the famous people, quote-unquote "famous", that you see on social media, statistically they're not making more money than you. I wish I could remember the stat right now because I had it like a year ago or whatever that I think it was people with 500,000 and more followers.
Yeah, on average, they made $343 a month with half a million followers. And over a million, on average, they made something like
Yeah, it was like nothing. It was like $2,000 a month or something.
And that's That is average. So, you have you have a MrBeast. He's over a million followers.
He makes His company's valued at almost $5 billion, and he has 500 employees, and he does 20 hour a day work days, seven days a week. Like, it's a different level. But then you have most people who are like, "I'm I'm a food influencer.
I go around the whole world and I hide behind the camera because I'm scared." Now, at least they started. "And now I film things and it gets all these views. I have 453,000 followers, but I can't make any money, so I actually need to go back and get a job.
I've done this full-time for 16 months and I can't even pay rent anymore." And that's a problem because we think that's what it is, that fame is everything.
Human Storytelling Versus Hiding Behind Gear
How you were just saying about somebody hiding behind the camera, I noticed that with myself this week. I saw something, I like literally don't remember what it was, but it was someone that I know and I follow, but I didn't know it was their content cuz I never watch my videos with sound on if I'm like watching something.
I didn't know it was their content, and it didn't have them in it and I just like swiped away. But then I saw their name at the bottom and I was like, "Oh, wait, it's like this person. I should watch it." But it was really funny because that was my immediate reaction where like if I don't see a face immediately, I don't really want to watch it, which is interesting.
And like so many people, I think, forget that, like
People. You're like, "Just let me get past this." So many people. That was like, "Just play it cool." My English accent came out.
I'm French today. So many people So many people. It's like it's hard to think of that cuz the easiest thing to record, which like you said, I'm glad that people are actually like making something.
Like that's like good job.
It is. So, and the problem is this is an opposition to sort of where we started, too. Cuz we want people to start, but also the wrong tools like So, there's two sides that we're talking about here knowingly that they are conflicting.
That's why like it's tricky, but like just starting, but then also having yourself in it. I know it's really scary for a lot of people, but like once you get over that hump, it's like the easiest thing possible and it has so much more value with your face in it, and that's how you stand out. Cuz like think about your favorite celebrities or even like the favorite shows or influencers that you like to watch.
Like you have a connection with the person. Otherwise, if they're not in the actual content, you're not used to seeing them, and then it's just kind of like, "Well, you can replace them with whoever," cuz there's like no personality or like facial recognition.
That's PBS. PBS sort of conventionally is sort of a voiceover with B-roll of history. So, you have no Except for a couple travel shows like Rick Steves and Yeah, a few people who made sure they put themselves in it.
But like you think of all reality TV, sort of maybe the most successful media pre TikTok, social media type stuff, infinite scroll stuff. It is purely human-driven story. It has nothing to do with anything else.
We're not following a group of cars that are being driven in races. Like, it's not that, it's the person driving the car. It's the person shopping for clothes.
It's not the clothes. No one cares about the clothes. Like, you care about it because the person wants it.
Well, yeah, we all love watching human things because it's so interesting to actually get to see like the inside, whatever. Like, I don't even know what the psychological function of that is, but it is very interesting to watch how other people move through space, do things, like what they say, think, even if you don't agree like at all, it's still interesting.
Creating Content With Smartphone Cameras
Yeah, so the wrong tools, right hands. So, you need to start, but that doesn't mean you need to buy microphones, and lights, and cameras, and editing software. Like, you can grab your phone and start.
Like, there's YouTubers who have never graduated beyond their phone. It shows, but they also, some of them are full-time YouTubers. And you might see a video pop up, like we saw one recently, that the guy is it's so passionate.
You see how much he loves it, which is great, and the videos are doing very well. But at the same time, it's like, "Oh, wow. This could be so much better."
But he still did a really good job, cuz I still watched it and I was like, "Oh, this is fun." Cuz again, it's all about the concept and the premise. Like, it had a really good premise, could have used a little bit of refinement in the storytelling and everything, but that's fine. But like, yeah, his passion and his want to do it, he was like, "I'm doing this.
I can have the shittiest microphone, the shittiest camera, but like I'm going to make this happen." And he's doing really well.
Yeah, so like we critique it, but like he should have one of these cameras like we have.
Yeah, but I also love that he doesn't.
Well, that's the thing. His the level of what he's doing now warrants it, yet he doesn't have it cuz he is the right hands with the wrong tools currently, but that's fine. Like he's built something successful, profitable, like full-time career out of it.
Well, yeah, and he's like taking us on the journey of it, which is really fun. Yeah, so it's not getting I know. I feel like so many people limit themselves cuz they're just like, "Oh, when I get a camera," or "I get the right space," or I get Like we literally in our living room.
Like we have the nice equipment, but that's because we run a video marketing agency.
Whatever. Same room. But we don't Like you can't let that stop you, because especially if you have the like, "Well, no, I need to create something.
Like I want to make something," and you want to have that, just like yeah, we could have our phones set up right now, which I think we actually tried at the very beginning.
Yeah, we were talking straight at them.
Yeah. Which, obviously, we had the cameras, but we were trying to figure out something else. But, yeah, you can literally use anything now, which is amazing.
Like you're you're sort of not hampered by anything anymore. Like even a video that we watched yesterday, like wasn't done very well, but it was done well in the concept. Like the And we're only critiquing the visuals of it because this is literally what we do for a living.
But like he had the idea and he just did it, standing way too fucking far away from the camera. He was like all the way over there, but like I love that he did it and he was doing a really good job. I forgot where I was going with that.
But, yeah, just not being stuck on, "Oh, well, when I do this. Well, when I do that." Cuz like I know I do that, not in the same respect, but in other areas of life, it's hard. Like
It's like, "I'll be happy when."
That's what I was just going to say. It's like, "Oh, well, I'll be happy when X," or "when I live in a sunny place," or "when I do this," and it's like but why is that tied up in that? Like you can be happy anytime.
I could be happy right now if I felt like it, but I'm not. Just start bawling. That'd be so sad.
I'd be like, "Okay, cut. End of podcast." But that's part of my book that I'm reading right now, "Psycho-Cybernetics". It's a very good book.
That has been very eye-opening for me in a way. Like, yes and no, but part of one of the chapters
Yeah, yes and no. It's you have takeaways from it. Like I think, see, that's the thing, the ultimate optimist.
I'm like, "Oh, yeah, it's just all yes. We won't take everything from anything ever." Like this episode, last episode, like hopefully there's something that you can take from it.
Because you're listening right now. It's not like if you're listening. It's like, well, if you hear this, you're listening.
Now, they just have it on. Oh, that could even be true. Oh, no, it'd sink in.
But if yeah if there's one little thing that someone can take, and that's why I think podcasts are so valuable now, too, is we have this community aspect. We have the voices of other people in our ears, and it's like, "Oh, you know, I didn't think about that, that, that, that, that, but now I'm doing this."
Yeah, it's very valuable.
But yeah, wrong gear, right hands, right hands, wrong gear kind of thing. Once you have once you're sort of the right hands, once you have the vision and the what, the like what for kind of thing, then you can address constraints. So, you mentioned we were using our phones.
Eliminating Podcast Setup Constraints and Friction
The reason we started that way is because the constraint that stopped us from doing this show was set up and teardown. We didn't We hated spending a half hour, 40 minutes setting up what we were going to record, and then a half hour, 40 minutes taking down what we recorded, then editing, then posting, then like all the things.
And trying to make clips.
Yeah, so we were like, "Okay, how can we just make it the simplest possible? Let's put the phones in the middle."
I thought you were asking me for a fist bump. I was like, "Okay." Here we go. Ding!
But let's just put the phones in the middle. So, that worked, but then it was like, "Okay, this isn't up to our standards." So, now how do we address the constraint differently? We ended up getting this little Let me see if I can get it.
Little recorder, Zoom F3. We have these mics. We have This all packs down into our camera bag when we travel.
It takes up, if you're watching, you can see it takes about that much total space for all the gear. And when you turn the pouches, it's about that thick.
Yeah, literally just the width of the microphone.
Yeah, so it's about it is so tiny. And it is crazy that we can do that. And this takes no time to set up.
We have a light that now we have a battery on it. We don't even plug the light in.
We have our two cameras that are just on tabletop tripod, like everything is just like setup, teardown, go. And we're able to do that not because we worried about having the right gear first, cuz if we wanted the right gear, we wouldn't have bought this gear. We would have bought other podcast gear because this is what podcasts look like.
It's what they use. It's how you do it.
Yeah, even like the mics. Like somebody recently asked us like, "Oh, well why do you hold the mic?" I don't know, we just like it. Like one of my favorite podcasts, they hold the mic and I find it really funny, and then you're just like, "We should just do that."
Well, yeah, because, again, this is easy. We don't have to This If I just unclip this, we're done. This is like I unclip this
You're done. I'm going to keep talking.
But I unclip the mic right here, and I put it away. It's done. I don't have to worry about a big arm to hold it.
I don't need tabletop I don't Nothing. It's a cord.
It is so simple. But constraints are the thing. Once you sort of are Once you've developed who you are and what you're doing, you can do so much more because then you're you're attacking constraints and getting them out of the way as quickly as possible.
Focusing On Ideation Over Buying Equipment
I know what it is. It's what we talk about all the time like off camera. The gear is the easiest thing.
So, hard things are hard. The gear, you can just click buy, add to cart, whatever, have it shipped to your door, then you have the gear. That's the easy part.
Or I can decorate the space and make it look like a podcast studio. There can be some challenges with that, but overall that is a very easy thing to do, especially now.
But money, money is the limiting factor.
So, unlimited money, you can We could buy If we had unlimited money, we could buy a building in any city in the world, buy the best interior designer, buy the best audio engineer, buy the best and be like, "Okay, set it all up for us." Like that's a very easy problem to solve. You just throw money at it and then it's done.
The hard part is the ideation. It's the what do I talk about. It's the what is this show.
But that's where everyone who I've heard say, "I want to do X," that's where they get stuck, and I don't blame them. I'm not like talking shit or anything, but like that is hard. Like coming up with the, "Okay, well now what do I talk about?
What do I say?"
I would say, though, usually they don't know that's where they're stuck because they focus on the gear. It's, "I will when…"
And that's what I mean. Like it's it's easy to focus on, "Ooh, well, the camera. Like I'm going to focus on that and put all my attention in that." That's like the easiest thing you could think of.
It's like, "Well, no, what is it?" And then if you like We've asked a couple people like, "Okay, well, what is it?" And it's like, "Well, like I think it'll be this." But like or not even that. If it was even that, I'd be like, "Okay, cool. Let's go here." But it's not knowing what it is, but wanting the outcome and the end product.
But because you see other people have it. And again, this isn't to be disparaging, but it's just like do the hard thing, and that's the most rewarding part. Like hands down, because then once you figure that out, everything like falls into place.
Yeah, then it's limiting factors, and how do you get those out of your way? And like this isn't just for podcasting. Like you mentioned it that way, but this again, I've done this for 17 years.
This is 80 to 90% of the people I've talked to is this conversation. And it's a lot of That isn't four people. Like I've talked to many, many, many, many, many people over these years.
It is a lot of people.
No, it's like every a lot a lot of people.
Cuz everyone's aspiring. We all want something different on the other side. The grass is always greener, is like a cliche.
But cliches exist for a reason. Like it's it's true. Like, oh, we think things will be better over there, or different over there, or whatever, but we don't always take action to figure out if it is.
And that's really what we're all about is just action. Do it and you'll figure out your way. It's stepping stones to something else, but you won't know what the something else is until you get close enough where it's one stone away.
-huh. Well, yeah, like something I wanted to do for a while is bring back my personal podcast, By Amara, and it was just talking about art and history news, like weird things that happened that week. And I loved doing it and I loved having the clips and everything, and like just I loved what the show was because it was stuff that I was curious about, but it was so much work that like people don't know, obviously, because I'm curating all these stories and trying to make it make sense for like a show format.
So that was a limiting factor, it was time, and especially cuz at that time, too, we were traveling literally every single week for filming, which was quite a lot. So, like the time was a limiting factor for me, and I just didn't make the time for it because it wasn't a It was a lot more time than it needed to be, but maybe I'm bringing it back.
Probably not because now we're working on another project, but
Well, yeah, and all the hyper local stuff. So sort of what you learned doing that
Then went to MAVEN. We do it for other people. Now has come full circle.
We do it for them and for our hyper local stuff. So, same idea. So doing news, doing scoops, like
Conceptually, it's the same thing. It's just everything But right hands. Like, right tools in the right hands.
Oh yeah, I have endless ideas.
Like it doesn't matter what the tools are because, yeah, you've you've done the reps to figure out what you want to attack and go after.
Well, and I have so many ideas, but I find it easier for me to just do the ideas versus trying to translate my idea to other people, which is a flaw of mine cuz it's it's hard.
Well, it's hard, because I have an idea of what I want it to look like and just what it should be, but I have a really Why are you laughing and smiling at me and pointing in my face?
Human Interaction and Brain Health Research
This reminds me of a brain researcher where I just listened to him talk, and he said one thing that stuck with me. It was about Alzheimer's. It was about avoiding dementia.
How What? There's like a nunnery, say, and they would check all the brains when the nuns would pass, and not all of them, but there was like a period of time, and they found that so many had all of the hallmarks of dementia, but they never experienced it. They had the amyloid plaque, they had all the buildup, they had everything about the physical brain said they should have had Alzheimer's, or dementia, or memory loss.
They never had it. But it's because this was the quote, what it made me think about, cuz it's not a flaw of you that you can't translate this to people. It's the hardest thing for our brain is other people.
So people get dementia when they don't interact with other people regularly because the brain acts like a muscle, and it starts You can think about it this way, like as though it's atrophy-ing, but basically if you're not doing difficult things, there's I don't remember the name of the section of the brain, but there's a section of the brain that all that it does is handle difficult things.
So if I if juggling is difficult and I don't know how to do it, that part of the brain will light up as I'm trying to figure trying to figure out. As soon as I figure it out and I keep doing it, that brain stop that part of the brain stops lighting up cuz it's not difficult. You have to always be doing difficult things to keep your brain healthy throughout all of your life.
And the way that he framed it is the most difficult thing for the brain is other people. So, the nunnery, they live there, the convent or whatever, forever. They live there their entire lives with a group of people that hopefully they get along with okay.
They won't get along all the time. They won't agree all the time. They will always have the most difficult thing for the human brain in their vicinity.
They'll always have other people. And if we want to avoid dementia, we need to always be surrounded by other people, because otherwise we don't have Like this, why I like where the show went here, is we sort of we push on the topics like we do off camera with each other, and I think that's what keeps us sharp is we're not always just like yess-ing everything, we're evolving together.
But all that to say, you said it's a character flaw that it's easier to do it yourself than it is to have other people do it, and I would say that's just pure fact just how it works. Like it'll always be difficult with other people.
Yeah. I just wish I could be better with it because I have grand ideas in sort of what I would want or envision for like what would make it like really captivating on camera, but also then that's my take on it and not the other person's. Like that isn't true to who the person is.
I don't know. It's just interesting. That does make me think, too, when you were talking about the nunnery of the book that I'm reading, and basically once you lose your goal, and it's not goal in like the traditional term of like, "Oh, meet your goals," but once you've lost essentially your reason to live and to be,
That's kind of it. Like you're you're gone. Like you lose that thing where that like wakes you up every day and gets you excited, and that you want to go do.
Cuz humans, like we are a goal striving people. Even if you might not think of yourself that way, like we all are. Like you at least have one goal that you're working toward whether you realize it or not.
And I find that so fascinating. But then that's why you can't have everything that you want, because then as soon as you get all of it, then the goal post keeps moving. And then you either, hopefully, it goes in the right way in a good territory, but a lot of times it goes in sort of a bad way.
And that's why, you know, people get addicted to really bad drugs and do all sorts of crazy cuckoo things.
Goal Striving and Purpose Among Entrepreneurs
Well yeah, when they have unlimited money, things get weird.
Because that was the goal was to make money, and then it just kind of like You know what's interesting, though? This is actually a perfect it's a perfect thing to wrap on, but I'm sorry. To end the episode on.
Think about the archetype of the person who, once they have effectively unlimited money, they spiral. -.
They're the famous people. So maybe musicians, maybe artists, they're people who their art, even if maybe that's influencer or whatever, is it. They no longer have something to strive for.
Yet the richest people in the world today, the Elons, the Bezoses, the they're engineers. They're problem solvers. They're doing things that 100% of their day is attacking new problems that are hard for their brain.
And the money wasn't the end goal, or the fame wasn't the end goal, it was actually, okay, like, obviously, we all need money, I'm not stupid, but that was only a byproduct in a way. It was like, "Okay, well no, I want to keep like Well, what if I did this? What if we do that?
How about we push it this way?"
That is really interesting.
They haven't spiraled into oblivion like a like some pop stars and things that you can think of who really just like, "Wow, what happened?" They just They lost all purpose, all meaning, all reason to strive for anything cuz they had everything they could want.
Yeah, that's interesting.
I feel like that was a little unlock.
Yeah, think like an engineer, think like a
A burping. I was going to play it off, but
Not like that. Well, I heard it. Okay, thanks for tuning in and go to call.show/you/ call.show/usefulnotfamous to leave us a message, and we'll feature you on a future episode.
Yeah, or leave me a burp.
No, please don't. You keep asking for things I don't want. Okay.
Bye!
