Episode 120 features James Gaddis, a former journalist, currently a digital marketer of many hats, who’s channeling his nostalgia and passion for storytelling on YouTube.
We talk about crafting a story, being on both sides of the camera, digital marketing and change, comfort zones, snap judgments, we attempt to replace primary with firstiary and much much more …
Mentioned and Helpful Links from This Episode
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00:00:00:05 – 00:00:23:06
Agent Palmer
Previously on Agent palmer.com. Mr. S is a tell all for the chairman of the board. Palmer’s trek continues with Star Trek The Next Generation. And Jess is still out there fighting the good fight for citizens who agree with her. And for those who don’t. This is The Palmer Files episode 120 with James Gaddis, a former journalist, currently a digital marketer of many hats who’s channeling his nostalgia and passion for storytelling on YouTube.
00:00:23:20 – 00:01:08:09
Agent Palmer
We talked about crafting a story, being on both sides of the camera, digital marketing and change, comfort zones, snap judgments, and we attempt to replace primary with first theory plus much, much more. Are you ready? Let’s do the show.
00:01:08:14 – 00:01:43:57
Agent Palmer
Hello, and welcome to the Palmer Files. I’m your host, Jason Stershic, also known as Agent Palmer. And on this 120th episode is James Gaddis. James is host of nostalgic. That’s nostalgic because he’s giving you some 80s and 90s nostalgia from Alaska. He wears many hats as a former journalist and a current entrepreneur, digital marketer and video creator. So be prepared for discussions about process and a healthy dose of storytelling and tips about research, plus being on both sides of the camera, learning, being the journey, keeping focus, getting outside of a comfort zone.
00:01:44:06 – 00:02:08:32
Agent Palmer
How long does this feel? Getting lost in media? Sometimes, if you can’t remember, leave it alone. More physical reading. The Pomodoro technique. Too many tabs, focus, YouTube, and much, much more. All of that is coming your way shortly. But first, remember that if you want to discuss this episode as you listen or afterwards, you can find all related ways to contact my guest, James Gaddis and myself in the show notes.
00:02:08:46 – 00:02:33:38
Agent Palmer
There you will find links to James’s YouTube channel. YouTube.com. Slash nostalgic. That’s nostalgia and his other pertinent links and socials. Don’t forget you can see all of my writings and rantings on Agent palmer.com. And of course, email can be sent to the Palmer files at gmail.com. So without further ado, let’s get into it.
00:02:33:42 – 00:02:57:29
Agent Palmer
Jimmy, you were in broadcast journalism and now you have a YouTube channel. And that seems to be like someone. And I could be, fishing here, which I don’t mind doing, but like, that seems to me like you still had more stories to tell that you couldn’t just always tell in broadcast journalism. And you were like, I want to.
00:02:57:34 – 00:03:06:05
Agent Palmer
I want to keep going. You weren’t, like, fed up and done with it. And like, I’m out. Is that the case?
00:03:06:10 – 00:03:27:00
James Gaddis
For the most part. Oh, well, I was fed up with broadcast it, losing my job, getting laid off. They say you haven’t worked in media or you haven’t worked in broadcast news until you’ve been laid off. So I kind of became part of the club. Okay. Many, many, many of my friends have been laid off or switch professions or, you know, just gotten out of media in general for whatever reason.
00:03:27:05 – 00:03:50:37
James Gaddis
And, you know, I felt like, hey, I’ve spent almost, almost 20 years either in front of the camera or behind the camera and took all of these things that I love to do. I loved shooting, telling the story through the lens, telling a story in front of the camera. And I love the 80s and 90s and all the stuff I grew up with as a kid.
00:03:50:51 – 00:04:08:46
James Gaddis
And so I said, you know what? I do want to tell more stories, but I want to do some more research. I want to dive into things, that I did love as a kid and learn more about them. And so essentially, that’s what the YouTube channel is about. It’s not so much, hey, I’m the expert. And let me tell you about X, Y, and Z.
00:04:08:46 – 00:04:36:28
James Gaddis
It’s no, I have a lot of surface knowledge about the things I grew up with and loved, but I don’t know a lot about them. Right? You know, so I get jacked up when you hey, you know, like, look at those He-Man figures. And, you know, just. I’ll lose my mind. Yeah. Let’s go look at those He-Man figure I love He-Man, but if you had a a deep conversation with me about the lore behind it or things along those lines, I’d only have a certain amount of knowledge, that I could possibly share with you.
00:04:36:28 – 00:04:45:07
James Gaddis
So my goal is to just learn more and share that experience, with the, with the subscribers, with with people that are watching.
00:04:45:08 – 00:05:09:19
Agent Palmer
I, I think that’s maybe one of the most, noble reasons to start any kind of, channel, whether it be the written word or on YouTube or anywhere else, because I think a lot of people don’t want to share the journey, and they don’t want to share the deep dive. They want to be like, hey, look at me.
00:05:09:24 – 00:05:44:21
Agent Palmer
I know that an episode three of the fourth season at the 12th minute and oh, by the way, I didn’t look this up. I just knew this off the top of my head. And it’s like, that’s fine. You know? Like, I mean, I just I joked like, I the amount that the tonnage of like dif vastly different interests that I have and the useless knowledge that comes with all of them, like I, I was a, I grew up playing Magic The Gathering and I’ve gotten back into it.
00:05:44:26 – 00:06:08:59
Agent Palmer
I still have an encyclopedic knowledge of every card that existed up until 1998. The ones more recently, the like, the ones in the last 25 years, not so much. Is this information relevant to the game now? No. Is this relevant to my life? No. Is it in there? Absolutely. Can I get rid of it? No, it’s it’s it’s there.
00:06:08:59 – 00:06:37:29
Agent Palmer
I, I, I, I don’t know what to do with this because like occasionally somebody will say something and it’ll pop in. And the same with like sports trivia that I know, it’s like, oh that number. Why is that number ringing? Oh that that okay. Yeah, that. Because that number reminds me of this story from this season. Yeah, I, I like the idea of you taking the time to dive into what you don’t know and explaining, like, hey, this is what I learned.
00:06:37:36 – 00:06:43:52
Agent Palmer
Isn’t this cool? Because, yeah, it I, I almost want to know more.
00:06:43:59 – 00:07:03:44
James Gaddis
That’s. Yeah, that’s that’s my hope is that you’ll feel that way when you’re done like that. You want to learn more with me? You know, of course you want to come back to the channel, and subscribe and, and just kind of join me on this, this journey of learning more as I go. And that’s been the that is truly, you know, they that’s truly been the fun part.
00:07:03:44 – 00:07:21:25
James Gaddis
You know, most people think that all the hard work is, you know, it’s the journey, not the destination. The journey kind of is because it’s amazing, the rabbit hole that you end up going down because you don’t know as much. Right? So you’ve got to start somewhere. And one article leads you to something else, which leads you to something else which lead you to.
00:07:21:32 – 00:07:41:59
James Gaddis
And then next thing you know, you’re like, I had no idea I ran this deep. You know, I just the the just the littlest things, how far back or how much maybe work went into something that seemed very simple on the surface. It’s kind of. It’s kind of wild what you don’t know until you know it.
00:07:41:59 – 00:07:42:11
James Gaddis
So.
00:07:42:15 – 00:08:16:02
Agent Palmer
So the question I would have is, how are you structuring yourself really? Because like, I know, you know, I haven’t done a deep dive for the blog in, well, go with years. Let’s just go with years. Okay. And, you know, the two deep dives that come to mind are I did a deep dive on deep, the, the animation house that did, like, Inspector Gadget and a bunch of those kind of things because I, I don’t know, it came up one day and I was like, what ever happened to it?
00:08:16:02 – 00:08:38:11
Agent Palmer
And I went down that rabbit hole and I wrote that post and that was. And the other one I did was like a deep dive on the history of coffee. Nice. Which other people have done too, but like, it was fun getting in there myself and being like, well, these two histories, like one’s telling this story and one’s telling this story and like, why are these not the same?
00:08:38:16 – 00:09:01:20
Agent Palmer
But like, you go down these rabbit holes and they, they kind of uncover other things, right? So you have to be disciplined to stay on your, your, your one topic, even though you’re finding, like all these other things. And I guess I just want to know, like, information is like the villains we learn about as Hydra. You cut off one head and two more appear.
00:09:01:20 – 00:09:31:55
Agent Palmer
So like when you’re going down, like, are you disciplined in, like, you know, staying on task or are you, like, I’m all I’m, I’m allowing myself to go off and like, just do another thing. Like, how are you with that? Because I know I’ve personally struggled with like, like, you know, three hours into the researching like, this is like seven posts, like, I can’t do this in one or what have you like or, and is your journalism background helping you?
00:09:31:55 – 00:09:32:47
Agent Palmer
I guess,
00:09:32:52 – 00:09:55:53
James Gaddis
100%, was going to be my answer. Okay. So you go out and you’re out for five, six hours, working on a new story, right? That you you need to come back. You’ve talked to three, four people. You’ve got, you know, an hour’s worth of sound bites or something along those lines, but you’ve got a minute and 30 a minute 30.
00:09:55:53 – 00:10:11:03
James Gaddis
You’ve worked all day, right? You could you could create a half an hour documentary with the amount of sound bites that you have collected, but you’ve got to put this story out in a minute and a half. You might get a little bit of time before and after the story, you know, to as the reporter to, to front it.
00:10:11:03 – 00:10:30:14
James Gaddis
Maybe, you know, live on the scene or something along those lines, live in the studio and that gives you another 20s then you have the anchor intro, right? So it’s always broken down into these segments, right? The anchor has a little bit of information to give, tosses it to you. You’ve got a little bit of information to give.
00:10:30:23 – 00:10:46:38
James Gaddis
Toss to you. Or we called it a package, which is the story. All right. You’ve got your minute and a half. Come back out to the reporter, another 10s to give a little bit more info. And then the anchor tag, they wrap it up, they might have a little bit more info. So you’re talking two minutes. Yeah. Something along those lines.
00:10:46:46 – 00:11:16:05
James Gaddis
So yeah. If they don’t cut your time. So yeah I take that experience and that is been a big benefit when it comes to diving down a rabbit hole of, say, you know, the the first ever animated. What was it? It was a commercial. The first time we saw He-Man animated. Okay. Right. They could have made this a 20 minute long video, but I tried to try to keep focus.
00:11:16:05 – 00:11:36:03
James Gaddis
Focus is always the thing in a story, right? What’s your focus so that you don’t go astray. And if you learn some other interesting things, you need to know how much time to give them. And then maybe if it’s if it’s something you can break out into a different story, save it for another video, and then that helps you grow this list.
00:11:36:08 – 00:11:42:58
James Gaddis
You know, that you can work on if and when time allows, which is it doesn’t, but.
00:11:43:02 – 00:11:55:47
Agent Palmer
Well, because this is the family channel is your passion project, but you you where like I mean, I guess can I ask how many hats exactly do you wear.
00:11:55:51 – 00:12:19:34
James Gaddis
Like I do, I’ve got a few. I run my own business, so that takes up a majority of my time. So I’ve got, I do social media, social media management, digital marketing and video production. And so I package all of that, for clients on a, like a monthly retainer basis. So I’ve got a handful of clients that I’m doing work for every day.
00:12:19:39 – 00:12:42:02
James Gaddis
I’ve got a few people that I, you know, that work for me, for a few of those clients doing the social media. I’ve got an editor if I need to do some to take some of the load off, but that takes up a majority of my time. And then YouTube is secondary. I would love one day for YouTube to become, first year.
00:12:42:11 – 00:12:46:26
James Gaddis
What? Primary? Primary? Yes. Yeah.
00:12:46:30 – 00:12:49:55
Agent Palmer
Although I like First Theory first series so much better because.
00:12:49:55 – 00:12:50:24
James Gaddis
Let’s roll.
00:12:50:24 – 00:13:00:20
Agent Palmer
It back. It does go. It does go much like at least from a poetic standpoint. First theory pairs much better with secondary.
00:13:00:25 – 00:13:27:14
James Gaddis
Yeah. Why isn’t it. That’s I’m going to look into that one. But yeah it’s it is definitely secondary. And I do it when I can. And that is why I think YouTube is a beast. And it, it’s a, it is a tough one. You’ve got to feed the beast. So they say I there’s some folks who gets some significant numbers, you know, and they post maybe once a month, but it you know, it’s a tough, algorithm to figure out sometimes.
00:13:27:14 – 00:13:36:03
James Gaddis
I think it’s one of those where I think, you know, you need, you know, what you need to do. Do I have the ability and the time to do it?
00:13:36:03 – 00:14:12:14
Agent Palmer
Well, I think I I’m not trying to be contrarian when I say this, but I think a lot of that has shifted in the last two years. And I think, I mean, you’re in social media, and I used to be in digital marketing. And the one thing I keep seeing is that, as the pillars have slightly fallen and shifted of the different platforms, kind of changing whether it’s changing algorithms or changing ownership or just the user base shifting.
00:14:12:19 – 00:14:42:11
Agent Palmer
You know, we from 2012 to about 2018, we had a great six year run where Facebook did this, Twitter did this, and Instagram did this, and YouTube did that other thing. And I think it shifted and people are a bit more wary of putting everything into one thing. And so I think from, from the side of like the this podcast is my passion project.
00:14:42:16 – 00:15:08:45
Agent Palmer
Do do do what makes you happy right now man. Like because the one thing that I’ve seen more than anything else is burnout from people chasing when the algorithm, the algorithms out of your control, if that shift, if the wind shifts like we’re all boats without a single sail, like like when the when the tide changes, the tide changes.
00:15:08:45 – 00:15:38:41
Agent Palmer
Like we cannot like occasionally if it is your full time job, you might be able to get a sail up and change because everything else shifted. But for the most part, those of us with more than one hat or more than one thing like, if if the creation process, if the research process, whatever process is the one that makes you happy, like I I’m I’m here for it.
00:15:38:41 – 00:16:07:55
Agent Palmer
And the other thing is we’re getting to a point where content has become a dirty word, and people will watch your video and go, well, he’s reading off a prompter and he doesn’t seem to be happy, like, like or versus like, oh, like he genuinely is telling me this because he’s excited. He found this thing. And, I’ve, I’ve tried to, I’ve been reading every book in my house.
00:16:08:00 – 00:16:24:53
Agent Palmer
I don’t know about you, but I’ve collected quite a few books that I don’t know how I got, and it’s challenged me to read outside of my comfort zone, for I mean, I, I don’t know, like, I do we ever really have a comfort zone when it comes to reading? Like, I guess I’m reading things I wouldn’t normally read.
00:16:24:57 – 00:16:45:33
Agent Palmer
Okay, I’ve tried to challenge myself in terms of like podcasts and YouTube videos to go out there and again, experiences, because some of the things that I’m like, well, it’s on my shelf, like I got it from somebody has some value. I mean, it’s a printed book. It’s got some value to someone, somewhere. Sometimes it’s me and sometimes it’s not.
00:16:45:33 – 00:17:11:49
Agent Palmer
But like, I think you need to expand and I’m, I’m trying not to like, reduce the size of my bubble and my sphere of influence to just like, oh, well, I like these three things. It just feed me these three things. And when you do that, you see some of the worst in some of these places where it’s like, that’s a person reading off a teleprompter who could not care, who doesn’t care about me.
00:17:11:53 – 00:17:17:27
Agent Palmer
It’s like, what do you what the why are you doing it? Why? And you know.
00:17:17:31 – 00:17:47:37
James Gaddis
Yeah, I think everything, anything I put out is typically something I’m going to love. I haven’t started to chase the algorithm yet or, you know, make any assumptions as to what I think. I’ll ask people, obviously. What do you want to see on the channel? What you know, what kind of content do you want? Because the people that have been kind enough to subscribe up to this point, they they matter, you know, and if I want them along on the journey, then you know, I want to be able to do some things with them, so to speak, that, you know, they’re on board for, not just always choose what I want to do.
00:17:47:37 – 00:18:05:45
James Gaddis
And getting out of that comfort zone and doing something that I’m not familiar with, who knows what kind of world it can open up. It’s like when you, you know, when you you judge or you don’t choose something on Netflix or whatever streaming service because the cover image you just like, man, I don’t think so. I don’t think so.
00:18:05:45 – 00:18:19:30
James Gaddis
And you know, and then perchance you happen to watch it and you go, wow, that was really good. But it’s amazing how we you, you just based whether or not you’re going to watch that movie on a essentially on the thumbnail, thinking, I’m not going to like it just because.
00:18:19:30 – 00:18:45:32
Agent Palmer
So I love it. I have the perfect analogy because it happened today. My, my partner and I love twister, the original twister. It’s like it’s one of those movies that we will just watch. If it’s on, we’ll watch it or we’ll just throw it on. And, during the Super Bowl, they teased, twisters, the, the sequel.
00:18:45:36 – 00:19:16:52
Agent Palmer
And so we sat down and we watched the trailer, which is when when you watch the trailer for twisters. It’s devoid of all the humor and, like, human emotion that you got from some of those ancillary characters. In the original. And I was like, well, hold on, what’s the original trailer like? We don’t like these are things that are we don’t remember these things.
00:19:16:57 – 00:19:41:09
Agent Palmer
So we went back and we watched the original two versions, like there’s two different versions of the original trailer or two different trailers that they and both of them are very similar to the sequel. There’s no humor, like it’s all about the The Storm. There’s no fun in the chase. And like, passion that like, is one of the reasons I love the original.
00:19:41:14 – 00:20:01:55
Agent Palmer
And so it leads me to believe that I don’t know why I watched twister the first time, but it wasn’t the trailer because I watched the trailer today for a movie I love, and I went, yeah, I wouldn’t watch that movie based on the trailer. No. No way, no way. So I might give the second one is shot because maybe there maybe it’s hidden behind there, right?
00:20:01:55 – 00:20:30:25
Agent Palmer
But like, you have to click on that thing like I, I try, I, you know, I try and take, all suggestions from people that I meet, whether on this podcast or friends and just go, all right, I’ll when I get the time, I’ll watch that because you whether you liked it or not, you want you recommended it or you brought it up.
00:20:30:39 – 00:20:43:34
Agent Palmer
And so it’s a way to get out of my comfort zone. It’s a way to not watch it, to watch something new. And I think, I think people are stuck in bubbles. Holy moly, are we stuck in bubbles. All of us.
00:20:43:34 – 00:20:59:35
James Gaddis
Oh for sure, bubbles are comfortable and I try to get out of them when I can. And then I’ll find myself back in the bubble thinking I really haven’t tried as hard maybe as I could have. Well, that’s. Yeah, we can always get a whole different unities. Yeah. That’s true. Yeah. You can always go back and get comfortable.
00:20:59:40 – 00:21:23:27
James Gaddis
Yeah. What was I watching? I was watching some some guru, you know, trying to turn my life around. But. And I think, you know, one of the things that I, that I took from it was you need to do something that essentially makes you uncomfortable. Every day. They do something that you do something you don’t like every day.
00:21:23:27 – 00:21:46:30
Agent Palmer
Well, that’s easy, because like, I, I’ve, I’ve gotten to a point now where I try and, like clean up a little bit every day instead of, like, like at the moment, it’s don’t go to bed with dishes in the sink, like, either wash them or put them in the dishwasher, which admittedly is something small, but it’s it’s a bad habit to get into to.
00:21:46:32 – 00:22:11:41
Agent Palmer
And so I hate it. Like there’s times when it’s like late at night and I’m like, I back to the kitchen, I go, like, I completely forgot, like, you just get on to something and especially and you can appreciate this when you have those other when you have those multiple hats and when you finish and like maybe nighttime is your time for your YouTube channel, which you’re excited about.
00:22:11:46 – 00:22:27:09
Agent Palmer
You finished dinner and you go, all right, time to research this. Like, or like, watch this thing that I really want to watch and take notes and see what I can come up with. And then, like, all of a sudden like, oh, you know what? I never really cleaned up from dinner. I’m going to do that.
00:22:27:09 – 00:22:32:20
Agent Palmer
And it isn’t it’s not fun and it’s not glorious, but you, you do it anyway.
00:22:32:25 – 00:22:35:14
James Gaddis
And so and then when you wake up, it’s clean.
00:22:35:16 – 00:22:36:05
Agent Palmer
Clean too. Yeah.
00:22:36:19 – 00:22:37:16
James Gaddis
Oh, this is nice.
00:22:37:18 – 00:23:07:24
Agent Palmer
It’s, Look, it did that’s that’s the thing. Like, it’s they’re the same with my desk, which I’m still horrible at, like, I will, I’m at a weekly cleaning at this point for my desk. Now, most of the stuff I do is digital, but I’m still a note taker. Or, like, writing, jotting things down. So at the end of every week, it’s like, oh, here’s all the scraps of paper from like the four different things I worked on.
00:23:07:29 – 00:23:22:09
Agent Palmer
And if what’s worse is when they’re not, when they’re ongoing projects and they’re not finished, then I’m like, well, I can’t throw this out. Like, what do I do with this? What am I doing? But yeah, you got it. You got to clean that that clean kitchen that clean workspace.
00:23:22:14 – 00:23:48:52
James Gaddis
Oh yeah. Mine’s pretty clean. Mine is for the most part, very clean. But yeah. Got to get out of your comfort zone. Little, little things. It’s again, it’s just that you never know. You just don’t know. And usually you’ll be surprised I don’t know, I find that I’m typically surprised to some extent. There’s this great guy, Tommy. He’s a subscriber and he’s always asking to do a review of prior to the X-Men and anything X-Men right over my head.
00:23:48:54 – 00:24:12:15
James Gaddis
Zero knowledge. Didn’t didn’t watch it as a kid. Not. I’m just I’m not really interested in it that much. It just wasn’t in my wheelhouse. And then one day was he said, it’s my birthday tomorrow. Can you do prior of the X-Men? I don’t have time to do a full review, but I at least did. The cartoon intro is a real for him on Facebook.
00:24:12:24 – 00:24:32:31
James Gaddis
Sure. And so I wanted a little background information and it’s it’s very tiny to me. But, you know, I thought it was this long series and. No, it was one I think it’s a 22 minute long episode. It was a pilot and it was it. It didn’t go any further than that. It wasn’t picked up. But so many people still love it.
00:24:32:31 – 00:24:52:26
James Gaddis
Like I think Wolverine in it is Australian, something I don’t, but just these little tidbits of information. And then you find out that the really popular arcade game, the X-Men arcade game from back in the day, the characters least the art is based off of this pride of the X-Men. So just a little thing. I was like, oh, that’s so cool.
00:24:52:26 – 00:25:16:12
James Gaddis
Now I have I have a connection, you know, I’ve been hearing about it, but I never looked into it, and I now I learned a little a little something and just those tiny little moments of making these connections, just my brain lights up and I get really excited. There is one. There’s one video. I’ll probably give away the surprise, but, it’s about Ubu the dog or sit.
00:25:16:12 – 00:25:16:50
James Gaddis
Ubu, sit.
00:25:16:52 – 00:25:17:45
Agent Palmer
Yeah.
00:25:17:49 – 00:25:36:49
James Gaddis
For whatever reason, I think I saw something online and I said, what’s the what’s the story? I want to know what the story is behind that. So I did my research. I looked around, and this is where when you don’t know what you don’t know, as as you start to learn more, as you start to do the research, sometimes the story can change.
00:25:36:49 – 00:25:54:38
James Gaddis
That’s something I learned the business, too. You go in thinking, this is what it’s going to be. Yeah, right. You got you. Sometimes you have your blinders on and you’re just moving along like, I’m going to tell the history A to B up up up up up up. And we’re done here. And so I’m going through old interviews and man his name escapes me.
00:25:54:38 – 00:26:15:32
James Gaddis
But the guy who owned the production company owned the dog Ubu. I’ve also learned that everyone and their mother apparently thought the dog’s name was boo boo boo boo. Sit, my sister included. That’s, I would say half the comments on that on the video that I made where people saying I thought his name was Boo Boo said, boo boo, sit.
00:26:15:36 – 00:26:37:19
James Gaddis
But, and this got me so excited. So I’m going through interviews. Okay, here’s the history. We were in Paris. We brought the dog up up up up up up. He talks about the ending. We had something animated. I didn’t like it. So we just put up the picture of the dog, and he said, that’s me. That’s me saying, sit, Ubu, sit.
00:26:37:24 – 00:26:55:41
James Gaddis
And then I had one of the sound guys or an engineer, somebody do the bark. And I went, what? That’s a person. My whole life I thought that was Ubu barking. We all thought it was Ubu Bark.
00:26:55:50 – 00:26:57:41
Agent Palmer
We all thought it was a dog. Definitely.
00:26:57:42 – 00:27:09:17
James Gaddis
My jaw hit the ground and I said, that’s. That’s the focus now. Like, that’s what the video is about. And I love those moments when you go, oh, I didn’t know that.
00:27:09:17 – 00:27:51:20
Agent Palmer
Is that is there a way, that you can, I don’t know, help people when they’re putting not stories or articles, but just storytelling in general because like, one of the things about that is it when you get to the end, it changes. But I mean, you initially set out to find out what the story was with the dog, and you discovered that you uncovered that, but with with maybe, like, longer stories, it’s easier to get your blinders like, like shocked, like, oh, my God, I can I can take this left turn.
00:27:51:25 – 00:28:14:03
Agent Palmer
But not always. Not every time. Should you write like, like some of terms sometimes. Like putting a story together and researching it is a maze. And I don’t know, like you’ve obviously. I mean, you did it professionally. So like, is there any hint you can give other than doing it so long and having natural instinct into where to follow it?
00:28:14:03 – 00:28:19:56
Agent Palmer
Like the is it really just the more you do it, the better you get.
00:28:20:01 – 00:28:34:15
James Gaddis
Yeah. I mean, I think it’s you just have to know what to look for. It’s tough. You, you know what it’s like when you’re doing an interview and you need to know which questions to ask. You need to know which roads to go down. You need to know what’s important and what’s not, what you can leave behind. You don’t.
00:28:34:15 – 00:28:55:23
James Gaddis
Again, you don’t want to. We used to talk about, hey, you know, our our morning show, that’s what brought me up to Alaska was to do a morning show here. And we had these these segments that we did with, historian. And they were in this block that was about three minutes long. And so they had a stick to around three, but we could play with the time.
00:28:55:37 – 00:29:27:50
James Gaddis
Okay. And I remember our editor would finish up and he’d say, oh, it’s 345, it’s four, it’s four minutes, whatever, what have you. And we would ask, does it feel like four minutes? He’d say, no, okay, we’ll give it the extra time. You know, when you force it, when you’re trying to make a video longer, just to make it longer, when you’re including additional information that doesn’t really, help with, again, your focus and the point you’re trying to make, that’s when it can get long winded.
00:29:27:50 – 00:29:58:27
James Gaddis
That’s when I think people start to tune away. And it’s, it’s the toughest part is when you have all of this information and you’ve done the research, you think, well, this is all important. I’ve got to include all of it. Maybe. Maybe not. And it’s a tough balance to find. Because you could just keep going. I mean, you could you could just keep going, and you next thing you know, you’ve got a video that’s 30 minutes long.
00:29:58:31 – 00:30:01:33
James Gaddis
Does it feel like 30 minutes or does it feel like an hour to someone?
00:30:01:38 – 00:30:20:55
Agent Palmer
I mean, that’s yeah, I mean, that’s my my current litmus test for is a movie too long is did I look at my phone because I’ll put my phone like down like on the other, like on the coffee table or like just slightly out of reach. But if a movie gets too long, I’ll look to see how long it is.
00:30:20:55 – 00:30:47:08
Agent Palmer
Like I’ll just, what time is it? We started this at seven to for. Yeah. When’s it over? Or like, if I have the remote, like, just click the up button so you can see the scroll and be like, wait, there’s still another hour left in this movie. Like. And so I get that, like sometimes like you’re like, that didn’t feel like two hours and sometimes you’re like, that’s an hour that felt like for like what are what are you telling?
00:30:47:08 – 00:31:11:23
Agent Palmer
How are you engaging with the audience with whatever medium it is? I’ve read books that don’t feel like 400 pages. Just you get lost in them. That’s that’s the story you want to tell, whether it’s 3 minutes or 3 hours, like, you kind of want the audience to get lost so they don’t look at their watch, their phone.
00:31:11:23 – 00:31:15:05
Agent Palmer
Right. The little scroll thing. Yeah.
00:31:15:09 – 00:31:38:27
James Gaddis
And sucked in. You’ve got to find a way to tell it. Right. So you’re not revealing too much too soon. It sounds, okay. Okay. It sounds like. Well, you’re just trying to keep me watching, so I’ll watch more of your video. No, that’s that’s the art of storytelling. If you watch a really good documentary, especially a crime documentary, they don’t they don’t spoil things.
00:31:38:27 – 00:32:01:44
James Gaddis
Right. In the beginning. But you’re like, I need to know what happens next. And you’ll notice sometimes the timeline will change. You know, they’re not just going from beginning to end. They they make you keep watching. They they keep your interest up, and then they’ll reveal something that’s absolutely shocking. Yeah. You know, I could have started the Ubu the Dog video right out of the gate with.
00:32:01:44 – 00:32:23:56
James Gaddis
Hey, did you know that the bark at the, you know, and this, you know, classic Ubu, the Ubu productions, you know, tag at the end of Family Ties. Wasn’t really a dog like. Oh, I just well, it just I just gave it away. It’s gone. So I’m going to kind of lead you in and then reveal it now.
00:32:23:56 – 00:32:32:47
James Gaddis
Yeah. It keeps people watching, which is what you want. But at the same time, I think we all enjoy that journey. From the outside. I know, I know, I do.
00:32:32:47 – 00:33:03:43
Agent Palmer
Oh, God, I, I would I, I’m going to sound like the oldest boomer and I’m not, but I’m going to sound like the oldest boomer you’ve ever heard. When I say I would rather somebody tell me a story to get an answer than Google it. I am at this point in my life defiantly anti Google, not because of anything other than if you don’t know it, you don’t know it and that’s fine.
00:33:03:48 – 00:33:25:29
Agent Palmer
And if somebody around you knows it and is going to tell you a little story about it, all the better. But do I need to know what year that was? Absolutely not. Are you going to tell me you remember that year because somebody was born that year? That’s kind of amazing because I don’t retain dates that well anymore outside of a few sports ones.
00:33:25:33 – 00:33:45:22
Agent Palmer
So like, I, I’m, I’m just like like, so I’ll be hanging out with my friends and somebody will be like, oh, I need to know the answer to that. I’ll be like, no, you don’t. No, no you don’t. They don’t like is your life going to be better because we answer this question? Absolutely not. Did you know the answer to this question before you did not.
00:33:45:29 – 00:34:01:28
Agent Palmer
Are you going to retain the answer after you Google it? You are definitely not. Let’s skip all of the the let’s let’s skip the facade. No, we don’t need the answer. It does not make our lives better or worse.
00:34:01:33 – 00:34:02:22
James Gaddis
00:34:02:27 – 00:34:19:47
Agent Palmer
We’ll we’ll continue. I don’t know. I’ve I’ve been happier not just whipping out my phone because I thought of a thing. Like, if I want to go down a research rabbit hole, that’s different, but just you and me not being able to come up with something right now.
00:34:19:52 – 00:34:20:35
James Gaddis
Like. That’s okay.
00:34:20:44 – 00:34:48:11
Agent Palmer
I’m. I’m all right with it. Like the magic of editing. I could I could edit out me googling anything I want, but I would rather not know. I don’t know, I don’t know, I don’t know, I, I’m not I’m not a Luddite, okay? I’m not I’m not going that far. But there are times when that stance makes me feel like a Luddite, because everybody else is so quick to, like, draw on the almighty search engine for the answer.
00:34:48:15 – 00:34:48:58
Agent Palmer
00:34:49:03 – 00:35:13:48
James Gaddis
I get it, I wish newspapers were back. I, I miss the newspaper. I miss the sports section, man. I, there’s a part of me that, misses the not stressing about getting information as soon as I wake up or, you know, just, just a bit of a, a kinder, slower pace. I, I appreciate that. Do you know.
00:35:13:54 – 00:35:31:12
Agent Palmer
Do you I, I don’t want to get too personal, but, like, do you do anything to try and, I don’t know, turn back the clock. Like, do you not look at your phone first thing? Do you try and slow drip your information?
00:35:31:17 – 00:35:47:04
James Gaddis
I try okay. It is very. It is supposed to, you know, the phone’s not supposed to be in the room when I go to sleep. That’s hit or miss. Not supposed to check it first thing supposed to, you know, kind of have a system that I’m trying to stick to, you know, no phone first thing in the morning.
00:35:47:04 – 00:36:07:58
James Gaddis
Okay. But I don’t do very well. I’m trying to read more, less digital reading. Okay. Is kind of the one big thing, you know, I have. I had a few digital magazine subscriptions that I’ve turned into physical, physical copies, which I enjoy.
00:36:08:00 – 00:36:19:31
Agent Palmer
Do you find the the focus easier when you’re handling a print magazine, as opposed to when you had those digital descriptions?
00:36:19:36 – 00:36:45:01
James Gaddis
Oh, yeah. Big time. Because it’s all you had in front of you, right? There is no no ability to switch immediately to something else. And that’s why I have a very difficult time sometimes working. I’m constantly, constantly on the internet, whether it’s for my channel, my clients, you know, even just getting certain, you know, looking up, I’ve got to get download music or stock video for a project.
00:36:45:06 – 00:37:05:02
James Gaddis
I mean, I’m just I’m, I mean, we’re all constantly online, but I’m noticing, I don’t I don’t like it, and I don’t like what it what it does to my brain. I don’t like that. I can’t focus half the time. I don’t like that. I’ll, I’ll, I’ll use the Pomodoro technique. You know what that is? That’s essentially.
00:37:05:02 – 00:37:30:05
James Gaddis
I’ve heard it. That’s it’s, you can set you can set the time to whatever you want, but I’m using it to try and help me focus. And one. What’s pomodoro is a tomato. So, one tomato essentially is 25 minutes, and then you get a five minute break, try to set up, do something along those lines. So you set a timer and you’re just supposed to strictly focus on that task at hand.
00:37:30:10 – 00:37:45:17
James Gaddis
I try to close tabs if I’m, you know, sometimes maybe if I’m if I’m editing for that 25 minutes, maybe I even turn the Wi-Fi off so I can’t go in search. I can’t go check Facebook, because it’s so easy. Oh, I’m just gonna check for just a second.
00:37:45:18 – 00:38:23:37
Agent Palmer
I think just a second. Tabs has got to be the biggest one for me because, like, I’ve got, I’ve got I’ve got two separate offices in this house, which is really just ones in the basement that’s like my gaming office, really. But sometimes I’ll go down there to write. If I can’t write in this office. And like, frankly, the amount of tabs I have on both machines, this one that I use for like my consulting work and editing and recording.
00:38:23:42 – 00:38:51:09
Agent Palmer
I shouldn’t need that many tabs open, and when the one downstairs is even worse, I play games and I write. I shouldn’t need that many tabs. And what’s worse is they’re probably duplicate tabs. On both. On both, you know, it’s like, what? Why? Why can’t I just let go and but I’m with you. I think that it is so easy.
00:38:51:09 – 00:38:59:38
Agent Palmer
Like, I’ve started purposefully, purposefully leaving my phone somewhere else, like I’m, you know.
00:38:59:42 – 00:39:09:32
James Gaddis
That is a great way to go. I have found that every time I do that, like, I feel better, like my energy’s up a little bit, I’m not as stressed.
00:39:09:37 – 00:39:09:55
Agent Palmer
And it.
00:39:09:55 – 00:39:10:35
James Gaddis
Sucks.
00:39:10:40 – 00:39:48:01
Agent Palmer
It sucks because I don’t have a landline. Like, it’s the only reason. The only reason I would consider getting a landline is because if somebody wanted to get Ahold of me, they’re out of luck because I’m trying to de-stress. You know, like, even if somebody wanted to give me something good or good news, you know, I’m, I’m trying to detach from the the the the like, you know, the the cliche of walking around my house just looking at my palm, like, I don’t I don’t want to do that.
00:39:48:06 – 00:40:00:07
Agent Palmer
But it also means I missed some phone calls on occasion. And that’s the only thing that sucks because like it, it’s the all in one. And I’m. I’m the guy that will call you. I’m the one who likes talking on the phone.
00:40:00:07 – 00:40:01:08
James Gaddis
You like to talk, and that’s fine.
00:40:01:08 – 00:40:11:48
Agent Palmer
I’m a talker, not a texter. I will text like, I guess I’ve I’ve learned which friends are texters, you know, and it’s like they’re never going to pick up the phone. So I will text. But.
00:40:11:48 – 00:40:30:12
James Gaddis
The. But you know what? If you have your if you have your phone away for a reason, then even talking, right, you probably shouldn’t even be. You’re probably focusing on something then. Right? So even the phone calls I’m guessing. Yeah. That’s fair. You know, would constitute like, hey, I don’t even have time for that right now. It’s like it’s like emails, man.
00:40:30:12 – 00:40:47:28
James Gaddis
I used to if, if a, if a client emailed even if it wasn’t important, I was like, oh, it’s like I only got I got to get back to him. I got to get back to him, I got, I come. But now sometimes it takes me a day or two depending on the severity of it. Right. And they know, you know, especially when I’ll email them and not get a response back for two days.
00:40:47:28 – 00:41:06:55
James Gaddis
And I respect their time. They’re busy, I get it. I finally have settled down a little bit and I can go, okay, I’ll get back to that. Once I finish these tasks, which are important, then I’ll get back to them and work on the next thing. But man, and thinking about you mentioned the tabs. Yeah, I can see myself.
00:41:06:55 – 00:41:23:51
James Gaddis
I do it all the time. I will I will catch myself. Click on the Gmail tab, click on my work Gmail tab, click on ESPN, click on this tab and and literally want to. And I just go back and forth out of boredom just because I need I need that hit a dopamine, I need to see a different screen.
00:41:24:00 – 00:41:25:47
James Gaddis
So I just start clicking tabs.
00:41:25:51 – 00:41:51:35
Agent Palmer
That’s the thing I, I sadly, whether it’s disconnecting to go for a walk or listen to music, and when I say listen to music, I mean like actively like put on headphones attached to my phone, but keep my phone in my pocket and not look at anything else. Just I’m just like, basically I’m trying to recreate the end of Dazed and Confused.
00:41:51:40 – 00:42:27:21
Agent Palmer
But unlike the end of that movie, I’m not physically tied to my headphones by a three foot cable. I’m wirelessly enabled and so I can go for a walk around my neighborhood or lay in my bed either once fine. But like while the dopamine hit is not nearly as large, the less I stay or the more I stay away from the actual phone and the actual stimuli all around, the more impactful that dopamine is of.
00:42:27:21 – 00:42:49:07
Agent Palmer
Just like I’m just listening to a cool album I’ve never heard before. Which, by the way, it’s not that there’s no dopamine hit there, it’s just that by comparison to, oh, I got three Twitter notifications, I got five Facebook things, and two people hit me up like, you can’t compare them. So like when you finally remove them, oh, so much better.
00:42:49:07 – 00:43:04:24
Agent Palmer
But like, I forgot how much I loved music just for music sake. Right when I was 14, you couldn’t get me to shut up about music. I, I now I want to listen to it. That’s that’s my safe space.
00:43:04:29 – 00:43:05:18
James Gaddis
00:43:05:23 – 00:43:06:28
Agent Palmer
Yeah. To go back.
00:43:06:28 – 00:43:26:11
James Gaddis
Yeah. Go let’s go back a little bit to, to help ourselves move forward. Which is wild to think. But I think it’s, I think it’s true not to sound like an old man okay Boomer but I don’t, I don’t know I’m, I’m worried about those kids with those screens attached to their hips. 24 seven. I can’t imagine, you know, I think we just barely escaped it.
00:43:26:11 – 00:43:50:52
Agent Palmer
But we absolutely did. I mean, I, I tell people all the time, like my for the first two years I was in college, we had dial up and I mean, it was paid for by the college, but you had to plug into a modem. And it wasn’t until like my junior year we got Wi-Fi and it wasn’t that good.
00:43:50:56 – 00:44:11:25
Agent Palmer
And it was a very rural campus, and there was only three places that were like two by two square feet, various places where you could actually get cell reception on your Nokia brick. You know, I am thankful for for not having smartphones and pictures, like we were able to do dumb shit and get away with it.
00:44:11:30 – 00:44:16:25
James Gaddis
Yep. Oh man. Yeah, thank goodness we didn’t have cell phones.
00:44:16:25 – 00:44:22:35
Agent Palmer
And it’s not that I’m ashamed. I think everybody does stupid shit when they’re young, but just yeah, I, I don’t have a.
00:44:22:40 – 00:44:23:24
James Gaddis
System out there.
00:44:23:30 – 00:44:42:08
Agent Palmer
Or not. Only is ours not out there. Hey, Jimmy, do you want to go out for a drink? It’s not going to be met with you going. Is somebody going to catch me doing something stupid with their phone? Like, that was never like, maybe you do something stupid and maybe two people would see it. And in a week everybody would forget.
00:44:42:13 – 00:44:46:20
Agent Palmer
Yeah, this is the way it used to be.
00:44:46:25 – 00:44:51:45
James Gaddis
Some some some some, very important lessons can be learned, I think I.
00:44:51:47 – 00:44:52:57
Agent Palmer
Yeah, yeah.
00:44:52:57 – 00:44:54:18
James Gaddis
You know, but,
00:44:54:23 – 00:45:18:24
Agent Palmer
So I did want to ask, you, could have chosen any medium, right? Like there are when you started the YouTube channel. You know, you could have done a podcast, could have done the written form like you had, I mean, obviously you you you already had to learn how to write. You know, you probably did voice over.
00:45:18:24 – 00:45:35:24
Agent Palmer
So you’re not afraid of a microphone, and obviously you were in front of a camera, but you had all these different platforms available to you. So, I mean, not to put you two on the spot, but like, why did you choose video? When all of these choices were available to you?
00:45:35:29 – 00:45:54:45
James Gaddis
It was the one I was most comfortable with, most familiar with. But I think I think it’s the one that gave me the, the greatest opportunity to I mean, just having the ability, the sound, the pictures to bring it all together. I can, you know, whether I, I am or people consider me, to be good at what I do.
00:45:54:45 – 00:46:18:07
James Gaddis
I consider myself to be pretty creative. And if I’m not expressing it, I think in a visual manner. Then, you know, there’s just like this empty space. I just I need to get it out. And this is the way that I need to do it. So I just kind of put all of those passions together in the knowledge.
00:46:18:07 – 00:46:37:49
James Gaddis
And, and I still enjoy being quote unquote, on air. Okay. I enjoy being in front of the camera. I enjoy talking to people. It’s just something I’m like, hey, I’m comfortable. I like it, you know? I do work behind the camera. Let’s just put this all together and let’s just, let’s just do it and see how it goes.
00:46:37:49 – 00:46:50:55
James Gaddis
It’s only been, I mean, the the channel, it’s only been, around for about a year, year and five months. So it’s still, I want to say, finding its identity and, you know.
00:46:51:00 – 00:47:08:59
James Gaddis
With work I hate it sounds like an excuse, but I just people are like, well, you have 24 hours in a day, like, I know, and I’m sometimes I spent 15 of them on work. Just on work. Yeah. So I can’t get the videos out as often as I would like, but, you know, I test a little something here.
00:47:08:59 – 00:47:32:50
James Gaddis
Let’s try this. Let’s try this. Let’s see what they like. And, man, the numbers vary, so wildly. Sometimes we’re talking, you know, he made a video, gets 145,000 views. Another human video is sitting at 350, you know, so I don’t know from one day to the next, but I do it and I put all the hours in and I’m usually happy when I’m done, regardless of the views.
00:47:32:50 – 00:47:53:53
James Gaddis
Okay. I always learn something like I’m like, oh, this is a this is a cool concept in terms of editing or, this is a cool visual that I learned how to create for this video. Maybe I only got 300 views and that sucks. But now I know how to do this. Yeah. Ten years ago that I would have.
00:47:53:53 – 00:48:10:29
James Gaddis
Forget about it. It never that way of thinking would have never happened. So I just, it’s like, what are you going to do? I have no control over it. You know, maybe there are some lessons. Maybe my thumbnail sucks. Maybe my title sucks. I’m working on those because that’s the window to your video.
00:48:10:43 – 00:48:34:36
Agent Palmer
Yeah, that’s the part that scares me the most when I listen to creators talk, especially on YouTube, is like, yeah, my thumbnails just I need to get better at my thumbnail game. And I’m just like, I. Maybe it’s because I’m in that vein where I’m trying to go out of my comfort zone and try and find new people.
00:48:34:36 – 00:49:00:55
Agent Palmer
So I’m not always watching the same creators. So if I subscribe to you, I subscribe to you. Like I don’t just subscribe for the heck of it. Like, I’ll try and watch everything I can to the people I’m subscribed to. So I don’t, I don’t care, I’m one of those 350. Like, I don’t care about your thumbnail game, but I know that in the wider spectrum of everything else, that’s important for you.
00:49:00:55 – 00:49:07:00
Agent Palmer
If you want your YouTube channel to be first three, we’re going to make that a thing. We’re going to make.
00:49:07:00 – 00:49:10:26
James Gaddis
It your thing. Yeah, I like it. It is. Yeah, yeah. Spread the word folks.
00:49:10:27 – 00:49:47:30
Agent Palmer
But also I think you all, you know, you’re in your infancy, relatively speaking. Like, you know, take the risks. Now I think I think I think it as much as you and I can sit here and go like, if it’s your passion, you’ll take chances when you have a million subscribers. But I think realistically, sometimes we all get complacent when we if we got there like, I’m not there, but I feel like if I did like if I, if I was pull in like Mariner Rogan numbers.
00:49:47:35 – 00:49:58:00
Agent Palmer
You know, maybe I wouldn’t be me, I don’t know. And so I feel like by all means, when you’re still growing, take all the chances you can get. Like, yeah.
00:49:58:04 – 00:50:04:55
James Gaddis
That’s the fun part. That’s the beautiful thing about it. I mean, to some extent, it’s like, you know what?
00:50:05:00 – 00:50:29:52
James Gaddis
I the editing portion, sometimes the process, sometimes the journey sucks. Okay. And it’s a topic I might love, but the journey sucks, right? You’re you’re doing your you’re doing your research. Someone says this episode came out in 1984, someone else’s. It came out in 1983. And you’re like, how like, this should be very simple. Why? So now I now I need to find a third source, a fourth source.
00:50:29:52 – 00:50:55:01
James Gaddis
You know, it could be anything I’ve come across. So many people can just write whatever they want, throw it up on the internet. And when you’re doing your research now, it’s. Well, do I, do I? So I’m starting to find sources I trust. But they’re not always there. Who’s who’s the Ubu? The dog expert, you know. So if I find information over here that says this and something else over here says this, who do I trust?
00:50:55:01 – 00:51:15:01
James Gaddis
Well, now I’ve got to find more. And so that’s when I. That’s when it can get very frustrating. But there’s this part of me that won’t stop until I know. Okay. Like, I know this is this is now accurate. Or if I’m not sure there’s certain ways, to go about it, whether that’s you know, of course, in the news, business attribution was a big thing.
00:51:15:06 – 00:51:32:07
James Gaddis
According to a court, if so, if you’re ever unsure if you’re doing your own YouTube channel and you’re unsure or attribute, you know, attribute to a source, so you can get that fact out, but nobody will call you out on it. That’s the big thing. I mean, you attribute in the news so that you don’t get sued, right?
00:51:32:07 – 00:51:55:27
James Gaddis
But in this case, sometimes that’s all you have. That’s all you have might be attribution if you’re trying to get a point across or, a fact out. But yeah, sometimes the the journey is, is rough. But in the end, I’ve been happy with everything I’ve put out and I’ve learned something from all of it. So that’s I mean, what more can you do?
00:51:55:32 – 00:52:15:47
James Gaddis
And for me, it’s sure I would love a million people to subscribe, but maybe, like in the case of chatting with you right now, mate, maybe some eyes get on the channel. It’s not a million, but maybe it’s like the right five eyes that open up another door to something else. Because ultimately, I would love to tell these stories.
00:52:15:47 – 00:52:44:42
James Gaddis
I would love to, work on documentaries in this 80s, 90s nerd realm. Ultimately would be my thing. I would love to have the time to put together 30 minute long videos. You know, on my favorite topics. But we’ll start. We’ll start with seven and eight at the moment. You know, eight, eight minutes gives you that, you know, that mid-roll that mid that mid video ad which I don’t turn on, by the way, because I think it’s just up now.
00:52:44:42 – 00:53:01:53
James Gaddis
I did a video on The Exorcist. That’s the other issue with my channel. That’s what what do I talk about? I’m still trying to find its identity. You know, like one week it was He-Man, the next was The Exorcist because it was its 50th anniversary. But that video did very well. But, you know, you’re getting into it.
00:53:01:53 – 00:53:12:23
James Gaddis
This is The Exorcist, right? So I said, no, Mid-Roll, we don’t want to interrupt the experience.
00:53:12:28 – 00:53:39:55
Agent Palmer
You. For the amount of creators I meet and the varying reasons for creating things, it’s always refreshing to run into someone like Jimi, who’s creating because he has stories to tell. As you heard, he’d like the channel to take off. And who wouldn’t? But he’s not chasing the views. He’s doing something that interests him and hopefully something that you can enjoy with him.
00:53:40:00 – 00:54:11:21
Agent Palmer
But it’s hard for him or anyone to do all of that without a little focus. And as we discussed, our focus could always be better. Too many tabs open. How many do you have? Too many distractions from alerts and notifications, from always being connected. Do yourself and your friends a favor. Make an effort to disconnect. I’m aware that parents of all kinds are dealing with screen time in a way that makes it feel like a fairly large issue, especially for parents of children under the age of like 15.
00:54:11:21 – 00:54:32:40
Agent Palmer
But I remember being told not to spend too much time in front of the TV or computer, and remember that was dial up internet. But now the screen time issue is impacting the lives not just of those children, but of the parents and the world as a whole. Disconnecting is a way to reset yourself, and it should be done as often as you possibly can.
00:54:32:45 – 00:54:55:32
Agent Palmer
Technology was meant to make our lives better, not worse. Being addicted to your favorite device is not making your life better. So read a book, change your digital magazine subscriptions to physical ones. Take a walk. Listen to some music without staring at a screen. Have a meal with no phones. These are but a few of the many ways to disconnect.
00:54:55:32 – 00:55:15:42
Agent Palmer
And trust me, though, it may feel odd at first, eventually you’ll come to enjoy not being so connected. Thanks for listening to The Palmer Files episode 120. And now for the official business. The Palmer Files releases every two weeks on Tuesdays. If you’re still listening, I encourage you to join the discussion. All links are available in the show notes.
00:55:15:49 – 00:55:36:37
Agent Palmer
There you will find links to James’s YouTube channel and the 80s and 90s nerd realm that you should definitely check out at youtube.com. Slash nostalgic. That’s nostalgia check and his other pertinent links and socials as well. The music for this episode was provided by Henno Heitur. Her email can be sent to this show at The Palmer Files at gmail.com.
00:55:36:37 – 00:55:51:28
Agent Palmer
And remember, you’re home for all things. Agent Palmer is Agent palmer.com.
00:55:51:32 – 00:55:59:24
Unknown
You.
00:55:59:29 – 00:56:07:49
Unknown
See?
00:56:07:54 – 00:56:24:58
Unknown
Me?
00:56:25:03 – 00:56:27:18
Agent Palmer
All right. Jimmy, do you have one final question for me?
00:56:27:18 – 00:56:50:51
James Gaddis
This is going to be this is kind of. Maybe I don’t like convoluted, but, it’s been striking up a conversation lately, and we were just chatting, I’ll say off mic. Sure. We, we mentioned Ready Player One. Yeah. Phenomenal books. If you haven’t read them. They are amazing. So much so that my best friend and I, my best friend, I’ve known him since I’ve known him longer than any of my siblings.
00:56:50:51 – 00:57:05:34
James Gaddis
Okay. Like, since we were very tiny, neither one of us will watch the movie because we don’t want to. I don’t want to see it outside of my own imagination. So I have yet to watch Ready Player one, the movie I just won’t do it. It’s the only thing. It’s the only time I’ve ever, I’ve ever said that about a movie.
00:57:05:34 – 00:57:29:52
James Gaddis
Like, oh, I read the book. I don’t want that disturbed, not watching the movie. But that said, there’s, you know, it’s been in the news lately. So I think Disney, and Epic Games are going to try to create, you know, Epic Games is, Fortnite I think, right? Yep. They want to create this expansive, open games world, you know, with I think eventually with VR.
00:57:29:52 – 00:57:52:01
James Gaddis
Right. So it’s sounding more and more like a ready player, one type world. Yeah. Is that something is that sort of thing right, even right out of the book something you would be, fearful of or excited for? I would probably live in it guilt free and just be like, I’m good.
00:57:52:16 – 00:58:08:38
Agent Palmer
Yeah, I’m fearful of it. Completely. Yeah, 100% fearful because, like, I, I try and disconnect as much as possible and like, I read Ready Player one.
00:58:08:43 – 00:58:37:19
Agent Palmer
In a day I couldn’t put it down. Has. This is amazing. But I’m happy for that to be fiction I like I look at the, the Apple VR and the meta VR and I go, no, I don’t want a snap suit. I don’t want goggles. I don’t want any of that. Like, I want to experience, real life, and I want to be in it all the time.
00:58:37:24 – 00:58:58:57
Agent Palmer
You know, famously in the books. Spoiler alert for anybody who hasn’t read them. But Artemus is like, we’re going to turn it off like two days a week. And if that was me, I would be like, I’m going to turn it on one day a week, right? And everybody else is going to live in the real world for the other six.
00:58:59:02 – 00:59:22:49
Agent Palmer
And you and I can maybe talk about the actual book and what it means because, like, there are some things about the end that I’m like, well, hold on now. We didn’t solve a lot of things. We saw the one thing in this universe. But generally speaking, I am all for, being disconnected. I don’t know that,
00:59:22:53 – 00:59:46:48
Agent Palmer
That kind of in in in in, I don’t want to say inclusive, but, like, expansive universe is good for us. I don’t know, I don’t know. Everybody needs to roll a d20 and see how much psychic damage they take for every hour they have their harp suit on. Right? Like, it just feels like one of those things.
00:59:46:48 – 01:00:13:50
Agent Palmer
And, I think for me, if it wasn’t about the digital currency, in the world of Ready Player One, I would be a little bit more okay with it, but, I, I don’t like the idea of paying for something in the real world to put it on and then try and earn more money, earn more digital currency or.
01:00:13:52 – 01:00:34:38
Agent Palmer
Yeah, I just, I, I don’t that’s the part I don’t one of the parts I don’t like about it, but I, I’m yeah, I don’t know if I could live in it like I, I was happy to read about it. But you know, by the same token, love Lord of the rings. I don’t know if I want to live there, you know what I mean?
01:00:34:38 – 01:00:49:18
James Gaddis
Like, I don’t know, middle earth. No. Middle earth. Yeah, I get it. You know, I think on the surface, it’s exciting, right? It seems like it would be cool for it. What about. What about, what is it? It’s augmented reality. Correct. That’s that’s when you you are. You get a little bit of both. Yeah. It’s also.
01:00:49:23 – 01:01:11:31
Agent Palmer
I think for I, you know, it goes back to my being okay, not knowing things I augmented reality. I mean, potentially you could turn it on and off as you wish, but I would spend more time with it off. So it probably wouldn’t do me very good. I don’t, I just I’m okay figuring it out on my own.
01:01:11:35 – 01:01:38:41
Agent Palmer
I don’t know if that makes me stubborn or just old fashioned. But, you know, one of the things I own, I own a home. And I know I’m privileged to own a home. It’s not a big home, but it’s. It’s a home. And one of the things that I never realized because growing up, my dad was, you know, had a son, and my dad’s like, all right, you’re old enough.
01:01:38:41 – 01:02:17:41
Agent Palmer
You mow the lawn right? And it was always a chore. But I worked in digital marketing when I bought a home. I loved mowing my lawn. I spent all day. I spent all day, moving pixels around. And maybe writing words for a blog and, creating video and creating an audio and a graphic. I got to punch out at five, come home and physically do something that was a chore for all of my life until I spent all of my life online and went, this is amazing.
01:02:17:46 – 01:02:49:51
Agent Palmer
I did that. Look, look, look, I there’s a before and after I did that physically and I, I, I think generally speaking, I don’t want to do I don’t want things like that to become more exciting. I almost want the lawn to become boring because I did all these other things and not in the digital space. And I think that’s where that’s where some of that Ready Player One stuff is a bit like, I don’t know.
01:02:49:55 – 01:03:09:13
James Gaddis
Yeah. I think, it’s exciting. You know, I’m a VR headset. It’s a lot of fun. Small doses, you know, it’s heavy, clunky, and I’m sure they’ll just get thinner and thinner until they’re just like and ready Player one. You’re essentially wearing glasses. But I do think it’s coming. Like, I think I, I, I saw some videos online.
01:03:09:13 – 01:03:38:19
James Gaddis
I don’t know if they were real or staged, but it’s people at this point wearing the headsets and doing the augmented thing just out, literally out in public because they have they’re probably just, you know, getting the getting the, using their phone. Yeah. You know, to, to get signal. And then they’re just walking around and, and got the and you, you see them touching the air, you know, pushing little buttons that we can’t see on screen.
01:03:38:19 – 01:03:50:37
James Gaddis
And I can’t imagine that that’s not going to just, there going to be this domino effect moving forward and just seeing how quickly technology, how it develops, how quickly it develops. There’s a word for it and it escapes me.
01:03:50:51 – 01:04:17:46
Agent Palmer
I mean, I that’s all fine, but I guess my, my concern is that most of the technologies, because you and I are of the same age, most of the technologies we grew up adapting. Right? Because obviously we we we started in an age where there wasn’t really an internet. And if there was, it was called prodigy. Right? Like or like AOL before the the chat.
01:04:18:00 – 01:04:19:30
James Gaddis
That’s like Netscape.
01:04:19:30 – 01:04:48:28
Agent Palmer
Netscape. I still have a three and a half floppy of a Netscape install, but like so. So we’ve adapted all these things as we’ve gone along and, and had we gone back and 20, 30 years ago asked younger us what was going to come of this technology, you and I would have been wrong more than we were. Right based on not growth, and not like the way technology has changed, but just the way it’s been used.
01:04:48:33 – 01:05:13:25
Agent Palmer
And so I think there’s going to be some kind of pushback where it’s like, no, I want to touch grass. And right now people are throwing touch grass is like a, a derogatory thing, like, oh, you spend it. But I think it feels like we’re coming to a, like a, like a point where touch grass will become like, no, this is my work life balance.
01:05:13:36 – 01:05:44:21
Agent Palmer
I’m going outside. Like, I’m not going to do this zoom call. We scheduled it from 3 to 4. It’s 5:00. I’m out. And I mean, I’m going outside, right? Like. And I there is no, you know, I, I like the theory of Ready Player one, and I enjoy the story of it, but I think I’d rather go for a walk in my neighborhood than choose from a directory of fictional worlds.
01:05:44:26 – 01:06:03:06
James Gaddis
Right? Every everything in moderation, which I say a lot, but it’s true. Yeah. I feel like it’s true in anything and everything. I think it can be great and it can be fun as long as you don’t get too caught up in it. Just like having 100 tabs open, just it’s the tabs. It’s the tabs that’s not moderate.
01:06:03:11 – 01:06:10:47
James Gaddis
There are tabs and you got to close them at the find the strength to close some. It’s terrible.
–End Transcription–
This transcription was processed by PalmerTech 3.1 and may contain errors for HUMINT (human intelligence).