90% of Podcasts Are Doing It Wrong — Truth Behind Media Deals & Inside the Joe Budden Podcast Empire

29:45And so I also want to make clear, the scale of our business is not something that I think every business is going to have. We're the unicorn. So let's not compare apples to oranges. But it's still something that it might not be. How much money are you making on Patreon? You saw it in the New York Times. $20 million? Was it accurate? At least a million a month. Okay. Okay. So you're making a million dollars a month on Patreon. Somebody can make$100 ,000. So what about someone making$50 ,000? This is where I get mad at people like you guys who are so educated, so well-versed in the business lane.

30:23Stop throwing those numbers out. Why can't you tell people, get 100 people to subscribe for$10 a month? That's$1 ,000 a month passive that you don't have. That changes your movements. That maybe frees you up one day a week that you can now dedicate to content. Everyone's looking to be a millionaire. I'll be honest with you. I never even considered the numbers we're doing right now outside of a calculation based on listenership. I didn't know if it was actually going to happen. But the goal was how do we become non-reliant on the systems that are in place for everyone else? That was the goal. People want something that is so fucking pipe dreamy, man.

31:07And like at some point as leadership in this industry, we have to stop putting these ridiculous numbers in front of people and just say, hey, work on securing 100 people to subscribe to your channel. 100. Then work on 1 ,000. my theory is a thousand paid subscribers changes your world forever because it's a monthly subscription it's reoccurring revenue it's the you now have a marketplace to sell hard products ticket sales uh experiences i would say five to ten different verticals to them and it could turn into a multi-million dollar business at a thousand people i'm not saying you're making a hundred thousand a month.

31:52And I'm not saying you're making millions a year. I'm saying the potential is there. And I'm not mad at you guys. When I say mad, I don't mean literally. I just mean, I think because we are in a position where we earn in a really big way in our categories, we tend to project our goals onto people that are just starting out. And I think it discourages them. And I'm with you. I've done it before and I'm mad at myself for doing it. But I think we need to give more value to starting at the bottom and genuinely working your way up and through the process, learning how to build a business, not learning how to become famous.

32:36There's a difference. I know a lot of people that are famous that are broke. So people are actually after the wrong thing in my opinion. I'd like to see a bunch of non-famous people learn the business and get rich. It's getting harder though. It is getting, no, no. It's more saturated with celebrities. Nah, it's getting easy. Fast tracking. Celebrities are fast tracking podcasts. Let's be honest. Celebrities are not, I'm going to tell you something. Celebrities in my opinion are fast tracking failure. Yeah. I've watched Spotify. This isn't a diss. I've watched Spotify, Amazon, all the big streamers go out and get the biggest name.

33:12Run a business and not thinking about podcasting? Think again. More Americans listen to podcasts than ad-supported streaming music from Spotify and Pandora. And as the number one podcaster, iHeart's twice as large as the next two combined. So whatever your customers listen to, they'll hear your message. Plus, only iHeart can extend your message to audiences across broadcast radio. Think podcasting can help your business? Think iHeart. Streaming, radio, and podcasting. Let us show you at iHeartAdvertising.com. That's iHeartAdvertising.com. What if mind control is real? If you could control the behavior of anybody around you, what kind of life would you have?

33:48Can you hypnotically persuade someone to buy a car? When you look at your car, you're going to become overwhelmed with such good feelings. Can you hypnotize someone into sleeping with you? I gave her some suggestions to be sexually aroused. Can you get someone to join your cult? NLP was used on me to access my subconscious. NLP, aka Neuro Linguistic Programming, is a blend of hypnosis, linguistics, and psychology. Fans say it's like finally getting a user manual for your brain. It's about engineering consciousness. Mind Games is the story of NLP. It's crazy cast of disciples and the fake doctor who invented it at a new age commune and sold it to guys in suits.

34:30He stood trial for murder and got acquitted. The biggest mind game of all? NLP might actually work. This is wild. Listen to Mind Games on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. New year, new goals, and in this economy, a better money plan is more necessary than ever. I am Matt. And I'm Joel. We are from the How to Money podcast, and every week we help you to spend smarter, save more, and make sense of what's going on out there. If you want 2026 to be the year you finally feel in control of your money, we're here to give you the tools and advice to help you make it happen.

35:07Listen to How to Money on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, what's up, y 'all? This is Questlove. Recently, I had the opportunity to sit down with A$AP Rocky ahead of his album release, Don't Be Dumb. He reflects on his journey from his Harlem roots to global icon status, discovering the hip-hop origin of his name. The ledge was on the TV. Rakim had the bucket hat Kangol during the past. I was like, that's Rakim. That's who you named after. I just was like, damn, that **** got swag. Rocky offers a window into not only a boundary-breaking artist, but as a man committed to fusing creative ideas, community, and remaining unapologetically himself.

35:49Have you ever gotten roasted for any of your outfits? For sure. Some people don't be getting the vision. Look, they can roast me, they can cook me, they can deep-fry me, they can saute whatever they want. because nobody knew the f*** with my fashion sense and my taste is impeccable. I'm just like, I impress myself a lot. It's an amazing conversation, one you definitely don't want to miss. So listen to the Questlove show on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. In the world, not only do those names not deliver a show, but even when they deliver a show, they're not delivering numbers.

36:29It's actually the opposite of what you thought you were going to get. Now, if you go get that same celebrity to post an Instagram in a bikini or next to a pile of money, you may get 300 ,000 people to like it. Yeah, but what does that do for the overall business, right? It fucks the whole industry. Exactly. So that's the part, right? So now when the company says, hey, we tried it with celebrity A, we're never given that budget again. We saw that failed. That's right. Now that money comes down. Across the board too. not just celebrities, but actual valued enterprises and IP that do deserve it. See, and that's why I've done everything in my power with Joe to separate ourselves from what the crowds are doing.

37:13You know, like we're watching something very special happen right now with Netflix and podcasting. This is a good segue.

37:23Actually, let me backtrack. Spotify in 2018 to 2020, we're experimenting with advertising, stitched advertising, ad reads, all that stuff. We went from the first exclusive podcast in 2018 to one of, let's say, a thousand that were signed to Spotify. And when everyone started taking on stitched ads, I begged Joe, I said, please, I said, please, let's not take a single ad. The reason was I saw the experience of podcasting being interrupted and devalued. You couldn't get through a 30-minute podcast without hearing 14 ads. I was turning shows off that I used to listen to religiously. So that's why I asked him, stay away.

38:05Yeah, we lost money. We lost potential money, but we gained the respect and kept the experience at a premium for our listenership and viewership. And that ultimately helped us win over any sponsors or advertisers or corporate partnerships down the road that we would have had in the moment for light money. Yeah. You know? You talked about experiencing walls. Obviously, you guys are super successful. Again, a unicorn in the space. But you said you experienced walls and barriers. Oh, yeah. Obviously, we talked about the Spotify thing, but I think change is something that, a wall that people kind of overlook.

38:44Most shows, when they have a change, show's gonna not do well. Oh, yeah. you guys have had change and it almost feels like it's a constant change whether it's we go from one day to three day we went from three holes to five holes to six holes to one hole losing cast members and the show just becomes even more successful with each variation how is that maintained and how did did you experience adversity at the time it's happening because it feels like it's just like a natural thing all right well here's how we're going to respond to it um those were scary times because because it was like a first Anything when you're first going through it is extremely intimidating.

39:24And when all the adversity that you guys are talking about was occurring in real time, yes, we were fearful because A, you don't know how the audience is going to react. B, you don't know how the partners you have are going to react. And C, it also leaves the show in limbo. So, you know, referencing losing, you know, our original cast when the big split happened. that was shocking for us. I mean, things weren't good energetically between the crew, but that happens in any group setting, musically, like it's across the board in businesses. It's no different in podcasting. So things weren't kosher in terms of like how people were getting along.

40:05And it was also noticeable publicly on the show. So when we face those moments, I would be lying if I said like, yeah, I wasn't worried. Like I just wasn't sure of what the outcome was going to be. and you know that's worrisome and and we were at this like this this um turning point each time we were it felt like like um an animal outgrowing their space like i need a bigger space to live like like we needed to shed the skin and go through that experience and whatever came on the other side we needed to go through it and experience it to get better and so yeah uh definitely questions from the partners definitely questions from um leadership myself um the the remaining hosts when there would be these these complications and and you learn how to be a business owner you learn how to handle these difficult times with grace even if you're panicking inside because there was that there's one part too it was like the jvp network yeah uh had other shows oh that failed right so like yeah like absolutely there's no like sweet way around like we started shows we were ambitious we were watching the success of the joe budden podcast and we said we could do more and honestly some of it was premature like we ran into the fire thinking we could handle things that we absolutely were not ready for.

41:36But doing that made us stronger. It made us so much more powerful. It gave us experiences that a conversation from one of our elder statesmen who's been there and done it like a Steve Harvey, or they couldn't have taught us. Some things can't be told and received. They have to be experienced so that you know what you went through. you could you could recall it down the line you could use it as you know power of information to help you with what's coming next and um yeah we were not ready we had we started shows they they failed um they started great but because we were so green thumb in in knowing how to be actual network executives talent management um all the stuff that we would that i was handling for joe and the podcast you multiply that and you're understaffed you're you're not ready for certain things it it could have drowned us but it didn't we never let it really go that far talk about okay you talk about netflix let's get into this conversation so netflix shaking up the industry.

42:49They just signed iHeart's, some of the iHeart podcast. Yes. Breakfast Club, Joe and Jada. Like 19 shows. So I spoke to Charlamagne yesterday actually about this. Yeah. And he had an interesting take on it. What was his take? His take was that it's beneficial. You don't really know exactly how it's going to play out, but it's beneficial from the standpoint that YouTube has been taking advantage of creators for a long time and that there's no alternative to YouTube. Netflix, obviously a higher level of production. So it's... Is it? Conditionally, Netflix showed. Like you have to, even if you're filming a documentary on Netflix, to my understanding, it has to be done with a certain level of camera or they're not going to even...

43:324K. So YouTube, you could do anything. You could put anything on YouTube. Yes, but... Okay. So keep going. So he was just saying that he felt that, like you said, he wasn't 100 % sure of like the total outcome. but he just feels like okay you know netflix it's it's a a situation that could potentially shake up the industry and add i agree with add more options better i agree than having like a monopoly in a sense as far as just youtube controlling all of the content and then i look at it from a standpoint of like obviously that's going to come with certain level of guarantees as far as money going back to this situation it also some creators might be a little scared and nervous because it's like me personally i'm gonna be watching a lot less breakfast club content not because i don't like the breakfast club but i'm not on netflix that like i'm on youtube all day on my phone right netflix is something i have to actually take time sit down on my couch 11 o 'clock at night scroll like the television on i make a conscious decision i've never really watched Netflix on my phone, other than if I download a documentary on a plane.

44:39Right. But if I'm watching just a random interview, I'm in the spur of the moment. I just want to listen to it on my car. You want to hit YouTube, get in, get out. But Netflix also, I mean, you know, they have shows that have billions, Diddy documentary has like billions of streams already in a couple of weeks. So they've pushed it to their audience too. So things can go viral on Netflix as well. Things do. Okay. Netflix coming in the podcast industry, you talked about it. It is kind of reminiscent of something that happened a couple of years ago. So let's, let's have this conversation. Sure. I think Netflix and YouTube were at war.

45:18Podcasting changed the habits of listenership and viewership. Netflix and YouTube were at war with, cable television viewers and podcast listenership across all dsps vodcasts which are the video side of the podcast are becoming so relevant and so imperative to premium platforms that without it all you have are 10 to 12 episode programmatic shows like Ozark and those take six months, two years to make. And then after three days of being out, what are people watching? What they've realized is what we've been saying for a long time. We're putting out two episodes a week, three hours each. We're giving, this is just publicly.

46:15So the Joe Budden podcast gives you six hours of free public and then another six to eight hours paywalled. So we're talking about between 12 and 20 hours a week. We own the market share. Netflix looks now and goes what Spotify did back in 2018. Holy shit. We're paying the labels all this money for the music licenses we have. But what if we enter the podcast market space and don't have to pay the labels their share because we're doing original audio with podcast. That means we don't have to pay the labels. we can collect profits every quarter, which means our stockholders will invest more money because they'll get a bigger dividend.

47:03I think the war is starting, not only between YouTube and Netflix, but it's YouTube and Netflix trying to figure out how to take over the most listened to and watched content in the world, which is podcasting. This goes back to my vision for what my daughter is going to do for her first job. They're betting 10 years down the line right now. They don't give a fuck what show. This is Netflix. They don't care what works and what doesn't. That's why they're not negotiating with individual shows right now. Now, I don't know what your conversation with Charlamagne was, but he didn't negotiate that deal with Netflix, right?

47:47I don't know if he did or not, but it was I Heart. I'm saying iHeart's the beneficiary. It was a suite of iHeart podcasts. It's a key word. It's a suite. iHeart was approached by Netflix. And now I'm speculating. I don't really know if this is how it works, but I'm using my better judgment. iHeart was approached by Netflix. Netflix came up with a really beneficial situation for iHeart to take their vodcasts and put them on a platform like Netflix. Not one at a time, a suite of them. And we just saw this recently happen with a competitor, Spotify. Bill Simmons and The Ringer, they announced 14 of, I'm paraphrasing, 14 of his shows were gonna be the first offerings from Spotify to Netflix for their partnership with Netflix.

48:43And my first thought was, didn't they buy the ringer from bill simmons so that means bill simmons didn't negotiate with netflix i'm sure he's pretty angry right now i'm sure spotify gets all the upside of the netflix deal i'm sure iheart gets all the upside of the iheart situation with all their shows and so what they're doing but iheart doesn't own we talk about this downstairs breakfast club is different because that's the iHeart entity. The individual shows, I don't know this for certain, but I know it. What shows are you referencing? Just give me a couple. Joe and Jada. They own their own show?

49:25They don't? I'm asking. Yeah, so it's interesting. Do you know? I don't know. Only because I was on the phone with iHeart yesterday. Okay, yeah. I was literally on the phone. Tell me. I'm just expecting for it. So a lot of, what's changed is that what you're talking about is 100 % correct. When podcasting started, it was just the audio experience right and then a lot of shows you we had we started with it became a video experience right exactly in the original contracts there is nothing for the video right those are old school old school contracts so now they've actually started putting language language this guy's good youtube rights inside of the language of their contract or video rights or video rights so now if you sign a deal like if i'm joe and jada in 2024 i start my podcast do you think i don't know who they have a deal with but they have a deal yeah let's just say they have a deal with some network do you think that their deal didn't include video rights in 2024 and five yeah that and i'm sure it did because the language has changed even in negotiating contracts and even with us like in our contracts it was like no no no what's the matter no it's real these are real conversations it was like look not something that we're interested in right because we we built this independently right of course and so most people don't have a video component of their pocket today's they they do labels know that labels being the powers of the corporation the corporations and so now it's in the contract yes right so a little bit more money in okay when you say standard oh no let's not just yeah lump every because we can't do that what's the matter you afraid of offending somebody what can't we do what is going on here I don't know anyone's contract.

51:03No, I'm just saying that. What iHeart and the Spotify's of the world are offering now. I'm saying for us, we've never given up any level of video at all. That's what I just said. But I know that there's other people, 85 South, they never gave up their video. Okay. So now think about when did they start? They started a long time ago. They started a long time ago. Exactly. I'm talking about the newer contracts. You're talking about people that's coming into the game right now. In the past three or four years. You think that they're signing deals off the rip? Yes. Yes. That's giving up. No, no, no.

51:31Stop. Don't ask the question. See, now we're going to sound crazy. You're not going to do this with me. Yes, they are giving up their video rights. Off the rip. Yes. Because they don't have any yet. No, because they want a bigger check. That part too. And they haven't even experienced what it is to be on YouTube. But they know that they're going to. It's not like YouTube is a secret at this point. They know that video is a major part. Probably more people might even watch the video than they listen to the audio. That is a fact. Well, who knows it better? they know like you said they're looking at it it's the same thing that you said earlier if they offer you 1.2 and master p told us this 30 years ago if they offer me one i must be worth 100 there you go they know if they offer you 2 million or 10 million for your video rights and your audio rights they know they're gonna make 30 off of it right because no one's no one's investing to get their money back right they're investing to make the profit there's a margin here's the other thing guys we're playing games here we're playing semantics joe rogan took his shit off of youtube for his check at spotify and experimented with his video on spotify that didn't work spotify has pivoted and now they cut a deal with netflix so that they can now take the video of all the podcasts they either own or have exclusive licenses to and maneuver those video podcasts however the fuck they want.

52:51That's Spotify and Netflix. What do you think is happening with Netflix and iHeart? I think, I'm just guessing, iHeart's having trouble making money on the audio side of all their businesses, terrestrial radio, digital. They don't know how to monetize it themselves. Yes, on a passive ad revenue fill, maybe they're filling 30 to 50 % of their ad inventory, but that's nothing. That's low level mass corporate integration with products. They want to see real money. They have to give over an asset that is helping another company gain market share. What helps market share when you could bundle up 50 shows, 50 iHeart shows that have video components to it and say, all 50 of these are now property of Netflix.

53:40We're going to take three of your eight episodes per show and air it on Netflix. What happens with the creators? They go, yay, I'm on Netflix. But what really just happened is there was an enormous acquisition between Netflix and iHeart. Netflix paid iHeart multiples of the value of those vodcasts so that iHeart actually had a margin on these 50 shows that they've been investing in for years, probably just making a small three to 5 % margin year over year. It's costing them brain damage to deal with each of these artists. So what's the one way they can go about it without having to negotiate with each artist?

54:22You go to the iHearts, you go to Spotify. What do you guys have rights to? Show me, show me a catalog we want to buy in bulk in bulk you get a deal right in any industry yeah you buy one of something you pay premium you buy 50 of something you get a deal both parties win in fact i'm sure even the creators of the shows got a bump in their salary yeah they had to get an extra bump in their salary bump in this allegedly allegedly we don't know but we would assume with this salary we would I'm not saying I know anything. I'm just saying they're getting a bump in their pay. So here's the question though, right?

55:04So they didn't get their own structured deal. I would, I would have to take a strong stance on absolutely not. But that's my opinion. I'm probably wrong. You could be. Yeah, you could be. I'm wrong. What you said is factual in the sense that when you offer a bundle, you're going to get offered an amount. but if you offer something singular it's going to be premium so obviously your jb is is premium this is premium we're top we're we're super premium super premium right yes so netflix may come to you maybe they don't i have we have business with that so that's what i want to do my deal here's the difference okay because this is i just saw you posted in that yeah i posted something i wanted to just show people the netflix logo on our show promoting the upcoming events we were actually um lucky enough to to have the privilege to talk about the new uh jake paul anthony joshua fight that's uh december 19th this friday on netflix and um yeah we weren't part of these announcements of we're going to be putting our content on netflix i love netflix i think they're a great platform.

56:16I think they've captured our generation. I think they're absolutely competition to any platform you could put in the air around them and a cultural staple that will not be going anywhere anytime soon. What I think is genius that, let me slow down. we didn't do a deal where our content is going to netflix yet our deal that we did with netflix was it was like an advertising partnership you know we have we have partnerships it has nothing to do with our content being on netflix so it's just the content your content is not on netflix netflix has their logo on it not yet no not yet so netflix just put the logo on your show or you just have a second we do original integrations for shows that it's a commercial it's a commercial we're doing commercials you have a commercial for netflix no no no no no no we did lower third is just one of the the branded pieces of content but we did an integration deal with them where uh when we agree on uh an event or a show or a doc or a movie that we both like and feel like reaches an audience that can be impactful through our show, that we do business together.

57:35That's it. I'm not going to get any deeper into the business. No, but what does that mean? You're running a commercial. It means that they talk to us individually. No, no, no. They talk to me. I get that part. I'm just saying, on the Joe Button podcast, right? Yeah. I see a Netflix thing on there. Yes. You mean the Netflix logo. Netflix logo. Yeah, yeah. So you have like a five minute part of the Joe Button podcast. I think it was like 20 minutes the other day. When you're talking about the fight. And we don't have to do 20. Listen, I don't want to get into the details of my deal structure. The point is that we have a partnership with them.

58:09You just saw a first iteration of it. It's us talking about the Jake Paul, Anthony Joshua fight. That's exclusively on Netflix. And that was the extent of it. That's it for now. But the content is not on Netflix. No. So that transition from, and you spoke about it earlier, that transition from we're not doing ads to now we are taking ads. No, we're doing partnerships. We do partnerships. Ads are like, hey, this Friday, December 19th, catch the Jake Paul Anthony Joshua fight only on Netflix. I'm Joe Budden. We don't do that. You have an integrated conversation that's organic. Yes. It's not just integrated.

58:57It's very much collaborative. Interwoven. It's very interwoven. It's good work. Good work. Right. We have a very bespoke situation with everyone we work with. Because before the Netflix, I was thinking prize picks and the way that was done was very interwoven. And it makes me think of, especially for creators, how business begets more business. And so if that relationship works, it's a proven model and test to say, look, we're good at doing this. You know, I know shows that have 25 ad sponsors. I can't listen to their show. There's a lot. I mean, I would say 90 % of the podcasts out there now that choose to turn on stitched advertising or take on dozens of partners.

59:39I can't. I know the show. I just can't tell you what products or businesses those shows are behind because they're flooded with bullshit. it. We went the other way. You don't see how little we shove down people's throats so that when we actually talk about something, you're going to know we believe in it and that it's an actual added layer of value to our listeners and viewers. You can be assured if we get behind something, it's because we believe in it. I've been offered every check from every business that you see on every other podcast and we've turned it down because it's gonna disrupt the experience.

1:00:22At some point, podcasters, media personalities, networks have to make a decision. What's more important? What is more valuable? The experience or this check today? And sometimes people miscalculate and they think the check, oh, it'll help me make more money. It'll help me up my production. They're lying. It's all ego-driven. The truth is, if you can't keep the audience engaged and happy, eventually the audience getting upset and moving off your platform will cost you all the checks you're being offered. Well, you also deliver content differently too. Yes. Your show is not based around guests. Yeah, no.

1:01:01The show has a revolving cast of characters. Yes, it does. No disrespect to anybody else, but let's just be honest. That's what happened. That's what happened. that's what happens that's what happens I agree with that and I'm so grateful for that so it's not like you locked in like you locked into Joe Button and then the surrounding other people it could be Mona one day it could be Queensflip it could be Ish it could be Rory and Maury like they they haven't who? no no Maul and Roy get it well you're saying in the totality of the show yeah oh oh you're saying over the life of it oh yeah yeah oh no when you said Roy I didn't know Roy Wood Jr.

1:01:49and Rory Roy Wood Jr. is wild shout out to our guys shout out to Maury Povich but that's a I don't think there's any other show that does that to my knowledge like a high profile we're the SNL of 2025 of this generation we're the office meets SNL that's good we're that's a good one we put we're a platform like we hope you use us and then go off and do your own thing so that's that's the thing you're not you're not gonna be here for forever no we will be here forever no i'm talking about the peep the supporting cast of characters i don't think so i hope i hope people go off and do their own thing and then want to come back as like um you saw that eddie murphy doc yeah loved it amazing right loved it so such an incredible piece of art but like like that where people are products of snl they go off do their own thing and then it's like this big deal when they come revisit the set again and you know do a monologue or like i hope that's the long-term play with what we're building is that we help people launch into to all their best capabilities.

1:03:05And then they look at us like we were this trampoline for them. Do they know that? No. That was extremely insightful what you just said as far as SNL. I'm wondering, do they know that? I say in order for that to work, they have to want to come back. I don't think everyone wants to come back. I'm here for two years. I'm going to do my thing. I'm going to get busy. I don't know if they know that. Like I said, I think the industry has trained most of our talent and best creatives to hold on to things as tight as they can for as long as they can because it represents security financially. the truth is um everything's nothing's forever and sometimes it's better to get what serves you best and then move forward and know that you did something special somewhere and you could always revisit it but a part of it is in snl it would be is a good comparison now that i think about that is that there's the grooming and the expectation like that's going to happen yeah right so like is that part of the process too like you i don't know but there's not a writer's room for this right like some of those writers not a traditional writer's room but we do have like a whiteboard and you know cory cory can tell you like um that's part of every episode is is watching the cast uh go up to the whiteboard and show their contributions and i've seen joe and other cast members be like ah that's not good that's or that's really good let's do that at the top Let's put this at the, there is a process.

1:04:37Is it a traditional writer's room? Absolutely not. But there is a writer's room actually. It's just not the conventional way you would expect a writer's room. Yeah. I'm only referring to that in sense of like, yes, those people become cast members. Those cast members come in with the expectation like this is the platform that's going to get me to the next piece. Right. Not in a sense anymore in terms of SNL, but in that, that piece for sure in the 80s and the 90s was like, here's a launch board for me to now become. um hopefully i think that's happening in real time i think people are i think people are coming to that conclusion as they get more time and experience around us um and i really love seeing that that evolution because there was a there was a different kind of pressure on joe and i when it was like everyone who comes here this is their everything that's it's like it's almost weird.

1:05:31It's because most people in our industry are so reliant on money. That's all they're really focused on. And I'm not, this is not applicable to the current cast. I'm just saying in general, that's kind of the model that our business works on. And truly, I want everyone around us to soak up the things that we're doing the good the the failures it's like growing up man right like you have parents and your parents you get one of two uh views of your parents you get the things you want to replicate the good stuff and then you get the stuff that you don't like that they did that you hope you take and say i won't repeat that with my kids or with my life um and i hope the cast and everyone that works with us does that for themselves because I want to see everyone go on.

1:06:25I can't wait for someone that's a part of the show to do something bigger than what we've done. That's going to be a hat tip to us. That's not a threat. That's a beautiful thing. I always said this. I like that everyone has moved on and that that is no longer with us and have their own shows, have their own business, have their, it says a lot about what we provided. you know do you think that there's any real value in podcasts oh my god the biggest not value as far as monetary i'm talking about yes all right i had a conversation with jim jones and um i pretty much told him now i don't i think that hip-hop was a very destructive force in our community for a very long period of time paraphrasing yeah and i think that podcast is replacing hip-hop where there's value in some in some love i don't listen to podcasts but the vast majority in my opinion is is not helping.

1:07:16No, it's not. It's dumbing down society and it's not, it's not, there's no value in it. Okay. This, this to me is something where I think I can relate it to music. It all depends on what you're looking for. If you want to hear dumb shit, there's dumb shit out there. But that's what's getting, but the music, once again, the music, I know that's what gets promoted. That's what gets promoted. But hold on. I'm with you. but there's more optionality now than ever. More people picking up microphones, putting out their theories, their interests. It's not necessarily podcasts. I think that word is limiting to, okay.

1:08:01There's creators out there that are talking, making videos and making original content about just about everything in the world. Educate everything. like for me you guys were the first of a show that served educational food for thought in the financial space that I felt like was like revolutionary it was the first of its kind where I was interested in it maybe it was your approach maybe it was your tone maybe it was your knowledge maybe it was a mix of all of it but I was actually interested to to see how you guys were going to build and mold this thing the same way you guys popped out i think there's dozens of other creators that offer really cool insight into everything and yeah 90 of it's going to be garbage just like music but i do think there's value in it i think there's value in really educated interested people that put time and energy into shit they love um giving you a taste of their brain but people really doing that though i feel like the vast majority of people are looking at like music at a certain point music stopped being a craft and it became a hustle and it's like it's always going to be a hustle though man and it's like yo i could just get in front of a microphone just that ends the first time they run into an obstacle they're gone so we don't have to worry about them i'm saying let's look at the people that are actually building catalog of interesting shit if we focus on negative we're going to find negative it's like it's like with a relationship you want to find something that's going to piss you off about your significant other you look deep enough you're gonna find something yeah you you said once that uh the podcast space is a bubble is what a bubble oh yeah it's popped already and it's popped you're gonna see a crumble right now so that leads me to that so what yeah if it's crumbling already right now so then the what rises to the top is it the value is it the creativity who are the the the sub-genre of people that will rise?

1:10:05Are they the ones who are the unicorns or the new creators out here that are about to come? It's the people who set themselves up for success. They could be, right now, it could be the guy with a thousand views an episode. Not a thousand subscribers, a thousand views an episode. But he's genuinely putting in the investigative time, doing the research, giving you information that has value. Those people are gonna rise. those creators are gonna those creators are going to succeed into the future um what has popped is the hustle for a quick bag to me that is over because these big companies aren't interested in one show they're interested in doing data digging and the only way to do that is to go to like an iHeart or Spotify and go, hey, give me your 50 biggest shows.

1:11:00Give me your 100 biggest shows. Let's watch how this plays out for eight months to a year. We'll have all the information we need after that. We'll cut everyone from the deal and we'll go sign the cream of the crop. And that's what I was talking about. That's what I think. A friend of mine at Network, and he was saying like people come to him, like a lot of rappers, and he's asking like, you know, And he's like, look, if this was during the pandemic, I could have definitely gave you a million dollars at one point. He's like, but the shit is different now. Like, you know, money is dried up. There's more saturated.

1:11:34Like, the money is not there. So now you have to bet on yourself. It's not even like out of luxury. I want to bet on myself because I believe myself. Like, you have to bet on yourself because there's not the same money that's floating around as far as the advertising deal structure. So you can't even get a good deal even if you want to a lot of these people. Let me give you a good analogy. I was just talking to my barber the other day and this was like great timing. Shout out to my barber, Brian. Him and I have really good talks when he comes to cut my hair. He was telling me about his barber shop that he owns.

1:12:06He has 10 different barbers and his business is based off of two different things. And this immediately struck me as this is the podcast business. Two different forms of business. One is walk-ins. people that walk off the street into the barbershop and the other side of the business is each barber's book of business long-term clientele that they build relationships with over time and I thought oh my god that's podcasting we have a bunch of people that have entered the space that are waiting for walk-ins and those are the sponsors those are spotify's and netflix's coming with deals. And then you have the barbers that have been in the game for 20 years that have 300 people in their Rolodex that never miss a haircut every month.

1:13:00And when he was saying it to me, I was like, holy shit, that's podcasting. The people that you're seeing infiltrate the market now, they're here today and gone tomorrow. Those are the barbers waiting for the walk-in. The people that answer your question that we're going to see win are the podcasts that have been building a Rolodex and have been learning the business and are figuring out how they could survive, whether there is rain, snow, pandemic, shutdown, no ad money, they'll figure it out. That's who we're going to see rise. And I just thought it was important because when he said it to me about his barbers, I was like, that's exactly how I feel about what's going on in podcasting right now.

1:13:43So I wanted to shout out Brian because that struck me. Little things like that really resonate with me. You touched on it, but I saw you put in your story today. You said the deal number is not the real number. The real number is what they make off of you once they have your data. There you go. That's self-explanatory. We were talking about this before. The deal number is the number that you agreed to to do the work that's outlined. The real number is two separate things. It's the money they make above and beyond what they pay you, the company that hires you or does a licensing deal or acquisition deal with you.

1:14:26And then it's the money they make using the information that you provided them through your term to then resell to a hundred different companies to help those companies function in their businesses. And it could be products. They could be selling it off to hardware products. They could be selling companies. They could be selling it off to other streamers. They could be selling it off to other podcast businesses, data centers. They recycle that data. That shit gets sold and flipped every month to 100 different companies. That's where the real money is. You don't hear about all the data center. I mean, this is where, yes, Data center infrastructure is a big deal in general, not just for, forget podcasting, but data centers are important.

1:15:10Why? Because they, the data centers provide information that give a blueprint to what consumers want and like. That's marketing. That's the easiest way into understanding human culture and human behavior. That's really where the value is, understanding behavior. Behavioral science. That's a fact. We talked about the Patreon piece. It started as advisory, and now that you said that your partner's there. I wonder when you guys look at the network as a totality. Are you interested in adding new talent, or are you going with the route of we're gonna create internal IP when we see like an Ian and Mark show and other shows?

1:15:58What is the strategy with the expansion of the network? okay um so uh what i what we what joe and i really honed in on was we have what we need right this second let's double and triple down on stuff that we could do in-house which is the birth of podwives um which is you know each of us that are on that show and our significant others fucking disaster i mean it's a successful show but fucking disaster i'll leave out why um and then there's the ian and mark show which is more like um a sketch comedy show with me and mark lamont hill um us getting in the way of trying to getting in the way of each other trying to create a sitcom like that's the the log line of it office feel yeah exactly it's like an office feel.

1:16:54Um, and what we decided to do was create these shows internally that work first. Let's, let's not, let's stop reaching outward. Let's stop outsourcing and bringing new people in and let's see what we could do with the people we already have. Um, and so that's phase one. Do I think we're going to get to a place where, um, we're bringing in outside town to do one-off projects or different shows? I do think that'll happen eventually. I just know we're not rushing into it you know like there's no race to to quantity there's race to quality we could do a lot with a little um but okay going forward in the future looking forward in the future yeah you obviously manage musicians yes are you going to go into this space where you're going to be a consultant manager for a podcast um uh i don't know what i'm gonna do exactly i've been offered um i don't need it but i've been offered financing to like create a multimedia management company at scale like think about like a like a rock nation for podcast podcaster like a violator yeah like a violator yeah well streamers and podcasters and content creators yeah i've been i've been approached about that and i've thought about that um right now i'm not interested in that.

1:18:17Right now I'm focused on what I'm doing and I like staying boutique. My partner Keeb and I are step in step just focused on what we can focus on and build today. A lot of times people drown in opportunity and I don't want to do that. I'll always have the ability to expand, but I won't have the ability to recapture where I am in the moment right now. So I want to focus on it because I feel like it's historic and we're changing the landscape forever and that takes all my attention so yeah maybe one day but not now I see we went through this whole interview and as we were talking prior to this I realized how integral DJ Premier was in this whole story so I want to shout out DJ Premier is the best ever man the one of the greatest people on earth first the nicest guys and most iconic composers producers artists to ever land on planet earth and i am so grateful and lucky to be in his presence without him um none of this shit you parks yeah obviously that you get to meet that meet you that's everything well well i should go back papoose that's the very first artist i ever managed um preem saw me working with pap and and that's how he reached out to have me start managing him so i got pap's blessing to go into that yeah so it's really without pap i wouldn't have preem but yes preem is like no pun intended kicked in the door for everything else you know so incredible um yes and now the nons album was joe light years light years see how we worked that in with the family too we got joe in there for the exclusive interview um i'm very proud to play a role in in getting the nas and dj premiere album out um shout out peter bitten bender mass appeal shout out to p um yeah man we it's been an ongoing conversation for years i've managed dj premiere for 15 years and every year we talk about we talked about getting the nas and preem album out so to finally lock in about a little over a year ago and start seeing the sessions come to life I used to talk as a kid about how much I love Nas and I'm lucky enough to say that we got one of the most mythical desired hip-hop projects in history out in the world the album's called Light Years please listen to it enjoy it, let it live with you and I hope people like it I appreciate you fellas appreciate you man hopefully we didn't upset anyone that wasn't my intention get your business straight uh all right my brother appreciate you man thank you thank you for having it's a wrap earners what's up you ever walk into a small business and everything just works like the checkout is fast the receipts are digital tipping is a breeze and you're out the door before the line even builds odds are they're using square we love supporting businesses that run on square because it just feels seamless, whether it's a local coffee shop, a vendor at a pop-up market, or even one of our merch partners.

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