Just a quick note to let you know that the JOJCAST is back. The first interview for Season Two is with ObviouslyBenHughes. Here’s a sample…

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There was a Sydney YouTube Gathering recently. As previously mentioned, I was unable to attend. I did however get up to Sydney a few days before the event to hang out with some of my friends who had travelled from near and far (mostly far) to attend the event.

I was really happy. Firstly because it meant I wasn’t going to miss out on the festivities altogether. But more than that because I was getting to hang out with my peeps rather than the whole of YouTube Australia. I had met most of these people before so we could totally bypass the initial awkwardness of the ‘getting to know you’ phase and revel in the, well, revelry.

I spent Thursday frequenting coffee shops mostly (Gloria Jeans, Starbucks) with Leuke, Mitto, Rohan, Rob and Chris. We swung by a comic book store. We waited for the posse to check into their hostel. We acted silly around Darling Harbour. We didn’t really do very much at all. We didn’t have to! We were just chilling, hanging out, and various other synonyms for the act of simply being in each other’s company.

After the boys checked into their hostel room, Leuke presented us all with gifts from that great island nation of Tasmania. (Okay, obviously it’s not an island nation – it’s just a state of Australia. But saying “state of Australia” just didn’t sound very impressive, now, did it?) There were little trinkets which contained special meaning to each of the recipients. And then he pulled out this gnome. Which gnome? This Gnome. It was Greg! Greg is the subject of a very funny YouTube video which I loved since the first time I had seen it. Many, many gnome jokes followed. And now he was mine! That is so cool.

In honour of Greg’s new home, I gave him his own channel and made him host of Sydney Live (my version of my trip with parody overtones of YouTube’s own recent live event.)

The next day Nick, Loz, Mitchell, Greg (the human; as opposed to the aforementioned Gnome) and Queenie joined us for Yum Cha in Chinatown. Craziness ensued. It was great fun.

After lunch Queenie told me that I was the ‘nicest Aussie’ she had ever met. What a nice thing to say! What really impressed me about this development was that it apparently put me ahead of her own boyfriend, Greg, in the niceness stakes. Yay!

After much walking we ended up at the Apple Store. It was kind of surreal to see so many people who were ‘together’ not really communicating with each other… because suddenly they had computers to look at! There were a few obligatory Apple Store videos recorded (including this one) but by this stage I knew my deadline to be on a train was quickly approaching. I said my goodbyes, posed for a photograph or two, and went on my way. But then something remarkable happened.

Only one person had really expressed disappointment to me before the event that they wouldn’t be able to see me. A young man by the name of Jordan. I told him that it was unfortunate but since he was the closest YouTuber to me, geographically speaking, I’m sure I would see him at another time. Anyway I stepped outside of the Apple store – and there he was, just waiting for a bus. Serendipity in action, surely?

It was so much fun. It was oddly life-affirming. It was amazing to see people in the (sometimes) harsh light of day and in three dimensions! I might not see these people everyday, indeed I am lucky to see them once or twice a year – but I talk to them most days. I talk to Leuke almost every single day. It feels strange if we don’t talk. These people are important to me, these people are an integral part of my life. Or – to borrow a Sarryism – they are VITAL TO MY YOUTUBE EXISTENCE! And yet not merely my YouTube Existence, rather, my existence full stop!

See Also
AusOne Sydney YouTube Gathering (Rohan’s Blog)
A Story Of Great Things (Leuke’s Blog)

It feels a little strange to be writing this here since I intended to cover this subject matter in video form early next week. However the more I converse with people, the more I feel the need to write it.

Lately I’ve been noticing a lot of deeply concerned people. I confess when the US election proceedings commenced, I expected to see a lot of people talking up the merits of their preferred candidates and party. What I am actually witnessing is a lot of terrified people who are freaking out every time a news article surfaces or a debate takes place. People are scared. It’s not a question – it’s a fact.

Now, please, dear Americans. Please know that I am being completely sincere with the sentiment I offer here. You are a very resilient and resourceful people. You need not be as worried as you are. You have survived eight years of George W. Bush. Hell, you survived having J. Edgar Hoover as the director of the FBI. (Anyone who has seen the X-Files: I Want To Believe movie will recall a telling sequence in which Mulder and Scully wait outside offices within the FBI. Mulder looks at the two photographs on the wall. On one side there is a picture of George W. Bush and on the other there is a picture of J. Edgar Hoover. The familiar X-Files theme plays eerily as we wonder momentarily about the greatest paranormal mystery of all; how do mad men end up with power, anyway?)

On election day you will (if you fit the eligibility criteria) have a single vote. This is wonderful. I implore you to exercise your right to vote. But I also invite you to realise that there are limits to your influence. Once the votes are counted there will be an outcome – and it might not be the one you were hoping for. Obviously I don’t know everyone who happens upon this blog, I don’t know your political affiliations and personal inclinations. But if you have strong feelings for one party or the other, you have the potential to be very happy (or very disappointed) at the outcome.

What I want you to know – regardless of what you think of any of the candidates – is that you need to find a way to be okay with the outcome. I can’t have you jumping out of tall buildings. Seriously. This blog has so few readers – I can’t have any of you dying on me.

Obviously the country – indeed the whole world! – are facing some challenges right now. We keep hearing about the ‘credit crunch’ and the bail out deal.

If I could tell the world just one thing it would be that we’re all o.k. And not to worry cause worry is wasteful and useless in times like these.

Er… sorry I was momentarily possessed by the spirit of a singer-songwriter who spent much of her youth in Homer, Alaska. Hey, I wonder if she could see Russia from her house… er, I digress.

The point is everyone needs to take a deep breath and not panic. We need to realise money is a form of exchange – and nothing more! We need to realise that there are people out there who will use our fears – real or imagined – for their own personal, economic and political gains. There are already stock market traders doing very nicely at the expense of more fearful, inexperienced traders. Potentially economic uncertainty might be used as political fodder in the same way that communism and, more recently, terrorism have been. If you are in an emotional frenzy you are very easy to manipulate. It is important that you are not reactionary.

Author of The Four Hour Work Week, Tim Ferris recently brought my attention to the 1943 Disney version of Chicken Little. In this version of the childhood tale, Foxy Loxy uses a psychology textbook to mobilise a fearful and reactionary pen of animals – ultimately to their deaths. This is a far cry from the vision of Disney animations we have now. There are no happy endings to be had here. But, perhaps, that makes the tale more meaningful!

If politics is something that is of interest to you, if it is a great passion for you, then by all means pour your time and energy into it. Just know that that rhetoric is a blackhole. You can pour as much of yourself and your energies into it and it will never fill the void. Again, the influence of even the most charismatic speaker has limits.

Scapegoating is great fun. I shudder to imagine what I would do if I didn’t have ABBA and Christianity to blame the woes of the world on. (End joke.) But if you have an obscene amount of personal debt, if you failed to meet a repayments schedule, if you went out and got something on credit you knew you couldn’t afford – NOW is the time to step up and be responsible. Don’t sit there and bemoan the price of petrol or the state of the economy. THIS is where you have an amazing realm of influence. You can’t control everything that happens politically or economically, but you can control your own actions. You CAN be responsible for yourself. If ever there was a time to learn about living within your means, now would be it.

The Department of Treasury have set up a bizarre interactive website, the Bad Credit Hotel. I doubt there is much here people don’t already know intellectually, though a little revision will help you alter your habits and be more mindful of the implications of credit.

It has been said that there is no accounting for taste, but I would put to you, dear reader, that there is no accounting for – well, anything…

Regular readers might recall my frustration with YouTube. The longer I spend around the creature that is ‘YouTube’ the less I understand it. I mean, I understand the infrastructure. I understand the logistics. What I am more concerned about is my own contributions, my videos. They are (at times) very difficult to make and I want them to have meaning, and, hopefully, connect with people. Sometimes I’ll spend months working on a project to have it received by a completely nonplussed audience. And other times I’ll have a brain explosion, record something in real time with no editing, and people lap it up.

Nalts supposedly makes a video a day simply because he has no idea what is going to ‘stick.’ He also suggests that Good Content is Not Popular and that we should Screw the audience! Okay, I need to stop using Kevin’s blog to make me feel better about myself. We both have Louise Hay for that!

The point is while I have some idea of what I intend to make I never have any idea how it will be received. Which brings us to this…

Happy Fake British Accent Day is well – very silly. A completely made up cultural holiday brought to my attention by that most happy of time wasters, Facebook. I say silly things in bad accents which may or may not have any resemblance to our British friends. A day or two before I made the video I had been introduced to British YouTube personality Jerry Cooke (hence the random exclamations of “JERRY!” in the video). At the time I even suggested my other Australian friends might get in on the act and use it as the basis for a birthday collaboration for Mr. Cooke. They declined. (Only HalfScottishGuy got in on the act and even then it only appeared on his alternate channel.)

Oddly this video appears to have struck a cord with the people. It has become my 4th most viewed video. Five months after I uploaded it it still averages about 10 views per day. This is unheard of for me. I have a little over 500 subscribers, and typically whatever views my videos had received in the first 48 hours of being live was basically where that number would stay.

Comments are always fun.

crazyboyxx (1 month ago)
lived in england 25 years and never heard anyone remotely like that. Why is it so hard for americans to do a remotely decent accent? They all end up sounding like royalty from 200 years ago. There are literally hundreds of accents in britain so theres huge choice.

I’m not American. (I wonder what specifically made this person think I was?) I would wager its difficult for most people to emulate any accent. Furthermore, are there any recordings of royalty from 200 years ago? If not how do they know what the 200 year old British monarchs sound like?

Certainly there is a great width and depth variation of accents within Britain. Clearly I am not a trained actor. Perhaps people missed the word “FAKE” in the title? Perhaps they also missed the video description where I suggested a list of people with REAL British accents they could watch alternatively.

I imagine my penchant for antagonism probably doesn’t help.

The Australian Story episode “Reality Bytes” which tells the story of Australian YouTube user DrLemur (Daniel Meadows) is now available online from the show’s website for viewing.

It proved to be much more than merely an account of one man’s detainment. And the love story between Daniel and Shannon unfolds beautifully in front of our eyes. (Eh, what can I say.. it made me feel all warm and fuzzy.)

One thing that Daniel seemed to take exception at after watching the advertisement for the episode was the status he was assigned as a ‘computer geek.’

Computer geek…? It’s an interesting interesting take on my life there. Tune in this is going to be very interesting. And… I tell you what if I’m a computer geek, all of you are computer geeks too. Every single last one of you watching on YouTube are a computer geek… nerds, nerds is what you really are. Just nerds. All of you. I’m not alone. I’m not.

I couldn’t help but agree with him after watching the episode. Even its presenter, Caroline Jones, confessed to not really understanding anything about the internet.

It amused me too because recently there has been much speculation that Vloggerheads might actually be a cult – when, clearly, any type of online activity (including YouTube) is seen as a pecuilar thing by the wider community.

Reading this from an RSS feeder? You might not be getting the full experience.

Related Content:

Re: Computer Geek? [YouTube]

It is not a story known by many outside of the YouTube Community, but when Australian YouTube user DrLemur attempted to gain entrance to the United States he was detained by Homeland Security and ultimately denied access to the country.

Now his story will hopefully get a broader audience when it is retold on ABC’s Australian Story. The episode will go to air in Australia on Monday 25th August at 8pm on ABC1.

There are no plans at this stage for the episode to be shown internationally, however it will be available to stream online from the show’s website.

I have known Dan (DrLemur) and his sister Heidi (Heidiscope) for some time now, and am delighted to call them both friends. I am sure they would both appreciate your support.

I had a bit of an emotional meltdown yesterday. It culminated in a car vlog – yes, remember those! – at 10pm last night. Something somebody said struck a cord with me and I couldn’t continue on the path I was headed. I suppose I knew long before then that I couldn’t continue; but it was a possibility I wasn’t then prepared to explore.

The truth is I reached a point where I had to make a decision. Whether I was going to choose somebody who had no interest in me, or whether I was going to choose myself. This morning I chose myself. This morning I decided I am all I have and if I can’t have the faith to invest in myself, what could I possibly have?

This morning it felt incredibly liberating, this line in the sand I have drawn. But later in the day it started to feel scary. The truth is I know I have made the right decision. I realise I have made the only decision I could make. And in a funny way for the first time in a long time I feel like I’m going to be okay.

Tomorrow I will pick up the pieces of my life and move on. Today, however, I intend to mourn a little, say goodbye to ideas in my head, and sleep a lot. It’ll be okay. Is it strange that I want to go listen to Joan Baez singing “We Shall Overcome” at this junction?

I am writing this near the Nowra Public Wharf, beside the vast Shoalhaven River and with a keen view of the bridge that connects Bomaderry and North Nowra to Nowra itself; and indeed to the remainder of the coast further south. (I point this out since it will not be readily obvious when I return home to turn my hand written scribbles into typed words.)

This has become my ‘home away from home’ which was fortunate since the familiarity of my own home had been driving me nuts. Its a strange combination of nature and industrial influence. The river literally sparkles in the sunlight everywhere but under the bridge itself and where trees close to the bank replace sun with shadow.

A lone Willie Wagtail performs acrobatic wonders before me, darting in and out of a deciduous tree. And now he or she is joined by a mate who seems to mirror the moves of the first, almost in some sort of ‘visual’ equivalent to a jazz trumpet call and response routine. The perfect accompaniment to Nina Simone’s “I Put A Spell On You” (the song currently playing on my iPod shuffle.)

It seems strange to feel so peaceful this close to a busy highway. For a time I had thought it might’ve been reassuring to know that civilisation wasn’t too far away. Today, however, I have reached a very different conclusion. What I really derive peace from is knowing that the Rat Race is over there and that I am no longer a part of it.

While the more responsible people of the world have been rushing to meet deadlines and bill payments, I have been basking in the sun. (I have long neglected my body’s Vitamin D requirements!) I have polished off the first five chapters of John A. Keel’s quest for Oriental magic, Jadoo. And I’ve been impressed by inspired performances from the likes of Jamie Cullum, Rickie Lee Jones, Carole King, Chet Baker and Miles Davis.

For me, personally, the question is no longer ‘When will I return to the workforce?’ but rather, ‘Do I really want to?’

The concept of the Rat Race is not a new one. While I did find myself waking up routinely at 5am, and sometimes working on unfinished projects until the early morning, it wasn’t the time demands that bothered me the most about my previous job. Rather, it was the mental demands. The truth was (whether intended or not) my workplace yielded an unprecedented assault on my psyche. Every moment of everyday my thoughts were purely work-centric. Even my dreams became a subconscious ‘playground’ for business ideas and concepts. I had, it seemed, surrendered all mental autonomy.

The constraints of no obvious source of income are fairly self-evident. I have been attempting to flesh out a business idea of my own, though have been frustrated by the obstacles I encounter. I can’t find a publisher who will produce what I envisage. I am presented with alternatives though I remain unconvinced that sufficient demand exists these alternatives. My dual desires to create a high quality product and keep overheads low are, predictability, at odds with each other.

Many of my friends seem to exist in a slightly different reality to myself. Most of them are students. (Indeed for most of them the most pressing need they have currently is finding a way to afford the new iPhone when it comes out.) Steve (QiRanger) suggested I get out and see the world. The idea didn’t instantly resonate with me. So I asked myself a slightly different question. Indeed a question I’ve asked myself many times before.

WHAT WOULD KEEL DO?

That’s essentially why I’m here, pouring over his first book; looking for inspiration, ideas and reassurance. I find it comforting to know my idol has been broke, lonely, and – incredibly enough – even terrified of the spectre of a blank page.

My typewriter collected dust in my hotel room. A few times I shoved a piece of paper into it, but a blank sheet of paper is a frightening, disheartening thing to a would-be writer. I always slapped the cover shut with the paper still blank.

- John A. Keel, Jadoo (“Broke In Baghdad”, pgs 77-78)

Four pelicans just flew over my head in a sort of V-shaped formation.

I guess I best get back to this book…

I have something of a shameful secret to tell you. I looked at the subscribers of the JohnOfJordan channel recently and realised I didn’t know who half of them were.

I’ve never been one to go around “thanking” people for subscribing. To be honest, that seemed really condescending in my eyes.

Oh, it gets better. When people don’t comment, I tend to assume they don’t watch. This is a flawed assumption since there are always more views than comments. Although for a long time I genuinely thought the sheer bulk of my views were the result of search engine bots.

When I did look at the list I checked out a number of the people I didn’t recognise. I regret that, due to time constraints, I wasn’t able to do this for all of them. I left a few comments, watched some videos and even subscribed to a few of them.

I was watching a new video from one of these previously unknown subscribers (Jetterz12) and was excited to hear what I did.

… JohnOfJordan for subscribing to me… Thank you JohnOfJordan which is really awesome because you were like one of the first people I subscribed to when I started my YouTube account.

That seems so cool to me. And before today I had no idea!

The video itself is awesome. A lovely scene from the British summer.

It sounds like a high school essay question doesn’t it.

JohnOfJordan: Emo or not? Please discuss (with examples).

Recently there was a YouTube Gathering in Noosaville. I was unable to be there in person, though I was in spirit and (as this video can attest) as a subject of conversation. At times there was even a live feed from the event via Stickam. A woman I had never met before appeared on camera and said, “Oh so this is the JohnOfJordan I’ve been hearing so much about? Where’s my [JohnOfJordan] t-shirt biatch?” It was hilarious!

Pauly sent this video to me. It is a discussion between Pauly and Choppa debating whether or not I am “emo.”

Pauly makes some interesting points. Its true, since I’ve become a YouTube Partner my videos have changed considerably. Perhaps I am more happy in them. Certainly recent projects, such as the birthday videos to Davey and Mitto, have been a real labour of love. The FiveDrunkenOuttakes video was fun to make – indeed, outtakes are always hilarious.

The truth is a lot has changed in my life recently and I guess, inevitably, that is reflected in some largely unconscious ways in the quality of my videos. Even getting my hair cut had an impact. I’m not going to pretend I am now happy all the time, but I think my motivations for making videos have changed. It used to be that when I felt unhappy I had this great need to share my pain with the world. In part, because articulating the pain made it seem less intense in the moment. In part, because it was nice to know that there were people who cared.

Something to consider, I suppose.