"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enwhat's going on guys welcome back to dope or no sad episode all right so it doesn't it doesn't have to be a sad episode really what this what this is all about is me personally saying i'm sorry i totally did this wrong i totally did this entire transition of doper nope just completely wrong and i just wanted to say sorry for that i got the guys here i got pat here i got tanner here i got a big long spiel that i wanted to kind of like just communicate to you guys the audience and tanner pat you guys feel free to chime in at any point where you you want to add in things you want to correct me you want to convict me it's my favorite part easily but yeah so basically what i wanted to say was i really should have brought you guys the audience in on this process i realized about a week ago that i made a pretty big mistake with how i handled things and i don't know i just wanted to apologize for it i realized that in my personal relationships if i just went around and just pulled a rug out from under people i should expect them to be upset frustrated scared annoyed and that's pretty much what i did to you guys i pretty much pulled a rug out and then i was surprised when everyone was like frustrated or upset or didn't want to go in that particular direction and i understand that now i see that now i didn't see that before but i kind of wanted to explain to you like what happened so i can give you guys better insight into how we got there and just a better explanation of where we've been this past year with kovid and why we're here now so back back back back even before kovid here we go let's just go through the whole journey let's do it let's go through the whole journey i think it's all relevant and this is why i'm bringing it up because back before kovid started we already had started to transition michael out of the channel because he really really really wanted to move to the rose channel that was something that he was really wanting that was something he was pushing for and tina and i were concerned but we also are not a studio in which we want to stop people from achieving what they want to achieve right obviously there are other factors at play but i think we are definitely concerned about what that might mean and then covet hit and it hit hard as as i remember tanner we were just like okay what on earth are we gonna do how are we gonna how are we gonna sustain the business doper nope had always been at the time the one channel that was sustaining everyone's jobs for the most part almost everyone's jobs and i think we had this tremendous amount of responsibilities on our shoulders to like get it right even through this entire time and i remember tana you were coming over to my place and we were like let's still record right let's still get this done let's still figure this out and we were concerned from the from the get-go especially of michael transitioning out like here's the thing we didn't really know what to do at that time we were we were deeply concerned um with all these changes how did how it would affect the content how it affect the audience how it would affect our livelihoods the livelihoods of everyone at the studio there was a lot writing on it and i think like we really did our best with what we had and tanner and i started making videos from home to to keep everything afloat and not that there wasn't a lot of work by a lot of other amazing individuals you know off camera there was but it kind of was hinging on us continuing to make content because that's what we do that's how we pay the bills and things then really took a turn for the worst right covet really hit hard and we had to stop even in contact with each other tanner and i and so with them we started trying to do online content and you know we're where we did like three or four videos before those inevitably absolutely bombed what's interesting tanner as i looked back on those videos today and they actually have a decent amount of views but if you recall and i recall like do you remember those they both they bombed they absolutely bombed and that's like the i think that's like the clarifying point to where a lot of our changes even happen from is like we were before kovid we were like i think we were doing really really well you know and then covet hit and that's what's tricky from our perspective compared to like you guys the audience's perspective is we're always trying to bring you guys the best content as best as we can and something that we enjoy too so it looks like yeah like if you look at it from the outside perspective you go back towards those videos like why'd you guys just not film at home why don't you guys just do that because those have views but back then those were getting legit like like 70 of the views which tells us the audience doesn't like it like our subscriber base doesn't enjoy this content yeah i think that's that's a really interesting point to note because a lot of times people will only look at the comments and they'll be like all the comments were positive and they work but the issue with it is the the real data to let you know whether or not you're making odd content that your audience likes is whether or not they click in and not the comments the comments are good and we love the comments but if half your audience doesn't click in your audience isn't engaged with the content that you're making and so we had to stop and we stopped making content for a while for like a month before we were like okay we have to do something or people are going to lose their jobs and yeah and that was you know that's always been such a big concern of mine obviously leading this company and you know on this project i know tanner that's been a ton of weight on tanner's shoulder too on tanner's shoulder just one on your shoulders just one of them yeah just one because i know we've talked about that a lot and i know we've tried to like diversify in a thousand different ways but doper nope has always been this monolithic thing that's supporting the company and that's not bad it's just where we are you know yeah and so we decided to wait to make content and then wait and then wait until we couldn't really wait anymore and we had to brave ourselves back into the studio it took us a bit to figure out how to make content in a way that you know that worked that the audience wanted but i i personally don't think like i ever checked in with myself to be like is this something that i want to make is this something that i care about and for me personally and tanner and and you can you can tell me what what you went through here but for me personally it was like it wasn't until like a month or two ago that i started checking in to be like wait a second now that the fear is like dissipating from this like toxic fear throughout the world because of this pandemic i was like wait a second do i want to do this yeah yeah i think it's uh tricky and i think it's part to where high five has always been and i mean we're changing it a lot now but we high fives been really bad at communicating the bad i would say we just never really have you know we've always just been like yo this is a positive space positive stuff positive things but in reality i think yeah it was just that was probably that was the most difficult time of high five for sure without a doubt and i think we didn't communicate the amount of fear towards it i think right like when you're running a business right we have 30 plus employees especially the time we had more i think we have a ton of employees this is the main thing that's like keeping people afloat like you said and you're creating shifts from okay what do we what what is inspiring us what do we want to do to how do we keep this afloat and i don't think we left that and i think that's kind of like the biggest change that happened from beginning of this year to like even up to like recently you know is until we tried making the changes to glover but it was we were stuck in this continual cycle of how do we stay afloat how do we get back instead of it being what is inspiring us like we've done in the past you know so that has a huge effect on the people who are creating it too right like they see the brand they see the videos like oh why don't they do this like why are they doing this now you know like there's a lot of people asking those questions but i think what it really comes down to is the content is a reflection of us so we were like embedded with fear legit for like i think you know the entire world was yeah right i just think we tried to mask that we tried to be like like hey look at us we're doing it you know what i'm saying and well i wouldn't say i intentionally tried to mask it i would say i wasn't aware of it and i think that's one of the things of like even like listening to what you're saying tanner is like yeah i do agree that i haven't done a great job of communicating like the depth of emotions at high five and i think it's largely sometimes due to the fact that like we don't know until it's afterwards you know self-awareness is is kind of like this weird kind of like trailing thing where it's just like oh that's what i was oh and not like necessarily during the experience of all the fear and emotions but pat i know when we canceled bu too because that wasn't that that was a great example of like what was happening at the time of like canceling bu because that wasn't gonna be making money that for sure couldn't support that team and so we were trying to figure out how to diversify and not lose everyone and then you coming on to doper nope yeah what was what was that like for you it's just it's tough because you go back and forth between you know this is a fun job this isn't like for a lot of people this looks like an easy job you know it's an easy fun job probably the best job you could ever have and there are times where it is like that you know with bu whereas like i just get to go to the studio and have fun but with dope nope it's such a different monster because like you said at the time it was supporting everyone you know and that comes with an extra level of stress and that's the one thing that people a lot of times don't see is like hey you guys the the guys who are watching right now like you guys are obviously some of our biggest fans and you'll watch anything we do but that's just not the nature of the entire platform like we just can't just only support a 30 you know employee company on 100 000 views of the 100 thousand people who are you know will watch anything we do you know so it comes with the level of stress and you play in your head like i'm trying to support you know all my friends here because i don't want all my friends losing jobs you know i'm trying to make sure that everyone is good here but then you're also trying to make sure that you're not going you know crazy stressful or not enjoying your job at all and that's where dopant just is a whole different monster man it's nuts and so i think to touch on that too is i think that's like a slippery slope is like i don't want to create that expectation that like we want this group of people that will watch anything like if we start making bad content stop watching you know what i'm saying exactly like that which is what happens i think it's important to recognize like oh this group of people this dire group people watch anything like that only lasts for so long so like it's our job to provide value so i think like that's the other slope too is it's like we can't just make anything like we also want to make things that do engage you and don't just like numb you to like what's going on like and and that's the thing i think to touch with what pat's been saying that's what we've been trying to bounce and trying to actually make work and that's where i think you know matt will go into where we're just now kind of figuring that out yeah and i think if if i could touch on some things too that you guys said because i i know sometimes uh less aware audience members might assert that like well why don't you just pare down and then just make youtube videos like everyone else on the platform like a because that's not what we want to do like our whole goal is to just like have a fostering community of creators you know what i mean and like that's the vision that's part of the goal is not to do things alone and yeah we have a lot of overhead but that's the goal the goal is to like have a ton of people to make better things together but then the other piece is you know while we do talk about money and while we do talk about views at the end of the day that only tells us whether or not we're actually achieving our vision our vision of creating content and creating a community that cares about what we're creating and we care about what we're creating that's an indicator it's not the reason we have to look at it because we have to make sure that that we're providing that value like tanner said to to the audience and to my employees and even to to my cr the creative inside me like we have to be providing all that value and one of the ways we do that is by supporting jaws by supporting individuals but also by looking at those those factors like views and revenue to be able to continue that but it's definitely not the goal it's definitely not the reason why we're there making videos if that was the reason why there's a bunch of different ways we could be making a lot more money which is exactly what i i'm assuming a lot of people might surmise which is pare down and like make more content which is yeah but that's not the goal the goal is to have this community that that creates these amazing things and we're so much closer to getting there but i think this also kind of leads into like where we are right here right now with even me personally right we started changing things right so we started changing things in doper nope right we started doing different things like dope week and going to stores and we started trying to change a decent amount to see like how we can invigorate our passion again and at that time i've been having so much fun with this overkill character and megadesk over on my personal channel and it gave me so much awareness to really what i was missing on the dopanoke channel of like what i really really yearned for with this channel like a deeper connection to my audience a deeper connection to what i'm creating so that people enjoyed it even more i started to love youtube again but over on dober nope we were still making things that like just really pulled apart my love for making content at the time when i started to check in with okay am i enjoying what i'm making and if i'm not enjoying what i'm making that's probably a huge reason of why i'm disconnected from my community why we're not all having fun on camera off camera right and so i didn't feel like we had a strong connection to our audience through doper know i didn't feel like we were making things we cared about or that our audience cared about and i personally overreacted to those fears now to preface this next part to most people the most common fear response is a phobic fear response right the most common fear response when someone's scared is to withdraw is to run away is to avoid is denial right that's not how i personally operate and i think that's why it's like for some people it's very hard to understand like what the heck is he doing over there this guy's always in a mid-life crisis but like the the if i could explain to you how my brain works this is something i think might explain a lot right so my natural response to fear is counterphobic in other words i attack it i try to destroy it i remove it i engage it i fight it and i try to control it this on the outside is is what looks like i'm always in that like mid-life crisis because that's what my fear response looks like i've been spending a lot of time in prayer and i feel like i feel like god gave me some awareness recently about this whole thing and what this says about my behavioral patterns and how i engage with fear and that's why i'm here today apologizing to you guys for it is because regardless of phobic counterphobic or whatever kind of fear response i had to to not making great things i should have used fear as information and not motivation for change i should have used it as information to reflect on and then to use to guide me through a much slower process of change that's something that was a big lesson for me that i took away from this entire this entire scenario and i was 100 wrong and i think like that that would have been the most appropriate response to fears right not to run and hide from it but not to attack it and engage right so i'm not saying my fear response was was an appropriate one by any measure i'm just saying it's different right for that i'm really sorry and i i still feel very fortunate to have learned this lesson uh to have an audience that spoke up that communicated that helps me understand that i need to look a little bit deeper inside myself and inside my own behavior does that mean i won't ever cancel things in the future absolutely not that's the nature of creative projects that's the nature of things as they come to an end looking back is that is that why i canceled everything in the past absolutely not like for instance battle universe wasn't a counterphobic or a phobic response that was a calculated response to ensure that we could save jobs right this overkill transition was definitely a fear response and i will 100 take ownership for that but i think it's important to note that we made as many doper nope episodes as there are episodes of friends let that sink in for you in a second i didn't even know that yeah that's crazy right the almost the exact same amount of episodes as friends made we did it in two and a half years friends did it in nine years maybe ten ten and so that kind of showcases to you how burnout works with a creator why why often creators need new change need need evolving things but it's not a surprise why we're looking for something new and exciting it's not a surprise why we've been burned out but that being said it's still not an excuse for not bringing you guys in on the process and having you guys come into this change with us pat you were talking to me earlier about some of this stuff uh about like how this kind of change should be like a uh like a give and take yeah it's a two-way street you know like this a lot of times you you watch a youtube video and you think oh this is just this person making this thing and i get to watch it and that's just not how we treat high-five studios this is something that we haven't done a great job at but we're trying to do a better job at is making this a two-way street if we enjoy making something and you guys hate it then that's not gonna work and vice versa if you guys love something and we absolutely despise it then we're not gonna make it because we're gonna get burnt out so fast and the content's not gonna be good this has to be a two-way street and we're going to get there sooner rather than later there's a middle ground that we can find that we're going to love making those videos and you guys are going to love watching it we just haven't found it yet you know and and that's where you guys are going to help a lot because we were having a pretty good time i think over the last few weeks and you guys weren't there and that's fun because now we hear what you're saying and that wasn't a two-way stream you were going down a one-way road and so now we know how to adjust and get back on that two-way street so what does that mean what does that mean where are we here you've watched all the way through this long video and we haven't even told you what we're gonna do so here's what i think we should do but i'm opening it up to conversation with pat and tanner and i'm opening up to conversation with you guys the audience right what i think is that dopant up doesn't go away i think we don't remove the beautiful colors that that we all loved pink and blue i think we don't change the channel name and i don't think we don't i think we shouldn't stop doper note right i don't think we should rename the channel i think there are a lot of comments that suggested why don't you just make a new channel called overkill instead of changing this one and i was reading those comments and i was like see this is why i should have asked people beforehand because that's a better idea and so like honestly that's probably what i'll do i can't promise that we'll upload super frequently but if if you're one of the one percent on this channel that liked overkill stuff link in the description and tanner tanner i know you also had an idea that that excited you about starting an underkill channel just to mess with the overkill channel yeah i might just make like an underkill channel and just legit prank him like it'll all be like videos under like three or four minutes you know and then it's just me like they're they're not gonna be edited hardly at all and it's just gonna be doing dumb stuff that i think will just trigger him maybe they'll even be short maybe i'll do like 30 second videos just like ordinals it's look like it's from cloverfield you know just fine yeah but i still love that character to be honest so yeah it's still fun i'm still gonna i'm still gonna love that people over on my personal channel still love the overkill character obviously you guys don't and that's why we're gonna we're gonna we're gonna take that away we're gonna take that away overkill actually really overkilled it so he i guess he did his job but i think this wasn't written dude i swear we didn't plan this change just to have the character i mean literally an overkill character is an alter ego i have because i have counterphobic responses like that's deep inside my head this is the deepest youtube channel of all time the metaphoric youtube channel yeah yeah i think you know to go back to what we want this channel to be i think it's important right now to return to a format that you guys love and with some added changes that will allow us to love it again i think we still stand by not buying things we intend to throw away and you guys have also again given us some really great ideas down in the comments below of like when we inevitably do buy things that we don't want i think it would be a great idea again taken directly from a comment that said why don't you guys just do a mystery box giveaway at the end of every video full of the stuff you guys aren't gonna keep i love that i think we should do that at the end of every video of like hey these are the things we're not keeping it's in a box selling it for 99 cents to whoever gets it first you know what i mean i think that's awesome we don't want to put things into a landfill and i think that's a win-win i also think that we still definitely want to do list-based videos we have a big long list of list-based videos that are classic doper note that we actually wanted to continue to do there's a lot there but i also think we still want to keep the the new heart of it which is buying things together and not pretending to buy it and then opening it up in the same video so that we can like make content faster for you guys well and just to give some clarity on that too a lot of you guys don't know like the behind the scenes on how like some of our channels work so for the longest time i would be buying the products and neither matt or tanner knew what i was buying until the day we were shooting and they would look at it and they would try to react to it and so you're asking someone to connect to something that they haven't ever connected to before and it's really really tough and i think that's what lost kind of some of the magic with all three of us because i don't like buying like this is gonna sound weird i don't like buying christmas gifts for random people if i don't really know what they want and that's what it felt like with youtube is like like we don't know what these guys are going to enjoy like yeah exactly and i know you guys were probably having the same reaction of like i wouldn't have really enjoyed this product i would have chosen something different and so like that's how it used to work and with this overkill change it was really all three of us sitting down and figuring out what we want to do together and looking at these products together and like figuring out what we want in the videos all together not just one of us or two of us or whatever and using that like thought process for writing but going back to like dopamine upside content is kind of like i think the push we're going for here and i i think like the last thing is the old set we don't even have anymore but i i will say personally we shot some videos i'm not sure if we'll upload it because it's overkill style but these videos is where where tanner and i sat in those mega chairs those mega comfy reclining chairs and we just kind of reviewed some products with the table in front of us and it was kind of dope or nope but it was also more relaxed and more comfortable than like than like the rhett and link type thing where it's a more formal show you know what i mean like not to knock those guys those guys are hilarious they're funny i love it i don't think that format really works for for doper note like we anticipated months and months ago so we want to keep it a little bit more loose a little bit more like let's see what we find but i think we have a lot of great ideas and so i don't think right now at least right now we'll probably bring that set back but we will probably turn all those lights in that green mega desk room to like pink and blue and have some fun in there you know but i'm also really open to your guys ideas of like how we might make this fun how we might make it more engaging for you guys so that i really appreciate you guys sticking around and hearing that out but i also wanted to say like a final thing about community yes i was wrong yes i was wrong to like pull the rug out from under you guys yes i was wrong to like come up behind you and go boom you know and scare the crap out of you right i was wrong but i also think that some people in this community need to take responsibility for their behavior too in their response to it so it's like i kind of want to bring up this this analogy of like what i just said of like coming up behind someone and saying boo if you're the type of person that turns around you're like oh my gosh you scared me that actually scared me please don't do that again that's okay that's a normal response but if you're the type of person that turned around and punched me in the face again that's not a healthy response to my unhealthy response you know what i mean like so i appreciate you holding me accountable but i'm gonna do the same thing i'm gonna hold you guys accountable all that all the toxic kind of energy in the comments where you feel entitled to make us do certain things even if we're not gonna have a fun time doing it like this is a two-way street and not only that i think like pat and tanner you guys were talking about like i think people often forget that we're people too you know what i mean imagine millions of people on the internet screaming at you you know pretty tragic mental breakdown like three years ago was i was just getting nothing but hate comments about like death threats and all this i'm like oh dude me too yeah yeah we've all gone through that yeah and also you gotta understand like this isn't just none of this has ever been just matt's doing either right like this isn't like matt came up to me it was like this is happening right now you know like matt called me i was like hey i'm not enjoying this are you enjoying this i said no he's like what do you think about doing this i said that sounds fun like this is collaborative like this isn't one person's fault this is something we all thought would be enjoyable and all felt like it would be fun and we did have fun doing it but we also all have to own the fact that like we really we didn't realize you guys might not like it right yeah and that's perfectly okay that's why we're changing but don't flame matt thinking it's all him and he wanted this change like it's just not the case well if anything you should do the exact opposite because there's no other creators that i know of on this platform that really loop their audience in and figures out what they want they just make stuff and the fact that like matt and high five studios is this open to making what you guys want as long as we enjoy it it's something that's rare on this platform and it shouldn't be taken as like you know advantage to be honest i appreciate that i appreciate that guys that means a lot i think that you know all in all like like tanner said it sucks that we made some stuff and didn't clue in our audience but i also think it's really important to note that we were having fun and we were making things that we really cared about and i think there's still a place not on this channel but i think we can also make things that you guys care about so let us know give us some feedback down in the comments below we really appreciate it so last piece guys wanted to ask you a question right now because probably a lot of you guys aren't aware but tanner right now is in vegas right he's in vegas he's got a house in vegas he still plans on coming out here every week shooting doper nope hanging out making awesome stuff but right now tanner is in a bit of a predicament and we've been praying for him over there and i think i think yeah tanner if you just wanna this is just whatever you wanna say let me just get it the whole thing out there haley has to go but my girlfriend has covet and i live with her luckily for me i was in california when she interacted with the person who had coven and when she officially got it right so i didn't bring it to anyone which is thank goodness right but and i came back and i tested negative so i'm i'm still fine that being said i do have to take care of her and she's been having an extremely difficult time like haley is like super strong so she'll downplay everything but it's been really difficult and we had we had some scares honestly like we almost had to go to the er and i hate that and i don't like being scared with this stuff and i am to be honest with you i'm absolutely frightened um and it brings out some of the worst in me so i'm trying to work on that but uh i'm gonna be here at least until at least another week and a half or so could be sooner than that could be than that it's better than that could be later than that though yeah i probably have no i also have to avoid getting it for the next week and a half as well um which has been the struggle because i have to feed her i have to like make sure she's like getting taking her medicine and that she's like okay and it's really really difficult so i'm really trying to balance that i can't go to california for the next two weeks i think legally the next two weeks and then after these two weeks lord willing haley is totally fine and she has a full recovery you still have to take a test wait to get those results and you could test positive and then yeah another this could be a much longer process absolutely could be i'm hoping it won't i'm being super safe like i literally haven't even hugged my girlfriend in like a week so um it's been pretty tragic and then i can barely speak to her but i'm doing that because i do want i do want to be back and i do enjoy making content and even though i am traveling so far there hasn't been one single week i've been doing it for over a month and a half now it hasn't been one single week where i feel like i've regretted anything like i genuinely enjoy doing this and it makes me want to start bringing my own content back and like start streaming and doing all the stuff too because i'm like i'm feeling less burnt out i'm feeling less stressed out and i'm feeling i'm finding my purpose in why i'm making all the stuff and why i'm doing what i'm doing and honestly i'm going absolutely bonkers i haven't let this happen so yeah i really want to be back there so yeah we wanted to open up to you guys do you want are you guys cool with this if you guys want i can always throw like little bits in the beginning of videos in like 10 secs like hey i'm still here you know but are you guys cool if like matt pat wood shoots some stuff because they're all there and they're i believe all negative so um they're all able to come together and make some great stuff but we want to give you guys that choice you know yeah one of the things i wanted to mention here is that while there's not much we can do from afar to aid tanner and haley we're we'll jump at any opportunity that we have to to do so i i definitely definitely mean that and i know tanner knows that i mean that i think it's also you know from an emotional standpoint too you you can correct me if i'm wrong tanner but i feel like if we can continue to shoot even though it wouldn't be as fun without my boy if we can continue to shoot i feel like that'll personally unload a lot of pressure off of tanner yeah absolutely actually um because i feel like you'd be like everything's waiting on me to come back right now yeah true actually yeah it's yeah and it's more than just like my livelihood doesn't just rely on dopamine but like a lot of people's deaths you know and that brings me more stress than anything but also i also don't like holding people up as well you ever get honked out at a red light that's like a nightmare for me i would prefer not to live that for the next few weeks but i also understand if you guys are like you know like a little bit like pent up from the whole last thing i totally get it too so yeah so let us know if we plan on coming back into the studio next wednesday me pat woods and maybe sam shooting some doper nope episodes where we find products we unbox them and hopefully we can start uploading again in a couple weeks but if if you're like no you know what i don't want any content doper knobs not dope note without tanner we'll possibly wait uh but i i want to make sure that we're doing the best thing that we can to support tanner even if it's just emotionally because like i said i don't want to be a friend where i'm just like waiting on tanner to like get better when he's like trying to take care of his business you know what i mean so keep all that in mind but i want to bring you in on that process i want to i wanted to talk to you guys about that um so that's our plan let us know like i i guess yeah just let us know if that's really really something that you don't want because otherwise we'll probably move forward with that but i think that's i think that's all we have to talk about i know that was a lot i appreciate for all you guys to stay to the end i appreciate you more than you more than you know more than you know and i do know 2021 is going to be a new year for high five i i know we've had some tremendous growth i know we've got some some crazy projects that i i cannot wait for and i do know doper nope has some life in her bones yet i do know it and so we're gonna have another one man that's awesome we're gonna have a lot of fun all right guys thank you very much for watching bye peacewhat's going on guys welcome back to dope or no sad episode all right so it doesn't it doesn't have to be a sad episode really what this what this is all about is me personally saying i'm sorry i totally did this wrong i totally did this entire transition of doper nope just completely wrong and i just wanted to say sorry for that i got the guys here i got pat here i got tanner here i got a big long spiel that i wanted to kind of like just communicate to you guys the audience and tanner pat you guys feel free to chime in at any point where you you want to add in things you want to correct me you want to convict me it's my favorite part easily but yeah so basically what i wanted to say was i really should have brought you guys the audience in on this process i realized about a week ago that i made a pretty big mistake with how i handled things and i don't know i just wanted to apologize for it i realized that in my personal relationships if i just went around and just pulled a rug out from under people i should expect them to be upset frustrated scared annoyed and that's pretty much what i did to you guys i pretty much pulled a rug out and then i was surprised when everyone was like frustrated or upset or didn't want to go in that particular direction and i understand that now i see that now i didn't see that before but i kind of wanted to explain to you like what happened so i can give you guys better insight into how we got there and just a better explanation of where we've been this past year with kovid and why we're here now so back back back back even before kovid here we go let's just go through the whole journey let's do it let's go through the whole journey i think it's all relevant and this is why i'm bringing it up because back before kovid started we already had started to transition michael out of the channel because he really really really wanted to move to the rose channel that was something that he was really wanting that was something he was pushing for and tina and i were concerned but we also are not a studio in which we want to stop people from achieving what they want to achieve right obviously there are other factors at play but i think we are definitely concerned about what that might mean and then covet hit and it hit hard as as i remember tanner we were just like okay what on earth are we gonna do how are we gonna how are we gonna sustain the business doper nope had always been at the time the one channel that was sustaining everyone's jobs for the most part almost everyone's jobs and i think we had this tremendous amount of responsibilities on our shoulders to like get it right even through this entire time and i remember tana you were coming over to my place and we were like let's still record right let's still get this done let's still figure this out and we were concerned from the from the get-go especially of michael transitioning out like here's the thing we didn't really know what to do at that time we were we were deeply concerned um with all these changes how did how it would affect the content how it affect the audience how it would affect our livelihoods the livelihoods of everyone at the studio there was a lot writing on it and i think like we really did our best with what we had and tanner and i started making videos from home to to keep everything afloat and not that there wasn't a lot of work by a lot of other amazing individuals you know off camera there was but it kind of was hinging on us continuing to make content because that's what we do that's how we pay the bills and things then really took a turn for the worst right covet really hit hard and we had to stop even in contact with each other tanner and i and so with them we started trying to do online content and you know we're where we did like three or four videos before those inevitably absolutely bombed what's interesting tanner as i looked back on those videos today and they actually have a decent amount of views but if you recall and i recall like do you remember those they both they bombed they absolutely bombed and that's like the i think that's like the clarifying point to where a lot of our changes even happen from is like we were before kovid we were like i think we were doing really really well you know and then covet hit and that's what's tricky from our perspective compared to like you guys the audience's perspective is we're always trying to bring you guys the best content as best as we can and something that we enjoy too so it looks like yeah like if you look at it from the outside perspective you go back towards those videos like why'd you guys just not film at home why don't you guys just do that because those have views but back then those were getting legit like like 70 of the views which tells us the audience doesn't like it like our subscriber base doesn't enjoy this content yeah i think that's that's a really interesting point to note because a lot of times people will only look at the comments and they'll be like all the comments were positive and they work but the issue with it is the the real data to let you know whether or not you're making odd content that your audience likes is whether or not they click in and not the comments the comments are good and we love the comments but if half your audience doesn't click in your audience isn't engaged with the content that you're making and so we had to stop and we stopped making content for a while for like a month before we were like okay we have to do something or people are going to lose their jobs and yeah and that was you know that's always been such a big concern of mine obviously leading this company and you know on this project i know tanner that's been a ton of weight on tanner's shoulder too on tanner's shoulder just one on your shoulders just one of them yeah just one because i know we've talked about that a lot and i know we've tried to like diversify in a thousand different ways but doper nope has always been this monolithic thing that's supporting the company and that's not bad it's just where we are you know yeah and so we decided to wait to make content and then wait and then wait until we couldn't really wait anymore and we had to brave ourselves back into the studio it took us a bit to figure out how to make content in a way that you know that worked that the audience wanted but i i personally don't think like i ever checked in with myself to be like is this something that i want to make is this something that i care about and for me personally and tanner and and you can you can tell me what what you went through here but for me personally it was like it wasn't until like a month or two ago that i started checking in to be like wait a second now that the fear is like dissipating from this like toxic fear throughout the world because of this pandemic i was like wait a second do i want to do this yeah yeah i think it's uh tricky and i think it's part to where high five has always been and i mean we're changing it a lot now but we high fives been really bad at communicating the bad i would say we just never really have you know we've always just been like yo this is a positive space positive stuff positive things but in reality i think yeah it was just that was probably that was the most difficult time of high five for sure without a doubt and i think we didn't communicate the amount of fear towards it i think right like when you're running a business right we have 30 plus employees especially the time we had more i think we have a ton of employees this is the main thing that's like keeping people afloat like you said and you're creating shifts from okay what do we what what is inspiring us what do we want to do to how do we keep this afloat and i don't think we left that and i think that's kind of like the biggest change that happened from beginning of this year to like even up to like recently you know is until we tried making the changes to glover but it was we were stuck in this continual cycle of how do we stay afloat how do we get back instead of it being what is inspiring us like we've done in the past you know so that has a huge effect on the people who are creating it too right like they see the brand they see the videos like oh why don't they do this like why are they doing this now you know like there's a lot of people asking those questions but i think what it really comes down to is the content is a reflection of us so we were like embedded with fear legit for like i think you know the entire world was yeah right i just think we tried to mask that we tried to be like like hey look at us we're doing it you know what i'm saying and well i wouldn't say i intentionally tried to mask it i would say i wasn't aware of it and i think that's one of the things of like even like listening to what you're saying tanner is like yeah i do agree that i haven't done a great job of communicating like the depth of emotions at high five and i think it's largely sometimes due to the fact that like we don't know until it's afterwards you know self-awareness is is kind of like this weird kind of like trailing thing where it's just like oh that's what i was oh and not like necessarily during the experience of all the fear and emotions but pat i know when we canceled bu too because that wasn't that that was a great example of like what was happening at the time of like canceling bu because that wasn't gonna be making money that for sure couldn't support that team and so we were trying to figure out how to diversify and not lose everyone and then you coming on to doper nope yeah what was what was that like for you it's just it's tough because you go back and forth between you know this is a fun job this isn't like for a lot of people this looks like an easy job you know it's an easy fun job probably the best job you could ever have and there are times where it is like that you know with bu whereas like i just get to go to the studio and have fun but with dope nope it's such a different monster because like you said at the time it was supporting everyone you know and that comes with an extra level of stress and that's the one thing that people a lot of times don't see is like hey you guys the the guys who are watching right now like you guys are obviously some of our biggest fans and you'll watch anything we do but that's just not the nature of the entire platform like we just can't just only support a 30 you know employee company on 100 000 views of the 100 thousand people who are you know will watch anything we do you know so it comes with the level of stress and you play in your head like i'm trying to support you know all my friends here because i don't want all my friends losing jobs you know i'm trying to make sure that everyone is good here but then you're also trying to make sure that you're not going you know crazy stressful or not enjoying your job at all and that's where dopant just is a whole different monster man it's nuts and so i think to touch on that too is i think that's like a slippery slope is like i don't want to create that expectation that like we want this group of people that will watch anything like if we start making bad content stop watching you know what i'm saying exactly like that which is what happens i think it's important to recognize like oh this group of people this dire group people watch anything like that only lasts for so long so like it's our job to provide value so i think like that's the other slope too is it's like we can't just make anything like we also want to make things that do engage you and don't just like numb you to like what's going on like and and that's the thing i think to touch with what pat's been saying that's what we've been trying to bounce and trying to actually make work and that's where i think you know matt will go into where we're just now kind of figuring that out yeah and i think if if i could touch on some things too that you guys said because i i know sometimes uh less aware audience members might assert that like well why don't you just pare down and then just make youtube videos like everyone else on the platform like a because that's not what we want to do like our whole goal is to just like have a fostering community of creators you know what i mean and like that's the vision that's part of the goal is not to do things alone and yeah we have a lot of overhead but that's the goal the goal is to like have a ton of people to make better things together but then the other piece is you know while we do talk about money and while we do talk about views at the end of the day that only tells us whether or not we're actually achieving our vision our vision of creating content and creating a community that cares about what we're creating and we care about what we're creating that's an indicator it's not the reason we have to look at it because we have to make sure that that we're providing that value like tanner said to to the audience and to my employees and even to to my cr the creative inside me like we have to be providing all that value and one of the ways we do that is by supporting jaws by supporting individuals but also by looking at those those factors like views and revenue to be able to continue that but it's definitely not the goal it's definitely not the reason why we're there making videos if that was the reason why there's a bunch of different ways we could be making a lot more money which is exactly what i i'm assuming a lot of people might surmise which is pare down and like make more content which is yeah but that's not the goal the goal is to have this community that that creates these amazing things and we're so much closer to getting there but i think this also kind of leads into like where we are right here right now with even me personally right we started changing things right so we started changing things in doper nope right we started doing different things like dope week and going to stores and we started trying to change a decent amount to see like how we can invigorate our passion again and at that time i've been having so much fun with this overkill character and megadesk over on my personal channel and it gave me so much awareness to really what i was missing on the dopanoke channel of like what i really really yearned for with this channel like a deeper connection to my audience a deeper connection to what i'm creating so that people enjoyed it even more i started to love youtube again but over on dober nope we were still making things that like just really pulled apart my love for making content at the time when i started to check in with okay am i enjoying what i'm making and if i'm not enjoying what i'm making that's probably a huge reason of why i'm disconnected from my community why we're not all having fun on camera off camera right and so i didn't feel like we had a strong connection to our audience through doper know i didn't feel like we were making things we cared about or that our audience cared about and i personally overreacted to those fears now to preface this next part to most people the most common fear response is a phobic fear response right the most common fear response when someone's scared is to withdraw is to run away is to avoid is denial right that's not how i personally operate and i think that's why it's like for some people it's very hard to understand like what the heck is he doing over there this guy's always in a mid-life crisis but like the the if i could explain to you how my brain works this is something i think might explain a lot right so my natural response to fear is counterphobic in other words i attack it i try to destroy it i remove it i engage it i fight it and i try to control it this on the outside is is what looks like i'm always in that like mid-life crisis because that's what my fear response looks like i've been spending a lot of time in prayer and i feel like i feel like god gave me some awareness recently about this whole thing and what this says about my behavioral patterns and how i engage with fear and that's why i'm here today apologizing to you guys for it is because regardless of phobic counterphobic or whatever kind of fear response i had to to not making great things i should have used fear as information and not motivation for change i should have used it as information to reflect on and then to use to guide me through a much slower process of change that's something that was a big lesson for me that i took away from this entire this entire scenario and i was 100 wrong and i think like that that would have been the most appropriate response to fears right not to run and hide from it but not to attack it and engage right so i'm not saying my fear response was was an appropriate one by any measure i'm just saying it's different right for that i'm really sorry and i i still feel very fortunate to have learned this lesson uh to have an audience that spoke up that communicated that helps me understand that i need to look a little bit deeper inside myself and inside my own behavior does that mean i won't ever cancel things in the future absolutely not that's the nature of creative projects that's the nature of things as they come to an end looking back is that is that why i canceled everything in the past absolutely not like for instance battle universe wasn't a counterphobic or a phobic response that was a calculated response to ensure that we could save jobs right this overkill transition was definitely a fear response and i will 100 take ownership for that but i think it's important to note that we made as many doper nope episodes as there are episodes of friends let that sink in for you in a second i didn't even know that yeah that's crazy right the almost the exact same amount of episodes as friends made we did it in two and a half years friends did it in nine years maybe ten ten and so that kind of showcases to you how burnout works with a creator why why often creators need new change need need evolving things but it's not a surprise why we're looking for something new and exciting it's not a surprise why we've been burned out but that being said it's still not an excuse for not bringing you guys in on the process and having you guys come into this change with us pat you were talking to me earlier about some of this stuff uh about like how this kind of change should be like a uh like a give and take yeah it's a two-way street you know like this a lot of times you you watch a youtube video and you think oh this is just this person making this thing and i get to watch it and that's just not how we treat high-five studios this is something that we haven't done a great job at but we're trying to do a better job at is making this a two-way street if we enjoy making something and you guys hate it then that's not gonna work and vice versa if you guys love something and we absolutely despise it then we're not gonna make it because we're gonna get burnt out so fast and the content's not gonna be good this has to be a two-way street and we're going to get there sooner rather than later there's a middle ground that we can find that we're going to love making those videos and you guys are going to love watching it we just haven't found it yet you know and and that's where you guys are going to help a lot because we were having a pretty good time i think over the last few weeks and you guys weren't there and that's fun because now we hear what you're saying and that wasn't a two-way stream you were going down a one-way road and so now we know how to adjust and get back on that two-way street so what does that mean what does that mean where are we here you've watched all the way through this long video and we haven't even told you what we're gonna do so here's what i think we should do but i'm opening it up to conversation with pat and tanner and i'm opening up to conversation with you guys the audience right what i think is that dopant up doesn't go away i think we don't remove the beautiful colors that that we all loved pink and blue i think we don't change the channel name and i don't think we don't i think we shouldn't stop doper note right i don't think we should rename the channel i think there are a lot of comments that suggested why don't you just make a new channel called overkill instead of changing this one and i was reading those comments and i was like see this is why i should have asked people beforehand because that's a better idea and so like honestly that's probably what i'll do i can't promise that we'll upload super frequently but if if you're one of the one percent on this channel that liked overkill stuff link in the description and tanner tanner i know you also had an idea that that excited you about starting an underkill channel just to mess with the overkill channel yeah i might just make like an underkill channel and just legit prank him like it'll all be like videos under like three or four minutes you know and then it's just me like they're they're not gonna be edited hardly at all and it's just gonna be doing dumb stuff that i think will just trigger him maybe they'll even be short maybe i'll do like 30 second videos just like ordinals it's look like it's from cloverfield you know just fine yeah but i still love that character to be honest so yeah it's still fun i'm still gonna i'm still gonna love that people over on my personal channel still love the overkill character obviously you guys don't and that's why we're gonna we're gonna we're gonna take that away we're gonna take that away overkill actually really overkilled it so he i guess he did his job but i think this wasn't written dude i swear we didn't plan this change just to have the character i mean literally an overkill character is an alter ego i have because i have counterphobic responses like that's deep inside my head this is the deepest youtube channel of all time the metaphoric youtube channel yeah yeah i think you know to go back to what we want this channel to be i think it's important right now to return to a format that you guys love and with some added changes that will allow us to love it again i think we still stand by not buying things we intend to throw away and you guys have also again given us some really great ideas down in the comments below of like when we inevitably do buy things that we don't want i think it would be a great idea again taken directly from a comment that said why don't you guys just do a mystery box giveaway at the end of every video full of the stuff you guys aren't gonna keep i love that i think we should do that at the end of every video of like hey these are the things we're not keeping it's in a box selling it for 99 cents to whoever gets it first you know what i mean i think that's awesome we don't want to put things into a landfill and i think that's a win-win i also think that we still definitely want to do list-based videos we have a big long list of list-based videos that are classic doper note that we actually wanted to continue to do there's a lot there but i also think we still want to keep the the new heart of it which is buying things together and not pretending to buy it and then opening it up in the same video so that we can like make content faster for you guys well and just to give some clarity on that too a lot of you guys don't know like the behind the scenes on how like some of our channels work so for the longest time i would be buying the products and neither matt or tanner knew what i was buying until the day we were shooting and they would look at it and they would try to react to it and so you're asking someone to connect to something that they haven't ever connected to before and it's really really tough and i think that's what lost kind of some of the magic with all three of us because i don't like buying like this is gonna sound weird i don't like buying christmas gifts for random people if i don't really know what they want and that's what it felt like with youtube is like like we don't know what these guys are going to enjoy like yeah exactly and i know you guys were probably having the same reaction of like i wouldn't have really enjoyed this product i would have chosen something different and so like that's how it used to work and with this overkill change it was really all three of us sitting down and figuring out what we want to do together and looking at these products together and like figuring out what we want in the videos all together not just one of us or two of us or whatever and using that like thought process for writing but going back to like dopamine upside content is kind of like i think the push we're going for here and i i think like the last thing is the old set we don't even have anymore but i i will say personally we shot some videos i'm not sure if we'll upload it because it's overkill style but these videos is where where tanner and i sat in those mega chairs those mega comfy reclining chairs and we just kind of reviewed some products with the table in front of us and it was kind of dope or nope but it was also more relaxed and more comfortable than like than like the rhett and link type thing where it's a more formal show you know what i mean like not to knock those guys those guys are hilarious they're funny i love it i don't think that format really works for for doper note like we anticipated months and months ago so we want to keep it a little bit more loose a little bit more like let's see what we find but i think we have a lot of great ideas and so i don't think right now at least right now we'll probably bring that set back but we will probably turn all those lights in that green mega desk room to like pink and blue and have some fun in there you know but i'm also really open to your guys ideas of like how we might make this fun how we might make it more engaging for you guys so that i really appreciate you guys sticking around and hearing that out but i also wanted to say like a final thing about community yes i was wrong yes i was wrong to like pull the rug out from under you guys yes i was wrong to like come up behind you and go boom you know and scare the crap out of you right i was wrong but i also think that some people in this community need to take responsibility for their behavior too in their response to it so it's like i kind of want to bring up this this analogy of like what i just said of like coming up behind someone and saying boo if you're the type of person that turns around you're like oh my gosh you scared me that actually scared me please don't do that again that's okay that's a normal response but if you're the type of person that turned around and punched me in the face again that's not a healthy response to my unhealthy response you know what i mean like so i appreciate you holding me accountable but i'm gonna do the same thing i'm gonna hold you guys accountable all that all the toxic kind of energy in the comments where you feel entitled to make us do certain things even if we're not gonna have a fun time doing it like this is a two-way street and not only that i think like pat and tanner you guys were talking about like i think people often forget that we're people too you know what i mean imagine millions of people on the internet screaming at you you know pretty tragic mental breakdown like three years ago was i was just getting nothing but hate comments about like death threats and all this i'm like oh dude me too yeah yeah we've all gone through that yeah and also you gotta understand like this isn't just none of this has ever been just matt's doing either right like this isn't like matt came up to me it was like this is happening right now you know like matt called me i was like hey i'm not enjoying this are you enjoying this i said no he's like what do you think about doing this i said that sounds fun like this is collaborative like this isn't one person's fault this is something we all thought would be enjoyable and all felt like it would be fun and we did have fun doing it but we also all have to own the fact that like we really we didn't realize you guys might not like it right yeah and that's perfectly okay that's why we're changing but don't flame matt thinking it's all him and he wanted this change like it's just not the case well if anything you should do the exact opposite because there's no other creators that i know of on this platform that really loop their audience in and figures out what they want they just make stuff and the fact that like matt and high five studios is this open to making what you guys want as long as we enjoy it it's something that's rare on this platform and it shouldn't be taken as like you know advantage to be honest i appreciate that i appreciate that guys that means a lot i think that you know all in all like like tanner said it sucks that we made some stuff and didn't clue in our audience but i also think it's really important to note that we were having fun and we were making things that we really cared about and i think there's still a place not on this channel but i think we can also make things that you guys care about so let us know give us some feedback down in the comments below we really appreciate it so last piece guys wanted to ask you a question right now because probably a lot of you guys aren't aware but tanner right now is in vegas right he's in vegas he's got a house in vegas he still plans on coming out here every week shooting doper nope hanging out making awesome stuff but right now tanner is in a bit of a predicament and we've been praying for him over there and i think i think yeah tanner if you just wanna this is just whatever you wanna say let me just get it the whole thing out there haley has to go but my girlfriend has covet and i live with her luckily for me i was in california when she interacted with the person who had coven and when she officially got it right so i didn't bring it to anyone which is thank goodness right but and i came back and i tested negative so i'm i'm still fine that being said i do have to take care of her and she's been having an extremely difficult time like haley is like super strong so she'll downplay everything but it's been really difficult and we had we had some scares honestly like we almost had to go to the er and i hate that and i don't like being scared with this stuff and i am to be honest with you i'm absolutely frightened um and it brings out some of the worst in me so i'm trying to work on that but uh i'm gonna be here at least until at least another week and a half or so could be sooner than that could be than that it's better than that could be later than that though yeah i probably have no i also have to avoid getting it for the next week and a half as well um which has been the struggle because i have to feed her i have to like make sure she's like getting taking her medicine and that she's like okay and it's really really difficult so i'm really trying to balance that i can't go to california for the next two weeks i think legally the next two weeks and then after these two weeks lord willing haley is totally fine and she has a full recovery you still have to take a test wait to get those results and you could test positive and then yeah another this could be a much longer process absolutely could be i'm hoping it won't i'm being super safe like i literally haven't even hugged my girlfriend in like a week so um it's been pretty tragic and then i can barely speak to her but i'm doing that because i do want i do want to be back and i do enjoy making content and even though i am traveling so far there hasn't been one single week i've been doing it for over a month and a half now it hasn't been one single week where i feel like i've regretted anything like i genuinely enjoy doing this and it makes me want to start bringing my own content back and like start streaming and doing all the stuff too because i'm like i'm feeling less burnt out i'm feeling less stressed out and i'm feeling i'm finding my purpose in why i'm making all the stuff and why i'm doing what i'm doing and honestly i'm going absolutely bonkers i haven't let this happen so yeah i really want to be back there so yeah we wanted to open up to you guys do you want are you guys cool with this if you guys want i can always throw like little bits in the beginning of videos in like 10 secs like hey i'm still here you know but are you guys cool if like matt pat wood shoots some stuff because they're all there and they're i believe all negative so um they're all able to come together and make some great stuff but we want to give you guys that choice you know yeah one of the things i wanted to mention here is that while there's not much we can do from afar to aid tanner and haley we're we'll jump at any opportunity that we have to to do so i i definitely definitely mean that and i know tanner knows that i mean that i think it's also you know from an emotional standpoint too you you can correct me if i'm wrong tanner but i feel like if we can continue to shoot even though it wouldn't be as fun without my boy if we can continue to shoot i feel like that'll personally unload a lot of pressure off of tanner yeah absolutely actually um because i feel like you'd be like everything's waiting on me to come back right now yeah true actually yeah it's yeah and it's more than just like my livelihood doesn't just rely on dopamine but like a lot of people's deaths you know and that brings me more stress than anything but also i also don't like holding people up as well you ever get honked out at a red light that's like a nightmare for me i would prefer not to live that for the next few weeks but i also understand if you guys are like you know like a little bit like pent up from the whole last thing i totally get it too so yeah so let us know if we plan on coming back into the studio next wednesday me pat woods and maybe sam shooting some doper nope episodes where we find products we unbox them and hopefully we can start uploading again in a couple weeks but if if you're like no you know what i don't want any content doper knobs not dope note without tanner we'll possibly wait uh but i i want to make sure that we're doing the best thing that we can to support tanner even if it's just emotionally because like i said i don't want to be a friend where i'm just like waiting on tanner to like get better when he's like trying to take care of his business you know what i mean so keep all that in mind but i want to bring you in on that process i want to i wanted to talk to you guys about that um so that's our plan let us know like i i guess yeah just let us know if that's really really something that you don't want because otherwise we'll probably move forward with that but i think that's i think that's all we have to talk about i know that was a lot i appreciate for all you guys to stay to the end i appreciate you more than you more than you know more than you know and i do know 2021 is going to be a new year for high five i i know we've had some tremendous growth i know we've got some some crazy projects that i i cannot wait for and i do know doper nope has some life in her bones yet i do know it and so we're gonna have another one man that's awesome we're gonna have a lot of fun all right guys thank you very much for watching bye peace\n"