Andrew Callaghan of All Gas No Brakes Goes Independent

Channel: Alex Kantrowitz

Published at: 2021-06-09

YouTube video id: HHth-p8twVo

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HHth-p8twVo

andrew welcome to the show thank you man
i appreciate you having me on
yeah it's great to be back in touch we
were talking in the middle of
um you know the height of all gas no
breaks and it's great to see that you're
doing this on your own
independent uh and i'm excited to hear
your perspective
on uh what's going on with the new thing
for sure
so before we get into channel five i'd
love to hear a little bit more about or
you can maybe you could introduce
our listeners or um you know or refresh
people's memory about
what all gas no brakes was how it began
and sort of what you were trying to do
with it
so all gas snow breaks began as a kind
of memoir
storybook that i wrote about my
experiences hitchhiking across america
when i was a teenager like when i was 19
i would just like hitchhike mostly in
the south and in the west coast by
myself with a recorder
i would interview like deadbeats
runaways various like
outlaw types about their life stories
and you know
triumphs and tragedies and whatnot after
a long time i decided to propose the
idea
of an all gas no bricks video show that
i would do on instagram and youtube
so i found a company a production
company called doing things media
i said yo if you guys buy me an rv i'll
go out there and make like crazy
honestly i first thought it'd be like a
road trip show i thought it was going to
be like me
focused on like gas station characters
and landscapes i don't know what it was
going to be
then we decided i was going to go to all
the craziest kind of events and explore
different subcultures around the country
like furries flat earthers
proud boys anarchists all that kind of
stuff
that'll wear an oversized suit for most
of the time
so this company gave me a 45 000 salary
and they bought me the rv and i signed
some paperwork and i had a great couple
years
yeah and it quickly until the end it
quickly became a hit yeah we'll get to
the uh falling out i think in the second
half um yeah but
uh the show became a hit and one of the
really interesting things i found was
that you moved beyond just going from
the flat earther conferences
and started uh going to
you know some real news events um yeah
yeah you want maybe you can talk a
little bit about how you it
well i think right around the time of
the the coveted pandemic i'd say around
last march
when things really like kicked into high
gear as far as the lockdowns
that's when i started covering things
that were vaguely political i started
with the
coronavirus lockdown protest video which
was my first
political video it was like i was
covering uh it was the california state
capitol in sacramento interviewing
conspiracy theorists about global 19.
that was a big hit and i was like damn
maybe i can do more than just funny
instagram and youtube content so then
when the protest movement kicked off
that's when things really went into high
gear and uh it was you know during the
protests or
turmeric it was during the protest
movement uh after the george floyd
murder
i started covering protests and riots in
minneapolis
portland and then seattle and yeah the
show just took a political turn it
wasn't like i
went out of my way to be like i'm going
to make this a daily show style
political show i just saw things
happening and i saw a lack of news
coverage so i said
why don't we use our platform to give
people voices in different
walks of life right and it wasn't that
the news wasn't covering these events i
mean the news was
on it in the way you know as much as it
could be but it was doing it in the way
that the news was used to which was with
a little bit of distance
and i think what was great about what
you did was you got right into the thick
of things
and you didn't try to constrain people
into salabytes you just put a mic in
front of them and let them talk
yeah i think that the mainstream
american news cycle is locked in this
just like
horrible divisive cycle of punditry
where they're like right wing talking
head left wing talking head it's these
same people
who are going to propagate the exact
same narratives and sell ads and make
money regardless of
what's going on you know like if
anything happens you know what anderson
cooper and don lemon are going to say
and you know what tucker carlson and
sean hannity are going to say
and they propagate this division because
you know it's profitable they're all
these news companies are owned by the
same people i mean the same people who
own
vice on fox news it's basically just a
news media matrix that is
exists to drive us further apart while
the rich get richer
so i wanted to kind of break that yeah
but i think what
what happened with you was that you got
into the thick of things and you
came in with a different format and
people really gravitated towards it
yeah and my format's actually the
easiest format i mean just going in
there and
not saying anything is actually really
easy but no one wants to do that because
they have
people controlling their their voices i
mean most journalists
are controlled by higher forces you know
higher up should tell them
what sort of narrative to push well i
mean that might be one thing i think
another part of it is that
our culture right now rewards certainty
you know people don't like to live
in the gray area it doesn't get
distributed the way that
you know something with black and white
that plays to identity might get
distributed
you know on social media and so
generally people have found comfort and
certainty in finding a world view
and then trying to look at everything
through that prism
uh and i think what's interesting is
that like you know we've talked in the
past
um i think you've mentioned to me that
you're left to center but
you're still willing to like you know
hear people out even if they don't agree
with you
and and i find that interesting totally
i mean it's too bad that
you know like if you are
it's hard to explain but if you believe
in one thing you have to believe in a
package of other things right so
if you believe if you're pro-choice and
you're pro-gay marriage
like i am then it's like boom you're in
like the biden camp like you have to
vote that way
but then if you vote that way you're
also in support of like middle
east [ __ ] that bidens into and you're in
support of mass incarceration
and all that stuff that biden and the
clinton can't do
so basically it just sucks like yeah i
guess i'm center-left
socially but i'm definitely not in
support of the biden administration
right and yeah and i think that it's
interesting because we talk about
certainty
obviously certainty about the way that
you view news events
but i also think there's been this other
current that's occurred inside the us
recently maybe the globe which is that
we view people with certainty as well
you know a german voter must be a b and
c
a biotin voter must be d e and f
and there's complexity to people i think
you portray that really well
where once you start to let somebody
talk
you start to learn that they're not
easily you know
able to be packaged inside a box and
then you start to learn a little bit
more about
their life experiences and where they
come from and
they don't fit neatly into this package
what do you think about that
yeah i mean i think that especially the
like i said the way we consume media
it's easy to
say to loop trump supporters or biden
voters into a prison
depending on who's telling you about
these people but the reality is that
people are complex and
people are stuck in misinformation
bubbles on all walks of political life
people are falling victim to fake
information and they're
surrounded and bombarded with propaganda
at all times
everyone i think social media is
destroying our society
uh hopefully that we can last more than
50 years
from now but what do you think that
it's just putting everyone in
information bubbles man i mean
look at the way censorship has affected
the way that people talk online
i mean it used to be that you could
argue with people online about
you know people want to act like they're
just removing the fringes from the
internet no
they're removing almost a majority of
trump conservatives off of social media
platforms
pushing them further into deep internet
holes where they only see each other
and they only talk to each other
meanwhile the same thing is happening
you know
with left-wing cities too like
the echo chambers are just getting more
dense and it's like this infinite mosaic
of bubbles and echo chambers and
it's funny because i bet that when the
internet first came around
they thought that it would make us a
more well-informed public because we'd
have exposure to so many different
worldviews and pieces of information i
mean you have the world at your
fingertips if you have a smartphone
but it's actually i think made people
made people like dumber and have less
informational literacy
and uh yeah it's just it's troubling
it's like
you can it no matter what you think
there's a million people online it will
validate what you think
whenever you decide to think it you know
what i mean yeah and i think that's sort
of what
playing back to the original theme that
i had with certainty i don't think that
there's a grand conspiracy to keep
conservatives uh off of
the social platforms or that um you know
liberals won't be willing to listen to
anybody else
but i do think that it is very easy
to get sucked into group think
today and the social media platforms
definitely help propel that
well it's not even a conspiracy to keep
conservatives on social media platforms
it just is what's going on
say more about you go to a trump if you
go to a trump rally i mean this is what
i started noticing that every person
was like i've been kicked off like
that's their main beef and i think that
this loss of faith and
and tech as a social institution and
free internet as a
as an idea being a limited place
i don't know what the effects are i mean
you know for example if you're involved
in a
like reopen colorado reopened california
facebook group to
end the lockdowns you most likely get
banned for medical misinformation
you know do i think that harmful
conspiracy theories
like uh you know some of them like
there's baby eating pedophiles with
who drink children's blood to stay young
forever and have lizard bloodline
but i think that limiting the reach of
that is good
yeah probably but if you believe that
there's some big giant conspiracy out to
silence you
and you get silenced and so do all your
friends
what are you supposed to think yeah well
i do think that
uh when the social platforms went to ban
q anon
for instance uh yeah that did sweep out
a good portion of
conservatives so there's something to
that
yeah and you wonder what the i guess
we'll see maybe maybe good maybe bad
we'll see what the long-term impact is
because i mean if you get pushed off of
mainstream social media platforms
i feel like that validates what you
already think as far as the
big conspiracy and it might even harden
your beliefs and make you more militant
yeah on the other hand we'll see we'll
see yeah and but on the other hand you
know the social media companies
probably gave rise to the fact that so
many people
believe there is this cabal of
pedophiles trying to take over the world
so
it's a push pull for that but what
happens is they often focus on the users
and not on uh the product itself
and so the product keeps working the way
that it's always worked but then they
end up suspending it
and then there you go you're in that
position right there's no right position
for
those tech guys you know i mean they
just everyone hates them
yeah it's tough out here do you work in
tech too no i mean i'm i'm a tech
journalist but i'm in san
on this like francisco here and you know
i i understand
yeah sorry salesforce power basically
from my window
yeah i was gonna ask you yeah you see
salesforce tower from your window
because that's the metric of uh
proximity to tech giants if i lean all
the way out
uh yeah i can get almost a glimpse of it
and and i do
really find it to be a monstrosity and
there's a screen on top of it i'm sorry
to all the salesforce listeners
but there is a screen on top of it which
they can customize and
use to send messages out to the city and
sometimes they'll have the eye of
sauron on there and i think it's a
little bit um you know too close to
science fiction i'm not a big fan of it
i mean san francisco is dystopian i mean
look at the inequality that's propagated
with the city failing to combat
gentrification and provide for their
homeless people
i mean i can't think of a place where
you can have the richest people that
close to just like the
largest homeless encampments in the
country it's [ __ ] up man yeah no doubt
and it's sad
and it's there's also um there's a
big willingness out here to say it's
other people's fault
and a reticence of course oh i'm sure
actually come and jump in and help which
is an issue
yeah seeing those black lives matter
science and pride flags on some of the
uh
what six million dollar row homes in the
mission district that's something
out of us as a dystopian science fiction
novel it's depressing
yeah i mean i i would say i don't think
you know
being wealthy should disqualify you from
participating in social protests but
um it it can't just be
you know holding that flag out the
window like if you want a more just
society you have to look for the
economics as well
what i'm saying is if you're wealthy and
you're from a rich family
especially if it's like bay area tech
money and you just you're not you don't
you don't live in walnut creek you don't
live in piedmont you don't live in some
of the beautiful suburbs that you could
live in palo alto
you decide you want a more urban living
so you move somewhere like the mission
district which is a historic immigrant
neighborhood and you decide to take over
the block and then you think that
the optics band-aid that you're going to
put is some kind of flag
or signal in front of your thing i don't
really care what you're doing you know i
mean that's like
that's colonialism yeah look no doubt i
think that um
at the end of the day we talk a little
bit about how people are complex right
and um you know and there's the
certainty that we use to to judge people
but i would also say that like
um it's important in this world i think
to be the full package
right like it's about the sum of actions
not about
a tweet that you put out there or a sign
in your window
it's about how you live i think they
should move their complex asses back to
palo alto then right
um yeah i think there's something to be
said for that
um also like i think that one of the
things that we
you know we can also look at is the fact
that
a lot of our system we've talked about
this on about this on the show a lot
a lot of our system is meant to preserve
what those in power have and
and it's very difficult to crack through
that because of the systems that
you know have been set up so i agree
with that and that that's
that's the depressing part is you can
talk about it but a lot of this stuff it
just it just goes and goes man
it's the machine and i'm not like some
sort of [ __ ] you know
anti-capitalist like but i'm saying it
is like this machine doesn't stop urban
growth and redevelopment
you know and once it goes it just keeps
going i'm from seattle right now i grew
up in this neighborhood capitol hill and
it's like unrecognizable
right it's like i'm like it's going
through
yeah and you did a great video from the
um
capitol hill it was autonomous zone
chazz
oh yeah yeah jazz that [ __ ] i didn't
even put out most of that footage
because it was just too dark
oh what did you see there that you
didn't put out well i mean the main
thing is like that you know
the the chop chaz had like i think it
was three and a half weeks and this is
how most autonomous zones go from what
i've heard
the first week is like everyone's got
the spirit of the revolution you know
there's like lots of seminars and
reading and there's clear organization
the second week it has more of like a
coachella vibe you know it's like a
festival there's drum circles and fire
spinners and it looks like a scene from
burning man
the third week and i'm not sure why this
happens it's just hella tweakers like
all like the meth smokers to set up
tents and it's just like a shit's show
and then the drug dealers come
and then and there was a couple of
shootings out there i was there for
those shootings it was really [ __ ] up
i witnessed that and uh you know and
then the day after the shooting i
remember i was walking back to chop and
this like white girl
like in full like anarchist gear comes
up to me and she goes don't go to the
park
i go why she goes there's a gang war
going on and i was like oh there's a
gang war going on okay where the hell
are you from
i go to the park there's no gang war but
there was like dudes
14 year old dude that's working ak-47s
and
people smoking meth on the street and
doing heroin on the sidewalk
you know and then the cops broke it up
but i think the autonomous zones need
some sort of central leadership to to
exist for more than their genesis
provides because you know you got to
have someone then like yo we got to
[ __ ] figure this out
what do you think you know so um people
point to things like chap or chess or
autonomous zones
um some of the rioting that you've
you've documented
and they say that you know if this is
coming from the left
uh and there's a message of overhauling
the system it's not gonna win
many allies and what do you think about
the fact that that can turn people off
and
um how does that sync with the political
goals of the movement
well i mean first of all i just want to
say that cops really gave the precinct
to the protesters in seattle
they they gave it on purpose they wanted
the
people to do that i mean that was the
most fortified strongest police station
in the city that they gave it to them
were you able to find that out through
reporting or how did you how do you know
that oh yeah
all of my everyone i knew who was there
everyone's streaming even the city
reported i mean the cops
purposely abandoned it and we're like
take this because they want people to do
some dumb [ __ ] so they can be like look
they're looting and burning and you know
only a small percentage of protests
have that element of destruction but you
know
you know on one hand i understand it
like in minneapolis i understood it a
lot
because it was like this is the
expression of the people this is the
first time they're seeing this
this imagery and that's what you got to
do to get people to listen initially
i understand the purpose of it you know
just just as many people came out to
protest the trayvon martin murder
but there was no looting and no damage
and no one gave a [ __ ] because the
reality is that the mainstream consumer
public seems to care more about property
damage than
lives lost by police so initially
i think that it can it can be a good
tactic to get people's attention
but i think that if their attention is
already gotten i don't see the point of
continuous destruction you know what i
mean like
months after the murder [ __ ] the [ __ ]
going down in portland where they're
just
breaking everything and talking about
the militant decolonization of the
american plantation
it's like you know you guys maybe can do
this [ __ ] here but you leave the city go
15 minutes outside of the suburbs you're
in the hotbed of
militiamen and all that [ __ ] so i i have
mixed opinions on it
like a lot of people do but i'm not like
in support of
[ __ ] up small businesses or anything
like that right right and not only that
it becomes
uh very easy to clip you know just the
actions of a few people put it on tv
and use it to discredit a full movement
which and that's exactly what happens
um and i did like your portrayal of what
was going on in minneapolis
because you know i think instead of uh
running away from what was going on you
stuck a microphone in
in front of people's faces and said what
do you feel and we don't even hear your
framing of it
so i kind of like that yeah i think that
like thank you appreciate juxtapose
what you do with the news clips a lot uh
oftentimes there's like uh
somebody in one of your video i think it
was um minneapolis one where there's a
news camera
that's far away from the action you were
just inside
and you start filming the news camera
and you're like what are you doing
he's like oh hell the hell one second
i'm filming the burning
and you never quite get a chance to hear
from the people
and i think i'll just just wrap this and
i'll let you respond to it's one of the
plagues we have in the country right now
well there's a lack of empathy
you know i'm not saying people need to
support one another you know in terms of
every single cause but you know we we
very rarely will put each other put
ourselves in each other's
shoes and would much rather demonize and
i think that's an issue
sorry go ahead andrew
yeah i agree with you 100 you know
and i you know i feel the same way about
almost all political causes i mean just
just common ground and mutual humanity
seems to be something that we've lost in
a very short period of time
and uh it's social media propagates that
yeah i'm right exactly and i'm writing
about this uh this week it will be out
on big technology but
the social media does have a way again
of taking a multi-dimensional person
turning them
one-dimensional and having everybody
believe that they know everything about
them and
uh generally it's just wrong and you
know people don't care about the cost of
being wrong about that which is an issue
yeah and people are people are scared to
have differing opinions than than the
hive that is around them i mean
for real like as much as trump
supporters talk about cancer culture you
know
left-wing group think a lot of them like
are scared to have different opinions
from like the trump crowd i mean if
someone in there
they don't really have disagreements i
feel like they'd be scared to be like i
actually do support abortion or like
there's tons of [ __ ] that they would not
be able to like say without being
ridiculed and ostracized from their
community
and like that's why like that's why all
these like gentrifier like white people
are so
so scared of like not not appearing like
as radical as possible like
you know what i mean like in san
francisco in seattle oh there's a
disconnect there for sure
well they just want to like they feel so
guilty about what they're doing because
the deep down they know like
in places like bushwick and the mission
district and uh in west oakland
the people who are moving in and
gentrifying the area they know like what
they're doing
so they feel like they have to be like
super hardcore on social media with the
infographics and with the
just trying to look as hardcore as
possible
it's crazy man and ah man
it's really hard to have yeah we've
talked about that in some degree in this
show where
the democrat coalition right now is
you know in some ways the people working
in amazon fulfillment centers
you know who are who are judged by
automated systems and fired
you know if they have too much time off
task they're voting in blocks together
with the people who they're delivering
packages to
and something about that feels
unsustainable
right yeah i agree what have you learned
about
uh the american people i mean one of the
interesting things
um that i find again talking about how
people are complex
people are multifaceted it's interesting
how often people contradict themselves
on your uh on your videos so it wouldn't
in your new channel it's called channel
five
uh with andrew callahan you can watch it
on youtube um
you went to a white lives matter rally
uh and
you asked some guy you know what's a
great white food and he goes fish tacos
totally unironically you know not
understanding come on this is a mexican
food
and then there was somebody at the you
went to uh the courthouse
with the while the derek chauvin trial
was going on
and there was somebody who told you um
they told you i am against the prison
industrial complex but i want derek
shoven to rot in jail for the rest of
his life so
i'm kind of curious what you learned
about the american people and their
their complexities
yeah i mean i don't even know like i
wish i could tell you like
i i just i document so much and i travel
so frequently that i've never really had
a moment to uh
sit down and think about a lot of this
stuff i mean i think that like
after i'm done filming for like six more
months
i think i'm just gonna like go into the
desert with like a
low laptop like a dell laptop and just
write about all the things that
i don't know it's hard for me to process
i'm 24 i've been doing this since i was
20. you know and yeah man there's
so much going on so many different
currents running through but
i will say that uh
people seem afraid to connect with one
another you know
say like it's phil i feel like
it's propagated by news media and social
media there's just this
people just are trying to get one
another to demonize the other side of
the political spectrum so bad
and it's so sad because the real life
implications
really mean disunity you know and i know
that we weren't
ever really unified why does it have to
be 50 50
it doesn't make any sense like i'm not
i'm not trying to sound like a
conspiracy theories like why is it like
this
yeah well i also know what is going on
yeah i want to ask you a question
because
you're you're among the people how you
know we've talked a lot about how
you know we can blame the news and we
can blame social media but how much of
this is people's responsibility on their
own
you know it's at the end of the day it's
not the social platforms or the news
uh media that's making statements or you
know demonizing each other
i guess they play into it but oftentimes
we end up getting sucked into it not you
and i
um but you know the people and i'm
curious you know is there a level of
personal responsibility here as well
yeah i mean i think there definitely is
you know and i think about that all the
time
you know are you were to just are you
supposed to just say that people have
very poor information literacy
or are you supposed to say that they are
bigoted and they're just dumb
or they are i don't really know i think
it varies from person to person i mean i
think certain people certainly are
hateful
and they latch on to hateful ideology
that
they because they don't like people but
i also think that most people think
they're doing the right thing
in the world most trump supporters think
that they're saving america
most people in the streets like rioting
and destroying [ __ ]
believe that they are ultimately
creating a
sort of space for conversations that
will better the country i think there is
i just don't think there's so much hate
i think that there is a lot of
brainwashing but i think
people people in their day-to-day
actions think that they're doing the
right thing
everyone not everyone but i would say
maybe 80 to 90 of people
do believe that they are doing something
that will be for the common good
eventually
is there anything that gives you hope
you know no
uh okay
wow so where do you think this goes i
don't know then
but i'll be there yeah you first you for
sure will
okay why don't we take a quick break and
then i'd like to talk to you a little
bit about your new channel
sounds good can i zoom back on in five
minutes
uh sure okay thanks i'll be right back
okay
and we're back for the second half of
the big technology podcast with andrew
callahan
of channel 5 with andrew callahan
andrew welcome back for the second half
glad to be back
i want to talk a little bit about the
business side of things and what it's
like for someone like you
who's just starting out and sort of the
um
the potential uh landmines you might
encounter so
we talked a little bit in the first half
about your relationship with doing
things media
they gave you 45 000 a year salary they
gave you the rv and they said
go have at it and why don't you pick up
the story from there
well i mean first i just want to say
that i have no problem with doing things
media you know i don't want
people to go out and say [ __ ] them or
whatever it's like just follow what i'm
doing next because at the end of the day
yes i signed a really shitty full
management deal
that limited my creative freedom not
creative freedom yeah it [ __ ] limited
my freedom as an individual everything i
did was owned by someone else for a long
period of time
and even to this day i can never access
any of it it's not mine i put my heart
and soul into something for two years
and still someone else owns it
and someone who i have disagreements
with and right i don't i'm not friends
with
but they own all guys everything works
yeah right so what does everything mean
everything i've ever done during those
two years there
wow does it except beyond all gas no
breaks or
i mean that's all i did for two years so
i mean maybe if i would have made a song
and put it on youtube they'd have it too
but you know they own everything so yeah
they gave me the rv
um let me do whatever i want i mean
experience wise up until things really
took off
it was fantastic you know yeah it was
almost fully funded by patreon um
for a long time what was your question
my question is
um yeah what what ended up unfolding
with your relationship with that okay
why are you on your own now
so basically you know it was great for a
long time
uh i wasn't getting any percent of the
uh
profits from patreon youtube merch
anything
up until the show went into out of the
red and into the black or the grand news
show
started making money about six to eight
months into it so for a while it was
them coming out of pocket
they took a gamble in the first place uh
started succeeding started coming in so
then they offered me a
you know 20 you know bear in mind i was
producing the show
almost entirely by myself filming
researching editing they were just
assisting with uh
you know some feedback here and there
but mostly merchandise
customer support is what they offered
and obviously promotions through their
various pages they'd repost me
and that would drive traffic to the
august no breaks page
so after a long time
you know things took off i was only
making 20 but i was happy with that
because we were making a hundred
thousand dollars a month on patreon and
the merch drops would make a couple 250
000 in a day on a merch drop so
were you selling merch wise for you like
selling replicas of your big suit or
i know it was mostly t-shirts hoodies
action figures stickers that kind of
stuff
so dude i was making like 25 000 a month
you know i mean so
from where i was standing i was like
dude this is awesome i mean i was
22 years old i was like this is great uh
you know i didn't need more um
then i would say around last november
december
we started working on a movie and uh
this movie hasn't been announced yet but
it's with absolutely which is tim and
eric's production company
plus a couple other partners we've yet
to announce the movie but i'm excited to
announce that i was
started working on the movie started
working on the movie and that
that required you know seven days a week
i had to work on that movie all the time
we had a new rv
i mean we had no free time was it like a
long form
format of what you were doing yeah
youtube okay yeah
a little more upgraded a little more
serious a little more political but
it'll be announced soon i'll we'll talk
about that when we get there
because i can't say much without being
under fire uh
the movie people people were really
selective about the announcement so
basically uh i'm working seven days a
week doing this movie
and of course the movie is going to come
out a year or something like that
that means i can't make as much content
for instagram
and youtube and patreon so that means
doing things media
got less money patrons started dropping
views started dropping
simply because i could not make any more
content i was
too busy i was overworked beyond belief
after
two years on the road segwaying directly
into a seven-day shoot schedule for a
movie
you know and i'm only telling i'm only
saying this all because you know these
details
uh leaked in the new york times and
everything like that i don't want to
experience the company
but uh you know they started pressuring
me more and more to make
capital c content make this make that so
i said to them hey listen man
i'll make more content but i need more
money at this point i mean you know i
was happy with 20 when i was living on
the road
but i'm working on a movie full-time if
you want me to work two jobs i can't be
getting this
low amount of money for you know and
plus their partners on the movies i'm
like i'm making money for you
and but they explained that you know it
was more likely you're getting paid
anything extra for them for the movie um
yeah but you know nothing like i was
making for the digital show but for me
it's not about the money it's amazing by
the way that the youtube
was and patreon was making more than the
feature film right but
maybe the feature film will make more
money when it's released but right at
this point
i mean i was making i didn't care about
the money man it was a passion project
for me and making a movie with tim and
eric i was like this is amazing i mean i
want to
devote all the time that i have to this
you know the digital show obviously i
love it but i've been doing it for years
um i don't i don't know i wanted more if
i was going to be
20 is not good man yeah it's not about
getting rich it's about being
compensated fairly for the work that
you're doing
right and 20 is not fair so i said hey
you know i'm happy to keep making the
show but i i need more i needed
something like 50.
they said nope uh things got
they just wouldn't budge on that and uh
you know
so i stopped making digital content i i
stopped but i also really couldn't
i mean i could if i tried super hard but
i mean and it would need to be
compensated fairly and incentivized to
do that
which i wasn't so i'm you know making
the movie all the time
and i'm not making content and uh you
know eventually they fired my two
best friends nick and evan who started
the show with me and
filmed you know i remember they fired
them and then
i was like i got out of my contract and
then they
told me that if i didn't produce two
pieces of content
by a certain date that i would be fired
they'd find a replacement host to
carry on what i built and uh yeah i just
got got terminated and that was it
yeah and i mean i looked at the page
before we recorded there hasn't been a
single video on all gas no breaks after
you left
right and i don't think you're easily
replaceable andrew i think you have some
real talent and uh it's difficult to you
know just
substitute anybody in and try to have
them you know
immediately adopt the format yeah and
i was trying to say that but you know i
in a way you know
for a long time it was really painful
you know to not
to be so disconnected from something
that i when i walk in the street people
will
look at me and they say all gas no
breaks become like a second name for me
yeah and just to know that that's
something that i worked so hard on and
put everything into that
that is not mine and never will be it
was hard
but it gave me more incentive to be like
okay now i'm going to make my own thing
using some of the e-commerce knowledge
that i learned from working with doing
things media and
at all gas no breaks to make a
sustainable completely independent show
so now like we're fully like i own 100
of them the rights and the masters to
everything that we make and everything
goes back on channel 5
at channel 5. right and i i love the i
did love the title all guests no breaks
because essentially it's
let me put a microphone in front of
somebody's face and just
let them go all gas and i won't put the
brakes on on like typical news
so yeah totally and i i like channel 5
even more though because it's like yeah
it's kind of an evolution of what we
were doing like i'm not trying to make a
bunch of videos of people screaming
anymore i want to like have like a news
vibe to it
i'm going to get a news van like a decal
an old school nbc man oh man
i'm gonna i'm gonna like change up my
outfit a little bit like random jacket
to the channel five on them like i got a
lot of stuff planned to make it feel
different
a lot of the videos right now are just
kind of like all gas no brakes videos
because i'm just trying to like retain
the whole audience and bounce back but
i'm gonna try a bunch of new [ __ ] i'm
gonna do streaming and like tick tock
and all that
yeah it wasn't lost on me by the way
that the name moved to channel five
because i saw that and i was like oh
andrew wants to do
you know more news and um i think that's
a good direction
i love how you run by another news uh
a reporter and you go hey are you
channel six where channel five
that was funny yeah in the miami video
yeah yeah
um and so so you
when did when was the termination from
doing uh
i think it was last march and so you
pretty quickly ended up
getting uh your crew back together are
you working with your friends again well
they're my best
friends they're my best friends yeah the
people who made all gaster bricks we
live together and we've been best
friends we were kids so it's like
firing them isn't gonna do anything and
like we are we are the heart of that
show
and we will be the heart of whatever we
do next so unless you're working
together again
yeah lesson learned the lesson had to be
learned i mean
i don't blame doing things media at all
i have nothing
i have nothing against those no doubt
well it does
i mean you know i i think it's classy of
you to say that but it also this goes to
show
sort of what it's like to go out and
start and
the different roadblocks that could
occur for some yeah
and wants to go out and make it on
youtube right and there's no checks and
balances when it comes to the ownership
and management of
all these new digital platforms like you
see all these tick tock kids get
exploited way way worse than i did
yeah i mean it's not like the the movie
industry where you have overtime sheets
and you have
stuff to really compensate you you can
be worked to death if you're
owned by a instagram talent management
company i was not work to death
i worked myself today you know they
didn't they didn't
you know but they are a company and they
have to make money and they
make money by other people making like i
said capital c content and i think that
that tr
that idea that art and creation is
another person's capital c
content income creates a fundamental
problem
for independent creators right and so so
tell me a little bit about how you get
the crude back together so you called
your friends up and said i want to do
this this you know something similar
uh but on our own without a management
company and then you know i imagine
you're gonna have to get
cameras and uh a new van so how does
that operation come together without the
support of an established company
i guess you're well
yeah well the thing is we already had a
lot of uh but we had some money left
over i probably had like
15 000 left over by the time all gastro
breaks ended
so we just went to b h photo in new york
which is a really awesome store everyone
should check out it's in midtown it's
amazing
and we just spent ten thousand dollars
we got cameras microphones and it wasn't
like i even had to call them up they
were sitting right next to me
and they were like let's let's do this
and then we booked a flight to miami and
just got it in
probably a month or two later right and
that's your first video on channel five
is
of miami spring break yes
it is amazing what happens when you put
a microphone in front of those
spring breakers they do self-incriminate
quite quickly
they really just go for it can't stop
them they do
and so um i think one of the interesting
things is that you were able to build
back
your following fairly quickly you look
at all gas no breaks
youtube pages followed by one and a half
1.7 million people
last check i had channel 5 is over 500
000 people that i followed right around
500 000. it's been a month and a half so
yeah i think it was a pretty pretty good
comeback given what we oh my god
yeah it's amazing um how what was it
like to see everybody start to come
to your new channel i mean i recently
discovered it but um
i imagined you to the youtube algorithm
that you know played some role in
getting people back to it but
it dude i'm not even gonna lie it wasn't
even the youtube algorithm
youtube was like i don't know people
just saw what happened to me and they
wanted to see what i did what i
people were like rooting for me like an
underdog they wanted to see what i would
do next
you know i wasn't gonna lose
right and so um with the new channel
are you are you making money on it now
or
what's your what's your plan or you're
making ad money is there any other way
that you're
no no all of our stuff demonetized we
only make money through patreon
when you're demonetized through youtube
i mean most of our videos get
demonetized yeah
and that's that's where youtube says
basically this video goes against some
of our standards we're not gonna yeah
creators that's almost
i mean i i think that some of the things
that people say in the videos are
ridiculous but it doesn't mean that
you're
uh going out and reporting on them
should be demonetized
and our first video something that's not
brand safe
that first video miami beach spring
break was taken down from
medical misinformation for an entire
week because someone said [ __ ] coving
what yeah and they said they didn't want
to get vaccinated they got taken down
for a while
right there was a whole group of people
saying they didn't want to get back so
it's like
if these social media i mean i i
understand look there
i understand where social media
companies sometimes need to draw the
line
but the thing is when you don't allow
viewpoints to be represented
you just play into the conspiracy
theories that you know
that you know and and have people go
like you mentioned to places that
are even worse and more group think uh
yeah oriented and then you end up
creating an even bigger problem yeah
that's like
you know q anon came from 8chan people
only went to 8chan
because 4chan started censoring the
political boards
you try if you follow the rabbit hole
into the internet's
darkest most unhinged conspiratorial
corners yeah
you can trace places along the way they
got
censored and and basically kicked off of
different social media platforms
even the creator of of 8chan wants hn to
be moderated in some way
right i agree with that
you with me yeah yeah yeah uh i have to
go in
like two minutes here that's cool okay
yeah yeah so let's let's wrap with this
um the last question i have for you
we've talked a little bit about how
social media
has you know created some of this
problem where we're
judging people um you know based off of
one-dimensional views of them we're not
taking nuanced approaches to news
but then again you've been able to build
this amazing thing on social media and a
lot of
people are gravitating toward it
all right andrew let's uh wrap on this
um we've talked a little bit about how
social media has you know divided people
media has but it's also
um the social media algorithms in
particular have
helped you you know reach so many people
with your message which is different so
you know i'm curious how you think about
that you know do these social media
algorithms have a point of view given
that they've
helped you rise or um you know
are we now finding that they actually do
have some room for some more nuanced
takes on what's going on in the world
that's a good point i mean i think that
social media knows what you like
obviously
like i think that's how it's helped me
you know especially because i started
pretty non-politically with entertaining
content i think people that like
similar stuff like maybe sasha baron
cohen or nathan fielder
or daily show stuff that would be or tim
and eric whatever would be kind of
directed my way
based upon their preferences so in that
way i think the social media algorithm
is great because it allows you to find
so much stuff that you think is
hilarious that you may have otherwise
not been able to find or have access to
like i'm happy for the algorithm in the
way that it's
made me been able to find other creators
and link with people across the world
like i don't think social media is bad
i think that when you uh get locked in a
social media news bubble
and become politicized that's when it's
bad and i think that's when the
algorithm needs to be worked on
otherwise it's very helpful and so you
could say transcendent
yeah for sure and that's uh that's a
word i would use to describe your show
so thank you again for making it
it's uh you can find it by searching on
youtube channel five
with andrew callahan yes
yes you can so yeah for sure
channel five uh on patreon also
it's five bucks a month that's where we
post all of our stuff early if you want
to fund the project
get some uncut uncensored episodes you
can check it out there but for most
stuff yeah just youtube
channel five with andrew callahan
terrific well andrew it's always great
to talk
thank you for being a friend of the show
a friend of big technology
and i can't wait to see what you do in
the future it's uh it's been a while so
far and
i think you're really hitting the nerve
so thank you i appreciate
you having me on man yeah looking
forward to seeing what's next
all right till next time my friends okay
all right thanks everybody for listening
thanks to nate guateny for doing the
editing road circle for hosting
and selling the ads we will see you next
week here on the real estate energy
podcast
bye andrew peace