Back in 2005, we were on our last dollar and in fact,
we got a emergency $25,000 not a grant, but
to do a project for a fellow progressive organization,
Brave new films and they saved basically our entire existence.
>> That was 2007.
It's amazing that you're bringing that up because that was a memory that
I wanted to bring up the fact that they carried us at such
a difficult time when TYT could have completely gone under.
>> Yeah, that was Robert Greenwald and he's a legend, he's fantastic.
You should check out brave new films.
He's a wonderful human being.
And Jim Gilliam used to work that he's passed away since, but
he was a genius on the progressive side and we appreciated his help.
He's actually the guy who built the original second Wall Street studio where
we started doing video because I was at a so
brave new films has helped us immeasurably through the years, just kind of just in
like little spots that those two things helped more than anything else.
And and so Jim and I were at a diner after a brave new films event.
And I was like, hey, because remember we started as serious satellites first
original talk show, we were on the radio, right?
And I said to Jim look, the point of the is to stay on radio.
I wanna do online video.
That's why I set up the company in the first place.
He's like, so why don't you do it?
And I was like, I don't know how okay.
>> [LAUGH] >> And I have no money, right?
And he's like, I can fix that.
Not the money part.
He's like, it doesn't cost much, I'll show you how to do it.
And I was like, well that's nice.
So that's the first Wilshire studio.
That's where we just did radio.
That's me and Ben from back in the day.
Look at that old school TV up there.
That's my old >> David is in the reflection.
>> That's funny.
That's Garafalo that we were interviewing at one of the convention.
That's probably the old convention.
>> And really fast, I think people should understand that it was more difficult to
do online video back then.
Now, anybody with a phone and internet connection has a show.
It wasn't like that back then.
>> No, when I was talking to Jim at the diner, You Tube did not exist.
And when we first started putting up clips,
we were putting it on like random places like yahoo messenger, whatever, right?
Well that came later.
[LAUGH] My space, we tried it all like no joke.
That's exactly what we did.
And so what I found out later about Jim is that he was
the lead developer at the age of 23.
And he was the chief technical officer of another giant digital media,
not the media digital company at the age of 25.
So he was a verifiable genius.
So he came in and he's like, yeah, no problem.
We use the cameras, we buy, here's where we set it up and boom.
All of a sudden we were doing online video.
We're like this is what I always wanted, that's amazing.
And then guys, not to your generosity even before the 25,000 came in from brave
new films, you guys saved us cuz we started the membership program.
Honestly, I think we invented Freemium back in 2005 where we said,
we're gonna give you everything free, but if you want it conveniently or
if you want more, sign up and support us through membership and then air America,
I'm giving way too many details here.
But that's part of the point here, I guess.
Air America said to us, hey, we want, we were their morning show,
we're thinking of canceling the morning show, we wanna move you to the evenings,
evenings on radio suck.
It's not afternoon drive, it's evenings.
A lot less people listen to it.
And so we thought they were trying to like play politics.
So we're like, no, we're staying with the morning show.
And then a little while later they were like, okay, then it's canceled.
I'm like, God damn it.
>> [LAUGH] >> So, but they were very nice because
they owed us some money because of the contract, right?
And they said, okay, you know what we'll do, we'll let you stay on air and
keep plugging your website.
Good luck with that kid.
Okay, and so that's when we started plugging membership because we're like,
we're gonna run out of money and we're gonna have to shut down.
We were not at all bluffing.
We had like $37 left, right, and you guys saved the day.
And then that happened several times again throughout the years.
And and that got us to the tiny bit that saved us for a little longer.
And then we got out of that hole through membership.
So that's why when I say we do the show with you guys and
you guys help to make the show it's not one percent exaggeration.
I remember none of the time a guy walked in with a switcher, he's like,
this is how you switch between cameras.
So it's not awkward.
And we're like, okay, where do we pay?
He's like, just take it.
>> Wow. >> Okay.
[LAUGH] >> Some wonderful Young Turks viewer
from back in the day.
I remember were so OG.
We're the first ever YouTube partner channel, okay.
>> Not a big deal.
And that has led to some conspiracies about how, yeah,
YouTube is, planted the Young Turks or whoever planted us.
[LAUGH] None of it is true, right?
And so but I remember thinking, my God,
one day we might be able to make money from YouTube, this is amazing.
Okay, >> [INAUDIBLE]
>> Yeah.
And as it turned out that was the case.
But until we got there there was almost no way to make money other than membership.
So that's why we had a tiny little team,
we barely paid ourselves barely had to work at RadioShack [LAUGH] Okay.
>> Yeah. That was fabulous.
So all right, I've talked too much, even though I've had went on many different
strands and forgot a couple of the the endings of those stories