Yo!
This video is sponsored by Brilliant.
Hey guys, before you watch this video, be sure to go down below and not smash that like
button, why would you like a video before you watch the video?
And why would YouTubers ask you to do that?
You're pressing of the like button is a valuable thing that you should only give to videos
that deserve it.
If, after or mid-way through this video, you laugh or learn something, feel free to press
the like button, a matter of fact, I encourage it.
But only do it if you gain value from this video, not just cuz some dude on the internet
tells you to like the video before it even starts.
That being said, if you enjoyed this bit, uhh it’d mean a lot if you pressed the like
button.
Hey guys, so I was just minding my own business the other day and Bo Burnham decides to drop
a trailer for his new movie, Eighth Grade.
>> ME IN CHAIR: *Breathes in* He has spoken.
>> KAYLA: So, the topic of today's video is being yourself.
Being yourself can be hard, and it's like, aren't I always being myself?
And yeah, for sure.
But being yourself is like, not changing yourself to impress someone else.
>> ALEX: It’s weird, because Bo Burnham always seems to know exactly the struggles
I’m going through at exactly the right time.
Like, I remember the first time I listened to Art is Dead.
>> CLONE: Ok, great Alex, but you gotta do that line with more gusto.
>> ALEX: Wut?
>> CLONE: You know, you gotta be loud and engaging for the audience.
>> ALEX: Yeah, that’s what I’m gonna talk about today...
>> CLONE: What I’m finna talk about today, gotta appeal to the youth demographic.
>> ALEX: Ok um, back, uhh, back to the video, I was in Yosemite, it was actually the same
time I made the Spider Caves video, and it was the middle of the night, I was going down
a YouTube rabbit hole, as one does in the middle of the night.
And I saw that video suggested to me via the recommended video section, but I never clicked
on it because, from the title, I thought it was about painting or something, because that’s
what I thought all art was for some reason.
And I just remember just sitting in my bed, and clicking on the video, and freezing up,
because the video was so spot on to all of the things I were scared were wrong with me?
AAAHHH!
Bo Burnham has done it again with his new movie Eight Grade, coming out this July, and
early reviews say the movie focuses a lot on the difference between the main character’s
online self and real life self, and that hit home because I’ve been thinking about that
a lot.
When I started this channel, my Technicality personality, heh that rhymes.
When I started this channel, my Technicality personality was exactly the same as my real-life
personality.
>> TINY ME: Hey guys, I’m here, let’s get technical.
You don’t need me to tell you I’m super psyched and super happy to be doing this video,
but why?
>> BIG ME: I was so young, and so small.
But over time, my real-life personality has evolved and taken a different path, this is
uh, this is a spider, I don’t really know what this is.
But my Technicality personality has stayed fairly consistent, and for good reason. *laughs* This is just weird now.
I think my Technicality personality is way more entertaining and way more good for this
medium than my actual personality.
Like, imagine if I act in my videos exactly how I act in real life.
“hey guys, uhh, I’m here, and uhh let’s get technical.
Today I wanna talk about uhh memes.
I'm really happy to see this Simpsons meme blowing up.
Uhh, it's a lot of that 2meirl4meirl action
It's not being oversaturated, which is good. And it's a big mood right there, so you know. It's all good.
>> TEACHER: Ok kids welcome to English class, hey Alex, what did you think of the reading?
This clip of a rock is more interesting because you don’t know if the rocks gonna do something.
Likewise, imagine if my actual personality was just how I acted in my YouTube videos.
>> TEACHER: Ok kids welcome to English class, hey Alex, what did you think of the reading?
>> ALEX: Hey my English teacher, I’m here with a God of Small Things analysis, let’s
get technical.
What really fascinated me was Arundhati Roy’s use of childish language even while talking
about intense subjects.
She’ll often push two words together creating a new compound word which is usually an adjective.
This can be seen when she writes the word “skyblue,” which appears around 30 times
throughout the entire book.
We did actually read this book in English, and it’s pretty good, but it ends in, like,
the worst possible way for every character.
Like everyone either dies, commits incest, is a bad person, or just ends up in a bad
situation, so.
Almost every YouTuber has to deal with the difference between their online self and their
real self.
The only YouTuber I can think of who’s exactly how they’re like in their videos in real
life, is Michael Stevens from Vsauce, like I’ve heard he’s actually vsacey all the
time, and I’m so glad to hear that, because if not I would lose faith in humanity.
In the coming months and videos, I wanna really take time define my personality and see how
my online persona relates to my offline persona.
My online persona has stayed pretty consistent, and my offline persona seems to be all over
the place, which just feels weird, but is always constantly not my online persona.
>> CLONE: Ok this is just getting too sad and pathetic.
Just be your usual Technicality self.
>> ALEX: No, gah, that’s that’s the whole point I feel weird that there is such thing
a Technicality self and a non-technicality self, but at the same time my Technicality
self is way more entertaining and charismatic and better for YouTube, so what do I do to
reconcile these two things?
>> CLONE: Dude I don’t know, I’m just a figment of your imagination constructed
to get more views.
I don’t even exiiiiiiiissstttt (fade out).
>> ALEX: That’s how we’re gonna end that bit?
Ok well.
So here’s the challenge: how do I make both my offline and online persona something I’m
happy with?
How do I stay true to myself in my real life, and have an entertaining persona online?
For my offline persona, Anna Akana has this system where she would basically chart out
Side note: Notice how I’m being wishy washy when it comes to saying “being yourself,”
because I’m less interesting in being yourself and more interesting in, well, finding who
myself is.
Side note: Notice how I’m being wishy washy when it comes to saying “being yourself,”
because I’m less interesting in being yourself and more interesting in, well, finding who
myself is.
Woah that’s deep 10/10 deeps.
For my online persona, here’s how I’ve approached it.
There are 3 channels on YouTube I literally can’t watch more than 5 videos of, or my
mind will explode and not be able to function because their videos are so good.
Those 3 channels are Austin McConnell, who you should totally check out, and the 2 we’re
gonna talk about today, Nathan Zed and Wendover Productions, because they represent 2 different
elements of videos that I’m really trying to work on.
On the one hand, we have Sam from Wendover whose content and ideas and meat of his videos
are so phenomenal, like, every Wendover Productions video I watch I think what?
How?
Why?
Questions?
>> CHAIR: You know what China does have interesting geography.
How do you even think of that?
Like, one day was Sam just sitting there like
>> CHAIR: You know what China does have interesting geography.
So amazing, and then other the other hand we have Nathan Zed whose voice and personality
and comedy is just impeccable.
He could literally talk about anything and make it engaging, to the point where I just
think, like how?
I really want to work on trying to get these two different sides of what I think is the
same the coin down really well.
I think I’ve been getting better at content, not as good as Sam, of course, but, you know,
getting better.
Like, the sources from the first couple videos I made were basically just links to Vsauce
and ASAP Science videos.
My early videos we’re based a lot on stuff I saw, say, in an It’s Okay to Be Smart
video, or Do Online Now Guys video.
Now, I’m really proud of stuff like the Illusion of Explanatory depth video, or the
Why do cable companies have monopolies?
video, because they’re unique; you can’t find them anywhere else on YouTube.
But, while my content has evolved, I feel like my personality still has some work to
go.
I think my jokes can be better, I think they can be more risky, and, well, as much as I
love puns and references and all that, and they’re def not going away, they’re relatively
easy and safe.
And my favourite type of art is art that does take risks.
Like, don’t you just hate it when someone’s all like...
“You know when you get your meal, *breath* and your waiter says enjoy your meal, *breath*
and you’re all like, *breath* you too?
Get it? because...
That joke was funny once: when Brian Regan did it first in 1997, before I was even born!
I’m really young.
The art and comedy I really like and really appreciate isn’t easy or safe, like Bo Burnham
or Watsky or BoJack Horseman.
And I’ve been working on that and y’all have been noticing, which is kinda what prompted
me to make this video, thank you so much, genuinely.
I wanna continue to work on it and make it better for you.
This segues me nicely into....
(eh eh?
See I can keep it going across videos)
This segues me nicely into my second fear with my voice on YouTube, which is it is MY
voice on YouTube.
Right, so this situation I’m in kinda reminds me of Logic.
Lemme preface this by saying I’m a big fan of Logic, I love his music, probably in my
top 5 favourite artists.
But while he makes really really good music, some, like Banthony Bantano, and other music
critics, have criticized him, admittedly rightly so, for sounding too much like his influences.
>> ANTHONY: I can't help but feel like his style is just a composite of his contemporaries.
The problem is he just doesn't really have a strong distinct sound that, when I hear it, I know I'm listening to a Logic song.
I don't think there's another artist out there who comes off as being as much a hip-hop artist as he is a hip-hop fan.
>> ANTHONY: I can't help but feel like his style is just a composite of his contemporaries.
The problem is he just doesn't really have a strong distinct sound that, when I hear it, I know I'm listening to a Logic song.
I don't think there's another artist out there who comes off as being as much a hip-hop artist as he is a hip-hop fan.
This is my biggest fear with my voice and my videos.
Obviously, I too wear my inspirations very proudly on my sleeve; you can easily see inspiration
taken from Vsauce and Jacksfilms and many other amazing amazing people.
Heck, when I pitched this very video to you guys, I described it as a Nathan-Zed-eqsue
video.
I mentioned how my content has evolved from being heavily inspired to being pretty unique,
but I feel like my voice hasn’t really evolved in the same way and to the same extent.
How DO I define my own voice?
How do I define my own style?
Anthony even SAYS Logic sounds more like a hip hop fan than a hip hop artist, and that’s
what I’m afraid I’m becoming; I’ll always be a YouTube fan and not a YouTube artist.
To summarize this whole, I'm working on making my offline persona as best as it can be, and I want my online persona to reflect that more, but I also want it to stay entertaining and charismatic.
Woah it's magic
So yeah that's what's been on my mind.
Follow my on instagram to encourage my nacisism, follow me on Twitter, because I’m so close
to 1,000 followers let’s get there yee!
Ayy, uhh, quick money update!
I should put on a suit.
Woah it's magic
Thanks to your support on Patreon and by using my sponsors, I’ve been able to buy a new
microphone to get audio that doesn’t sound like it was recorded in the middle of a windstorm.
This is the Sennheiser MKH416, it’s known as the gold standard for shotgun mics, and
it’s actually the one Marques Brownlee actually uses.
I’m really happy with this purchase, I hope it steps up the audio game and makes my videos
even more enjoyable for you, and, like I said, I’ve got my sponsor, Brillaint.org to thank
for it.
Listen, we’ve talked about Brilliant before, in literally the last video at that, so you
already know Brilliant has amazing math and science courses that engage you in fascinating
problems and help you understand big concepts at a deeper level.
But what I want to talk about today is how Brilliant.org actually, like, helps Technicality.
They’ve signed up to not only sponsor the last video and this video, but a variety of
upcoming videos.
They’ve shown to me that they are dedicated to help Technicality grow and improve by sponsoring
my videos, which really means a lot to me.
On top of the fact they’re a great source of inspiration for videos, their courses are
just fun to do in my free time.
So if you wanna support this amazing company that’s helping me do bigger and better things,
go to brilliant.org/technicality and sign up for free, like, you have nothing to lose.
Plus, if you like it, the first 200 people that go to that link will get 20% off the
I like these videos, they’re like public journal or diary entries that document what I'm thinking of and when, so I kinda like making them every once in a while.
I also wanna give a huge thank you to all of my patrons over at Patreon.com/Technicality,
especially AllStrawBerry and Scott Robinson who are pledging $99 and $100 respectively,
which is utterly amazing, I’m perpetually in disbelief, thank you so incredibly much,
that’s crazy.
Also, did you like this video, or do you want me to stick to education?
I like these videos, they’re like public journal or diary entries that document what I'm thinking of and when, so I kinda like making them every once in a while.
But if you like these sorta videos, maybe I’ll sprinkle them in occasionally (so,
like once or twice a year), or maybe I’ll even make them their own series.
Or maybe the name Q with A could take on another meaning: like instead of you asking me questions, I ask the questions on my mind about life, the universe, and everything. Woah, another 10/10 deeps, that’s 20 total deeps.
Bye y'all