Ep: 114: Too Online [Moving To A New Feed!] 1) Tenet Powerpoint Presentation Guy, 2) Alabama Urn Guy and Bass Pro Shop Guy

[00:00] One note before we get started, we are moving the two online podcast, this podcast to a new feed. If you are subscribed to the Boys Club podcast, thank you so much. [00:10] this podcast will no longer keep showing up. The two online podcast will no longer keep showing up. So please subscribe to the new feed link in show notes. Yeah, we'll be in a new thread. We'll keep [00:22] cross posting for a little bit, but if you don't subscribe to the new one, you'll start missing out on this, which would be very sad. Guess what? Boys Club is doing our very first conference called Brand New. Dina, what are we going to be talking about? So we're going to be covering a lot of the stuff that we cover on this podcast. Crypto, of course, the new internet, digital culture, emerging technology will be at the Austin proper on March 12th. And we're pulling [00:52] very fun tickets are now live and they will never be as cheap as they are right now today go buy your ticket members and zaddy holders get special pricing and if you aren't a member you can apply to attend brand new so go to boysclub.vip backslash brand new link in show notes to get all the details and can't wait to see you in austin yeah hi hey how's it going good we got some two online we have [01:22] that I'm not doing today. Oh, which what is that? Well, I'm excited to tell you about the story that I'm doing. But the ones that I almost did, but decided not to do, I am curious if folks would have wanted to hear that. So if you hear this, you're like, man, I want to hear about the story. Let me know. The first one was the nine month cruise.

[01:36] Okay, cool. Did you, this is not your story. [01:40] Not my story, but I have seen some stuff around it. Would have loved to learn more. [01:46] Then the next one was... [01:47] What do you do for a living, man? [01:49] Hey, what do you do for a living? You know that guy? Oh, I think I've seen that only because Reggie James, he got stopped on the street. What do you do for a living? You haven't seen any of the guy's other content? Uh-uh. He's like a TikTok man on the street kind of guy, right? Man on the street, yeah. I haven't seen him. Oh, interesting. Okay. Okay. [02:05] Okay. And then my last one, [02:07] Is a go Sal a Korean makeup technique? Have you come across this at all? It's wild. I might do that. I think that one is needed. The first and the third I am really here for. Okay, should we jump in? [02:22] Let's jump in. So for those who don't know, this is our show where Dina and I talk about our internet stories that we've been exposed to throughout the week and deep dive into our research on these stories. [02:52] to this whole new world. Everything can be better. So why not finance? To get started, go to kraken.com backslash boys club, sign up in just a few minutes and see what crypto can be. Not investment advice. Crypto trading involves risk of loss. Cryptocurrency services are provided to US and US territory customers by Payward Ventures Incorporated, PVI, DBA, Kraken.

[03:14] So do you want to go first? You go first. Okay. So my headline here is man goes viral for his first date tenant for dummies presentation. You have seen this, right? I have seen this. Okay. How much have you seen? Have you like gone deep? [03:28] I have digged in a little bit, but I'm excited to hear more because it's a great story. It's a great story. So I just want to put some... [03:36] tags before we get started here of different themes that this story touches that I think are [03:42] important to call out. One is [03:44] San Francisco startup man. [03:47] And the sort of persona around tech bro. Archetype. An archetype. The second one, I would say, is being cringe for the bit. And then the third one is just Peloton. We'll love a Peloton story. Always here for a Peloton story. I would say the fourth one is the internet's ability to find information. Collective action. Bring receipts. Bring receipts. Always bring receipts. Exactly. Totally. So before we get started, I want to disclose that I've only... [04:13] watched a couple of Christopher Nolan movies. [04:15] The story is about Tenet, which is a Christopher Nolan film. He's known for nonlinear storytelling. [04:20] So Memento, Inception, Oppenheimer. [04:24] I think I'm too dumb for his movies. I don't know. Are you a fan? Well, he also did like Dunkirk and... Dark Knight. Dark Knight. Like he has some stuff that's definitely... Maybe he didn't write those and maybe he's just a director on them. I don't know. But yeah, he's very like... Heady. [04:39] He's a heady filmmaker. [04:42] yes Oppenheimer also he's the Oppenheimer yes and people really either love him or hate him I would say they're he's he's kind of a polarizing figure anyway so the story starts with a video that goes viral of him accepting an award at the New York film critics dinner it's this sort of cozy fancy schmancy thing where it's being filmed by someone who like it's not an official film it's someone in the audience just with their phone and he is being very charming and he's talking about how

[05:12] Yeah. [05:32] in that [05:33] speech and that sort of award exception speech. He makes a joke. He sets it up by being like, opinions are everywhere. For example, I was on the Peloton during a workout and the instructor [05:42] and starts talking shit about one of his films, talking about how it's a couple of hours that she'll never get back. And she just like is roasting one of his films, the film Tenet. And he's getting some laughs in the room. And I would say overall, it's very good natured. Yes. And it's kind of just a throwaway joke that he makes. He's not coming off petty. He doesn't come off. He's not coming off petty. He's not coming off petty. Now the internet will and always does find receipts and brings receipts to these things. The source material. Yes. So someone finds the video of the Peloton instructor, [06:12] who's Jen Sherman. I don't take her classes, but she's, you know, your classic Peloton instructor lady. She's doing a program called Light Arms and Weights. You know, she's on the bike doing the [06:21] Wait. Circles, like Pilates-style arm circles. [06:26] straight arm where you're just like dying and she's biking too. And she starts saying like, Oh, the song, the song, [06:33] that is playing in the background is from the soundtrack of this movie called tenant. And then she goes, what the f*** is going on in that movie? That's two and a half hours of my life. Then we'll get back. So she's just talking shit while she's working out. And this is, I would say very normal for Peloton instructors to do this. A line that I heard her say that I really loved is she said, what is this? And I was like, man, if you're on a Peloton, they have to talk for hours and hours and hours. So much content, so much, so much content. And they are just trying

[07:03] They're, they are, [07:05] artists themselves. Totally. And so [07:08] You could have heard that comment a million times before, but the only reason you're watching that video, her clip on her on the bike in that moment, is because you've watched the Christopher Nolan commentary. So you're watching it through his eyes, and you're like, oh my god, this is... [07:24] So hard to hear. Totally. [07:27] Totally. So that video gets posted goes viral. [07:31] She then issues an apology and she's like, I'm so sorry. I was just running my mouth off. This is just what I do. And issues an apology to him. And he accepts it. The loop is closed between... [07:41] Jen Sherman and Christopher Nolan. All is fine. No beef. Then there's a new guy that enters the chat. So this is all happening. It's going super viral. And this San Francisco startup bro, I think sees an opportunity to insert himself into a momentum of virality. He quote tweets the Peloton [07:59] video. [08:00] The roast video. [08:01] the roast video, the Peloton roast video. And he says, one time I was, I went on a date and a girl that I was going out with asked me, [08:07] to make a PowerPoint presentation explaining Tenet. And I did. And I've used it. [08:11] since then on three other dates whenever tenant confusion comes up. So that's the first tweet that goes absolutely viral. [08:17] And I would say it goes viral for a few different reasons. First of all, he's showing his date PowerPoint presentation about Tenet. [08:22] So the first thing is you're like, what are you doing, my friend? What are you doing? The second thing is that he has done this multiple times and keeps on going on dates with new women, showing them the presentation. And like doesn't seem to make the connection between the PowerPoint presentation and the fact that he's going on all these dates with new women.

[08:42] Also, he uses a line whenever tenant comes up. [08:45] And it never comes up. So that's kind of a crazy thing to say. So when I saw this tweet... [08:50] Mm-hmm. From him. The things that were running through my head were... [08:54] Is this a bit? Right. This can't be real was my first thought. But then I thought a white man in San Francisco takes every opportunity in the world to mansplain. So this could be real. [09:06] And then the idea that there's a dude in San Francisco who presumably from his vibe and his Twitter presence is... [09:13] works in tech, him feeling like he is some authority on a heady artistic film also really checks out. So there's a lot of evidence against him where you're like, this could be real. If it were real with anybody, it would be real with this guy. Totally. I would say that that tension of, is [09:35] is at the core of why this has gone viral. Because I think that that's the ultimate question. For most people, you're like, what? Is he for real? Right. So that's the first tweet that goes viral. The second tweet that goes viral is him sharing the presentation. So he comes with his own receipts being like, this wasn't just a gag. I actually have 27 pages of a PowerPoint presentation. And it's there. And he shares the whole thing. And it's just as annoying as you can imagine it would be. Did you look through the presentation? I did. And the first slide says something like, it's okay if you don't understand Tenet, [10:04] it means that you're just not as film smart as you maybe thought you were. And I'm like, ew, shut up. It's just like so annoying. There is a world where the tweet went viral and then he made the PowerPoint.

[10:14] - Sure. [10:15] Okay. There was no... Yes. Okay. Okay. There was no timestamp on the PowerPoint itself. Okay. Okay. Yes, that is possible. So then there's the third viral moment, which is... [10:25] Him... [10:27] It's almost even like hard to say. He makes a video of himself giving the presentation [10:33] to a date in San Francisco, [10:36] And... [10:38] then post it online. And it's, [10:40] a 17 minute video of him on a really kind of awkward, weird date. [10:46] being filmed through a window so it's also filmed in in this weird way where you're like looking in through the window but they are miked you can hear them very clearly very surrealist she's this cute girl whatever and she's idly curious i'd say and the nice way to interpret this 17 minute video is [11:06] He's just a passionate guy and he's sharing his interests. [11:09] The not nice way, which were some of the tweets that you saw, was that he's a menace to society. [11:15] And this is live Reddit. You can imagine the tweets around it are just brutal. Live Reddit is such a brutal. Live Reddit is so bad. And you're watching the video. And for me, I was just so triggered by going on really bad dates with clueless guys who speak at you. Yeah. You know, and she's there and she's kind of interested, but... [11:36] My kids are really into Barbie right now. And so we've watched it 1 million times. And there's this line where Ryan Gosling says... [11:42] let me let me play my guitar at you and this is this is let me play my guitar at you energy so that's the third viral moment now i will say just to cap off the story you look into the dude and he has the startup and he's like san francisco startup guy his startup is making videos about startups

[11:59] So he has found himself, especially in this third viral moment, [12:03] making a video to kind of like show off his services, I'd say. So I think there's a world where he engineered [12:10] this whole thing [12:11] landing at the video so that he can basically sell in videos to other setups okay okay that's one way to look at it i didn't know that part of the story about what his job was part of me respects the hustle [12:25] I'm like, it's very hard to go viral. It's very hard to... [12:29] engineer [12:30] Something like that. So there's part of me that I'm like, okay. [12:33] You know what? [12:35] He did it and it worked and you got to respect that on some level. And there were a lot of weird design decisions. Anytime anything goes viral, you're sort of like, what was it? [12:48] that did that and the way the video is filmed it feels very like voyeuristic like you're watching something you're not supposed to be watching and you're just sort of like are they in on it are they not in on it i did look at the thread and it was like video and then he thanked the restaurant [13:04] and showed off like they're great spritzes and stuff like that which i was like okay that was part of the deal with the restaurant that they would be like promoted and then he also promotes her and she also creates video content so there's not a question in my mind about the date being staged right oh oh totally i think he said i think he even says that i think he says like [13:25] This is the day is staged. It was an opportunity for him to perform, to perform. And I think also her, cause she creates tech content videos and also her, which is just, there's an underlying, uh,

[13:38] feeling I've been having since the new year around, uh, [13:41] Just content online in general and virality and TikTok culture. And there's this. [13:47] willingness to do anything that [13:51] has just like really rubbed me the wrong way the last few weeks where I'm just like, what are we all doing? And, and I feel like we've hit a breaking point where there's no more we can possibly put on the internet. Like there's no way that you can break through the noise anymore or something like, and just when people are looking at the world and like, what is late stage capitalism going to be? What, where are we going to go after this? I'm sort of looking at like late stage [14:21] pretty close to the top. [14:24] Totally. I will say a couple of things come to mind with that. I think late stage content is bang on the money. I think that one thing is... [14:32] his willingness to be so cringe and i think that there's one way to look at it which is that he's totally clueless and he just doesn't know that he's a weird mansplainer and is annoying but i think there's the other way to look at it which is that he's [14:43] Engineered this whole thing and he's just totally at peace with being super cringe and he doesn't care and he's doing it for the bit and the payoff is worth him being considered the super cringy dude and I will say part of that also is being willing to put yourself in the firing line of polarizing content and this is something actually your tick tock viral moment was a result of finding a topic area where there are extreme beliefs on both sides of the argument and being willing to sit in the middle of it and you know what I'm saying.

[15:13] take the heat from both sides of and so I think that this is like a reflection of that polarizing content which is that like some people think it's like really great and he's doing like God's work and explaining to him other people think he's like an annoying asshole and he's just sitting in the [15:26] And I think that that's how people are going viral right now. But the result of it is like you say, [15:31] man, [15:32] there's nowhere left to go after that. I know, I know, totally. And I also think it is an archetype that people [15:39] Like, for me, this man... [15:42] Mm-hmm. [15:43] I have no grace. I'm not coming in with a warmth. I'm like immediately annoyed with him, no matter what he's talking about, like just who he is in his essence. There's nothing there. And that's unfair and ungenerous, but it's also true. And I can see a different version of this story with a different type of person at the center. And I would have a totally different [16:13] And so it's like all those things combined. Great story. Really interesting stuff going on here. It's also funny when I saw this a few times. [16:23] at the Golden Globes, where things that are happening in internet culture and that are very much like online... [16:28] phenomenons. [16:30] meeting the real world in moments. And one, I saw it happen with Christopher Nolan and him being interviewed, and [16:39] after he won the Golden Globe, like in the press room. And they were like, did you hit the Peloton today? And like trying to bring it in. He was like, no. And you can tell he's just like, I don't want to talk about this. Why are we talking about this? And he was like super nice about it. But you know, you're also like, stop. So cringe. And when people try to bring

[16:56] sort of weird niche things that have happened on the internet into a mainstream moment in IRL experiences. Sometimes it just like really doesn't work. And all of a sudden, everybody's like, Ooh, what we do in the privacy of our home on our phones. Nobody wants to see out in public. I don't need to see that. Totally. I will say one more thing about late stage content. [17:15] when you said that, what it reminds me of is remember that there was like a turning point [17:20] with reality TV. [17:21] when at first when reality TV started, [17:24] It was pure. You... [17:26] It was pure. You were getting the person having that experience. And then there was a moment where... [17:33] Everyone was watching reality TV and people started to understand that there was a formula for how to do reality TV well and how to be like the viral, how to be like the famous person on how to win reality TV. And everyone started becoming reality TV personas. Yes. And there was like a shift that happened. And this reminds me of this time we're now, which is like the shift on this engineered virality thing. [17:58] and people just being cringe for the bit. It reminds me of [18:01] that moment. Totally. Okay. This is actually a perfect segue into my stories. When you're first getting started with crypto, it can be scary. Am I doing this right? Is this just like my bank or trading app? How is it new and different? Well, that's why we love Kraken. They have a 24-7, 365 customer support team that's there to hold your hand all along the way. This isn't a nine to five Monday to Friday bank. This is crypto. It's all the time. Anyone's welcome. Open door policy. Come one, come all. Try something new at kraken.com backslash boys club.

[18:31] Not investment advice. Crypto trading involves risk of loss. Cryptocurrency services are provided to U.S. and U.S. territory customers by Payward Ventures Incorporated, PBI, DBA, Kraken. [18:44] The reason why this is a perfect segue into... [18:46] My stories is because both of these stories are pure viral moments, unengineered moments. [18:55] virality which after your stories are sort of a palate cleanser where you're like man these are people just being stupid and then go viral [19:04] Okay, so... [19:06] Headline would be men doing stupid stuff in Alabama. [19:09] Is the container for this two online story. Within a span of eight days, an Alabama man skinny dips in a fresh aquarium at a bass pro shop and a man gets stuck in a large vase. [19:22] Have you heard either of these stories? I scrolled past the Bass Pro Shops. [19:28] And I was like, not today. I'm not doing that. But yeah, go on. Well, I'm here to bring you along on this story. Okay. So the first one we're going to talk about is a man in an urn. A video goes viral. And it's posted by this account called Christy Yamaguchi, Maine, which is sort of a parody account. They also have a podcast. They're content creators, these people. Okay. And the video is... [19:56] Such an incredible encapsulation of a culture that is so far from my reality and my world. So these people are in Mountain Brook, Alabama, and they're at a party. You know that meme that's like...

[20:09] a group of guys walking [20:11] in a parking lot and they're all wearing the same thing. And it's like, I'm going to call my dad, the lawyer or whatever. And it's a joke about, they're all wearing boat shoes. They're all in khakis. They're all white guys, khakis, polos, Southern men culture. Mm-hmm. [20:25] And it's a lot of, there's men and women at this party, but it's a lot of that vibe. And it's a very chaotic video. And so I'm just going to play you a, [20:35] the video because... [20:37] the [20:38] audio is is pretty fun this is what we're watching you can tell immediately a lot of alcohol is being consumed like you're seeing drinks you're seeing people like [21:04] glazed in their vibe. And at first you just see all these people huddled around this thing and you're not really sure what it is. [21:10] And like loud, aggressive talking. And then the crowd kind of parts. And you see a man, a grown man, stuck inside a very large vase, like on the ground. And you can only see his torso and his head. And his legs are stuck in this vase. And everybody's yelling different recommendations for him. People are like, take your sweater off. People are like, put your arms together. Like everybody's sort of giving him their recommendation on what he should do. And then he's mad. He's not having a good time. Yeah. He's angry.

[21:40] He's not lightheartedly laughing. He's saying, call the fire department to break this, break this mother. I'm doing everything I can. God damn it. I already took my belt off. And he's like trying to like respond to people who are giving him these different recommendations that he's really upset. And so this video gets posted, goes viral, 15 million views on it very, very quickly. [22:03] Of course, Twitter is commenting and laughing, but also people are giving their own recommendation. And then this account, Christy Yamaguchi Maine, is posting additional videos that people are sending into him from that party. So people start like using this account as a main source of truth of what's happening with this guy in the urn. [22:20] Some funny tweets are one says we have a man stuck in a decorative urn at this Mountain Brook house party. I repeat, we have a drunk man stuck in a large decorative urn at this house party details as they develop. And so this is happening. And then you're seeing these other videos and angles and stuff like that. [22:37] And he ends up getting free. The last video I saw, I found out that he got free, but the last video I saw was like a few of his friends using some tools to like chip away at the urn, like slowly to crack it open so that he could come out. [22:51] So then this man starts to become sort of this figure in this subculture of the internet, like Southern Alabama. It's sort of jock culture, but it's not related to sports. It looked more to me like frat boys. [23:06] Frat culture. Exactly. Frat culture. Yeah. And so then this account, Christy Yamaguchi-Main, has this podcast that's called Jorts Center Pod. And they get him on the podcast. They do an interview with him. And I'm just going to play a little bit of the beginning of the audio for you.

[23:22] Welcome to George Center. My name is Christie Yamaguchi-Maine or @thewapplehouse on Twitter. We are taping an emergency episode. [23:30] Because after I shared a video on Twitter yesterday, about 24 hours ago, that I'd come across of a slightly... [23:39] I'd say... [23:40] perturbed uh uh maybe angry in the moment individual certainly doesn't seem to be so now but uh he was surrounded by a bunch of well-dressed party goers uh and he was stuck in a giant decorative vase or vase or urn or whatever the hell you want to call it uh and then suit okay so they go they go on to then like interview him and he seems like a nice guy and he's he's much [24:11] Is he embarrassed about it? He doesn't seem embarrassed. He seems like this is his moment in the sun. And his name is Connor Padgett. He's an architect in Birmingham, Alabama. He's a grown person who had a night out that went viral. So this... [24:26] Happens. [24:27] And there's some journalism around it on Alabama's [24:32] the university's website. And at the end of their article, they said, Padgett's sticky situation went viral days after a man stripped naked and jumped into the Leeds Bass Pro Shop aquarium before knocking himself unconscious on Friday. So there's another story that happened just days before, 23 minutes from Mountain Brook in the Bass Pro Shop of Leeds, Alabama. So these two

[25:02] to each other, but had unending reach on the internet in totally different areas. So transitioning to the second thing that happened here. [25:11] This man... [25:14] Was... [25:15] Definitely on a substance of some kind. I think he has some issues, certainly. Cannonballs. [25:22] and dives into a Bass Pro Shop aquarium. Someone captures the video of him doing this. The video sort of goes viral, but the video actually doesn't go viral because there's sort of a sad tone because you can really see like something's wrong. But what really goes viral is stills of this man inside the aquarium. So people are taking screenshots for a few reasons. [25:45] One, he's completely naked, but there's no penis to be found. You cannot see a penis on this man. [25:52] Okay. So there's many theories as to what's going on. My favorite tweet was... [25:58] "Oh my God, this man has his **** out." And so that's one. The second theory is a lot of George from Seinfeld, "I was in the pool, I was in the pool," shrinkage. [26:11] Okay. So one theory is shrinkage. Second theory is micropenis. This man has a micropenis and it's being displayed. [26:20] all over the internet. The third is bad angle. He's quite overweight, weird, like water, the eye, trick of the eye, trick of the eye. So there's three theories that are going around. But my guess as to why this goes viral is because you were watching, you're looking at it and it's, it brings up confusion. Sure. Yeah. Yeah. Why is this man naked? Why is he in

[26:43] this aquarium why can't you find a penis on him and that's all the things that's a stop the scroll moment for sure definitely stop the scroll moment and then there's another still that goes viral of him of him just like laying on the [26:57] floor naked and people felt a real kinship with that image where they were like, this is sort of how I feel all the time. [27:05] This man is all of us. [27:06] This man is all of us. Someone had that picture and says Bass Pro Shop has fallen. [27:13] Because it does kind of read like... [27:15] Like, the king, this king is dead, and this... [27:19] Kingdom is over. [27:21] - - [27:23] So one last funny part of the story is that a Jimmy Kimmel writer is [27:28] This woman... [27:29] decides to do a parody video where she writes a parody video as if she is the wife of the Bass Pro Shop guy. Okay. And it goes almost more viral than any of the other content. Because something that happened with this, the Bass Pro Shop man is... [27:44] there wasn't like a real source of truth. You know how you're like, Oh wow, this thing just exploded. And you're not really, there's a few things that go viral and there's a few things that have like definitely a huge count on them in terms of like engagement, but they were just everywhere and it's hard to parse out. So what's funny is when that happens and then someone similarly to sort of the tenant guy follows along with their own content building off that. And it, there is like a singular source of truth. It's not like these funny tweets that come from it,

[28:14] her video goes viral so much so that she's basically was like, oh my God, please stop. Like, stop watching the video, stop sharing the video. This was just supposed to be funny. And now like, there's legitimately people who think this woman is this man's wife. And she's like, no, no, no, no. So if you actually search the media on Twitter for Bass Pro Shop Guy, a lot of it is this woman and her like stupid two minute parody video about him jumping into the aquarium. Okay. [28:40] And so in conclusion, my favorite sort of way to sum this up here is quote tweet of the guy in the urn. And someone said naked Bass Pro Shop swimming guy stuck in a comically large vase guy. Two incredible guys in just eight days. I'm thinking we are so back for 2024. [29:00] so i think we could add in san francisco tenant guy weird guy weird white guy week that's on here is what happened here so that's my story great thank you so much anytime that was incredible