BEFORE YOU READ: Give us a quick follow on IG. Takes less than seven seconds. OW is starting to expand, and we need you to be a part of it! Thank ya! Enjoy the log!
Happy Mond- wait. It’s Wednesday. Huh - turns out even explorers need a rest sometimes.
Traveling Twinkle-Toes Tejas was, you guessed it, traveling this past weekend, soaking in the Miami heat and exhaust fumes of the Formula 1 event on South Beach (hence the late log hehe). This got him thinking; if he landed this gig from only a few connections, why is the idea of “connection” so integral to content creation?
Back on the horse, the boys excavate this together in Log 7 of Season 2 of OW. Dive in with none other than the luscious-haired Sean Oulashin.
Read all the way to the end to answer the question of the day in the comments! We’re replying to every single one.
Beyond recognition, beyond having a “K” next to my follower count, beyond impacting people at scale, there’s one true reason I do this whole content creation thing. I constantly refer to it as the thing that “gets me out of bed,” the thing that keeps me pressing record - and it’s exemplified itself every single week with these two boys in this newsletter.
It’s a moment that most content creators inevitably reach, although it sometimes flies under the radar. Are you ready for it?
It’s the exact moment that a conversation with an internet friend shifts from talking about the internet (content strategy, etc) to something completely unrelated to the internet. The moment I asked Tejas “hey how are you doing like… mentally” or when I asked Danny “where the hell is Norwich.”
The moment when you stop referring to internet friends as “internet friends,” and start thinking of them as just close friends. I absolutely love it.
In a holistic, almost fake-deep way, it’s the internet’s whole purpose, fully realized. Connection. It’s harnessing the true power of the World-Wide Web and putting it to good use. Great use, actually.
I was reminded of how special these moments are during our once-a-season coffee hour with some of the amazing readers of Out West (if you missed this one, you can bet your bottom dollar we’re doing more!). Despite it being our first time meeting most of them, we could already see the seeds of connection being planted as we facilitated conversations and ideas with the group. Though there were only a few people, it was a reminder that big ideas start from small groups. Even more, it was an amazing reminder of my days as a teenager, scrounging the internet for anyone who would listen to me.
Content creation is like casting a net into an ocean full of idea-bearing relationships, and it’s up to the creator to assemble the pieces into something worthwhile. I think I speak on behalf of my boys here when I say that building Out West is something we’re more than excited for, and something we can’t wait for your all to be a part of.
Make content. Meet people. It’s that simple.
Idea, film, record, edit, post. Results? 5,191 likes. Eh, okay.
Idea, film, record, edit, post. Results? 2,037 likes. Oof, damn it.
Idea, film, record, edit, post. Results? 10,998 likes. There we go, but let’s do it again.
Now multiply this process by 731 days and that’s how my brain has operated since I started content creation.
I’m living my dream life but this part gets kinda rough; there is always a chase for more, no matter what stage of being a content creator you are at. I’ve met people with 20M followers and they said, “thank you, but let’s get to 21M.”
This constant flow of creating and posting to increase vanity metrics is like anesthesia, you become numb to what these numbers mean in the first place.
It wasn’t until last Thursday’s Out West Coffee Meet-Up where I saw faces to those numbers that broke me out of this spell.
Hearing our fans’ stories and that we have a community of people who live around the world, working at Heathrow airport, to the cornfields of Mississippi… holy shit. Moreover, everyone in that call was locked in on one thing – to become a better storyteller and take advantage of these platforms we have today.
You couldn’t do this ten years ago, barely even five years ago. This idea of community is the thing to chase. I know, it’s trite to say that but sometimes, a certain situation can bring a whole new meaning.
Thank you Out West family, I’m beyond pumped to grow this thing and provide as much value to this community!
Daniel McMahon - The Sweet Threshold of Eleven
In Year 10, I went to a concert with some friends. I snapped a pic, posted it to Instagram, and went to sleep. What followed was never-before-seen: 40 likes.
Back in those days, I had a plausible like-goal for Instagram posts: 11 likes. You see, for posts with less than 11 likes, Instagram would show the names of those who liked your post. But when you hit that sweet threshold of eleven likers, Instagram would hide the names and just reveal:
11 likes.
Clean. Minimal. Understated. That’s right, I’m in the double digits, and I don’t even have to prove the individuals. On every post, I strived for this, so when I hit a new personal best of 40, I’d secured my seat on the next private jet to LA.
It’s silly, of course. But there was a real tangible sense of accomplishment when Instagram detached the humanity away from my likes. Something about only showing the number suggested scale. A quantity of people we can’t all show on the screen right now. I don’t know, my 15-year-old self liked it.
But 7 years later, this childhood mindset still has its claws in me. As it does for all of us. I can put my hands up and say I’ve lost all sense of scale when it comes to the little digits on my phone. I can read 20,000 and think “really, that’s it?” when in reality that’s a packed-out O2 Arena in London.
(I really recommend scrolling through this visualisation of crowd sizes. It’s quite something)
To those of you who attended our Out West meet-up last week, thanks for putting things in perspective for us again. It’s so wonderful to see your faces, hear your stories, and truly realise we’re all in this shit together.
Another week, another newsletter. If you’re reading this, THANK YOU. You’re truly the best. We appreciate all the eyes recently.
This is only our seventeenth consecutive log, although it feels like the hundredth. We’ve been working on OW since last November, and it’s cool to finally see everything coming together.
We wanna know: have you connected with anyone through content creation? If not, WHY not? What’s holding you back?
Open up in the comments. Don’t be shy! We’re responding to every single one. :)
You're Just A Number To Us
Sad I missed the meetup! Love the point of Internet friends --> close friends, Sean. I was just in LA last month, and a creator economy founder I met through Twitter over a year ago invited me and another friend over to dinner at his mom's house, where she made a home-cooked Passover meal. Pretty cool moment because I wasn't able to travel home to celebrate the holiday with my family! Keep crushing it, y'all 🙌
Been doing content creation for awhile and feel like I get caught up in the numbers so much, I forget there are real people behind the screens!
That being said, if anyone in this Out West Community ever wants to talk content, internet stuff, or really anything else, HMU! Would love to meet some like minded individuals!
Thanks guys!