Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

How to succeed in MrBeast production (Leaked PDF)

simonwillison.net

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

351–360 of 1001 posts

Re: How to succeed in MrBeast production (Leaked PDF)

#351

Post by ghiculescu »

shalmanese wrote: post #217

One distressing trend I've noticed becoming ubiquitous on HN is that any writing that is confronting to a consensus worldview becomes flooded with highly upvoted comments that are, in essence, excuses for why it's not necessary in this instance to re-examine your priors. He's making low value content/the culture of the company is horrible/he's a fraud/it's more luck than skill. The actual critiques are personalized t…

Please share what you wrote, lots of people might value it despite all the naysayers.

Re: How to succeed in MrBeast production (Leaked PDF)

#352

Post by matheusmoreira »

mihaic wrote: post #249
shalmanese wrote: post #217

One distressing trend I've noticed becoming ubiquitous on HN is that any writing that is confronting to a consensus worldview becomes flooded with highly upvoted comments that are, in essence, excuses for why it's not necessary in this instance to re-examine your priors. He's making low value content/the culture of the company is horrible/he's a fraud/it's more luck than skill. The actual critiques are personalized t…

Have you considered that the sour grapes attitude actually comes from an understanding of the world, and how everything has been turned only into profit maximization? And that the nitpicking is merely a failure to express that understanding of the world, especially since it seems like pro-status quo commenters don't care to learn more? I think I'm one of the sour grapes commenters often, and I've very often tried to…

> And that the nitpicking is merely a failure to express that understanding of the world, especially since it seems like pro-status quo commenters don't care to learn more?

I agree with you on this but I don't think it's a failure. I think people just get tired after a while. They get tired, and then they start displaying their disapproval in ways that require less work.

It's just easier than typing out all those words and being ignored.

> My greatest frustration is trying to describe for instance why someone like Mr Beast is antisocial and then being met by responses that obviously never bother to understand what my point was

It's really tiresome.

At some point you start to realize that you have fundamentally different values than the people you're trying to discuss things with, that these values are irreconcilable and that further argument will just make people hate you instead of convincing them.

This isn't really about "sour grapes", we have moral objections to what others are doing, and there's no point in trying to have those arguments with people who do those things for a paycheck.

Re: How to succeed in MrBeast production (Leaked PDF)

#353

Post by qwertytyyuu »

hypeatei wrote: post #105
zulban wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The guy has earned a net worth of maybe $700 million starting with YouTube. Saying it's all a bunch of contrived bullshit hides the fact the he is obviously brilliantly talented and dedicated at making a business from YouTube. If you or others blow off a document he wrote or an interview he gives because most of his videos are "just" gaming an algorithm then you must not be a very curious person. I don't like coffee…

I read this post because I was curious about how these operations work. What I found is: - Making good YOUTUBE videos is paramount, not quality videos - Be quirky and crazy in videos using a blank check - If something goes awry or you need it faster, also use a blank check - Some advice related to thumbnails and titles (relying on YouTube's current algorithm which could change the next second) The only thing I found…

Pretty sure he regards c players as ones that only “carry their weight” but nothing more

Re: How to succeed in MrBeast production (Leaked PDF)

#354

Post by j_timberlake »

smsm42 wrote: post #10

> “I Spent 50 Hours In Ketchup” > In general the more extreme the better. I may be sounding like "get off my lawn" guy right now but should there be some realization that these people are a cultural analogue of if not heroin than at least cigarettes? They are making a good living from making things objectively worse in a society by tickling the base instincts of the addicts. I am not calling for government interventi…

Most hobbies are just as dumb when you think about it.

Sports = watching grown men play with balls, Games = giving yourself unnecessary problems to solve, TV/Reading = learning (usually) completely useless information

Re: How to succeed in MrBeast production (Leaked PDF)

#355

Post by antegamisou »

GlacierFox wrote: post #273
shalmanese wrote: post #217

One distressing trend I've noticed becoming ubiquitous on HN is that any writing that is confronting to a consensus worldview becomes flooded with highly upvoted comments that are, in essence, excuses for why it's not necessary in this instance to re-examine your priors. He's making low value content/the culture of the company is horrible/he's a fraud/it's more luck than skill. The actual critiques are personalized t…

Is it just me or is the way you construct sentences jarring and hard to read? Not sure if it's my dyslexia but I had trouble deciphering the first couple of paragraphs/word jumbles.

No, this person/LLM model indeed writes way too long sentences.

Re: How to succeed in MrBeast production (Leaked PDF)

#356

Post by qwertytyyuu »

bgun wrote: post #70
hypeatei wrote: post #6

So basically: Come up with contrived BS that caters to younger audiences, micromanage anyone who is holding you up, and attempt to game a blackbox algorithm on a site you don't pay for (YouTube) The whole modern social media / influencer sphere seems like a huge bubble that will pop eventually. Google has already started wiping inactive accounts[0] presumably because storage isn't truly infinite or cheap. I imagine Y…

People like Mr. Beast have managed to discover psychological attention hacks that are not too dissimilar from sex or fear-based content (porn or a lot of political ads), but more insidious because it’s much more tame and “fun” on the surface. And while I don’t think either can be made explicitly illegal without some pretty nasty second-order effects on freedom of expression, we can’t expect the likes of Google to pro…

Pretty sure TikTok’s vans were politically motivated

Re: How to succeed in MrBeast production (Leaked PDF)

#358

Post by h0l0cube »

shalmanese wrote: post #217

One distressing trend I've noticed becoming ubiquitous on HN is that any writing that is confronting to a consensus worldview becomes flooded with highly upvoted comments that are, in essence, excuses for why it's not necessary in this instance to re-examine your priors. He's making low value content/the culture of the company is horrible/he's a fraud/it's more luck than skill. The actual critiques are personalized t…

> confronting to a consensus worldview

There's a bit of missed irony here that you decrying the 'sour grapes' crowd with 'sour grapes' of your own, and yourself have been upvoted to the top. I do agree this culture of indulged victimhood is really dragging internet discourse down, but you surely can see your own complicity in it?

Re: How to succeed in MrBeast production (Leaked PDF)

#359

Post by gleventhal »

I don't have the energy for an intellectual debate, but personally, I have the sense that Youtube is net bad for the world and the monetization of Youtube has incentivized and amplified mediocrity, stupidity, and social decay.

I don't follow or watch Mr Beast videos, but from what I've seen, they are largely driven by a money fetish and as far as "creativity", it feels on par with the more boring "What would you rather" conversations I had in middle school.

Maybe he has unlocked the key to virality by vigorously analyzing data, but looking at his videos, at a glance, it seems to more be formulaic, predictable, and simply having an actual budget that sets it apart (if it is actually set apart, as I find it hard to tell how much of it is others copying his work versus hius work being unoriginal).

Re: How to succeed in MrBeast production (Leaked PDF)

#360

Post by gleventhal »

nrp wrote: post #150
simonw wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m with you on the management vibes - it doesn’t sound like a culture that I’d enjoy. That’s one of the things I find so interesting about this document: it does feel very honest and unfiltered, and as such it appears to be quite an accurate insight into their culture. And that’s a culture that works if you want to create massive successful viral YouTube videos targeting their audience. How much has that specific ch…

That’s one of the most interesting parts of this document. Many people will read it and think “I would never work at a place like that,” and many others would think “that’s exactly the environment I want to work in!” More startups should be this transparent about their stated/desired culture (even if unintentionally).

It clearly biased for young people or those without a family with something to prove, the perfect type of employee to exploit and vampirize.
Post reply on HN