“Trust Yourself”
This is me not actually working hard—I was filming a sketch for a ‘This is Unplugg’d’ series that never materialized. You can view the sketch here, though!
Every Friday features a new newsletter from Nathan Graber-Lipperman examining how culture influences business, telling a story from his entrepreneurial journey, and peeling back the curtain on everything Unplugg’d. This week, he writes on relaunching Unplugg’d and reframing his mindset towards work and life before touching on Travis Scott’s Fortnite extravaganza, sales of The Ringer and Barstool, and the one and only Big Poppa.
Before I even really start…thanks to everyone who read my letter last week and my story from Sunday! It means a lot, and I appreciate the huge amount of positive feedback I got on both of them. I was planning on screen-shotting all the awesome comments I received, but it ended up being too many and I realized I had to get around to writing this whole thing.
Weird flex, I know. Nonetheless, I am incredibly grateful, and I’m extremely happy to hear just how much the story resonated with people. I had people who I barely talked to in high school reaching out and opening up about some of the stuff they’ve dealt with in the past several years, and I had a lot of really good conversations. The key moving forward is to build this community even more, so that those authentic, vulnerable conversations are happening between us all!
Anyway, it’s been a while since I’ve written one of these—about five months, to be exact. I had a bunch of drafts queued up and ready to go, but I opted to wait until I felt like I was back in a place where I could actually publish these consistently. And I’m excited to say that that day is today!
The format you can expect every Friday morning is usually pretty consistent. First, I give some perspective on something I’ve been thinking about in the world of entrepreneurship, business, and media; topics have included everything from the art of selling to a company’s purpose and responsibility. I then provide updates on Unplugg’d and our upcoming projects before diving into commentary on what’s happening at the intersection of culture and business. Finally, I wrap up by looking at the memes, movies, music I’m consuming because, let’s face it, who doesn’t like memes, movies, and music?
Before we get into it, though…mark your calendar, because our Official Relaunch is this Sunday at 8pm EST! We’ll be releasing new products, projects, and more — for a sneak peek of what we’re doing, click the image below or go to beunpluggd.com/relaunch.
Also, in talking to some subscribers about our “What Does Being Unplugg’d Mean To You?” campaign, we realized that while people wanted to participate, not everyone is comfortable filming themselves. Therefore, if you’re interested, our renewed ask is this: you can either film video, record audio, or write us a quote answering the question — though if you opt to go either of the non-video routes, we ask that you send in a picture, too.
The whole point of the campaign is simply to put faces to quotes about why people like what we do; therefore, as long as you do that, we’re cool with whatever you’re comfortable with! In order to be featured in our campaign, please send all quotes to ngl@powderbluemedia.com by 1pm EST on Saturday, 4/25. Thanks!
Alright, now on to the letter. Let’s dive into it.
Wednesday night, I was tweaking. Big time.
For all you non-Midwesterners, I feel your confusion. I had never heard this phrase before going to Evanston. To clear things up, I’ll pull from the intellectual’s wordbook, Urban Dictionary, here in defining the term — tweaking means “the act of freaking out.”
I had a brief conversation with one of my roommates over the phone earlier in the day, and one of the things we talked about was how Cal State Fullerton already announced they would be doing online classes in the fall. Given that it certainly feels like this is a realistic outcome for all major universities, my roommate brought up a not-so-crazy thought: would we ever get to be back in Evanston together with our other friends?
It didn’t hit then, but later in the day, my mind started racing. Is college ever going to even, like, happen again? Am I going to see any of my friends? Or is the expectation that I’ll be going right into the workforce during what’s shaping up to be the worst economy since The Great Depression?
The thing that hit home the most, though, was this: why did I work so hard the last seven months to figure out my work-life balance — investing time into my relationships while relaunching Unplugg’d with a renewed vision — when this could be the new reality for the foreseeable future?
Is sitting on my laptop in my parents’ house all day really the new normal?
What do I do if I invest a lot of my energy into my work without being able to access the balance I had found?
What happens if no one gives a crap about what I’m doing?
This sentiment persisted late into the night. And then…I took a few deep breaths. I thought about that journey, and what I had learned along the way. Looking back on my pyramid, my purpose is to pursue the things that make me happy. And the things that make me happy are creating things that make other people happy.
(Twitter / Northwestern Athletics)
I can’t control the situation going on in the world right now. To be honest, I don’t really think anyone can. What I can control is what I choose to spend my time on. And for me, a lot of those projects come back to my pyramid, and my pursuit of happiness. How can I use what I’m good at — storytelling, design, and branding — to help people who really need it right now?
Turns out that in order to realize what was best for me, I just had to listen to myself. Cause, like, I had finished writing it all down into one, cohesive piece literally three days prior.
Once I had calmed down, I sat down and said, Okay, what’s my plan for tomorrow? I wrote down a list all the projects that got me really excited, and I built time into my schedule to make sure I was taking breaks by doing things such as yoga, reading books, and video calling with friends. I went to bed feeling invigorated, and woke up with a renewed sense of purpose.
To me, at this point, while I would love Unplugg’d to scale and become this awesome brand that my peers and I can build together, I don’t need that to happen in order to define my personal success. Therefore, even if I’m choosing to spend my time in a more strategic, revenue-driven fashion than I have in the past, at the end of the day, if this is someone no one truly wants, then that’s the reality of the thing. It’ll become a passion project, the “night job,” while I channel my efforts elsewhere.
With that being said, as relaunch date nears, I’m excited to reveal what I’ve been working on for all this time. You’ll notice that a lot of the projects are very mission-driven. That’s because it’s driving me — to make cool things that make other people happy. Plus, I wholeheartedly believe you can build a company that a) helps people and b) sustains itself. You don’t have to operate a non-profit in order do good; I guess you could call me an optimistic capitalist.
And if my hypothesis is incorrect, and this test fails, well, that’ll be that. I’ve been picking up multiple paid gigs to work on concurrently with Unplugg’d so as to take a lot of the pressure off and focus on creating the best product I can on a feasible timeline.
The main lesson I’ve picked up on, though, is trust yourself. Trust your vision, trust your conviction, and trust your purpose. Because if you can do that, no matter what happens, you’ll be successful.
Moving forward, you can expect one of these letters from me once a week…along with new episodes of my podcast, which you can listen and subscribe to here. The pod will focus on conversations with people ranging from entrepreneurs to athletes to entertainers and more. Some of them you might’ve heard of; some of them you definitely haven’t. Nevertheless, my guests are a collection of people I find to be incredibly interesting or influential in my life, and I hope you find them to be so, too.
Additionally, I’ll be writing a monthly longform story for UNPLUGG’D MAG, which you can read more about here. And to wrap it up, I’ll be working with my team — as well as collaborating with other brands and individuals — to drop new products and designs every month, available to purchase directly from our website.
In the coming weeks, we’ll announce more information on other ways to get involved with the Unplugg’d community, such as a Discord channel and Patreon. For now, though, make sure to refresh our relaunch page at 8pm EST this Sunday and join us as we bring the brand back together!
(Side note — sorry for trolling with the Rick Roll. I thought it was pretty funny. No bias.)
(On another side note — I’m really proud of the tagline “We’re Getting The Brand Back Together.” I came up with it in the shower. I often have a lot of my best thoughts in the shower.)
(Okay okay — on with the rest of this thing.)
Links (and Other Things)
Dave Portnoy and Bill Simmons Cash Out
Last summer, I wrote about when Barstool Sports Founder Dave Portnoy made waves by threatening any of his employees who joined a union. Many saw this as a response to employees at The Ringer organizing one in a public fashion. That story focused on the changing dynamics of the media industry, and why I believed this trend — of content creators rebuking the gig economy in favor of a more reliable line of work — wasn’t going away anytime soon.
Cover Art from my August article, “Fair Pay and a 401(k): Online Media is Moving Away from a Gig Economy.”
Well, a lot of that talk was thrown out the window when both media companies sold within two weeks of each other earlier this year. The Ringer, founded by Bill Simmons in 2016, sold to streaming giant Spotify for a cool $200 million. While the author of the beloved Book of Basketball brought his immense following from ESPN to the new venture, in the years since, The Ringer has thrived due to its deep roster of unique personalities like Jason Concepcion and Chris Ryan. Podcasts such as The Rewatchables and original content like the Emmy-winning NBA Desktop have managed to gain a near-cult following, too, which has been vital to the company’s growth.
On the other hand, Dave Portnoy first started selling a NSFW, Boston-centered print publication called Barstool Sports in 2003. Since then, Barstool has grown into a media behemoth, boasting nearly 8 million followers on Instagram, 8 million unique site visitors per month, and some of the internet’s favorite podcasts (looking at you, Pardon My Take). And in January, Penn National Gambling rewarded Portnoy in purchasing a 36 percent stake at a $450 million valuation.
The ramifications of both of these deals on the media industry are paramount. For starters, they proved that yes, media companies can make money in today’s economy…which, to be honest, was a really big inspiration for me. The Ringer brings in the majority of its revenue through sponsorship for their personality-driven podcasts and videos; for Barstool, it’s sponsorship, gambling, and merchandise.
I believe that this shows the importance of developing a unique voice and product in the incredibly-crowded world of online content. For example, I tune into NBA Desktop every week not because I like the show that much, but more so that I just love Concepion and think he’s hilarious. And while I’m not a huge fan of Barstool’s content, people live and die by PFTCommenter and Big Cat.
Barstool’s ‘Pink Whitney’ vodka. Yeah, it’s garbage. But it is pink!
Once you can unlock a brand people buy into, though, that’s when your business can really skyrocket. You can’t just rely on the tired subscription models of yesteryear; no, you need to develop multiple revenue streams that can work in tandem.
I look at Barstool, and how they literally developed a branded vodka that I’ve seen my peers bring to parties before. While it may be disgusting (yes, I’ve tried it; no, I did not like it), they’re so in tune with their target demographic that they can literally sell them crappy alcohol and have it snapped up.
In the future, I think the perspective here is that yes, you can build a media company in 2020 — you just have to be open to change. Simmons and Portnoy went all in early on a new medium — podcasting — and it paid off in a big way. They both proved their value to the companies buying them, as Spotify has aggressively moved into the podcast industry and Penn wanted gambling content with a built-in audience. Where other outlets like Sports Illustrated and Deadspin have struggled is when they don’t have a brand to buy into past the quality of their content, and when people stop paying for that content — in SI’s case — the path to revenue becomes murky.
I mean, would you buy a Sports Illustrated-themed bottle of vodka?
Nevertheless, as aspiring venture capitalist Drew Wandzilak and I talked about on Episode 33 of my podcast, most media companies simply aren’t venture-backable. What is? The “picks-and-shovels” ventures, Drew says. VCs are looking for the Anchors and Patreons of the world, platforms that creators need to use and are much easier to scale.
In the end, the ceiling for media companies is absolutely capped. Tell that to Simmons, though, who just bought a $16 million estate, his fifth house. That’s a lot of high ceilings.
Cactus Jack throws on a fortnite extravaganza
On Thursday night, rapper Travis Scott performed hits such as ‘Sicko Mode’ and ‘Goosebumps.’
Except he didn’t. Well, sort of. If you logged on to Fortnite at 7pm, you would’ve been able to attend Scott’s “concert” within the game, which basically amounted to a giant, shirtless, Jordan-clad avatar romping around the punny “Astronomical World” (Scott’s last album was dubbed Astroworld).
A gamer — clad in a Travis Scott skin — watches the Fortnite festivities take place.
If you showed up to the event, though, you wouldn’t have been alone. A reported 12 million people — yes, you read that right — joined in on the festivities, exploring the open-world space while rocking out to La Flame’s discography.
For proponents of the online event model, COVID-19 weirdly couldn’t have come at a better time from a business perspective. No, I don’t think that executives are out there celebrating the fact that people are in their homes for the time being. But at the same time, it’s an opportunity to showcase the affordability and creativity possible when creating an online event. And with a lot of in-person festivals, concerts, and events getting pushed back for the foreseeable future, who’s to say consumer culture won’t change and this will become the wave of the future?
A young Chicago entrepreneur who I was fortunate enough to connect with, Joe Lee, is going all on this model. His platform, Gamerjibe, allows you to host anything from job fairs to esports watch parties, all virtually. Individuals — mainly, people already within the gaming community — create avatars and are able to network with other individuals and talk to companies looking to hire.
Joe will be coming on the podcast in the coming months, so look forward to what I think will amount to an awesome conversation then. To sum, though, this space is definitely one to keep an eye on as consumer ideas and preferences change due to the pandemic.
Mo Poppa, Mo Problems
You might’ve seen pictures of a really big, really sad dog named Big Poppa circling around the Internet this week. The original tweet from Atlanta native Rashida Ellis read “Big Poppa has been so sad today, I think he miss playing with the kids in the building. He just watches them from the patio”. At the time of writing, the tweet has 810.8k likes and 91.2k retweets, a clear viral sensation.
My sister and I were talking about Big Poppa. She said that when it comes down to it, she thinks that this image of the three-year-old English bulldog will be the defining image of the coronavirus.
So I thought about it some more. Our president keeps saying we’re at war with an “invisible enemy,” so I started looking at iconic war photos such as “Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima,” “Napalm Girl,” and more. These are photos that defined entire generations, moments in U.S. and world history. I thought, Could Big Poppa really live up to these legendary stills?
My answer? Yes. We don’t deserve Big Poppa, and that photo is heart-breaking. Therefore, I decided to Photoshop Big Poppa into a museum-style exhibition to celebrate the art he truly embodies.
Also: in black-and-white.
Hang in there, buddy. We’re going to pull through this thing together. I think.
Trailer of the Week: Bad Education
Hugh Jackman, Allison Janney, and Ray Romano.
Boom. Sold yet?
Bad Education tells the story of a student reporter as she traces the embezzlement in a Long Island school district. As it turns out, the corruption has lasted for a decade, and it’s up to the superintendent (played by Jackman) to keep his district’s prestige while saving his own skin.
The miniseries is based on a true story, and it’s made by HBO. Seems like an open-and-shut must-watch, right? I know I’ll be.
What I’m Listening To: Analogue (2018)
When my brother first told me to go check out ODIE two years ago, I was hooked instantly.
I think Billboard describes the artist best: “Somewhere in between the musical spaces of hip-hop, R&B, pop, and Afrobeat exists the genre-beding artist whose musical experiments have separated him from his peers.” On his debut 2018 album Analogue, the then-21-year-old displayed incredible range and phenomenal production on standouts like “Bliss City,” “North Face,” and “Little Lies.” But it’s the third track on the album, “Story,” that’s always resonated with me the most. He sings about always remembering your roots — “And everywhere I go / I can’t erase my home” — as you continue to push on in life, as well as the inspiration his family provides for him each and every day.
Born in Montreal and raised in Toronto by Nigerian parents, ODIE takes a lot of his inspiration from another genre-fluid artist in Kid Cudi. And just like Cudder, I’ve found that right now, the soothing beats and lyrical flow of Analogue make for a good backdrop both for getting work done and relaxing. You can listen to Analogue here.
NGL is an O.G. sneakerhead, diehard Big Lebowski fan, and huge ultimate frisbee nut. You can follow him on Twitter here and sign up for his newsletter here.