Dropout首席执行官Sam Reich谈商业、喜剧与保持文化独特性

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go to adeo.com/decoder, and you'll get 15% off your first year. That's a tti0.com/decoder.

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这里是Pushkin Industries，我是乔纳森·戈德斯坦，《重量级》节目重磅回归。新一季规模空前宏大，承载更大希望。

From Pushkin Industries, I'm Jonathan Goldstein, and heavyweight is back. The new season is bigger than ever. Bigger hopes.

我一直在等待这一刻，当他说：妈妈，我明白了，对不起。

I keep waiting for this moment when he says, mom, I get it. I'm sorry.

更大的梦想。汤姆·汉克斯想见你。这是个真实的机会。也会有更大的心碎。

Bigger dreams. Tom Hanks wants to meet with you. This is a real chance. And bigger heartbreaks.

我以为这会是我的电影时刻。也许他甚至会在我耳边低语，我一直爱着你。

I thought it would be my movie moment. And maybe he would even whisper in my ear, I've always been in love with you.

在Apple播客上收听《Heavyweight》的新剧集。大家好，欢迎来到《解码器》。我是汉克·格林，互联网多面手，Complexly联合创始人，我们制作了《科学秀》、《速成课程》及其他教育类YouTube频道。不幸的是，这是我最后一次担任《解码器》客座主持。除非，尼尔，我哪天决定再要个孩子，记得打电话给我。

Check out new episodes of Heavyweight on Apple Podcasts. Hello, and welcome to Decoder. This is Hank Green, general Internet guy and cofounder of Complexly, where we make SciShow and Crash Course and a bunch of other educational YouTube channels. This is my last time in the Decoder guest host chair, unfortunately. Unless, Neil, I decided to have another kid someday, just give me a call.

但我们会充分利用这次机会，因为今天我要和我的朋友山姆·赖希聊天，他是Dropout TV的CEO，我认为至少是创始人。你会听到他和我争论他是否算创始人，这没关系。他在场，他可能清楚自己在说什么。但这是个了不起的故事。

But we're gonna make the best of it because today, I'm talking with my friend Sam Reich, who is the CEO and, I think, at least, the founder of Dropout TV. You'll hear him argue with me about whether he is the founder, and that's okay. He was there. He probably knows what he's talking about. But this is an incredible story.

山姆以0美元收购了这家曾名为College Humor的公司。随即不得不解雇几乎所有员工，紧接着就遭遇2020年初新冠疫情导致的全行业停摆。你或许不认为这会是成功的配方，但山姆取得了巨大成功。Dropout此后逐年增长。即使没在Dropout TV上观看，你可能也在竖屏视频平台见过他们最热门节目《游戏改变者》的片段，该节目由山姆主持。

Sam bought this company, which used to be called College Humor, for $0. Immediately had to lay off almost all of the entire staff, and then got smacked right in the face with COVID shutting everything down because it was early twenty twenty. You wouldn't think this would be a likely recipe for success, but Sam has been very successful. Dropout has grown every year since then. You've probably seen their clips on a vertical video platform, if not watched them on Dropout TV, from their most popular shows, including Game Changer, which Sam hosts.

虽然'主持'未必能准确描述每期节目的情况，但他确实总在场。我们也会稍微讨论这点。但山姆和我真正深入探讨的是企业规模扩大后的管理难题。当公司只有你或少数几人时，创意工作更容易开展；但当面对众多利益相关者各不相同的优先诉求时，事情就复杂了。例如，多数媒体公司都要应对广告主和股东追求盈利的双重压力。

Well, host might not always be quite the right word for what happens in every episode, but he's definitely there, And you'll hear us talk about that a little bit too. But what Sam and I really spent a lot of time on was the problem of running a business that is getting big. It's much easier to do your creative work when your company is just you or maybe just you and a few other people. It's harder when you have a bunch of stakeholders with competing priorities, and they all want something from you. Most media companies, for example, have to deal with some combination of advertisers and shareholders who all wanna make money.

Dropout既没有广告主也没有股东。只有山姆和几位专注创作优质喜剧的伙伴。山姆向我描述其商业模式为'喜剧SaaS'——订阅者付费观看想看的节目。说实话，这听起来是很棒的商业模式，但相当罕见。

Dropout doesn't really have advertisers or shareholders. It has Sam and a few other folks, all of whom make good comedy. Sam described the business model to me as a comedy sass. Subscribers pay money and get programs they wanna watch. It sounds like a pretty good business model to me, honestly, but it's pretty rare.

所以我和萨姆深入探讨了为什么这件事比想象中更难。这是一次与好友的精彩对话，希望你喜欢。好了，萨姆·赖克，我们开始吧。

So Sam and I got into the weeds about why it's harder to do than you'd think. This was a great conversation with a great friend, and I hope you enjoy it. Okay. Sam Reich. Here we go.

萨姆·赖克，你是Dropout的创始人兼CEO。欢迎来到《解码器》。

Sam Reich, you are the founder and CEO of Dropout. Welcome to Decoder.

你好。非常感谢邀请我，汉克。能来这里我感到很荣幸。

Hi. Thank you so much for having me, Hank. I'm flattered to be here.

你正在用一种与媒体行业其他人截然不同的方式做一件非常有趣的事，这就是为什么我觉得和你探讨这些会非常激动人心，同时也想弄明白你为何及如何能做到这些。不过首先，我通常不太喜欢追溯起源故事，我觉得它们往往只是让人误以为能从某个人的特殊经历中学到东西——而这些经历其实与他人截然不同，同时也是人们自吹自擂的方式。但你能从Dropout创立之初给我讲讲它的起源吗？我们不需要追溯到2006年大学幽默那些事，就直接告诉我Dropout是怎么落到你手里的？

You're doing a very interesting thing in a very different way than I think anybody else in media, which is why I think it's really gonna be exciting to talk to you about this stuff and also try and figure out the whys and hows that you can do that. But to start, usually, I don't really tend to go in that much for origin stories. I think they're usually mostly just like a way to sort of make people think that they could imagine that they could learn something from the very particular circumstances that one person experienced, which I think are gonna be different from other people's, and also a way for people to toot their own horns. But can you give me an origin story of Dropout from the beginning of Dropout? So we don't need to get into, like, 2006 and college humor and stuff, but just hit me with, like, what how did Dropout end up in your hands?

有时人们称我是Dropout的创始人，其实并非如此。Dropout其实是...

Sometimes some people call me the founder of Dropout, which actually is not true. Dropout Well,

我对此持有异议。确实如此。

I You beg to differ. I do.

好吧，那我就认领这个称号。听着，Dropout是我们当时的母公司IAC提出的重点项目。

Great. I'll take it. Listen. Dropout was a priority that came out of IAC, who was our our corporate parent at the time.

所以这就是College Humor的拥有者？

So this was who owned College Humor?

这就是College Humor的拥有者。多年来，IAC一直在试图弄清楚如何不仅赚大钱，而是赚很多很多的钱。对吧。那时候总有一种——愤世嫉俗者可能会称之为快速致富的计划。那就是广告销售，然后社交媒体大大侵蚀了广告销售的市场。

This is who owned College Humor. And for years and years, IAC was trying to figure out how we would make not just a lot of money, but a lot a lot of money. Right. And there was always kind of a a cynic might call it a get rich quick scheme of the time. And it was ad sales, and then social media took a big chomp out of ad sales.

然后转向电视，结果发现电视制作并不能非常有效地扩展规模。最后，我们想到的办法是尝试直接面向观众。

And then it was television, and it turned out television production didn't scale very effectively. And then finally, the idea was let's try going direct to audience.

是的，就像他们说的，直接走OTT路线。

Yeah. Just to go OTT, as they say.

就像他们说的。当时有一群

As they say. And there there was a collection of

我不太确定我们正在超越的具体是什么，但我们确实在超越某些东西的顶峰。是的，我猜是整个系统。

I'm not sure exactly what the top we're going over is, but we're going over the top of something. Yeah. I guess the whole system.

这个说法确实让人觉得我们像是在赌上全部家当。某种程度上，我们确实有点这样。好吧。当时College Humor内部有一群高管对这个计划非常乐观，我未必是其中之一。

It does like, that phrase makes it feel like we're we're gambling the house. And and in a way, we kinda were. Okay. There was a collection of executives who were very bullish about this within college humor. I wasn't necessarily one of them.

我逐渐接受了这个想法，并安慰自己：即便行不通，至少我们还能暂时创作些很酷的东西。核心理念是直接面向观众。这里不会有好莱坞那样的守门人。我们不必像广告销售那样每年从头再来。顺便说，订阅模式的本质优势之一正是你无需每年重启业务，而广告销售则需年年外出推销。

I slowly but surely warmed up to it imagining that if it didn't work, at least we'd get to create our own cool stuff for a while. The notion was go direct to audience. There won't be the gatekeepers that there are in Hollywood. We won't have to start over every year like we do in ad sales. That is, by the way, one of the intrinsic benefits of subscription is that you're not starting your business over every year versus ad sales where you have to go out and sell every year.

从零开始。

Start from zero.

嗯。而且确实，世事常变。没错。另外，你不只是在做YouTube那种——虽然你确实在靠播放量盈利，但同时你也在这些平台上销售，而这些平台决定你是否能获得流量，它们的优先级变动可能对你的业务有利或不利。

Mhmm. And the yeah. Things are always changing. Yep. And also, like, the you you're you're not just doing the YouTube thing where, like, certainly, you're selling against views, but also you're selling on these platforms that decide whether or not you get the views that can have their priorities shift in ways that are gonna be advantageous or not to your business.

而这永远会是...这永远会是他们的...他们的主意。

And and that's always gonna be that's always gonna be their their idea.

确实。我认为这是我们首支公告视频的核心观点，AVOD（广告型视频点播）本质上——什么是AVOD？就是带广告的视频点播服务。懂了。这个词其实也可以泛指所有非订阅模式。

That's true. I I think that was the sort of meat of our first announcement video, and I think it's really true where AVOD, as it were, is like What is AVOD? Advertising video on demand. Gotcha. It's a word that, like, you could also just say anyone who is not going subscription.

对。这种商业模式涉及我们、观众、平台和广告主四方。

Yeah. That is a business that involves, like, us, the audience, the platform, and the advertiser.

嗯。反弹啊之类的问题。

Mhmm. Bounce and all those things.

是啊是啊。这甚至算不上一个...这是个动物园。

Yeah. Yeah. It's not even a. It's a menager

因为所有人都知道，一旦你一旦你打破规则，里面就会一团糟。总会有人被落下。

for And everybody knows once you once you break, it's just a mess in there. There's no it's somebody's always getting left behind.

没错没错。对每个人来说达到高潮都更难了。你可以决定是否保留这一点。

That's right. That's right. It's harder for everybody to achieve orgasm. You can decide to keep that in or not.

永不打破。永不打破。这是商业意识。这是商业规则。说实话，我有时候看YouTube就会想，天啊。

Never break. Never break. That's a business sense. That's a business rule. Honestly, I like, sometimes I look at YouTube and I'm like, oh my god.

他们的派对，YouTube正在举办的派对，有太多不同需求的人需要满足。包括政府，你知道，比如监管机构。完全正确。我就想，老天，我永远不想违法。我只想要我的观众。

Their party, the YouTube party that they are having has so many different people at it that they have to satisfy. And that includes, like, the government, you know, like, regulators. Totally. And and I'm like, man, I just never wanna break the law. I wanna have, like, my my audience.

我想要我的团队。就是为这事工作的人，然后可能还有广告商或者我自己。

I wanna have my, like, team. So, like, the people who work for the thing, and then I wanna have maybe the advertisers or maybe myself.

而你可以决定，比如说，如果赚钱对你来说不重要，或者满足YouTube算法对你来说不重要。你可以决定这些不是优先事项。

And you I mean, you can decide, you know, not to break if, for instance, making money isn't important to you or satisfying the YouTube algorithm isn't important to you. You can decide that these aren't priorities.

是啊。我是说，如果你要支付员工薪水，就不能假装金钱不重要。但是

Yeah. Well, I mean, you can't just you can't if you're gonna pay people's salaries, you can't decide that money doesn't matter. But

没错。正是如此。这对我经营企业是个重要启示：商业模式越简单越好，或者说至少能让你更高效地运营。

Exactly. Yeah. Exactly. And this this was a big moment for me in running a business, realizing that the simpler your business is arguably, the better it is, or or certainly the more effective you can run it.

对，尤其在初创阶段。企业变复杂往往是因为它们已经成功了，

Yeah. Especially at the beginning. Yeah. I mean, businesses get complicated because they have a lot of because they've succeeded already,

于是有了把事情复杂化的机会。

and they have opportunities to complexify.

但它们在起步阶段并不复杂。对对对。

But they do not get complicated at the beginning. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

我们正刻意保持业务尽可能简单，这其实很难。

Am willfully trying to keep our business as uncomplex as possible, and it is hard.

嗯。你们刚增加了广告业务。《游戏变革者》最后一集就这么做了。

Mhmm. You just added advertising. You did it. So you you the the final episode of game changer.

我们实际上并没有因为要退出而增加广告。有粉丝非常担心这种情况会发生，但这不会发生。

We did not actually add advertising to drop out. There are fans who are very concerned that it's gonna happen. But that is not gonna happen.

不过确实有过一次赞助。

There was an there was a sponsorship, though.

确实有过一次赞助。是的。

There was a sponsorship. Yes.

在那个位置上这对我们很有意义，你需要这个才能找到一档高预算的游戏节目。

That made us a lot of sense in place that you would have needed this so that you could find a a high dollar game show.

用'很有意义'来形容，这种说法挺有意思的。不过，是的，作为一个观众，

Quote, unquote, made a lot of sense is an interesting way to put that. But, yeah, I think I As a viewer,

这确实合理。对。对。对。

it made sense. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

对。对。所以我逐渐接受了订阅制。就像，我开始接受这个想法，哦，直接面向观众意味着我们可以简化运营，意味着我们能自己掌控局面。

Yeah. Yeah. So I warmed up to subscription. Like, I warmed up to the idea of, oh, going direct to audience means we get to simplify this operation. It means that we get to call the shots.

这意味着尽管预算会减少，但我们的创作自主权将更大。

It means that even though budgets will be less, our creative autonomy will be more.

我是说，预算一定会减少吗？比如，显然，按观众计算，你们赚的钱要多得多。关键在于能转化多少人。关于如何营销订阅产品，当时有很多讨论吗？还是说就直接上线，在视频结尾加个提示条，人们就会去注册？

I mean, would budgets definitely be less? Like, the thing about like, obviously, per viewer, you're making a lot more money. It's really about the number of people you can convert. And that that marketing, was there a lot of discussion about how you would actually market the subscription product, or was it just like, let's make this available. We'll pop a bumper on the end of the videos, and people will go sign up.

我们推出时的理论是，将YouTube订阅用户转化为付费用户的时间会比实际见效的时间长得多。哦。你懂我意思吗？那个资源很快就枯竭了。是的。

The the theory when we launched was that we would be converting YouTube subscribers to paid subscribers for a lot longer than that turned out to work. Oh. Do you know what I mean? Like, that that well ran dry fast. Yep.

是啊。

Yeah.

听起来很熟悉。所以最终你们确实有了营销手段，但对IAC和College Humor的人来说，这并没有成功。IAC是个大型媒体集团，他们不喜欢...他们拥有许多杂志和电视节目、电视频道。

That's that sounds familiar. So it turns out you did have a marketing vehicle eventually arrived, but this did did not end up being a successful, thing for the people at IAC and College Humor. And IAC is like a big media conglomerate. They don't like people. They own a bunch of magazines and TV shows, TV channels.

确实。确实。我觉得IAC在这整件事中有点背锅，但记录显示，他们在十多年里没从我们这儿拿到大笔钱的情况下，对我们很有耐心。可以说，他们展现出的耐心比许多母公司在这种情况下会有的要多。与此同时，很多人在College Humor期间开启了辉煌的职业生涯，而IAC并未从中获益多少。

For sure. For sure. And I think ISC kinda gets a bad rap in all of this, but for the record, they were patient with us in terms of us not delivering them a big chunk of money for over a decade. Arguably, they showed more patients than I think a lot of parent companies would in that same situation. And a lot of people in the meanwhile, gave birth to spectacular careers coming out of college humor when IAC did not very much benefit.

所以我仍然感激IAC在那十年里作为我们的守护者。后来他们对我们失去兴趣时，我们客观上说并未失败，只是也没有取得巨大成功。第一年结束时我们有大约7.5万订阅用户，我想他们原本希望这个数字能翻倍。

So I remain grateful to IAC for being our shepherds through that decade. And then they when they got bored of us, we didn't objectively fail. We just didn't succeed spectacularly either. We had, like, 75,000 subscribers at the end of year one. I think they were hoping for, like, double that number.

是的。

Yep.

他们试图卖掉我们，但我们在账面上看起来非常糟糕，因为我们刚刚烧光了他们的全部投资。起初很多人感兴趣，但看到我们亏损的金额以及那份让我们在盈利前亏损更多的商业计划后，他们一个个都退出了，最后只剩下我。

They tried to sell us, but we looked very bad on paper because we had just burned through their whole investment. So a lot of people were interested at first, and then they saw the amount of money we were losing and the business plan, which had us losing even more money, before turning profitable. And they all dropped out one by one, leaving me.

只剩下你。女士。

Leaving you. Ma'am.

只剩下我。

Leaving me.

然后你就带着不知怎么弄来的一大笔钱出现，直接说，嘿，我要买下它。耶。嘿。那是什么？

And so you came with all your your big pile of money that you somehow had, and you just said, hey. I'm gonna I'm gonna buy it. Yay. Hey. What's that?

你抽着雪茄搞幕后交易？不。这对我来说是故事最诡异的部分。实际上你并没有带着大笔钱去收购Dropout。山姆，你到底是怎么从IAC手里买下College Humor的？

You got a cigar, backroom deals. No. This is the this is the weirdest part of the story for me. So you did not, in fact, go to them with a bunch of money to acquire Dropout. How did you how did you acquire College Humor from IAC, Sam?

我觉得特别好笑的是，网上有种说法像是‘山姆用他老爸的钱买下了Dropout’。

I find it very funny when, like, there's there's a certain sound bite on the Internet that's like Sam used his dad's money to come and buy Dropout.

哦，哇。

Oh, wow.

这在我父亲是研究不平等问题的专家背景下显得特别滑稽。我心想，你们对我们家财富的认知偏差也太大了。

Which is very funny in the context of my dad being the inequality guy. I'm like, are misinformed in terms of how much money you think this family has.

没错。给不了解的听众介绍一下，山姆的父亲是罗伯特·赖克，曾在比尔·克林顿政府担任劳工部长。对吧？

Yeah. For those who don't know, Sam's dad is is Robert Reich, who was the labor secretary under one of the Bill Bill Clinton. Is that right?

对，在克林顿时期。众所周知，劳工部长可是你能想象到最赚钱的职业了。

Yes. Under Clinton, which as we all know, labor secretary is the most lucrative profession that you could possibly imagine.

你可能偶尔会在网上看到他疾呼不平等现象。

You see him on the Internet sometimes yelling about inequality, probably.

没错。没错。没错。而且他做得非常出色。

Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. And does it very well.

他非常有才华。

He's very talented.

于是我去向IAC报价0美元，这是我当时能提供的全部金额。虽然有人出价300万美元，但那样公司会落入竞争对手手中。他们会解雇所有员工，拿走资产看看能如何利用。我觉得他们喜欢赌一把的念头。哦，抱歉。

So I went and I offered IAC $0, which was the amount of money I had to offer them. There was another offer for $3,000,000, but, it would have gone to a competitor. They would have fired everybody and taken the assets and see what they could do with them. And I think that they liked the idea of gambling. Oh, sorry.

所以我的报价是0美元。最终他们会成为少数股权持有者。这有点像给他们上了份'白痴保险'。

So my offer was $0. They would end up in the minority the minority stakeholder. So it was sort of like idiot insurance for them.

这样他们就能保留Sam后续运作带来的任何成果。

So they get to they get to hold on to whatever Sam does with it.

对。对。对。对。这是给他们的保险，以防事情发展得特别顺利。

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Insurance for them in in case things go very, very well.

我认为比起把公司交给竞争对手，他们更愿意赌在我身上。这样故事更精彩。如果成功，对他们来说也更激动人心。于是我们达成了交易。需要说明的是，我不会仅凭感情用事做这笔交易。

And I think that they liked the idea of gambling on me more than the idea of handing the company over to a competitor. It's a better story. If it works out, it's more exciting for them. And so we we did that deal. And, for the record, I would not have done that deal purely sentimentally.

我这么做是因为真心相信这个商业案例。

I did it because I really believed in the business case.

你是否觉得自己看到了母公司高层没看到的东西？或者那些运营College Humor的高管没意识到的价值？比如价值所在可能和他们设想的不同？还是说...

You feel like you saw something that the people at the parent company didn't see or that that the executives who were had been operating College Humor didn't see? Like, the like, where the value was maybe wasn't where they thought it was? Or

也许吧。我是说，我们对公司所做的变革太具颠覆性了。我很难想象有任何母公司会说，好啊，咱们试试看。因为那实在太激进了。

Maybe. I mean, what we did with the company was so disruptive. I have a hard time imagining any corporate parent going, yeah. Let's try that. Like, it was so extreme.

我认为这种事可能只会在全新的环境中发生。

I think it it probably only could have happened under in a new environment.

所以，呃，你知道，紧接着的第一步就是公司在你接手后规模急剧缩小。是的，我们从

So and and so the, you know, kind of immediate first step was the company got very small after you. It was in your hands. Yeah. We went from

107名员工，我记得大概是105人，一夜之间缩减到了7名员工。

a 107 employees, I think we were, to or a 105 employees to seven employees overnight.

所以你们当时也同意这样裁员？

So you were also signing up for that?

是的。我们在2020年3月的一个周二与IAC签订了协议。周三，篮球队停赛，周四我们就进入了疫情封锁状态。

Yes. We signed our deal with IAC on a Tuesday in March 2020. On Wednesday, the basketball team stopped playing, and on Thursday, we were in COVID lockdown.

哇。我之前不知道这个。这对我来说是新消息。太疯狂了。这真是

Woah. I didn't realize that. I that that's new information to me. That's wild. That's

篮球狂热吗？

basketball crazy?

篮球队停止比赛就像是一个

The basketball team stopped playing is such like a

触发短语。不。完全。完全。我就是用那个故事打动人的。

triggering phrase. No. Totally. Totally. That's how I get people with that story.

他们会说，哦，我想起来了。对。我现在记起来了。

They're like, oh, I remember. Yeah. I remember now.

然后你们有College Humor，后来为了与已有流媒体平台名称一致而进行了品牌重塑，但在我看来，它现在已经是相当不同的业务了，因此我认为你是Dropout的创始人。不过你不必这么认为。但你确实是CEO，而且全权负责。这一切发生的方式很奇怪，当你提出这个建议时，你觉得他们可能会同意吗？不。

Then you had College Humor, which is has since rebranded to align with the name of the preexisting streaming platform, but I would call it, at this point, a pretty different business, and thus, I consider you the founder of Dropout. But you don't have to consider yourself that. You certainly are the CEO, though, and you're, super in charge. And a strange a strange way for this all to happen, did when you proposed this, did you feel like it was likely that they would say yes? No.

我喜欢这样。

I love that.

我是说，我看到了墙上的字迹，也就是说，我看到他们没什么选择。但记录在案的是，我当时是首席创意官。而且在IAC的十多年里，尽管我自己缺乏这方面的认可，我其实并不懂商业。所以这是对我这个非商人的一种信任。走进那个房间时，我对这一点非常清楚。

I mean, I I saw the writing on the wall, which is to say, like, I saw that they didn't have a lot of options. But for the record, I was a chief creative officer. And I didn't even then, much to my own lack of credit over the course of ten plus years at IAC, I didn't really speak business. So it was a a leap of faith in me as a nonbusinessman. That's what I felt very, conscious of, walking into that room.

我们需要在此暂停一下，稍作休息。马上回来。

We have to pause here for a quick break. We'll be right back.

本节目由Vanta赞助支持。创业或经营企业意味着承担诸多责任，远不止打造优秀产品这么简单。确保遵守安全协议，特别是那些保护客户数据安全的协议，便是其中之一。Vanta通过领先的人工智能、自动化及持续监控技术，帮助各种规模的企业快速实现并保持合规。Vanta还能助您以高达五倍的速度完成安全问卷，为您节省时间。

Support for this show comes from Vanta. Starting or running a business comes with a lot of responsibilities beyond just having a great product. Making sure you're compliant with security protocols, especially those designed to keep customer data safe, is one of them. Vanta helps companies of all sizes get compliant fast and stay compliant with industry leading AI, automation, and continuous monitoring. And Vanta saves you time by helping you complete security questionnaires up to five times faster.

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本节目由.tech域名赞助支持。为企业命名如同给孩子取名。当然，主要区别在于世界上可能有多种不同职业。但如果他人已注册您心仪的域名，您就错失良机。使用.tech域名，您能获得真正想要的初创企业名称。

Support for this show comes from dot tech domains. Naming your business can feel like naming a child. Of course, one of the main differences is that there could be a lot of different jobs in the world. But if someone already has the web domain you want, you're out of luck. With a .tech domain, you can secure the startup name you really want.

无需妥协。更妙的是，使用.tech域名能向客户和投资者直接表明您的企业以科技为核心。看看已启用.tech的部分企业：全球最大消费科技展会CES.tech，以及OpenAI支持的初创公司onex.tech，这只是全球数十万家科技企业的缩影。这不仅是拥有一个名称那么简单。

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本节目由Framer赞助播出。如今要想成功，光有绝妙点子还不够，还需配以出色的网站。这正是Framer的用武之地。作为一款设计优先的无代码建站工具，Framer能让任何人在几分钟内发布专业级网站。

Support for the show comes from Framer. To be successful these days, you don't just need a great idea. You need a great website to go with it. That's where Framer comes in. Framer is the design first, no code website builder that lets anyone ship a product ready site in minutes.

免费即可开始使用，你可以浏览数百个模板，或从完全空白的画布起步，享受最大自主权。Framer支持添加动画、文字特效、显现效果、视差滚动、滚动动画、循环动画等诸多功能，所有操作都能在数秒内完成。内置AI会处理繁重工作，比如生成初始布局或将整站翻译成任意语言。你还能进行AB测试设计，设置漏斗分析用户点击行为。无需编码，绝不妥协。

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欢迎回来。我是汉克·格林，正与Dropout首席执行官山姆·雷施交谈。我们刚聊到他的创业故事——尽管他本人不这么认为，但在我看来他确实是Dropout的创始人。这使他成为极其罕见的真正关心媒体的经营者。曾几何时，传媒公司多由热爱创作的人领导；而如今，掌舵者更多是偏重数字运算的商业型人才。

Welcome back. I'm Hank Green talking with Dropout CEO Sam Reisch. We were just talking about his origin story, how he became, in my opinion anyway, though not his, the founder of Dropout. And I think that's made him something very unusual, someone who actually cares about media. There was a time when media companies were more likely to be led by people who enjoyed making media and a time when now maybe now media companies are mostly led by people who are kind of on the on the number y side, the business y side.

恕我直言，你绝对是当代传媒高管中的异类——不仅深度持续地参与创意过程，担任主持人和出镜嘉宾，还不断构思甚至亲自撰稿。你绝非只是照读提词器，而是亲自策划节目创意。我认为你最具影响力的节目《游戏变革者》背后，正是你在主导创作愿景？

And you are definite you you are a current a current example of a person who is a media executive, if you'll excuse me saying that, but but who is extraordinarily and deeply and constantly involved as a creative force, as a host, on screen talent, but also constantly ideating and even writing. Like, you're you're not, like, you're not just sort of showing up and reading the teleprompter. You are also coming up with ideas for shows, and you are the creative vision behind, I think, probably what is your most successful show, question mark? Game changer?

我觉得《游戏变革者》和《维度20》一直在平台上争夺头把交椅。

I think game changer and dimension 20 are are constantly duking it out for position on the platform.

《维度20》是College Humor推出Dropout时就存在的节目，对吧？

20 came along like, existed as a product when college humor launched dropout. Is that right?

那是个，你知道的，首日就被砍掉的系列。不过《游戏变革者》确实改变了局面。

It was a, you know, day one dropout franchise. Yeah. So did game changer, though.

哦，我之前不知道。难怪它能存活这么久。所以它才有七季或八季什么的。

Oh, I didn't know that. That's why it's been around. That's why it has seven seasons or eight seasons or whatever.

没错。完全正确。我觉得

Exactly. Exactly. I think

我知道你对早期那些集数不太自豪，但我们家可喜欢那些了

And I know that you're not super proud of those early episodes, but we love them in my

那真好。真好啊。这么执着于突破常规。

That's nice. That's nice. So determined to jump the shark.

是啊。我是说，你在《游戏变革者》里确实遇到了创作瓶颈，因为你不断升级玩法。到最后，梯子上再也没有可以攀爬的横档让你更聪明了。

Yeah. Well, I mean, you are you have got a real sort of, creative problem with game changer and that you continue to escalate. And eventually, there is there there's no more there's no more ladder rungs on the ladder that you can get smarter.

确实。比外太空更远的地方可不好突破。

It's true. It's hard to go further than outer space.

是的。所以没错。如果你不知道的话，《游戏改变者》这个节目的概念是：每一集的游戏都不同，

Yeah. So Yeah. If you don't know this, the idea of this of game changer is it is a game show in which the game is different every episode,

而且

and the

参赛者到来时并不知道游戏内容是什么，然后他们必须自己摸索出来，这

contestants arrive not knowing what the game is going to be, and then they have to figure it out, which

对。有时候弄明白它需要或多或少的努力。

Yeah. Sometimes it takes more and less work to figure it out.

但确实。我是说，最近一季的季终集，我大概到一半的时候才搞明白。

But yeah. I mean, the the the most the the the season finale of of the most recent season, I don't think I figured it out until, like, halfway through.

当然。当然。

Sure. Sure.

我当时就想，到底什么时候会有变化？什么时候，什么时候下一环节才会发生？结果发现，哦，不。

I was like, at what point is this gonna change? At what what point at what point is, like, the the next thing gonna happen? It was like, oh, no.

这是

This is

整件事情。

the whole thing.

对。对。

Yeah. Yeah.

但很疯狂。而且，你知道，部分原因是你与许多即兴喜剧演员合作，所以，那就像是他们的专长。那种氛围。就像，我们打算在这个空间里一起发挥。但你似乎能通过编写节目的方式来引导未来走向。

But wild. And also, like, you know, part of this is that you work with a lot of improv comedians, and so, like, that's kind of the the jam. That's the vibe. It's like, you know, we're gonna play in this space together. But it does seem like you're able to direct the future with the way that you write the shows.

感觉它本可能走向许多其他方向，那些结局远不如实际发生的令人满意。

It felt like it could have gone a number of ways that would have been much less satisfying than the way that it went.

嗯。嗯。

Mhmm. Mhmm.

那是一种错觉吗？是你为我营造的错觉吗？那是剧本安排好的，还是本可能有不同的发展？

Did was that an illusion? Did you create that illusion for me? Is that a was that, like, sort of a written thing, or could it have gone differently?

我不这么认为。我是说，我们在内部也为此纠结过。是的，你懂吧？因为有时候'游戏改变者'就是一场游戏，而其他时候，它更像行为艺术。

I don't think so. I mean, I think that, like, we grappled with this internally. Yeah. You know? Because sometimes game changer is a game, and other times, it's more akin to performance art.

当然有些游戏迷会更喜欢那些剧集。还有些比较轻松的观众，他们欣赏'游戏改变者'无论它是什么形式。是的，我真的很想做这期节目，可以说尽管存在一些固有缺陷，我们还是坚持完成了。明白了吧。

And there certainly are the game wonks who like those episodes ever better. And then there are sort of, like, the kind of lighter hearted audience members who who appreciate game changer sort of no matter what it is. Yeah. I really wanted to do this episode, and I would say that we pushed it through despite some inherent flaws Gotcha. That it has.

其中一个缺陷就是结局是注定的。但我们想和雅各布以及观众玩的心理游戏是——这个'注定'到底有多注定。

And one of them is that the conclusion is inevitable. But what we wanted to do with Jacob and with the audience is to sort of, like, tease them in terms of just how inevitable is it.

是啊不，作为观众并没觉得结局是注定的。

Yeah. No. It didn't feel inevitable as a viewer.

对对对。就是要让他感觉可能真的没有安全网，也要让观众误以为可能没有安全网。但当然了，我绝不会让他失败。

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. To make him feel like there might actually not be a net underneath him and to trick the audience into thinking there might not be a net underneath him either. But, of course, I would not have let him fail.

好吧。你现在彻底破坏我的观感了。我认识的游戏节目主持人绝对会用各种方式折磨任何人，这算是角色设定吧。

Okay. Alright. You've ruined that for me now. I've I've I mean, if this the the game feature host I know would absolutely terrorize anybody in any way. Part of the character.

呃，我可没打算在他发现我偷了他的血之前就结束节目——这么说吧。

Well, I wasn't I wasn't gonna, like, stop the episode before he knew I stole his blood. Let's put it that way.

是啊。我猜有很多事情是你希望发生的。好吧。

Yeah. I guess there was a lot of stuff that that you would want to have happen. Okay.

对。

Yeah.

结果非常好。不过回到正题，为什么你认为现在比过去更难让一个有创造力的人来领导媒体公司了？

Turned out very well. So but back to the thing. Why why do you think that it is less likely and harder to have a creative person at the helm of a media company, now than it once was?

我觉得，就像行业普遍发生的那样，当人们希望企业更成功时，行业就会呈现出某种元特质，于是商人接管企业以谋求更多利润。因此，我看到的现象是，这些庞大而单一的公司大多由金融人士，或是被提拔的法务或营销人员管理，因为董事会认为这些人最能操控商业杠杆。对吧？创意是产品，但让我们来操控商业杠杆。产品只是商业的一小部分。

I mean, I think, like, happens to industry in general, industries take on meta qualities, as people want for them to be more successful, and therefore, business people take over in an effort so that those businesses make more money. I think, therefore, what you get is a little bit of, like, separate what's occur what I've seen occur is this sort of separation between these companies that are giant and monolithic, and they're run mostly by finance people or maybe, like, promoted legal or marketing people because those are the people who the board has basically decided can best pull the business levers. Right? Creative is the product, but let's pull the levers of the business. The product is a minor part of the business.

我这话带点讽刺，但这些公司就是这种态度。而在我这边，这些更脆弱的小企业本不该存在——经营小企业本就风险极高，在当今行业中产阶级被掏空的世界里，经营中等规模企业更是如履薄冰。抱歉，听起来像你认识的某个人。

I'm saying that facetiously, but that's the attitude of these these companies. And then on my side of the aisle, these smaller businesses that arguably, shouldn't exist because they're much more vulnerable. It's vulnerable to run a small business. It's it's very vulnerable to run a medium sized business in the world we're in now where the the middle class of our industry has been hollowed out. Sorry to sound like someone you know.

你父亲？我父亲。但我们主要由这样的人运营：无论成功与否都会坚持做这类事，因为我们对它充满热情。这意味着我们必须是创造者，因为没有精明的商人会做这个。

Your dad? My dad. But we are run mostly by people, who would be doing something like this regardless of how successful it was because we're so passionate about it, which means that we need to be creators because no savvy business person would do this.

确实。

Yes.

现在我们的处境有些特殊，需要说明的是。当初我报名做这件事时，以为它会是个小而谦逊的项目，能让我在没有老板的情况下，按照自己的方式工作很长一段时间

Now we are in an unusual position, to be clear. When I signed up to do this, I thought it might be nice and small and humble and that I could work without a boss on my own terms for a long period of time

嗯。

Mhmm.

这正是我离开企业世界后想要的。它的成功程度远超我的想象。

Which coming out of the corporate world is what I wanted. It's been way more successful than I could have ever imagined.

是的。

Yep.

但随之而来的工作量、压力和复杂程度也远超我的预期。所以没错，我原本是想经营一家小公司，但实际上我们现在已经是个中型企业了。

And it's a lot more work and more stress and more complicated than I could have ever hoped for. So, yeah, I I got into this to run a small business, and in fact, we're in a medium sized business.

确实如此。它确实发展壮大了。具体是什么类型的业务？虽然Dropout本身是个流媒体平台，但我想你并不认为自己是个运营流媒体平台的人吧？

Yeah. You do. It, it it has it has grown. What kind of business is it? Is it it do you see yourself so, like, obviously, Dropout itself is a streaming platform, but I imagine that that you do not consider yourself a person who runs a streaming platform.

嗯。你可以这么理解

Mhmm. You could see

你自己作为一家媒体公司的CEO。

yourself as CEO of a a media company.

我想是吧。虽然我倾向于把业务精简到本质，也不怎么美化它。我认为这本质上是个订阅平台。如果非要逼我说，我大概会说我运营的是一个喜剧SaaS。

I suppose. Although, I'm, like, really into boiling this business down to its essence and also not sort of, like, glorifying it. And I think what it is is basically a subscription platform. Like, if you were to, like, really corner me, I would basically say I run a comedy SaaS. I

不，我觉得你其实不该这么说。

don't I don't actually think that you're allowed to say that.

我不喜欢...那太...我觉得这样描述显得很做作。它就是个品牌。

I don't like, that's that's I I feel really anti pretentious about what this is. Like, it's a brand.

你想要笑声，我们每月7美元提供给你。

You you want laughs, we will provide them for $7 a

差不多吧。是的。有时候我觉得自己有点像安迪·沃霍尔，因为Dropout对不同人有不同意义。对我而言，我们就像画布上的金宝汤罐头——交易就是你每月付6.99美元，我们给你这堆节目。

month. Kinda. Yeah. I mean, I think I that that this I do feel a little bit like, Andy Warhol sometimes insofar as, like, I think dropout means a lot of things to a lot of people. And, like, for for my purposes, we are a Campbell soup can on a canvas, which is to say, like, the transaction is you pay us now $6.99 a month, and we deliver to you this collection of programming.

当然，我们怀揣各种创作野心。而且，

And, yes, we have all sorts of creative ambitions. And,

是啊。

Yeah.

我认为Dropout聚集了这样一群独特而美好的观众，他们与内容紧密相连。他们与表演者紧密相连。他们与某些东西紧密相连，那些他们逐渐理解品牌所代表的东西。

I think Dropout has collected this, like, really unique and wonderful audience of people who are connected to the content. They're connected to the talent. They're connected to, certain things that that they've come to understand the brand stands for.

嗯。

Mhmm.

但核心在于这个运作的机制。是的，它可能有效也可能无效。如果它无效，所有这一切都会消失。对吧。

But at the core of it is this, like, mechanism that's working. Yeah. It could work or not work. And if it didn't work, none of all of this would go away. Right.

而这一点对我来说非常重要，我需要明白。

And and that feels really important for me to know.

我想我应该问一下这个运作的机制是什么。我本来想问点别的，但希望我能说到那。但现在对你来说，是什么在起作用？显然，今年订阅Dropout的人比去年多，去年又比前年多，是的。

I guess I should ask what the mechanism is that's working. I wanted to ask something else, but I'll hopefully, I'll get there. But but what's the what's the thing that's working right now for you? So obviously, more people are subscribed to dropout this year than they were last year and last year than they were the year before that, and Yeah. Yeah.

是的，它在增长。是什么在起作用？我指的是，在你的漏斗模型中，人们为什么注册？这些人是谁？

Yeah. It's growing. What is the thing that is working there? I I in in terms of, like, your funnel, in terms of, like, why do people sign up? Who are the who are these people?

因为你没有，比如说，你没有朋友。懂吗？你没有一堆知名的媒体资产，没有那么多节目。Dropout上的内容也没那么丰富。

Because you don't have, like, you don't have, like, friends. You know? You don't have a bunch of, like, storied media properties. You don't have that many shows. There's not, like, that much content on Dropout.

确实。但但很多人正在注册。我我不知道你是否能告诉我你们目前的订阅用户数量。

True. But but lots of people are signing up. I I don't know if you can tell me a number of the number of people who you have subscribed.

有一段时间了，我我一直说我们离百万订阅不远了，现在依然如此。

I for a while, I've I've been saying now we we're, like, spinning distance from a million, and that's still true.

嗯是啊。

Well Yeah.

我是说，我我我认为成功之处在于——不把话说得太绝对——人们订阅后会持续订阅。然后越来越多人加入订阅，并且他们会观看内容。

I mean, I I I think what's working, without putting too fine a point on it, is that people subscribe and they stay subscribed. And then more and more and also more and more people are subscribing, and they watch.

而且他们会观看。这些人是真订阅。不像我用Netflix那样划水，想着‘说不定哪天有想看的’。他们...你知道的，我的Rocket Money账户状态不理想，我我还没订阅。对。

And they watch. So these people subscribe. They don't just like coast the way I do with Netflix, where I'm like, well, maybe there's something I'm gonna wanna watch there sometime. They're they're I've and I've you know, my Rocket Money situation isn't what it should be, and I I haven't I haven't subscribed. Yeah.

是啊。但但你看，Dropout经常出现在我电视上。所以这些用户是真正订阅并活跃观看的。

Yeah. But but, you know, I like, Dropout pops on my TV a fair amount. So, like, these people are subscribed and and actively watching.

是的。我们拥有高度活跃的用户群体。

Yes. We have a highly engaged user base.

你们的用户转化路径是怎样的？人们是如何进入平台的？

What's your funnel? How do you get how do people come into the platform?

有几种不同的方式。最主要的是通过有机社交媒体，即用户主要在Instagram、TikTok和YouTube短视频上观看我们节目的片段。

There are there are a few different ways. The dominant one is through organic social, meaning they've watched clips from our shows on largely Instagram and TikTok and YouTube shorts.

你们设计节目时是否刻意追求这种效果——虽然不确定是否刻意，但可以说你们做得更好

And you design shows to be good at being well, I don't know if you design them that way, but you do I would say better

时好时坏吧，我们确实这么做了。对吧？

sometimes better and sometimes worse, we do that. Yeah. Right?

《游戏改变者》在这方面非常出色，因为它有点像《谁是线人》那种风格，对完全不了解的观众来说，里面充满了大量适合剪辑的精彩瞬间。

Game changer is very good at this because it's just like it's like kind of got that whose line is it anyway vibe for people who have never heard of any of this, where where there's just, like, good clippable moments a lot.

我认为《游戏改变者》擅长这个。《制造噪音》也非常擅长——当你想到《制造噪音》本质上是即时执行、即时执行。按理说《二十面体》本不该擅长这个，但不知为何却做得很好。

I think game changer is good at this. I think make some noise is very good at this when you think of of make some noise being being prompt execution, prompt execution. Arguably, dimension twenty really shouldn't be good at this, and yet it somehow is.

有时候确实如此。他们就是才华横溢又有趣的人。作为一个曾参与过节目的人，我这么说。

Sometime yeah. They're just talented funny people. I say as a person who was once on the show.

没错。你可以为此邀功一部分，那个赞美。但这是事实，汉克。我是说，就像你以那个角色在节目中创造瞬间时，心底有个声音在说，让我把这变成高光时刻。

Yeah. You get to claim a percentage of credit for that Yeah. That compliment. But it's so true, Hank. I mean, like, you as that character creating moments on the show, some little voice in the back of your head is like, let me turn this into a moment.

嗯哼。

Uh-huh.

而当你创造出一个精彩瞬间

And when you have a great moment

噢，是的。

Oh, yeah.

在当前这个时代，它就成为了节目的营销素材。

That becomes marketing for the show in the in the world in which we now live.

对。而且五年前这种模式还不存在。比如疫情发生时，那还是个很小的生态圈，现在却成了网络视频的重要组成部分，同时也很难变现。所以能把Reels、Shorts和TikTok转化为收入的人寥寥无几。

Yep. Yeah. And that didn't exist five years ago. Like that like, when COVID happened, that was a very small ecosystem, and now it is a huge part of online video and and also very hard to turn into value. So very few people are able to turn their Reels and their Shorts and their TikToks into any any amount of money.

有些人有门路。有些人拥有庞大的观众群，事情就变得容易了。但你却扭转了局面，让内容的存在依赖于资金支持。如果你想看到更多这样的内容，可以通过订阅成为支持者，成为这些内容得以存在的理由之一。

Some people have ways. Some people have very large audiences, and then it gets easy. But you have you you've turned it around where it's like, this content only exists because of a thing that costs money. And if you would like to see more of it, you can come be one of the people who is the reason that this content exists by being a subscriber.

我认为如果没有广告业务的支持，Dropout很难运作下去。

I think it'd be very hard for Dropout to work if we hadn't the advertiser supported part of our business.

不过，没错，你直接启动了它。你当时的态度就是，我不需要这个。

But, yeah, you just you just kicked it off. You were like, I don't need this.

是啊。我基本上就是觉得，我经营不了广告业务。我不擅长这个，在很多方面，我是个糟糕的销售员。确实如此。

Yeah. I was basically like, I can't run an ad business. I'd be no good at it. I'm, in a lot of ways, like a terrible salesperson. Like Sure.

像宝拉那样，所以那根本不在考虑范围内。

Paula like, in that so so that just wasn't cards.

推销东西。我只是觉得你不想推销那种特定的东西。

Sell things. I just don't think that you want to sell that particular thing.

确实。嘿，谢了，伙计。我们

Sure. Hey. Thanks, man. We

知道这个在这里。是的。

know this is there. Yeah.

K。另一方面，你是个非常棒的销售员。因为你，我有这么多袜子，而且每一双我都喜欢。

K. You are, on the other hand, a very good salesman. I have so many socks because of you, and I love them all.

啊，我喜欢这个。所以你的意思是，绝大多数或者说，你知道，订阅Dropout的大部分人是因为看到了片段，然后又看到另一个片段，接着又一个片段，然后他们就想，好吧，我得看看这个。这东西在哪？我得找到它。

Ah, I love that. So what you're saying is the the vast majority or, you know, the the biggest hunk of the people who are subscribed to dropout came in because they saw clips, and then they saw another clip, and then they saw another clip, and they're like, fine. I gotta watch this. And where is this? I'll find it.

绝大多数人。所以我认为目前我们10%的订阅者是通过付费进来的。

The vast majority of people. So I think 10% of our subscribers right now come in through through paid.

哦，好的。所以你们基本上就是，比如，放出最好的片段？

Oh, okay. So you do you just sort of, like, run the best clips?

是的。我们确实这么做。我们某种程度上利用社交媒体上的自然表现来，比如，提示我们应该放大哪些片段。

Yeah. We do. We do. We sort of use the organic social performance to, like, clue us into what what, clips we should amplify.

嗯。

Mhmm.

我认为这帮助我们度过了低谷期。

And I think that's helped us out through low periods.

即便你使用剪辑片段，本质上是从自然流量转向付费推广。是的，这才是关键。另外，你是否注意到《龙与地下城与变装皇后》引入了新人才到平台？

Even that is is you're using the clip. You're just, like you're going you're moving from organic to paid. Yes. So that's that's really the thing. And and I do you ever like, know that you did, like, Dungeons and Drag Queens where there were some new there was, like, new talent bring to the platform.

这些人自带粉丝基础，那些粉丝可能会注册会员。这种方式是否同样有效？

These people have fans. Maybe the those fans are gonna sign up. Has that also been effective?

哦，当然。完全可以这么说。我们确实在利用内容本身进行营销，但方式多种多样。选角策略和特别客串绝对是其中之一，而《龙与地下城与变装皇后》对我们影响巨大。

Oh, for sure. For sure. I mean, you you could argue that we are certainly, like, using the content to market itself, but there's all sorts of ways that we're doing that. So so casting and and stunt casting is certainly one of them. And dungeons and drag queens was huge for us.

明白了。那么观众最多的节目是否对会员注册贡献最大？

Okay. Okay. Are the shows that have the most audience the most responsible for sign ups?

基本如此。这有点像自我实现的预言——平台上最受欢迎的节目通常拥有最大的社交媒体影响力，自然也能带来最多新用户。

I would say so. Yeah. A bit of a self fulfilling prophecy there, where it's like the most popular shows, the most watched on the platform tend to have the biggest social channels tend also to drive the most viewers. Yeah.

具体是哪些节目呢？

So what are those?

我是说，目前平台上没有哪部剧集不拥有自己的一群铁杆忠实观众。你知道，如果一部剧集现在没有...

I mean, no show that's currently on the platform doesn't have its own hardcore dedicated audience. You know, if a show isn't Now that's

问题在于你没法取消任何节目，山姆。

problem because you can't cancel anything, Sam.

是啊。我是说，我们虽然没有正式取消，但确实有部分节目...

Yeah. I mean, we we have, not exactly formally canceled, but we have sort of a

暂停制作了。

Paused production.

暂停制作、搁置一旁、暂缓开发的节目，那些没能吸引足够观众的。平台上最受欢迎的节目是《维度20》和《游戏改变者》，其次则是《聪明裤》、《重要人物》和《制造噪音》的某种组合。

Paused production sideline, put on the back burner shows, that are not, didn't collect audience as well. The most popular shows on the platform are Dimension 20 and Game changer. And then the second most popular shows on the platform are some combination of smarty pants, very important people, and make some noise.

这很合理。我们得短暂休息一下，稍后马上回来。

That makes sense to me. We have to take another short break here. We'll be back in just a minute.

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欢迎回来。我是汉克·格林，正与我的朋友兼Dropout首席执行官山姆·赖希交谈。我们刚讨论了Dropout上的热门内容及其成功之道，这让我有机会了解他们的制作过程以及平台可能新增的内容。你们是否考虑过引入非自制内容？目前平台上所有内容均由CollegeHumor或Dropout制作。

Welcome back. This is Hank Green talking with my friend and Dropout CEO Sam Reich. We were just talking about what's popular on Dropout and how it got that way, and that gave me a chance to ask how they make it and what else might go on the platform. Have you ever considered putting stuff on that you didn't produce? So right now, everything on the platform is is college humor or dropout produced.

当然。当然。我们有。我们是。我认为之所以棘手，是因为我们将社交媒体营销视为我们在做事方式上的重要差异化因素。

For sure. For sure. We have. We are. I think the reason why it's tricky is because we consider social marketing to be a big differentiator in terms of how we do things.

如果我们去授权一个主流节目，他们绝不可能允许我们运营他们的社交媒体渠道。是的。所以除非我们能这样做，否则对我们来说毫无意义。奇怪。

And if we were to go license a mainstream show, there's no way that they would allow us to power their social channels. Yes. So there is no point to us doing that unless we get to do that. Weird.

这真是个我完全没想到的、如此具体的拒绝理由。我

That's such a specific reason to not do that that I would not have imagined. I

的意思是，好吧。其他原因也显而易见。对吧？比如，如果我们随便授权任何内容，会不会稀释品牌价值？我们不想成为一个工具平台。

mean, okay. The other reason the other reasons are out there too. Right? Like, if we just license anything under the sun, does it dilute the brand? We're not trying to be a utility.

我们更想打造品牌效应。但我想说，我们有兴趣在平台上托管那些我们可以运营其社交媒体内容的内容。因此我们正在进行一些相关讨论，因为这可能是个有趣的实验。不过我们对此显然非常、非常、非常挑剔。明白了。

We're trying to be, more of a brand play. But I would say that we are interested in potentially hosting content on the platform that we could power its social content. And so we are having some of those conversations because we think it'll be an interesting experiment. But we're being very, very, very choosy about it, obviously. Gotcha.

Dropout现在有多少员工？

How many people are at dropout right now?

我们大约有40人。嗯。全职的，但这还没算上对我们事业做出重大贡献的许多其他人员

We are 40 ish. Uh-huh. On a full time basis, but that really doesn't account for so many people who are such major contributors to what we

对。没错。是的。

do. Right. Yeah.

因为涉及太多合同制演员了。无论是剧组方还是艺人方。

Because there are so many contract players involved. The crew side, on the talent side.

是的。而且你和，比如，你知道，那些人确实感觉像是团队的一部分，特别是因为，就Dropout这类节目的固定班底而言，那些人大多不是雇员。他们更像是观众想象中Dropout的代表人物。比如，确实有一批反复出现的喜剧演员，他们被观众视为Dropout大家庭的一员。

Yeah. And you and and, like, you know, those people do feel a lot like part of the team, especially because, like, in terms of, like, Dropout kind of cast members, those people are are mostly not employees. They are kind of the the folk that people imagine when they imagine what Dropout is. Like, there's just For sure. Sort of a bunch of recurring comedians who come in and and are seen as dropout the Dropout family by the audience.

确实如此。

For sure.

这些人虽然是合同工，但感觉又不止于此。

People, like, are contractors but are also something more, it feels like.

绝对是这样。正因如此，顺便说下利润分成，也正因如此，我们才会竭尽全力让在Dropout工作成为大家的积极体验。要知道，好莱坞这个体系里人们某种程度上已习惯并期待这种模式。全职机制本身就有各种利弊。比如我们确实长期雇佣过全职艺人。

Definitely. And which is why, by the way, profit share and, which is why, by the way, like, so many of the things that we do, we bend over backwards to make working at Dropout a positive experience for folks. I think that, you know, Hollywood is a system where people are used to this and expect this to a degree. There are all sorts of inherent sort of benefits and drawbacks to the full time equation. Like, we we did have full time talent for a long time.

这样做的好处是双方都有保障。明白吗？我们知道有固定人选可用，他们也清楚自己的工作保障。而弊端在于我们只能使用这些人，必须从他们身上获取相应价值，这就导致了可选范围变小。

The benefit there is security for both of us. Right? Like, we know that we have people that we can turn to, and they know that they have that amount of job security. And then the downsides are that we have to make use of those people and only those people because we have to derive that amount of value from them. So it means that the pool gets smaller.

而对他们来说的不利之处在于，他们无法探索可能因受雇于我们而出现的其他机会。你懂吗？

And then the downside for them is that they can't explore other opportunities that might pop up as a result of their employment with us. You know?

还有就是，我的意思是，这已经成为许多YouTube公司的通病。BuzzFeed就是个典型例子，员工们制作了一档非常受欢迎的节目，却仍以普通员工身份领取薪水，而他们的节目为公司赚了大钱，却未获得艺人级别的报酬。比如，如果《宋飞正传》火了，杰瑞·宋飞的片酬就会涨。但如果是'尝试兄弟'走红，他们该如何谈判今年涨三倍工资呢？

There's also, like I mean, this is a big this has been a a a weakness of a lot of YouTube companies. BuzzFeed is the best example where you have employees, and then they get a really popular show. And then they're being paid as an employee, but their show is making the the company a bunch of money, and they're not being paid as talent. And so, like, you know, if if Seinfeld gets popular, Jerry Seinfeld gets paid more. But if, you know, the Try Guys get popular, how do the Try Guys, like, get to negotiate, like, a three times higher salary this year?

这不太符合商业运作规律。所以'尝试兄弟'开始对留在BuzzFeed感到不安，可能想自立门户。这个问题从YouTube诞生之初就存在。我觉得借鉴好莱坞过去的运作模式其实很合理——比如这季你来制作这档节目，

It's sort of not how business works. And so the Try Guys start to feel pretty uncomfortable being part of BuzzFeed and maybe wanna go do their own thing. And this this, from the very beginning of YouTube, a big problem. And I feel like that this model of just, like, listening to how Hollywood has worked in the past actually makes sense in this case where it's like, okay. Well, you're gonna come and you're gonna do this show this season.

如果下季节目表现优异，你的经纪人就会来和我们协商。届时你将能参与其他项目，但这档节目会成为你年收入的重要部分，因为观众喜爱它，你创造了巨大价值。

And the next season, if the show did really well, like, your agent's gonna have a conversation with us, and we're gonna be figuring out that, like and you're not gonna, like you're gonna be able to do a bunch of other stuff, but, like, this is gonna be a big part of your yearly income now because that show is popular because people really like it, and you're creating a lot of value.

我不清楚人们对独家协议了解多少，但这类条款很有意思。假设Apple TV邀请你参演剧集，你会签一份合约承诺在特定时间内完成若干集拍摄，通常涵盖多季。但合约通常会限制你在该领域接其他工作，比如未经苹果许可不得参与其他流媒体的节目。试想如果苹果迟迟不续订你的下一季节目，而合约里又规定了等待期，

I don't know how much people know about exclusivity, but I think this stuff is so interesting where it's like, if you are signing up to participate in a project, let's say Apple TV comes and wants for you to be in their show, you will sign a contract with Apple TV that's like you are committed to x number of episodes over y period of time. You're usually signing up for multiple seasons. But as a part of that contract is, like, you can't do other things usually in that category, which is to say, like, you can't do other streamers' shows, for instance, without Apple's permission. But then imagine for a moment that Apple takes a long time to pick up a second season of your show. And then those those times are built into your contract.

可能他们要花九个月才决定续订。这九个月里你就不能接其他流媒体项目，这简直是——

So maybe it takes them, like, nine months to pick up another season of your show. For that nine months, you are not allowed to do other streaming things, which is a huge

你该学学怎么兼顾吧。在干嘛呢？刷聊天软件吗？

You just gotta learn to juggle or something. Are you Chats. What are you doing?

你是做什么工作的？

What do you do?

做什么？你得保持体型，因为他们需要你看起来和以前一样。懂吗？九个月过去了，老兄，我已经是另一个人了。

What do do? You gotta, like, stay in shape too because they need you to look the same. You know? And it's like, nine months went by, man. I'm a different guy.

是啊，确实。保持头发长度不变，指甲长度也别变。明白吧？

Yeah. For sure. Keep your hair the same length. Keep your nails the same length. You know?

嗯。

Yeah.

别，我是说，这确实很难。独家协议对那些能在这个行业工作就心存感激的人来说真的很苛刻，几乎没有谈判余地。所以我们的态度是，如果我们不体谅别人的其他工作，就等于逼他们在我们和其他工作之间做选择。正因我们不要求任何形式的独家合作，卢·威尔逊才能和我们共事——否则他得全职待在《吉米鸡毛秀》剧组。对吧。

Don't, I mean, it it's, that that's tough. Exclusivity is really tough for folks who are who are grateful to be working with this business in this business at all, and so very little negotiating room. So, like, our attitude about it is if, we were not accommodating of people's other work, we would simply be forcing them to make a choice between us and and the other work, whatever it is. So the fact that we don't ask for exclusivity of any kind means that Lou Wilson can work with us because otherwise he is full time at Jimmy Kimmel Live. Right.

懂我意思吗？哦，

You know? Oh,

嗯，有意思。

yeah. Interesting.

我们正努力将自己定位为每个人最理想的第二职业选择——除非他们连第一份工作都没有，那样的话，他们也会非常乐意与我们合作。无论如何，我们都希望他们能非常开心地为我们工作。

We are trying to position ourselves as everyone's favorite, second job unless unless they don't have a first job, in which case, you know, they are very, you know, happy to be working with we want for them to be very happy to be working with us even so.

我是说，你们在这方面已经建立了声誉，像是开创了更具创意的做事方式，对从助理到艺人等所有工作人员都更加友好。而且，你知道，给承包商利润分成，尤其是艺人，这通常不是行业惯例。虽然有分成制度之类的各种方式，但我从没听说有人直接进行利润分成。为什么要这么做？我想知道原因？

I mean, you're getting a reputation for this, for being, like, like, pioneering the more creative ways of doing things, being more worker friendly to to everybody from PAs to to talent and and everything in between. And, you know, profit sharing for contractors is like, for for talent, it's not usually how things work, though. Like, there's, like, residual systems, like, various ways of doing this, but, like, I've never heard of anybody doing, like, a straight profit share. It why do that? I guess why?

另外，这很难吗？我是说，真的很难吗？其他人不做是因为太难，还是因为他们没必要这么做？

And and also, like, why is it hard? Like, is it is it hard? Is the reason that other people don't do it because it's hard, or is the reason because, like, they don't have to?

我不认为这很难。我们做的事并不算困难，更不用说我们出色的财务团队在负责了。但具体来说，我们选择利润分成而不是...

I don't think it's hard. I don't think what we're doing is that hard, say nothing, about our brilliant finance team who does it. But, like, specifically, the reason we're doing profit share and, like, not

我不是说开支票在操作上有多难。我是说让这种商业模式运转起来很难。

I don't mean, like, it's logistically hard to cut the checks. I mean, it's hard to make the business model work.

我...我觉得开支票确实有点难。但派拉蒙应该能解决这个问题。我觉得版税分成更难处理。

I I think it is kinda hard to cut the checks. Yeah. But it it it I feel like Paramount could figure that out. I think royalties are harder.

是啊。没错。版税确实更复杂。

Yeah. Right. Which is like Royalties are harder.

这就是我们实行利润共享的原因，从管理角度来看对我们来说简单得多。我认为其他公司不这么做是因为这不标准，而且他们可以逃避责任。但主要原因可能是这个——他们有一类需要讨好的人，而我们没有，因为我们收购了公司。他们犯了关键错误，在上升过程中。

Which is why we do profit share because it's like a much simpler for us from an admin standpoint. I think that other companies don't do this because it is not standard and because they can get away with not. But the big one is probably this, which is that they have people that they need to satisfy, a whole category of people they need to satisfy who we don't have because we brought the company. They ascended. They made that critical error going up from.

具体来说，根据公司不同，第四、第五、第六号人物就是股东们。这意味着通过囤积资金，你实际上是在讨好某些人。对吧？而我们不存在这种情况。

And right there, number four, number five, number six, depending on the company is the shareholders. And that means that, like, there are people like, basically, by hoarding money, you are satisfying someone. Yeah. Right? Which, like, we don't have.

我们不需要讨好任何人。

There's no one to satisfy.

理论上说，IAC集团...他们理论上...他们从不会来敲门说'老兄，你现在该把这个做成大事业了，来给我们看看成绩'。

Well, I mean, IAC theoretically, are they Theoretically. They never come knocking and say, like, man, you could turn this into a big a big boy now. Come come and show us the success.

IAC理论上，我理论上。对吧？

IAC theoretically, me theoretically. Right?

没错。

Yeah.

布伦南也是公司合伙人。布伦南，理论上。

Brennan is also a partner in the company. Brennan, theoretically.

我曾尝试投资，但你不肯收我的钱。

I've tried to invest, but you will not take my money.

也许某天我会的，汉克。

Maybe I someday will, Hank.

到时告诉我。

Let me know.

别误会。我们都在赚钱。

And don't get me wrong. Like, we're all making money.

没错。

Right.

对。当我们说利润分成时，甚至不是指全部利润。是的，对吧？部分利润归我和IC。

Right. No one like, when we say profit share, we're not even talking about the whole profit. Yeah. Right? Some of that profit goes to me and to IC.

当然，还有运营资金。你不会每年都把银行账户清零。

And, of course, there's also operational funds. You're not you're not gonna zero out the bank account every year.

当然。当然。有运营资金。还有玩乐资金。你懂吧？

Of course. Of course. There's operational funds. There's there's play money. You know?

我们想尝试新事物。

We wanna try new things.

是啊。尝试新

Yeah. Try new

事物。所以这些钱会流向各种不同的地方，但没有股东需要讨好，这意味着我们每年越来越盈利并不一定是我们的首要任务。

things. So all that money is going all sorts of different places, but but there are no shareholders to satisfy, which means us being more and more and more profitable every year is not necessarily our first priority.

那你们的首要任务是什么？你们想做什么？Sam Reich，你到底想做什么？

What is your first priority then? What are you trying to do? What are you trying to do, Sam Reich?

我不知道，老兄。我不知道，Hank。你觉得我该怎么做？

I don't know, man. I don't know, Hank. What do you think I should do?

我不知道。说得好。

I don't know. That's a good point.

你们或多或少都在同一条船上。是的，这很容易就能把局面

You're you're in the same boat, more or less. Yeah. Could really easily turn this

反过来针对你。

around on you.

为什么我要这么做。哦，拜托。给我一个机会。就一个。

Why I do it. Oh, please. Give me give me one. Give me one.

哦，我是说，我对所创造的事物和共事的人怀有强烈的责任感。对观众也是如此，而且有时候创作本身也让我感到非常满足。当然，有些工作纯粹是出于责任才做的。是的。

Oh, I mean, I feel a strong sense of obligation to the things that I have made and the people who I work with. I feel a strong sense of obligation to the audience, and I also Yeah. Very rewarded by making things sometimes. Like, obviously, there are some parts of my job that I do purely because of the obligation. Yeah.

没错。有些工作是为了薪水，有些则——你知道的，每项活动在不同方面占比不同——但有时候我做这些纯粹是因为热爱，太有意思了。

Yeah. Yeah. Parts of my job that I do because I get paid to do it, and there are some parts of my job that I do that, and this is, like, you know, different different amounts in every column and and different activities. But sometimes I'm I'm doing it, because I just freaking love doing it. It's so fun.

是啊。

Yeah.

嗯，有意思。我虽然也有点责任感，但那不是主要动力。我更庆幸能在特殊条件下创作——某种程度上，我觉得自己比'三巨头'更自由，或者说，地位更低些。

Yeah. That's interesting. I don't feel I feel a little bit of a sense of obligation. I wouldn't say that's my primary driver. I think that I feel very aware and very grateful for the ability to create things under a unique set of circumstances where I don't have I I feel uniquely under the trois, uniquely lower than trois.

嗯哼。

Uh-huh.

我认为那是个非常

And I think that's a very

必须坚持住。我们正在学习的东西。

gotta hold on to that. We're what we're learning.

这就像是一个真正的...它是一个非常独特的生态系统的一部分。我认为这意味着我们可以创造出一些独特而酷炫的东西。我热爱这一点。就像，孕育这些东西是我最喜欢的部分。

It's like a really to the. It's a really unique ecosystem to be a part of. And I think it means that we can create some uniquely cool stuff. And I love that. Like like, giving birth to the stuff is my my favorite part.

归根结底我是个艺术...我是个艺术势利眼。我已经连续三年去爱丁堡边缘艺术节了。今年，

I'm an art I'm an art snob at the end of the day. I mean, I've been to the Edinburgh Fringe now, like, three years in a row. And, this year

成为你工作的一部分？

to have be part of your job?

完全...几乎不算。你懂我的意思吗？是的。我曾经...你你

A total I mean, barely. You know what I mean? Yeah. I used to. You you

从那里挑了些节目。对。对。对。顺便说，爱丁堡的法国喜剧节是个非常古怪的节日。

pulled some acts out of there. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. French, by the way, is like a a very weird comedy festival that happens in Edinburgh.

它持续数周，在小房间里举办，全是些怪异艺术，我羡慕极了。还从没机会去过。

It's like it's like weeks long, and it's tiny rooms, and it's just weird art happens, and I'm very jealous. I've never gotten to go.

汉克，咱们得找年去，我给你当导游。

Oh, Hank, we gotta go some year, and I'll I'll show you around.

我在等我儿子长大到合适年龄。

I'm waiting for my son to be old enough.

合理。他们也有超棒的儿童项目，专门为孩子们设计的活动。确实。

Yeah. That's fair. They've got great kids stuff too. They've got a whole kids programming component. Yeah.

好吧，之前不知道。我们一定要去。

Alright. I didn't know that. We're going.

但我就是热爱那些稀奇古怪的东西。当我思考想给世界留下什么时，答案总是：更多这样的东西。

But I I just love, you know, weird and unusual stuff. And when I think about, like, what I wanna leave behind in the world, it's more of it.

好的，我喜欢这个问题。你们是如何做决策的？这是个解码问题，我们得问这个。

Okay. Love that. How do you make decisions? That's a decoder question. We gotta ask that one.

是的。有个关于决策的精彩TED演讲，讲的是当你面临艰难选择时，通常是因为利弊看起来差不多。所以其实选哪个都行，随便挑一个就好。

Yeah. I there's a there's a terrific TED talk on decision making, which talks about how when you're faced with a difficult decision, it's used usually because there's, like, pros and cons that feel roughly equivalent to each other. Yeah. And so it kinda doesn't matter. So, like, just pick one.

随便选一个就行。Ruth Chang的《如何做出艰难选择》提到，许多重要决策的方向其实很明确。而那些困难的抉择，你需要想清楚自己支持什么、追求什么。只要把优先级理顺，正确的决定往往就会浮现。

Just pick one. Ruth Chang, how to make hard choices. A lot of the important decisions, are pretty it's pretty clear what direction to go. And then with the difficult ones, you sort of have to decide what you're voting for, like what you're optimizing for. And so if you have your priorities in order, oftentimes, the the right decision will emerge.

也就是说，希望我们的业务足够简单。虽然要考虑很多因素——比如内容本身、观众体验、演职人员的福利、财务状况、还有我个人在创作上的兴奋点。虽然这些因素的优先级我一下子说不准，但只要把它们理顺，通常就能做出正确决定。

Meaning, again, hopefully, our business is, like, pretty simple. There are a lot of factors that we have to incorporate, and those factors are something in between, like, the content itself, the experience of the audience, the welfare of the cast and crew, our financials, what's, you know, personally creatively exciting to me. And if I have those, you know, roughly in the they're not in that order. I don't exactly know what order they fall into off the top of my head. But if I have those in the right order, I can usually make the right decision.

你如何看待Dropout在当前媒体界的定位？你觉得自己是行业的一部分，还是游离在边缘？你会为整个行业担忧，还是觉得那与你无关？

How do you imagine dropout in the media world right now? Do you even feel like you're a part of of this industry, or do you feel like you're kind of hanging off to the side? Do you do you feel like you worry about the industry broadly, or are you just sort of like, that's not me?

更像是与我无关。我感觉自己像在孤岛上，可以当个随心所欲的疯狂小丑国王。

It's more that's not me. I mean, I do feel like I'm on a little bit of an island where I get to be sort of like, you know, the the mad trickster king of my domain.

确实。对大多数大公司旗下的流媒体平台来说，百万订阅量可能意味着巨大失败。但从宏观媒体生态来看，这种情况似乎完全不可避免——甚至早就该更多出现了。

Yeah. And I mean, like, it's it's very weird to be like, you know, for most streaming platforms, like, that that have been launched by big companies to have a million subscribers would be a tremendous failure. And showing that that it seems like a a little bit in terms of, like, macro media ecosystem thing. It seems like this is a totally inevitable thing and that it should have happened more already. Yeah.

一切都在不断分裂，对吧？就像这样，你知道的，越来越多的事物都是如此。流媒体平台又怎能例外？我们甚至还没提到Vimeo，它几乎不费吹灰之力就促成了这种现象。

I Everything keeps fracturing. Right? Like so, like like, you know, more and more of everything. And why wouldn't this happen to streaming platforms? And we haven't even talked about the fact that Vimeo, oh, like, enables this with a pretty low lift.

所以你用的是

So you use Yeah.

我想是一个叫Vimeo OTT的产品。

I think a product called Vimeo OTT.

没错。

That's correct.

对。Vimeo基本上能让你搭建一个流媒体平台，他们有个版本能自我整合，可以上架应用商店，支持Roku、PS5等各种设备。明白吗？这确实简化了整个流程。

Yeah. And and so Vimeo, like, basically lets you build a streaming platform, and it, like, you know, they have they have a version of it that's that's all it all integrates with itself, and it can be in the App Stores, and it can be on Roku and all the PS five or wherever. You know? For sure. And and and that that simplifies this this process.

我认为Vimeo押注的就是这种情况会发生。但看看使用者，很多是独立创作者或健身博主这类生活方式类网红。也许RuPaul的流媒体就是代表——

And I think that what Vimeo is betting on there is that is that this will occur. But I think when you look at the people who use that, it's a lot of, like like, individual creators or people who have, like like, a workout, like, a thing. You know, they're, like, lifestyle influence type things. I think that maybe the the RuPaul streamer represents

是啊，我也这么想。比如Criterion collection。

Yeah. I think so. Criterion collection.

哦，好吧。

Oh, okay.

是啊。嗯。

Yeah. Mhmm.

而且它确实。感觉就像事情会朝那个方向发展，不同的，你知道的，群体各自会有自己的小天地，这当然会继续让我们彼此疏远，因为大家看的东西都不一样了。但是

And it yeah. It just feels like like it would head in that direction and that the different, you know, segments would each get their own Yeah. Their own little world, which will, of course, continue to make alienate us from each other because no one's watching the same things. But

这感觉像是我们生活的这个内容世界的症状。所以这是个合理的问题。比如，为什么不多做点呢？是啊。

It it feels symptomatic of this Yeah. World of content that we're living in. And so it's a fair question. Like, well, why not more? Yeah.

这是个好问题。我认为，

And it's a that's a good question. I think,