---
title: 'Inside Mojo Ep. 10 - What is WM2020 Anyway?'
source: 'https://youtube.com/watch?v=XMqiHepjKPw'
video_id: 'XMqiHepjKPw'
date: 2026-08-07
duration_sec: 2984
---

# Inside Mojo Ep. 10 - What is WM2020 Anyway?

> Source: [Inside Mojo Ep. 10 - What is WM2020 Anyway?](https://youtube.com/watch?v=XMqiHepjKPw)

## Summary

In this episode of Inside Mojo, host Rob and CEO Ashkan Karbasfrooshan discuss the origins and outcomes of the 'WatchMojo 2020' initiative, a strategic plan launched in 2016 to ensure the company's growth and relevance. They explore the challenges of navigating company life cycles, the importance of balancing iterative, evolutionary, and revolutionary innovations, and the lessons learned from competitors and industry giants like MTV.

### Key Points

- **Introduction and Context** [00:34] — Host Rob introduces the episode with Ashkan Karbasfrooshan, CEO of WatchMojo, discussing the company's journey and the 'WatchMojo 2020' initiative.
- **Controversy from Previous Episode** [01:03] — The team discusses the backlash from the previous episode about MissMojo in the 'woke era', highlighting how people were quick to be offended without fully understanding the content.
- **Origins of WatchMojo 2020** [03:34] — Ashkan explains that the initiative began around 2016 after reading biographies of media moguls like Henry Luce, which inspired him to avoid complacency and plan for the future.
- **Company Life Cycles** [06:05] — Ashkan discusses the stages of company growth (early stage, growth, decline) and how WatchMojo aimed to find a second growth spurt by innovating and adapting.
- **Competitive Landscape in 2016** [08:17] — The conversation shifts to the hyper-competitive environment in 2016, with competitors like Valnet adopting a more data-driven approach, contrasting with WatchMojo's content-first philosophy.
- **Rob's Experience at Valnet** [12:48] — Rob shares his experience working at Valnet, a competitor, highlighting the company's focus on analytics and growth, which eventually plateaued and led to layoffs.
- **Balancing Content and Analytics** [15:46] — Ashkan emphasizes the need to prioritize content while also paying attention to analytics, a lesson learned from competitors and industry feedback.
- **Handling Negative Feedback** [18:44] — The discussion covers how Ashkan dealt with negative reviews on Glassdoor, emphasizing the importance of not letting a few unhappy voices overshadow the positive culture.
- **Unique Employee Treatment** [22:47] — Ashkan explains WatchMojo's servant leadership and stakeholder mindset, which prioritizes audience and employee happiness over maximizing size or profit.
- **Innovation Strategies** [26:27] — Ashkan advises entrepreneurs to break down goals into iterative, evolutionary, and revolutionary steps, making small bets across a portfolio to find growth.
- **Why Competitors Failed** [30:07] — Many competitors lacked stamina and patience, focusing on short-term gains rather than long-term vision, which is why WatchMojo survived.
- **MTV's Pivot** [32:27] — The team evaluates MTV's decision to shift away from music videos, concluding that it was a necessary adaptation to survive changing media consumption.
- **Iterative vs. Revolutionary** [36:12] — Ashkan argues that companies should do both: iterate slowly on core products while also pursuing revolutionary ideas, even at the risk of failure.
- **Poll Results** [38:57] — 65% of viewers voted that companies should innovate at the risk of dying, while 23% said pretend to innovate and coast, and the rest said keep milking current success.
- **Reflections on WatchMojo 2020** [45:34] — Ashkan expresses gratitude for the team and the journey, but as CEO, he acknowledges that more could have been done, and he's now focused on WatchMojo 2030.

### Conclusion

The episode underscores the importance of continuous innovation and adaptability in business, drawing lessons from WatchMojo's own journey and industry examples. Ashkan's key takeaway is that companies must balance iterative improvements with bold, revolutionary bets to survive and thrive.

## Transcript

language. If you think you may be offended, switch off now.
Taking notes. Taking names and taking Welcome everybody to another episode of Inside Mojo, where each week we take you back through 20 years of YouTube history through the WatchMojo lens. I'm your
host Rob. With me as always, uh WatchMojo CEO and co-founder Ashkan Karbasfrooshan. What's new, Ash? Not much. Very busy. Things are good. I won't lie. 2025 is el año de la vindicación. I won't lie.
sounds pretty 2025 is the year of vindication. I mean, I'm looking still for this Reddit thread where apparently they talked [ __ ] I think that's my daughter's just like, you know, saying that, but
looking for it myself and couldn't find it. But let's talk about that before we episode. We stirred up a little controversy last week talking about uh the launch of MissMojo in the woke era, and there was
videos. Did you expect that type of reaction? Yes and no. I mean, I think what we discuss is interesting. Hello Mohammed. for many storyteller entrepreneurs and also fans of YouTube. Um but I also
I'm always surprised when there's any engagement. But no, but I think it was kind of self-proving or you know, it was like it it was like what we were saying, which was in the
everybody had a reason to be offended by something, somebody. And the reality is they didn't even understand, you know, You see me, I'm like customer service man. I replied and I was like, "Oh, you
misunderstood." And I even said if I misspoke, it's on me. But they kind of ultimately summarize the 2010s, which was a decade where people were just offended, thin-skinned, and the reality is nobody gives a [ __ ]
about what you or I think. This is the world of like whether you're an employee or an entrepreneur, whether you're a storyteller or a technologist. own realities, they have their own vantage point. And if you're just going
to automatically jump to conclusions and make assumptions, as they say, you're thing. But it just showed that I'm like, yeah, these people in like a decade ago were whining and complaining and not even understanding what the hell they
you listen, you you don't want to have a big head, vindication that yeah, it's like most people are lost. And it's fine. I'm lost. I was lost. I will be lost. Like I'm not any different. But this is the
internet. People are quick to dislike, unsub, be offended. But when you yeah, they're either like just ill-informed, misinformed, uninformed,
and you just move on. You know, as Keanu Reeves says, if you say 1 + 2 = 8, good for you, you figured out life, get out of my [ __ ] way, you know? I'm not here to deal with the the morons. Well, building off of that era of the
2010s, today this week we're talking about WatchMojo's 2020 agenda or what what are the plans for 2020? So, um what do you what can you say about that? few years back you were looking towards 2020. What were the big goals?
So yeah, I mean look, when you're in business school, very early you study company life stages, you know, Polaroid, Kodak, whatever, when they started were disruptors and then by the end of their journey they were being disrupted. As I
disruptors like WatchMojo, we disrupted VH1, MTV, cable, whatever by embracing YouTube, even we were vulnerable to being disrupted by competition, innovation, demographics,
whatever. So, about 10 9-ish years ago, um just so happened that I was reading um Henry Luce, the founder of Time Inc.
biography. I had read The Publisher, which was the biography of William Randolph Hearst. I had read Well, it's right there. They're all here, actually. I Want My MTV, which
was a verbal oral history of MTV. And I did come to the kind of conclusion that yeah, maybe I had gotten a bit complacent myself. Maybe this after 7 years of
hardship that most people wouldn't even want to put up with, we had found some success in like 2012, '13, '14, '15 was like, "Oh, we're actually making money and we're not You know, I'm not donating blood to keep the
not selling my kidney to make payroll, which wasn't that far off. Yeah, yeah, I know, but I mean, I didn't go to to you know, there was no bloodletting, but it was it was but I remember vividly, I was sitting actually
my old place, um drinking a little bit of scotch late at night, reading uh Henry Luce's um The Publisher. He had founded Time, he eventually branched out into like Life, which was a
very successful magazine with just pictures, kind of like Instagram before there was Instagram, 50 years before. Uh then People, Illustrated, Fortune. And that's like kind of where we got the
but I did kind of just look in the mirror or at the wall at that point. It book, and I was like, "Yeah, I was like, I've gotten a bit complacent. And if I want to be CEO, I have to be open to
I have to be open to take risks and uh real risks. And it was like a flip of a switch. So, in 2015-16, I said, "Hey, let's let's look ahead to WatchMojo 2020 and think of, you know, iterative,
innovative, disruptive, evolutionary, revolutionary things that we could do. Some of which turned out to pay off, some of which were flagrant failures. Um but that's what WatchMojo 2020 was.
And if you've heard me talk about WatchMojo 2030, it's oh, here we are, 2025. As I look at as we're entering our third phase of growth in the company life cycles, which are, you know, early
onset, you know, early stage and then growth, and then you get into decline. And if you are good at what you do and not clueless,
you try to then reverse that or even avoid decline. And then so we kind of went through that in the 2020 in the 2020 era by finding a second growth spurt.
And then '23-'24 were hard largely because of what was happening with the But then in the last 9-10 months, we've started to grow again and it's great. And I told the team earlier, I I gave everybody shout-outs, hats off, and
props. I said, "Most companies don't get to experience a second growth spurt. Um you know, let's keep it up." And uh you know, as as an entrepreneur, you're like you you're nothing without your team.
pointing to that and I said, "But it doesn't mean that like success is a fait accompli, so to speak, you know?" Right. Um before we continue, we have a poll that should be going up on our YouTube page. So, go check that out if
you're interested. We want to know what should a company do to secure their future. Should they innovate at the risk of total failure, keep doing what or as some companies do, just pretend to
keep doing what they're doing anyway. So, let us know what you think is the best bet for a company to kind of secure their future. we will uh revisit those results at the end of the podcast. So, you mentioned uh
companies going through life cycles. Back in 2016, um what what was the life cycle period that WatchMojo was in and how was the YouTube landscape changing at that time? It's a great question, Black Rob. Um so,
I'm going to ask you about that one in a bit. Rob? I'm not too sure. Does it have something somewhere. some recent industry news?
I wouldn't know if I'm on a blacklist. Uh but you might be. So, so it's funny because in 2016 until June when we got hacked and until I really saw competition. Like I could sense it, but 2016, I remember
Labor Day, one of my good high school buddies was like, "My girlfriend's go." And um a couple months before that we had been hacked right before I went to Greece.
So, I was in a state of mind of like we are a sitting duck. And as much as the team, they do what they do and I love them and they have zero awareness of like the oncoming fire. You know, they're in the trenches. I respect that.
You're on top kind of um so, I remember vividly that Labor Day so, I remember vividly that Labor Day weekend when I was then stopping in Vegas and then going to San Fran to meet a gentleman who was Paul Allen, Bill
Gates's uh money manager. Sorry. Bill Gate Paul Allen was Bill Gates's co-founder at Microsoft and he had a gentleman, we'll call him Tom. It doesn't matter. Great guy. But so Tom was Paul Allen's money manager, and Paul
was Paul Allen's money manager, and Paul was enamored by social video, YouTube, and all that. And he wanted to invest, or you know, kind of join us as an advisor. And when he was doing his due diligence,
you know, it's very easy for me as a CEO founder to be appreciative and the glass to take an interest in your company, they're going to kind of look at everything. They're going to flip you over and, you know, give you a root
canal where you don't want to be inspected. And so, he was like, "Your competition." Sorry, he was like, "You have a lot of competition, and you don't seem to be taking it seriously." And so, there was
a company who, just by coincidence, happened to be in our backyard in happened to be in our backyard in Montreal. And they had adopted a very, Montreal. And they had adopted a very, um, you know, more moneyball
kind of bottom-line oriented approach to topic selection, thumbnails. Everything um, you know, very much, speak. But, um, and you happened to work there at
the time, I believe. And so, and I I'll name it. It's Valnet. It's not a big deal. It's not We'll discuss it now cuz it's few days. And my tendency would be to say nothing because, frankly,
uh, if Coca-Cola finds out that Pepsi has a rat problem, Coca-Cola is actually not going to put a spotlight on that because any normal person is like, "Well, do you [ __ ] also have a rat problem?" You know, if Pepsi learns
that Pepsi uh if if Pepsi learns that Coca-Cola like decayed teeth, they're doesn't your you know." So, it's not like generally I wouldn't. But, again, this is meant to be instructive. But, so in 2016-17,
everybody that would approach me was like, "Ash, you're a bit idealistic. You've hired all these English majors and communications majors and journalism guys and you have the liberal arts guys who are playing their banjos and, you
know, knitting. But Valnet has hired all these and you could confirm since you all these business people, these analysts. Also, all of them the founders started off in the adult industry, the porn industry.
Yeah, this is known and there's no shame. I mean, it's it's I've also always cuz when people ask me I always, you don't want to knock people. So, I formidable in that the porn industry has always been the
the porn industry has always been the trailblazer of fast and hard practices. but in my heart, in my head, in my soul and all that I was like, "But that's not where I think our beacon should be, you know?" And I wasn't even saying that's a
aiming, that's the article The Wrap that Um, when I saw this I didn't even use I factual, I just said the truth. I was share it. Yeah, and I didn't know. So, I I read it
for take a couple minutes, please. So, when were you there? What was your much. Again, this is not about them. It's more about how as an entrepreneur you have to stay true to your own principles even when people are telling
to operate. So, when were you there? What was your experience like? Cuz you approached me in 2020. Uh, I assume you had already left, but I would love to Yeah, I approached I approached you after I had left already. I'd been
working there for 6 years. I got hired in 2013 right outside uh right right out of university. So, I had just graduated with a degree in journalism and uh and editor. I was working on the website The Richest, which was a pretty big at the
time and the company was small back then. It was only 25 employees or something like that. Um, and it was actually very exciting to work there cuz it was growing fast. It was very motivating.
fast and then we um you know, hired a lot of people. The company was really growing. Eventually, they launched a YouTube division which I transferred over to and then started working on their channel Screen Rant on
YouTube among others. And then, you know, as we just mentioned thing kind of started to plateau and that's where that's where we started to as you said, there there people who demand constant growth and when that
stops, then it's kind of like they turn their attention to other things. So, the YouTube thing kind of fizzled out. I got laid off in 20 uh 19. And uh that's that's when I approached
WatchMojo as a direct competitor on the in the YouTube space. there and uh Yeah, I mean, I I know uh not one of the there and they were like, "Yeah, WatchMojo's success was, you know, but
were one of just so happen they were in our backyard. Look, I don't know too join them. I know a lot who left there to join us. A week ago, I was like, "Hey Shakespeare's birthday. We should do top 10 poets or playwrights." No way in a
[ __ ] million years would they want to do that. But, I've always believed, and I'm getting at again, we can move on. but I think the lesson I would love for
entrepreneurs and storytellers and just people to take is when you're on your journey to try to figure out your own purpose and find your own kind of course to success, let alone your path to happiness, you're going to get derailed
that are just pointing to things that are not necessarily the way to do things. And, you know, I said, "Okay, we're not going to become, you know, National Enquirer or whatever."
Um but, I did kind of talk to the team and just say, "Because we prioritize the content and because now there you know the themes we've discussed on this series, democratization of publishing, no barriers to entry for distribution."
I was like, "Guys, I am fine to always just put content first, stories first, not care about the money, be long-term greedy, not you know put people But I was like, "Y'all have to start paying attention to analytics. You have to look
attention to analytics. You have to look at what does well. We can't pretend So, in some ways, as much as I remember vividly with my uh wife, who's one of the co-founders,
and we were with friends, so we were supposed to be partying and whatnot. I remember vividly moments of like anxiety and angst cuz I was like, "All these people are coming to me who are industry pros, investors, acquirers." And they're
that?" And I was like, "I don't think it's the way to go." Now, I want to talk when I talk about denication. We never This is very anecdotal, but this is also like whatever. Like the degree of not giving a [ __ ] is off to a
whole other level. I never, being Iranian-Canadian, know nobody's going to call me demure, but I would never go up to the team who and be like, "Why don't you go write about what an amazing company this is?"
Never would I have the balls, the shame, the courage, the audacity. So, because a lot of our VPs and managers after 10-15 years were guys and gals I hired out of school and a bit green,
they would be like, "Oh, but look, so-and-so left. Clearly they were unhappy." Okay, it happens, you know, one out of 20, one out of 100, and they would go on Glassdoor. And they would be like, write just
like, "It's a online. I love democracy. I love freedom of speech. I come from a [ __ ] country that if you said, 'I like wine,' they would cut your balls different. I was like, let them speak. It's fine. Like it's a shame they never
But there's a saying where it's like a But there's a saying where it's like a CFO tells a CEO, what if we um what if we don't train our
emplo- No, what if we invest in our employees and they leave? And then the other guy goes, well, what if we don't invest in them and they stay? So, I didn't realize as well that I'm like, because we never asked people who
are happy to communicate about their experience here, we created a vacuum where people who are unhappy, naturally, they had some sense they weren't comfortable to speak up. It didn't work for them. They didn't want a 9-5 job.
and they weren't. Maybe they thought they were Spielberg and they were vegetable lasagna. It doesn't matter. But I'm like, yeah, we created this vacuum, this gap. So, for a while our Glassdoor sucked.
It was just one after another complaint and it's like we had a small team. I knew who it was. I would reply saying, thank you. It's a shame you feel this service guy, you know. But the funny thing was this this before I saw the rap
article, I got one of these generic like emails. They're like, we now because of this law in California could force Glassdoor to delete negative article. You know, I had to think of the angle.
I would never ever want anybody to remove anything bad, you know. It's just the way I am. But it again, I feel vindication because I'm like, what an organ- And we're not talking
about acne or this is a general life thing, you know. I'm like Buddha sitting here on a mountain. I was like, you have to as a young individual also be aware of these things. Like you could read two things
and like the comments, you don't know. You react. You know, the comments last week's episode. So, I was like, "Yeah, you know what? If you are not Rob, but Dick, uh whatever, Richard. You're
Richard and you're looking to work, you have to be smart. You have to read between the lines. You could read one Glassdoor or hotels.com, TripAdvisor. It's not about general. Do you ever leave a hotel when you're
that hotel? No, but it's occurred to me that especially like particularly with Amazon reviews, if I'm reading those and and it's actually helpful to see people leaving five stars and and even because
how many people go and put the five stars? positive. YEAH. WELL, IT'S NOT The reality is good places will get the good reviews, but you generally have more of a tendency to
go complain, you know? Like today, I told our bank, I said, "I'm taking away my business personally cuz I go this is the third you suck. You clearly don't care. We're moving." And they were calling me all
morning. It is unfortunately when you're unhappy that you speak up, but that doesn't represent that this bank could be otherwise really great. So, bringing it all together, jam bandi as they say in Farsi. Um when I hear people
complaining a decade ago about Miss Mojo, I take it seriously, but you also have to drown out the haters, the noise. have like 100 people that would never
leave cuz they were happy, comfortable. I mean, you've been here a few years, you know? But but again, like I paid so much attention to that one negative feedback, and I've learned, [ __ ] it. It's all good. Like it's just it's You
can't make everybody happy. So, when I saw this, that article, I was like, "Look, at the end of the day, that is the choice. You could grow, you could focus on return on capital, return on this, but that comes at a heavy expense
to people and humans. And you know, we are a big company, we have like 50 full-timers and other 50 freelancers. Sometimes when I talk about business, I say it. I go, "Hey, I don't pretend to be running General Electric or Google
Facebook, TikTok Well, TikTok's different cuz it's owned by China. But like Facebook, Google, Microsoft, all these companies got to where they are people. You know, so early on as an
choice. It's like if you care about people, then I got news for you. You cannot maximize your size. But if you don't care about that, then you could have a great company and a great environment. But you then get the
advisors who come to you and go, "Why aren't you more like these guys?" I'm back?" For the record, aired a 14-year-old getting raped. Just saying. That's what the rap article said. So, you know, when
back to the guy that when I was on vacation was emailing me, blasting me, to go. I'm like, "Yeah, this is why I didn't really put much stock in what you said. And you're [ __ ] Paul Allen's money manager. So, when little Joey
Ash said woke.' I'm like, 'Okay, thank you. Just move on. Anyway. Vivication. Somebody said like, "Oh, Ash see aggressive Ash? I don't think anybody want You want passive-aggressive
better version of Ash than crazy psychotics. And you know what? Tom Brady, the biggest sociopath ever. Embrace your sociopathy. You know, I'm serious. Harness it in healthy ways, I think.
Balance. Balance. Balance. In the In the media industry, is is WatchMojo unique in the way that we treat employees or or value value about employees, including employees. I've always believed Herb Kelleher,
founder of Southwest Airlines, who is now dead, born on the same day as I, March 12th, stakeholder. Everybody's important. He put employees happy, they'll take care of your clients. Because of the nature of
YouTube, I said audience first. I said if your audience is happy, then your then yeah, your clients, your shareholders, and everybody else. I always from the beginning was adopted a very servant leadership, but also
stakeholder mindset, because I knew it it's not even altruistic. You know, it's self-serving in the long term. So yeah, we are unique, but that's also why after 20 years we're not like a company that's worth a billion dollars. You know, I was
social thing. What that was like, are you a billionaire? I'm like, do you understand math? I'm like, how would we be What What do you think like know? Um it's a trade-off. I sleep well at night,
but it's also a journey where things used to bother me. And now even today I had an employee ask me some questions, and they were like, so-and-so. And I was and they were like, so-and-so. And I was like, you do understand I care about you
and so-and-so. But I'm like, most people in my shoes don't give a two-thirds of a willing to bend a bit, but I'm like, every time we make exceptions for people, it doesn't really work because people lose sight of perspective. But I
will take it. I love the culture we have, but I've also learned it's a bit like when I pick up my daughters, they're so lost about the real world, You know, that's not like they're not here to understand all these other
But also they're young. They're not You know, they didn't sign up for I don't it. It's like I think there's that meme of the New York Jets player Michael Clemens where he's like, you see him, he's like,
I'm in that mode. I'm not here to teach anybody Mhm. So you know, if somebody is like, oh, that." I'm like, "Okay, maybe this is why you're not where you want to be in
your life. Just go fix yourself before you come criticize us." people have opinions that they're not willing to change even if they get an this. The most close-minded [ __ ] useless people were the DEI crowd.
would just sit there and have a very rigid view of what if they thought was good or evil. They had brought nothing to the conversation. them on what real diversity is, what what real equity is, what what real
inclusion is, then they just kind of like trailed off you're like, "You're not giving me anything intellectually challenging or stimulating. You're just showing me that you're like repeating tropes and all
these things that you're supposedly against, you are manifesting that." And time for that." You know, like I don't have to prove anything to you. Like challenge me, debate me, bring something. But if you're really lost and
after a few efforts you're still lost, yeah, you know what? It's great. Here's a boat. We're going to push you off the boat or just jump off. again uh this week. Um so, going back to 2016, it was a time
when competition was growing. WatchMojo didn't really have the first mover's advantage that it did when it when it started out when YouTube was younger. Um and it was the kind of like a hyper hyper competition time. How did you guys
into your plans for the the years following that? So, when I talk to other entrepreneurs I advise or invest, I always tell them, I'm like, "You don't have to go for these BHAGs, big hairy audacious goals,
which could kill you and generally don't pan out." I said, "Just break it down into like baby steps." You know that movie Baby Steps uh um with De Niro and Bill Murray, I think. Um I was like, you could break it
think. Um I was like, you could break it into iterative things. Miss Mojo was not for a male audience, we did it for the Disney crowd. Um, you could also be a
bit more evolutionary and be like, okay, let's say we are you know, producing content and there's an element of factual or trivia. So maybe we could get into, you know, trivia and use technology to leverage all the questions
that human beings have created, auto-generate them automatically. Okay, revolutionary was like, okay, maybe we develop a show that we sell to HBO. develop a show that we sell to HBO. Much harder. Very different dynamics. So
I think for us that was a great way to also say that, hey, you know what, we might put a bit more energy into Miss Mojo because it's an easier pivot for lack of a better word. But yeah, you know what, if I'm like signing
a development deal with Sonar Entertainment to launch a show like what, I'm not going to come to the team and be like, hands-on, we're all going to get in a writer's room, which would just be fun, but a big ass distraction.
innovation, disruption, risk and all that, there's a quadrant. It's you know, evolutionary, sorry, iterative, evolutionary, revolutionary. And if you could make small bets across
those, you generally, as we demonstrated, find a second path to growth and a third, as we did, path to growth. But I do think most people get complacent, human nature.
Once you're successful, why do you do anything? Think about it. You know what I mean? Like people lose that drive. I I still believe vision, for entrepreneurs, it's ambition, vision, execution, persistence, luck,
timing, resilience, and focus. I definitely still think persistence is but not saying I like Trump at all,
but if you think of Trump and think of his stamina, the energy, relentlessness, I think that is probably something that media, you know, writers of successful
people sometimes forget. The stamina you need to stay at it need to stay at it is really, I think, what separates like winners from aspirants to win. Because everybody is
competing for the same thing. Um I'm a very persistent, resilient guy, but I also I'm like pragmatic, so sometimes I'm like this person doesn't get it. Do I want to invest time and energy to help them see
too, and I'm open to others telling me when I'm wrong. But what I realize is it's actually that drive, that stamina, you know, it's like you need that just fuel and fire, um which could be manifested as
persistence, but it's actually stronger than persistence. It's just You can be persistent, but be a low-energy mofo. You're not going to succeed. competition that cropped up around that time and has since like kind of
evaporated, where WatchMojo is still here 10 years later? What do you Yeah, I mean, I've always believed in, you know, stories of people and things and events, and I was doing this when there was no money in web video, when
there was no money in YouTube, so I will do it now whether we're making money or not. I believe in that. I do think that like a lot of um competition or a lot of phonies and, you know, wantrepreneurs and uh
you know, people who just see a near-term opportunity, but do anything, don't do something because of today, skate to where the puck is going. Where are the fish swimming? You got to plan a 1 or 2 years ahead. So,
yeah, most of our competitors, they just kind of didn't have that stamina or that maybe the the the patience or the persistence. when your former employer kind of threw in the towel of YouTube, I didn't bash
I was like, you have your own websites. I understand why you're going to put your energy there, but it was a bit nearsighted because YouTube is where the audience is. So, if in your term you don't see the KPIs or the return, yeah,
phony. And I'm not talking about them, I'm just saying in general, I see this in business all the time, you know, I I've seen it for the first 10 years when WatchMojo was still just like a expensive hobby, I was also developing
some tech projects, and those tech projects, I was like, these have to be winner take all, but they're not there yet. It's do I think in 2, 3 years they're going to be there? And most people, you know, the biggest
[ __ ] thing VCs, venture capitalists did to [ __ ] up the entire entrepreneurship mindset is putting in money and hoping that they scale things overnight with more capital, which is such a recipe for disaster, you know?
That's like cooking. [ __ ] I realized I have something on the stove, but it's low heat. It takes so much time, it takes patience. You can't crank the heat to maximum and hope that your food cooks faster, you're just going to have a
pretty shitty dish. Speaking about innovating or dying, you mentioned MTV earlier, and that's a really interesting case because, you happened with MTV where they made a a like a hard turn away from music, which
was their their bread and butter for your throughout the '90s, and into more of like a youth culture thing, doing reality TV and stuff like that. How do you evaluate that decision and and ultimately, you know, MTV
it failed to have the maybe cultural impact that it did when it was based on music, but like what's your assessment of of their decision-making there? So, I know we had a workshop. I'd also love your thoughts if you want to touch
on it. We had a workshop, the second one. The first one was copyright fair use. The second one was brand purpose, programming, people, principles, balancing it with the pursuit of profit. A lot of P's are like alliteration.
But, one of our board members was with us to chime in and she had worked at MTV at the time. And to her credit, she said, "Yeah, on the one hand, um you know, I was at MTV when we pivoted away from music videos." And
make the case that it was a foolish mistake." And after she was done, I said, "Hey, you know, great feedback, great great anecdote and analogy." But, I said, "You know, had MTV not shifted away from music and then the other crap,
music videos with the way it was going a different direction, you had Napster, you had many other thing, Kazaa, crapster, Um I'm like, "Yeah, it wasn't like MTV by
not adapting was going to survive." So, that is actually paradoxically, yeah, there you go. So, this is like again, infancy, growth, decline, death. And knowing me, I drew parallels between as a person how you could change, as a
product, and as a company. It's an article I wrote like probably 5-6 years ago. Um but, the point I'm getting at is MTV I think was doomed because of cable declining eventually and music videos.
[ __ ] bunch of accountants and lawyers to run it. You know, like I studied finance and I've always said, I'm like, I don't I'm I'm going to add a little content in the video than any of you guys do. I know it sounds ballsy and
the content, too. But, we've worked on a few projects this year where I'm sure you're like, "Fuck Ash." You know, like we don't need I know you want that line. Let it go, right? Like, you know what I'm talking
people in the story than I do. And the reality is when MTV brought the [ __ ] lawyer to run MTV? If I I studied finance. So, we never have to have a [ __ ] accountant run the company. But,
so MTV was both like micro, macro, seasonal, timely. It was just it was it it ran its course. But, for us, this is what I told the team and might sound greatest thing. It's entering its golden
era. But, get out of your [ __ ] shell. If I'm not like sitting here resting on our laurels, why the [ __ ] are any of you sitting there thinking our [ __ ] doesn't stink? Like, you have to improve. You have to change. You know,
be better than the previous [ __ ] dish I made. So, my frustration is that and grown a bit more zen. I can't be in people's faces every day and telling them like, "Be better. Hustle more. Skate faster. Chase the
won 4-2." Okay, you didn't like the two six more. But, it is challenging because I'm like, "Guys, you know what? If MTV is they're not irrelevant, but if what MTV was they
WatchMojo's not going to suck up to that?" And again, with democratization of product production, no barriers to So then, in that case, do you think it's better better idea to iterate slowly and
make incremental changes rather than just like make a hard left turn and like venture into uncharted territory just at a at a greater risk? D, all of the above. All of it, everything. You have to do everything.
What you need to do is like if you had like a portfolio, you need let's say yourself too thin. You need two things that are like iterative. You need one thing that's evolutionary. You need one thing that's
revolutionary and you need one [ __ ] behag where you're aiming for the fence where you want people to make fun of you. And that's when Michael Clemens FU FU FU. It's fine. You know, citizen what is that?
Teddy Roosevelt a citizen in the arena or whatever. I forgot the name but it's like forget the haters. You're the man in the arena. You're the one getting You know, but yeah, you have to do it all, you know, like you have to do it
all. My regret is not the iterative evolutionary things like Miss Molger adapting us to snap. My regret is listening to the losers and the idiots and the clueless and the lost at sea and not going more towards the revolutionary
totally disruptive things. Like and that's what I'm doing now more. And also I have no problem telling people, you know what? Interesting. That was a load of [ __ ] and this is why that sounds stupid because the
people need to hear that. I heard it. I heard it all my life. If I heard it, why Is that where this mad scientist article comes in which you published on context still very diplomatic. The mad scientist article was more explaining what we were
doing. You know, often times I'll get like a investor, an advisor, an employee and when I find myself repeating it is easier to write something because if I share an article, it's not like I'm
debating you. You're not going to be defensive. You're going to be like, ooh, interesting. You know what I mean? Um So the mad scientist just kind of start if you want to scroll down, I think just explained a little bit the concept of
revolutionary. Um and that's actually what I need to start thinking about, which is how do I kind of keep the trains on the track, but really start to go back and listen to my own inner voice and just do the
otherwise watch more any any company, you become MTV, you become Eastman Kodak. Right. Oh, here we have Garrett again. Here we have the article, yeah. And I believe the results are Yeah, there you
go, Henry Luce, publisher. A lot of lot of articles. There's always somebody ask me a question, I'm like, years ago. Here you go, go read this. Yeah, we have poll results from the poll
that we left earlier. So, we were asking from their perspective of a company, uh, what is their best bet and to secure their future? Innovate at the risk of dying, pretend to innovate, but just coast, or
keep milking what they're doing. And the 65% of people said risk it, risk it for the biscuit, innovate at the risk of dying. Uh, 23% said just pretend to innovate, but coast, which, you know, I guess, I don't know, would you Can you
kind of done that? Like like kind of faux innovated, but just really kept on doing the same thing? Kruger. I watched Seinfeld. I'm kidding, right? I I will say that innovate at the risk
of dying, I don't want to give too much credit to Google, but when Google's YouTube division embrace shorts, I was like, let's give them credit, they're willing to burn the house down. When I see if I Google, you know, if I'm going
Buenos Aires, I'm like, what are some good hotels that and I see that they're answering Gemini, I think is theirs, they're not Yeah, Gemini's theirs. When I see them disrupting themselves, I'm like, okay, so they're like willing
You could criticize, um, their CEO on certain grounds, but I'm like, hey, you know, in in in the when I've watched them play, I'm like, they are innovating at the risk of dying. Pretend to innovate but just coast. Not
anymore, but that was Microsoft in until um Satya Nadella, the current CEO. And I would say he is probably the CEO of the century that is not a founder. Elon, you could hate him, but Elon is a
entrepreneur. Mhm. You know, and Steve Jobs was the OG and the goat. Um but I think Microsoft was like that under Steve Ballmer.
And then keep milking it. I mean, that's more traditional, right? I mean, those are the Eastman Kodaks who like who like we don't want to get into digital photography, let's say. Or many other companies that just are like,
we're good. We're making money. And what I experienced like 10 years ago when I would tell media executives about YouTube, milk it, but I could see their complacency and laziness because the CEO
of the media company of MTV, basically, was like, well, this isn't my problem. In a couple of years, I'm going to retire or in 4 years, my contract is up and I'm going to go to another company. And then the [ __ ]
who's going to replace me, he or she has to worry about this. Why would I worry respectfully, I'm like, I think your time is off. I'm like, this is your problem now. And you're going to have a harder time finding a replacement,
succession planning, whatever whatever you think your pension is worth, it ain't worth that, my friend. Um but the keep milking it is media. I mean, every media company, like I used to go meet Kevin. Kevin and I used to go
meet every [ __ ] Canadian media company. My [ __ ] god. We would meet them every 6 to 18 months. They would just repeat the same [ __ ] They're all dead. You know, the newspaper companies, all
dead. We met with Corus. Useless company. I That's very I I'll tell you what. From a financial perspective, when you just look at their P&L and their stock. Operationally, people I that I
there. Um Bell Media, you know, Bell Media we've spoken to them sporadically every 5 years they come up for air and they're like digital this and that, but they're just sold but it but Bell Media is part
of BCE, it's a telco, they don't care. But other companies that were pure play just the weatherman. I'm telling you what's happening. You don't want to go you have no umbrella, yeah, you're going to catch a cold, you know, what do you
want me to tell you?" And now Michael Clements, FUFUFU, clean your mess anymore. If you look at the comments of some of our videos, like just being real, WatchMojo does get accused of milking it
you guys are crazy. You guys find one thing that works. I mean, I love you all, but it's like tone it down because you are I understand, your heart's in the right place. Not you, all of you.
but you guys but I also don't want to be a hypocrite, it's balance. So, when something works, I get it cuz you want to be like, "Look, Dad, like I cleaned my room, I cleaned the basement." I So, I I'm not I am but I'm
very empathetic, I get it. But this was like the challenge for the last couple like, "Let's do this." And I would get so much resistance, but I was like, do you understand that we all when I pushed the top 10 format or geek culture
you're like, "Is there a shrink in the building?" Like Batman doesn't exist, like, "Humor me. Lie to me, Jerry, you know?" So, yeah, but we also don't milk
it. Like we are more you know, ethical. Like we don't do things that are just clickbaity. And it's all relative. Like I understand why you know, the the accusation which I'm like that sometimes we put in an entry
or do something to get people riled up. I'm like, "No, [ __ ] we just overlooked something." Or or that happens to be our opinion and YEAH, AND THAT'S that's the best But no, no, no, I mean, look, I think it's all
relative. Like again, compared to the other company in the city that shall remain nameless where you worked at and was taken down by the rap, they were accused more of that. And I think in the 2010 [ __ ] Zerp era, it made sense.
But clearly, I don't think that is where the world is going when there's more voices, more authenticity, and you know, more sincerity in a voice. I don't think anybody By the way, I'm sure people are like, "Ash is even more unhinged today
anybody could accuse us of lacking authenticity and sincerity. It's just I wouldn't do this to come and read like a boilerplate corporate answer. Um so, no, were to come off the street and be like, "WatchMojo milked it." I would defend my
team and be like, "No, this is the way our editorial is. They don't compared to these other examples." But vis-a-vis my team, when I feel you guys are too much on one end, yeah, it is my role to come and maybe ruffle some
feathers and be like, "Guys, we need to change. We need to adapt, you it's like balance. You get internal, external, you get mistakes. Looking back on your 2020 plans, are you
satisfied with what what WatchMojo has accomplished? Was it a success? You know, again, the whole kid born in Iran could have died here, you know, I'm very grateful. So, I, the individual, I mean, nothing but gratitude. I love the
team. I think they see that. But as the CEO, I tell them, I go, "I'm I'm playing I go, "You don't want some other guy I myself may one day be like, "I'm bringing in Dick, who's a real dick, and
he's going to be running the show." Um, I not really and I alluded to it. I didn't want to hurt people's feelings. came back. Oh, another Vindicación.
I've never blackmailed anybody. And blackmailed, obviously not black Mhm. Never blacklisted anybody. So, I that I'm working on a few of these projects. They've kind of thrown him at
do this, you get to work with this gentleman." And I know him. I interviewed him. But he was like, "Oh, you know, when I resigned to go get a master's." And we didn't know where he was going. He was like, "I knew that
like the door would be open for me." type of thing. maybe I need to change that." I'm like, "Yeah, why do you think we're not going to blacklist you, but there's no fait accompli that you could just leave and
come back, right?" But what I'm getting at is you you want to work with people who are comfortable pushing the envelope and, you know, take risks, push when
they need to, but buy into the system, right? So, for us, you know, when I look right? So, for us, you know, when I look at more 2030 than 2020, I don't dwell on the mistakes. I'm like, "We are here today, which is good." But
then when I make decisions going forward for 2030, that's where I'm like, you have to understand why we maybe could have done more through the Watch Mojo 2020 initiative and why we're going to maybe hurt some feelings,
push forward and break some walls because of what we did in the previous Okay. Good answer. I was looking for I was looking forward to what we're going to talk about next week to preview that
episode. Um, but Uh, yeah, if you want to wrap up anything for about today. Well, so next week, actually I think I like it. It's the whole brand building in the era of vanity from the Expos to
the Yankees. I mean, when you hear that, what the hell do you think? from the Expos to the Yankees? Well, Expos is just a tragedy in my eyes. Like I I relish any opportunity to talk about them because it's just kind
of like a sore spot. I miss I miss baseball over here in Montreal. But I that, too. And the Yankees, I mean, they're they're the brand name of the MLB, I guess. So,
Yeah, so basically coming out of WatchMojo 2020, like when we started that initiative in 2016, eventually, not that you start drinking your own Kool-Aid at all, but more saying, "Hey, maybe we could aim for the
fence, be bigger." So, we went and we just went crazy over hiring, investing, and bringing in a lot of executives, and doing live shows. It was an intense period, you know? So, we'll talk about that. We'll we'll dive
we'll talk about that. We'll we'll dive into, you know, managing your own pride. A little bit of pride is good, hubris is bad. We all have egos. So, that's I think what what's on deck next week.
it, and can't wait to see what the commenters have to say about today's Nothing but love. Nothing but love. Some time soon. Always great talking to you. Cheers.
see you next time. Take care.