Episoder

  • The flood of allegations around the world's most famous influencer range from petty YouTube drama to serious (and possibly illegal) safety issues. MrBeast is very popular in our household, but the raft of controversy makes us question whether our kids should keep enjoying their favorite YouTube channel.

    This week, I break down why The Beast is under fire, and how the controversy snowballed in recent months, leading to a parenting moral quandary.

    Plus: Fake and AI-generated product reviews are officially BANNED in the U.S. But can it be enforced? And details about some fantastic upcoming guests.
    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

  • It's a busy week here in my house, so while I'm lining up fresh interviews for you, please enjoy this feed drop from my other show, where we interviewed two wonderful video game speedrunners who race through one of the chillest games ever made: "Stardew Valley."

    - Originally published on January 13, 2023 -

    Where RUSHING into marriage is a good idea!

    Speed running Super Mario Bros. is a straightforward endeavor. Whoever saves the princess fastest gets the record. But what about open-ended sims, where you set your own goals?

    This week, we were so mesmerized by Stardew Valley speedrunners on GDQ that we had to invite them on the show. Lee (@atwentysomethingloser) and Lisa (@lichatton) are Stardew-obsessed Twitch streamers who have dissected the game to find the fastest ways to marry specific villagers, complete Community Center bundles, catch every fish, and other in-game milestones, often achieving these runs in mere hours.

    Their strategies involve animation canceling, min/maxing gifts, and a lot of sleep! Lee and Lisa share how they got into the wild world of speeding through one of the chillest games of all time, how it has increased their love for it, and share what else they play after thousands of hours of Stardew.

    Follow and subscribe to Lee and Lisa!

    https://www.twitch.tv/atwentysomethingloser

    https://www.twitch.tv/lichatton

    For more video game community conversations, subscribe to "Colette & Matt Have Entered the Chat," wherever you get podcasts: https://haveenteredthechat.com/
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  • You and everyone you love will die. There's no way around it. Yet we rarely talk or think about the topic until we have to. For the first time in human history, we are "living longer and dying slower." That's good news, but it also creates a cultural disassociation with the reality of death.

    But there's a growing movement - online and IRL - around death literacy. It advocates for ongoing conversation and education about this universal part of life. Just like exercise, finances, or playing piano, how can we be successful at something if we don't learn, practice, and grow?

    That's the mission of Bevival, an online community and resource devoted to changing the cultural conversation around death. It's the brainchild of Caren Martineau, an entrepreneur who suddenly realized she has more time behind her than ahead.

    Jade Adgate is a death midwife, who supports people with terminal diagnoses and the families left behind. She also empowers a large community on social media by sharing her work and insights to help grievers she can't reach in person.

    Together, they produce the Exit Interviews podcast, a regular conversation with leading authors and philosophers about how we can make meaning from "the final frontier."

    This week, Caren and Jade sit down with (a reluctant) Matt to discuss their calling around death literacy, their mission to engage the Internet on difficult topics, how death has become commercialized in the 20th and 21st centuries, and why that dehumanizes mortality.

    Connect with Caren at http://bevival.com

    Follow Jade on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/the.farewell.library

    Subscribe to the Exit Interviews podcast: https://www.bevival.com/books-podcast-death-literacy

    This show is made possible by listener support: https://www.patreon.com/influencepod

    Watch & subscribe on YouTube! https://www.youtube.com/@InfluencePodcast

    Join our Discord community! https://discord.gg/influencepod
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  • The surreal machinima "Skibidi Toilet" has been viewed 65 BILLION times across platforms, attracting the attention of Hollywood explosion enthusiast Michael Bay. The mega producer (Transformers, Pirates of the Caribbean) has licensed the bizarre web series to make a feature length film or TV series.

    The Gen Alpha meme generator is more than just a flash in the pan - it has real narrative structure, and the Skibidiverse has been rapidly expanding over the last year. Even if your kids have never seen a Skibidi video, they are definitely talking about it on the playground. I break down whether toilet heads make any cultural or financial sense in a theater near you.

    Meanwhile, two extraordinary online child safety bills are making their way to the U.S. Senate with bi-partisan support. If passed, they would dramatically reduce the data collected on kids, and cut off the algorithmic content that is so damaging to their mental health. What would social media actually look like if we could make it safe for minors? And could these regulations help adults, too?

    Plus: Would you quit your job to be an influencer? 50% of adults would if they could. Many of those are already trying. 

    And YouTube's biggest stars are pissed that AI is learning from the captions on their videos. Where is the philosophical line between fair use and theft when it comes to large language models? And how will we protect creators who may soon be out-matched by "synthetic" video content?

    This show is made possible by listener support: https://www.patreon.com/influencepod

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  • When we report a spammer, a scammer, or online harassment, where does it go? Who decides what gets removed or banned? Bots can do some of the work, but when it comes to messy online emotions, we need human expertise for context and judgement.

    So who are these heroes? What do they see all day? And how does content moderation work on a global scale, where the ethics, laws, and cultures of different platforms are so subjective?

    This week on INFLUENCE, Alice Hunsberger breaks down this complicated world. She's the VP of Trust & Safety and Content Moderation at PartnerHero, a company that staffs some of our favorite social media apps with specialized teams that weed out bad actors to ensure everyone has a safe experience online.

    Alice explains why this crucial work is often unnoticed or deeply misunderstood by the public, why viewing humanity's worst behavior for a job is so punishing, the impossible tasks for regulators, and why she remains optimistic about the Internet despite the constant flow of harmful content.

    For more on the Trust & Safety industry, subscribe to Alice's newsletter and podcast: https://alicelinks.com/

    This show is made possible by listener support: https://www.patreon.com/influencepod

    Watch the show on YouTube! https://www.youtube.com/@influencepodcast

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    Call the show and leave a message: (347)-871-6548
    Email me with guest & trivia suggestions! [email protected] (NOICE)

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  • When Catie Osborn ( @Catieosaurus ) had a medical emergency, she thought she was losing her mind — perhaps experiencing early onset dementia. But after further evaluation, she got a much different diagnosis: ADHD.

    Suddenly, her entire life snapped into focus: Intense fixation and extreme boredom, difficulty maintaining friendships, the crushing burden of everyday tasks, and in her own words: "I didn't know how to People."

    She deeply educated herself about the spectrums of ADHD, autism, and their corollaries like anxiety and depression. Then, when she lost her job as a Renaissance fair director during COVID, she began educating the Internet about the struggles and triumphs of the neurodivergent. Her deeply personal videos on TikTok and Instagram caught fire. 3 million followers later, she now works full time as a speaker, author, podcaster, and social media advocate for neurodivergence and mental health.

    Specifically, she observed a unique connection between ADHD and intimacy. And when no one was talking about neurodivergent sex online, she became a unique advocate for that as well.

    This week, Catie and Matt talk about the rapid rise in ADHD awareness, its ongoing stigma and misrepresentation, the empowering (and sometimes life-saving) impact her content has on her audience, how to make a living as a science communicator, her unique brand of adult "spicy" content, table-top RPGs, answers to your questions and voicemails, and why getting doxed by online trolls brought her closer with her mom.

    Follow Catie and learn more about her work:
    https://catieosaurus.com/
    https://www.tiktok.com/@catieosaurus
    https://www.instagram.com/catieosaurus

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    This show is made possible by listener support: https://www.patreon.com/influencepod

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  • At the age of 7, Jacob Simon set out to become a world-class figure skater. He competed around the world and was training for the Olympics when a dislocated shoulder derailed his career. Devastated but not defeated, he made a conscious choice to focus on the positive.
    His other skills as a writer and artist came in handy when he started sharing short, personal videos on Instagram and TikTok about the climate crisis. But these were not about rising temps or dire warnings.
    All of Jacob's stories feature GOOD news about climate progress and hope for the future: animals bouncing back from extinction, governments passing green laws, renewable energy breakthroughs, and regular people making a huge impact on their communities.
    Turns out, the Internet was also exhausted from two decades of doom scrolling. Jacob's daily stories of progress have garnered him millions of views and hundreds of thousands of followers, who rely on him to cut through the darkness of our media diet.
    This week on INFLUENCE, Jacob and Matt discuss his new life as a science communicator, why social media (and news media) bias toward "bad" news, the rigorous research he puts into every video, the stories that most-inspire his audience, the ingenious way he makes a living, and what we all can do to help the climate, even when it seems futile.
    This show is made possible by listener support: https://www.patreon.com/influencepod
    Start your 14-day FREE trial of Zencastr here: zencastr.com?via=mattsilverman
    Join our Discord community! https://discord.gg/influencepod
    Call the show and leave a message: (347)-871-6548
    Email me with guest & trivia suggestions! [email protected] (NOICE)
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  • I'm on vacation this week, but very happy to share this interview we did on another show, with Norman Caruso (The Gaming Historian) back in 2021.
    If you enjoy games as much as we do, check out "Colette & Matt Have Entered the Chat," wherever you get podcasts: https://haveenteredthechat.com/
    -- Original Show Notes from May 28, 2021 --
    Norman Caruso, aka The Gaming Historian, has been meticulously documenting the history of video games (and their weird peripherals!) on YouTube since 2008. It took him 7 years before this passion project became a full-time job. More than 90 million views later, his channel is among the most rigorous and well-respected in the world of games journalism. Norman has covered topics as ubiquitous a Tetris and Super Mario Bros. 3, all the way down to failed tech like the Sega Mega Modem and an IRL fishing module for the Game Boy.
    We chat with Norman about how he got his start, why primary-source historical research takes so long, how he chooses topics, why it's OK to be wrong sometimes, and why you may never see a Pokémon video on his channel.
    Subscribe to The Gaming Historian on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCnbvPS_rXp4PC21PG2k1UVg
    This show is made possible by listener support: https://www.patreon.com/influencepod
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  • When Mark Malkoff was in 8th grade, he wrote a letter to Phil Hartman, one of his comedy heroes on "Saturday Night Live." He assumed Hartman was too famous and busy to look at fan mail. Except, Hartman *did* respond with a heartfelt note.
    For Mark, this (and many other encounters) cemented a life-long obsession with comedy and late night TV — so much so that he moved to New York City and became an audience coordinator at "The Colbert Report" and "Late Night with David Letterman." He was touching the TV biz, but he wasn't writing or performing, and the grueling hours were catching up. That's when he turned to the Internet.
    Mark is known for his creative and wacky challenge videos (like living in IKEA for a week, or drinking something at every Starbucks in NYC). But his encyclopedic knowledge of late night TV began to shine when he started "The Carson Podcast," a 400 episode love letter to "The Tonight Show With Johnny Carson," in which he interviewed many people involved in its production - from the guy who held the curtain for 20 years, to legends like Carol Burnett, Jimmy Buffett, Brooke Shields, Mel Brooks, and Michael J. Fox.
    Recently, Mark launched a new podcast called "Inside Late Night," which covers the generation of comedy that came after Carson — "Saturday Night Live," David Letterman, Conan O'Brien, "The Daily Show," and more. His candid and meticulous conversations with the writers and performers who've made us laugh for decades often unearth showbiz stories that have never been told before.
    Mark joins Matt to discuss why viral videos don't pay the bills, getting deep and personal with podcasts, the savvy way he gets into celebrity inboxes, being mistaken for Stephen Colbert, getting Lorne Michaels' autograph, and that time Adam Sandler gave him his phone number.
    Subscribe to "Inside Late Night with Mark Malkoff" wherever you get podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/inside-late-night-with-mark-malkoff/id1745253634
    This show is made possible by listener support: https://www.patreon.com/influencepod
    Join our Discord community! https://discord.gg/influencepod
    Call the show and leave a message: (347)-871-6548
    Email me with guest & trivia suggestions! [email protected] (NOICE)
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  • Mike Johnston was living the dream. His band was signed to a major label. He was touring the world, playing for thousands of adoring fans, and making good money. But something was missing.
    He didn't know what, until a friend told him how happy he looked when he was teaching drums, rather than performing. That's when he figured out he has an "educator's soul." So he stepped back from the band and taught drums full time. It was exhausting, and this income potential was capped by the hours in the week. To make up for a lesson, he recorded a session and dumped it onto a fledgling website called "YouTube." That's where everything changed.
    Today, Mike's drum instruction videos reach millions of curious enthusiasts and dedicated musicians. He uses YouTube and his website to teach exponentially more people than he could possibly address with in-person lessons alone. Back in 2006/2007, he risked his entire career to build drum education the way *he* wished he could learn. The big unknown was whether others wanted it, too. (Narrator: They did.)
    This week, Matt sits down with Mike to discuss the fascinating evolution of online music lessons, where he gets his inspiration for new lessons, why he never watches other drum lesson videos, and why he's not afraid of AI taking his job.
    Check out Mike's Lessons to learn more: https://www.mikeslessons.com/
    This show is made possible by listener support: https://www.patreon.com/influencepod
    Join our Discord community! https://discord.gg/influencepod
    Call the show and leave a message: (347)-871-6548
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  • “Fake news,” conspiracy theories, and click-bait are no stranger to all our Internet feeds. When we spot it, we may block an account or kindly refer a relative to a more reputable source. But what about the misinformation we can’t even see? Specifically, content in other languages, created for online communities we can’t possibly access?
    For the relatively small community of Vietnamese-speaking immigrants in the U.S., there are almost no reliable media outlets to serve news in their native language. And strange entities have sprouted up to fill the void, often mixing far-right conspiracies with legitimate news to create “information disorder,” a particularly insidious brand of propaganda.
    This week on INFLUENCE, investigative data journalist and journalism professor Lam Thuy Vo joins Matt to discuss the complexities of consuming a balanced news diet in the Vietnamese-American community. She has written numerous pieces for The Markup (a non-profit tech journalism site) about the “Languages of Misinformation,” and a mysterious YouTuber who produces a shocking amount of very dubious Vietnamese-language “news.” Who is she? Who is behind her channel? And what’s the goal?
    Lam also profiles a heroic Vietnamese-American grandmother who took it upon herself to translate reputable news sources to combat the misinformation she was seeing in her community’s social media bubbles. These forces paint a picture of a very complicated voting block that – if misinformed by the Internet – can significantly impact local and national elections.
    Their wide-ranging discussion goes deep on what it means to be media literate in a world of deepfakes, AI, and algorithms that care very little for languages that are not English.
    Read Lam’s extraordinary work here: https://themarkup.org/languages-of-misinformation/2024/05/22/the-inside-story-of-the-youtube-influencer-who-peddles-misinformation-to-vietnamese-communities
    https://themarkup.org/people/lam-thuy-vo
    And follow her here: https://x.com/lamthuyvo
    This show is made possible by listener support: https://www.patreon.com/influencepod
    Join our Discord community! https://discord.gg/influencepod
    Call the show and leave a message: (347)-871-6548
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  • The early days of YouTube were for home movies, cat videos, and short vlogs. But in the summer of 2006, something emerged from Wisconsin that would change our perception of what Internet video was capable of. “Chad Vader: Day Shift Manager” tells the classic story of Darth Vader’s younger brother, who commands a middle-management job at the local grocery store, rather than a Death Star.
    But “Chad” was more than just a hilarious Star Wars parody. It had the production values of a fully-fledged sitcom: Multiple actors and plot lines, costumes, sets, a musical score, sharp writing, and legit cinematography. The Internet — and YouTube corporate — took notice.
    Before “Like & Subscribe” was a thing, YouTube featured Chad Vader on its homepage, which reached millions of eyeballs and generated serious heat around the series. Fans began demanding new episodes, and YouTube realized the new potential of its platform. It was starting to shift from a novelty site, to a loyalty destination.
    Chad is the brainchild of Aaron Yonda and Matt Sloan, improv comedians from Madison, Wisconsin, who had been making sketch comedy videos for public access TV and film festivals. After Chad Vader was canceled by Channel 101 and ignored by the Los Angeles establishment, they decided to check out this whole “YouTube thing.” The success of the series (and other emerging creators) prompted YouTube to roll out its advertising partner program. Yonda and Sloan’s channel, Blame Society Films, became one of the first ever to monetize. Chad’s popularity lead to brand partnerships, contract work, and collaborations. But despite its huge success and even an award from George Lucas himself, Hollywood never figured out how to translate a Star Wars parody sitcom to traditional TV.
    This week on INFLUENCE, Aaron and Matt chat with the Other Matt about their origin story, the evolution of their audience, the “lunacy” of Internet comments, why YouTube sketch comedy is dying out, voicing the REAL Darth Vader for TV and video games, and the long-running series their fans love and support today.
    Subscribe to Blame Society Films: https://www.youtube.com/@blamesocietyfilms
    Beer and Board Games: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL49WgzlbhrT0kCIoZQukx-xbwFjSQhYFQ
    Game Society Pimps: https://www.youtube.com/@GameSocietyPimps
    Junkyard Joust: https://www.youtube.com/@JunkyardJoust
    Welcome to the Basement: http://welcometothebasementshow.com/
    This show is made possible by listener support: https://www.patreon.com/influencepod
    Join our Discord community! https://discord.gg/influencepod
    Call the show and leave a message: (347)-871-6548
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  • Chelsea Laufer went to a prestigious film school. She got a job in TV production, and then in animation. But it wasn't until she uploaded her *own* creations to the Internet that her life turned magical.
    Chelsea VFX makes inspired, short-form digital magic tricks where she disappears into hula hoops, takes a dip in her own cup of coffee, and changes the color of her sweater with a snap. Her visual effects skills rival Hollywood movies, and her flair for short-form surprises racked up millions of followers and (likely) 1 billion views. Her motto is, "If you can think of it, you can make it happen" — at least in the world of digital manipulation. But when her fans tell her she should work for Marvel or Disney, she has one huge reason she prefers to create for the Internet.
    This week, Chelsea shares her rules for magical short-form storytelling, why she's the worst person to watch a movie with, and the fascinating tale of her most-viewed video which went INCREDIBLY viral (500 million views!) for all the wrong reasons.
    Plus: Trivia is BACK!
    Follow Chelsea IMMEDIATELY:
    📸 https://www.instagram.com/queenchelseavfx/
    🎵 https://www.tiktok.com/@queenchelsea
    This show is made possible by listener support: https://www.patreon.com/influencepod
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  • When I was coming up in media and learning about online video around 2010-2011, Craig Benzine (known to the Internet as @wheezywaiter ) was a big inspiration. His videos were so absurd, so fast, and so funny. I felt like he was speaking to a new kind of audience. "YouTuber" was starting to become a job, and being ridiculous on the Internet could pay the rent. Loyal subscribers and conversations from the comments section were the gold standard.
    But as YouTube became more algorithmic, Craig's channel started to stagnate. His core audience was remained, but the growth had stopped. He felt completely stuck, for about 5 years. Then, in 2018, he made a radical change to his content that doubled his audience — from 500,000 to 1 million subs — in just a year.
    I'm thrilled to talk to Craig about making Internet videos for 16+ years(!), and what drove him to "make a movie every day." We discuss how YouTube editing became a unique artform, why getting 30 views and 1 comment from an online stranger was the best feeling in the world, the years he toiled in obscurity before the Internet finally took notice, and the re-invention of his channel.
    Plus: Your voicemail!
    Subscribe to WheezyWaiter on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@wheezywaiter/
    This show is made possible by listener support: https://www.patreon.com/influencepod
    Join our Discord community! https://discord.gg/influencepod
    Call the show and leave a message: (347)-871-6548
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  • The mysterious Jack Rhysider talks to hackers, cyber criminals, bank robbers, crypto scammers, (real!) spies, CIA agents, and penetration testers. Because his job sends him to the darkest corners of the Internet, his true identity is not known. But that never stops him from sharing how his extraordinary podcast - Darknet Diaries - comes together. From the kernel of an idea, to sweeping stories full of twists and turns, his true crime episodes started with the InfoSec crowd, and quickly gained mass appeal. Jack joins Matt to discuss his obsession with security and privacy, his journey from IT to blogging to podcasting, how he learned from the world's best audio storytellers, the moment he knew people really loved his show, why he loves to make things that are not sustainable, and the possibility of a new podcast in the works.
    Check out Darknet Diaries (True stories from the dark side of the Internet): https://darknetdiaries.com/
    This show is made possible by listener support: https://www.patreon.com/influencepod
    Watch & subscribe on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@InfluencePodcast
    Join our Discord community! https://discord.gg/influencepod
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  • Oh hey there! Matt here. It's been a minute, but if you're subscribed to this feed, I have a big update for you. 2G1P is now INFLUENCE, and I'm very excited (and nervous!) to be taking the reigns of a show we are so proud of. All the details you need to know are in this ep, and down below. I hope you'll join me for this next chapter!
    Help me reach 1,000 subscribers (even if you don't listen on YouTube!): https://www.youtube.com/@InfluencePodcast
    This show is made made possible with listener support: https://www.patreon.com/influencepod
    Join our amazing Discord community: discord.gg/influencepod
    Email me with your dream guest! [email protected]  (noice!)
    Call me and leave a voicemail! (347) 871-6548
    Connect with me: https://twitter.com/Matt_Silverman
    https://www.instagram.com/matt_silverman/
    -Show Description-
    What does it really take to make a living (and an impact) on the Internet today?
    Join Matt Silverman (who has been covering online culture for 15+ years) in conversation with YouTubers, musicians, podcasters, streamers, journalists, TikTokers and more about turning creativity into a job, building community on ever-changing platforms, and their complex relationships with huge online audiences.
    INFLUENCE is the relaunch of 2 GIRLS 1 PODCAST, a weekly comedy/interview show about fascinating online communities, which ran for 7 years and nearly 300 episodes.
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  • Happy new year! We wanted to share an update about some truly unexpected circumstances, and explain that the show (and all Patreon contributions) will be paused while we figure things out.
    We hope you'll still hang with us on Discord, and please get in touch if you have any questions:
    discord.gg/2g1p
    [email protected]
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  • This week we're joined by an EXTREMELY special guest. You might even say ... it's a Christmas miracle.
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  • Academic researchers have typically kept to universities and book publishing. But as the Web was maturing in the mid 2000s, blogs and social media accounts devoted to history attracted significant audiences. It turns out lots of people (besides professors) wanted to learn about stuff like: The Middle Ages.
    Danièle Cybulskie (known as the "5 Minute Medievalist" online) is an author and historian who began pulling medieval research out of the library and onto the Web, much to the chagrin of the academic world. But she was clearly ahead of her time. These days, her mission to make medieval studies more accessible has turned into a fulltime online career. Her show "The Medieval Podcast" is a favorite of esteemed professors and long-haul truckers alike — anyone who loves knights and castles and wants to learn more about what life was really like between 500 and 1,000 CE.
    Alli and Lindsey speak with Danièle about how she got interested in Medieval studies, the online community that has formed around it, and why we are still so obsessed with chivalry, lords, and peasants across every form of media.
    Follow Danièle: https://twitter.com/5minmedievalist
    And check out The Medieval Podcast: https://www.medievalists.net/category/podcast/
    Support 2G1P on Patreon! https://www.patreon.com/2G1P
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  • Alli is away being a lady businessman, so Lindsey and Matt discuss why "Deep Space 9" and "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" were WAY ahead of their time, a Christmas dive bar in Seattle, and which Christmas movies are the best.
    We want to hear your opinions, so call the hotline, email us, or let us know in the Discord!
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    Call the show and leave a message! (347) 871-6548  
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