Sam Harris' Guilt Free Internet Business Model | Joe Rogan

And as you know, we were talking about earlier with your, with the way you do yours, you used to use Patreon and now you use your own website after the Sargon of Akkad incident, which you nobly stepped back away from Patreon now. Or not so nobly, depending on what you think of Sargon of Akkad. Well, it's not even that. It's, yeah. Well, even- There's so many misconceptions about what happened there and I tried to clear them up on my podcast, but yeah, there's an interesting implication to not taking ads. I think what's happening, and this is much bigger than even podcasting, I think I'd be interested to know what you feel about this. I mean, you are the quintessence of the successful ad model in podcasting, right? It's like, this is working fantastically well for you and for people like Tim Ferriss and probably Mark Marin. I mean, there's some, it's kind of like a winner take all thing happening in this space where ads are working great. And I am a really, also a highly successful example of the support model. It's like the PBS model or the NPR model. And what's weird is that I can't like, that we, you and I are both surrounded by people who have podcasts, want to have podcasts and are asking us for advice about how to succeed and how to monetize. And like, I'm not even in a place where I can recommend my model to anyone else, right? Because it's a very, you know, it's very hit or miss. I mean, I just happen to have developed an audience that will support my work. And you had developed that audience previously, ironically enough on YouTube. There's a lot of YouTube debates. Well yeah, just random people putting my content on their YouTube channels. Right. Well not, yeah, mostly debates, right? Yeah. And as a, you know, as an author, but it was just the podcast grew. And I had this sort of forced choice where am I going to go the ad route or not? And I found that, I mean, I have two things to say, you know, fairly strongly against ads, but really only one of them applies to me. And I don't think it applies to you or Tim or anyone else. I just felt personally, I couldn't use ads because of such as what my platform is and the kinds of topics I'm engaging. And it just didn't work. I mean, there was nothing highbrow enough where I felt like my credibility wasn't getting subtly undermined by shilling for it. I mean, it could be something that I just legit loved. And it could have been the Oxford English dictionary, you know, like, you guys, this is the best dictionary in the world. You guys should use it. I still couldn't do it. And I tried it with the only thing I took on as a sponsor was Audible. And I did that for some weeks. And then it just, you know, I love Audible, but it just felt wrong. And so I decided to just experiment with a different business model. And it's working for me, but it's, I don't think it can work for most people. And I view that as a problem. And the thing that I think is interesting is that there's this is much bigger than podcasting. So you have like, you have Facebook on the one hand, which is just a totally free platform where the users don't even realize that they're not the customers. They're the actual product, right? The users are having their attention sold to advertisers. And it's this enormous business. And on the other end of the digital spectrum, you have Netflix, which is just a stark paywall, right? And there's no way in, but to pay the subscription. And, you know, that's, and, you know, Netflix could run ads and get more money if they wanted to, but they're, you know, they're not doing that. And presumably won't do that. And I'm hoping, just generally speaking, that the digital future looks much more like Netflix and much less like Facebook. And because I see what ads has ads have done is they've anchored everyone to the illusion of free. Everyone expects their digital content for free, except in places like Netflix, right? So like if when you release a comedy special, when you release your next hour and you sell it to Netflix, I would imagine there are very few people in your fan base who are thinking, well, fuck Joe Rogan. Why didn't he just put that out on YouTube? Right? Why is this on Netflix? They sort of understand that this piece of content is belongs on that shelf and that if they want it, they have to subscribe to Netflix. Whereas if you did something slightly different, but functionally the same, if you put it on Vimeo and charge people $5 or whatever, you know, Vimeo on demand, I think you'd get a lot more pain, right? People would say, well, fuck you, you greedy bastard. Like you're already doing great. Just release your stuff. Right? And I view that as a problem. It's like, it's like a psychological problem. People have been anchored to the ad subsidized model more or less everywhere and they expect everything for free. And in my world, I'm trying to just to continually brook that expectation and push people into a different sense of you get what you pay for. And so that the hybrid model I've created for myself is I'm putting more stuff behind a paywall, right? I mean, so that this is, it's not just pure sponsorship of otherwise free content, but I'm very personally, I'm very uncomfortable with the idea that if someone actually can't afford it, they can't get access to my content. So I just tell people, if you really can't afford the stuff behind my paywall or you really can't afford my meditation app, just send us an email and we'll give it to you for free. Right? So yeah, I've heard that. I was like, this guy's crazy. I mean, it's actually, it's actually in the pricing in the app store for my meditation app. It's like, there's the pricing and then below that there's, if you can't afford this, you know, here's the, here's the email address. I think that's fantastic. And so that's free. Yeah, I'm splitting it that way, but I'm raising prices. So it's like, it's like a certain, because I think everything is too cheap in the, in the digital space. I think, I think we're anchored to, I mean, there are people who will spend $5 a day on a cup of coffee every day for the rest of their lives. And yet if you told them this podcast or this app that they, that they say is incredibly valuable to them is going to cost them $5 a month, they feel raped, right? You know, so it's, you know, and I completely understand it because I know what it's like to hit a paywall and think, I can't get my credit card out again. I'm not going to pay for this. I'm going to find this information somewhere else. So we've all been anchored to this thing. And, you know, something is going to win in the end. I mean, I, you know, I think at some point, you know, it's going to look much more like Netflix or much more like Facebook. And I'm, I'm, I mean, I'm throwing my lot in with the former, but you know, it really is the wild west. Well, the Netflix thing is different because Netflix has programs that cost a lot of money to create. This podcast is very easy. You're my friend. I call you up. Hey, you want to do a podcast? You come on over here. I mean, obviously we had to pay for all this equipment, but other than that, it's just in bandwidth and rent and all that stuff. Other than that, it just goes up. Right. Whereas you do a comedy special across hundreds of thousands of dollars. You have to secure a venue. You have to hire staff. I mean, it's a big deal. It's, it's, that's, and that's an easy thing in terms of like bang for their buck, what, what Netflix will get out of it. If you do a television show, I mean, my God, you, you, you need to hire hundreds of people. There's wardrobe and makeup and set and there's writers and producers and executives and everybody has to go over the script with a fine tooth comb. It's incredibly, incredibly strenuous. There's a lot going on when you create a television, like stranger things or something like that. I mean, you have so much special effects. And so to ask for that for free seems to me seems ridiculous. Well, yeah, but, but except the, I mean, so I'm kind of split again, I'm running on two tracks here. An app is much more like a television show surprisingly than, than it is like a podcast. But even if it's just a podcast, if you want to build something, if you want to build a media company, like, you know, like, like, let's say you were, let's say you were asking for support for this otherwise free podcast. People don't know what your aspirations are. I mean, maybe you want to start a podcast network, right? Maybe you have, you're trying to build a, a business that is, that maybe you have massive payroll expenses that, you know, so the expectation that the product should always be free closes the door to any of those aspirations, if in fact you have them. And, you know, it's like, I mean, it's very interesting psychologically because so I, so I have, I've created this network of support for my podcast, but I see people do calculations that they would never do in a more transactional space if they were just let's say buying my next book, right? So like, for me, offering a free podcast and then saying, if you find this valuable, you can support it, right? That, you know, from the side of being a creator of that content, it feels like the, the most transparent interaction possible because a person can listen for free for as long as they want to just discover how valuable it is and then they can support it to the degree that they find it valuable. Whereas if I'm selling you a book, you can't even read the book before you, before you buy it, right? You have to make the decision to buy it and I'm trying to convince you to buy it because it took me all this time to write it and, and, you know, you're, you know, it's, it's, it's transactional with, but with a podcast, people make calculations that they would never make when they're just figuring out whether they want to buy something. It's like, like I'll, and it's really along the lines of what you just described. People say, well, how much does a podcast cost to produce? Right? Like, like if I knew what you were spending the money on and what it costs you to, to do this podcast, well, then I would support you, right? But they're never saying how much does it cost to write a book? And if I knew what you were going to spend the money on once you, once you were, once, once I bought this book, then I would know whether or not I wanted to buy it. You either want the book or you don't, right? So the problem with the support model and this is the problem with Patreon and everything else is that it engages the sort of the philanthropy charity side of the brain, right? And people are worried about what you're going to do and how much it all costs. Like how much does this might cost? Right? You know, like that, that's, that's a question that someone is asking when they're donating, when they're donating. And the problem there is they're not understanding, you know, just the opportunity costs. Like I, you know, I have to decide how to spend my time. Am I going to spend 90% of my time on a podcast? Well, that, if so, that closes the door to, to virtually everything else I can do, right? So it's, you know, it has to become a viable business. And so, I mean, I've recognized now that I'm, you know, to some degree, going against the grain of human psychology in asking for support. And now I, now I feel like I'm going to ask much less. I mean, I'm going to tell people what the business model is and, and, you know, and still remind them of it. But I'm personally, I'm going to go more and more in the direction of putting stuff behind a paywall. And if people want it, then they can support. And so it's, it's, it's kind of, it's sort of Netflix. The ultimate version of it would be, if it were Netflix, that would also let you get it for free if you really couldn't afford it. Right? That, I mean, that, that's the guilt free business model that I'm converging on now. I like it. I like how you're thinking and I liked the ethics involved in it. And I think it's a great thing. And when you said it on your podcast, I was shocked, but it makes sense coming from you.