This was either leaked or released by Mr. Beast and it's awesome. It reminds me of Facebook's Little Red Book.
It shows what operating at a high level looks like, regardless of career or creative discipline. The whole thing is worth reading, but here are some of my favorite excerpts and an attempt to summarize parts:
Your goal here is to make the best YOUTUBE videos possible. That’s the number one goal of this production company. It’s not to make the best produced videos. Not to make the funniest videos. Not to make the best looking videos. Not the highest quality videos.. It’s to make the best YOUTUBE videos possible.
Which is why I say we are not Hollywood. 99% of movies or tv shows would flop on Youtube. On top of that they'd be wildly unprofitable, have no flexibility, and long lead times that can’t adapt to trends. We arn’t here to make a small movie once or twice a year, I want to make one a week lol. Which is why you need to be nimble and produce content OUR way, not the way you were taught before.
You’re either an A-Player, B-Player, or C-Player. There is only room in this company for A-Players. A-Players are obsessive, learn from mistakes, coachable, intelligent, don’t make excuses, believe in Youtube, see the value of this company, and are the best in the goddamn world at their job. B-Players are new people that need to be trained into A-Players, and C-Players are just average employees.
He breaks down videos into 4 critical sections, after establishing the title and thumbnail should be excellent and known before hand, with the earliest parts of the video being more important than the later parts:
  • 1st minute is the most important
    As with almost every video on Youtube, the first minute has the most loss (go look). This is why we freak out so much about the first minute and go so above and beyond to make it the best we freakin can. [...] The first minute of each video is the most important minute of each video.
  • 1-3 executes on the hype accelerating through the story's timeline abnormally fast in a "crazy progression"
    Let’s say we have 10 minute video about a guy surviving weeks in the woods. Instead of making the first 3 minutes of the video about his first day then progressing from there like a logical filmmaker would. We’d tried to cover multiple days in the first 3 minutes of the video so the viewer is now super invested in the story. They’ve seen this man survive multiple days in the woods and emotionally now want to see how much further he can go.
    • Then around minute 3 they do "re-engagement"
      A re-engagement can be described as content that is highly interested that fits the story and makes people genuinely impressed. Another way to look at this is it’s a segment that “only MrBeast can do this”. It’s important to re-engage the viewer around this time because they could get bored of the story and click off. These re-engagements are usually spectacles and sometimes need lots of time and money to perfect.
  • 3-6
    This is where you plan out all the most exciting and interesting content that is also very simple. This includes lots of quick scene changes and highly stimulating simple content that reflects the story. The goal is to make them fall in love with the story, the people in the video and the overall video itself.
    • 6 minute mark has another "re-engagement"
  • Then the "back half"
    But in general once you have someone for 6 minutes they are super invested in the story and probably in what I call a “lull”. They are watching the video without even realizing they are watching a video. Typically the not as good content would be in the back half of the video.
Whether it be production, creative, camera, or editing I want you to be obsessed with Youtube. Get rid of Netflix and Hulu and watch tons of Youtube, it will without a doubt in my mind make you more successful here. The more invested you are in our world on Youtube the more you’ll understand trends, how we can stand out and be more original, what we could do better, etc.
That's only about half of it, and the whole thing is a gold mine. Some from the next immediate part:
  • "video everything" when you're scouting or anything so the team can see everything
  • "say the negatives" so it can be dealt with because there's nothing actionable about "this is great"
  • focus exclusively on "critical components" essential things that nothing matters without until they're secured
  • "higher forms of communication" preferring in-person conversations for really important things
... there's so much more, but I'll stop with one of my "yes kween" paragraphs:
I hate excuses and I despise with my entire soul when people just try to save face instead of learn from how they messed up. Mistakes are okay! Genuinely they are and I expect you to make a lot. That’s perfectly fine. Every veteran here has cost me a million dollars at one point or another, and you can go ask them yourself if I ever held it over their heads. The reason i’m okay with fuck ups is because I know that’s how you learn. I see it as me investing in you and your brain. (hence why I have 0 tolerance for C-Players and they must go immediately. Those fuck ups could be done by an A-Player that will retain the information learned). I just beg you that you learn from every mistake and try not to repeat it, that’s when it gets annoying. I’ve never ever ever once fired someone on the spot for messing up, you have nothing to be afraid of. Own shit so we can address how to fix it and then move on.
Good summary, I will read it. Right now in the Cuba Bitcoin community we are engaged in starting to create educational content on YouTube as well as other networks and this is just what we need. Thanks.
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Thank you for taking the time to write this summary!
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Mr. Beast is one of the greats, most subscribed channel and views of all time! He is young too, so he really has the world at his finger tips. Alot of good things for others to learn from here :)
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Unfortunately there is some "bad behavior" that appears to go along with advice from that guy: https://apnews.com/article/mrbeast-jimmy-donaldson-allegations-philanthropy-feastibles-742306d7c77e2eca8d895bf439790c69
He's also been accused of rigging give-aways. Accusations don't equal a truth, but the advice comes also with that kind of baggage.
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Him saying stupid things as a kid, a coworker publicly saying stupid things to a victim that claims no harm, and some unsubstantiated accusations from a disgruntled ex-employee, hardly amounts to baggage, let alone baggage that taints his advice on video production. It’s bath water afaict.
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Well, since you posted the video, I rather expected you'd be apologetic for him. Of course, at a certain point, the people you apologize for you become compatriot with. Mr. Beast is definitely not in my camp, no matter how great his video production skills are. Evidently he is in yours.
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I'd apologize for you thinking you know people better than they themselves do so I guess we are compatriots as well.
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Not everyone can be expert in everything. I'm sure you'd have certain areas that are hard won in coding things like stacker.news. My experience is with regards to people like Mr. Beast. COVID has proven people don't know what's best for them. It isn't a new development. Just the latest refinement. So no, we aren't compatriots. At best, we are associates with differing expertise domains.
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ah yes, formulaic attention sucking is...honorable??
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In his case, it was for fame. The give-a-ways were just a way to get eyeballs.
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At what line does entertainment become attention sucking?
Is attention sucking/entertainment more honorable when it's accidental?
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mr. beast videos are entertaining, but entertainment is void. what do you take away from the video? if all of these insights were gathered in order to serve a purpose, the attention they garnish amounting to a goal - like everyone watching this could learn something new about this, or have a new perspective on this, then it wouldn't be attention sucking for the sake of views. right? mr. beast is an inhuman machine that produces great YouTube videos. that's my take anyway
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mr. beast videos are entertaining, but entertainment is void
Is it? Are takeaways, learning, and perspectives the only things that fill a void? Moralizing entertainment is a hard job. You must presume to know what people benefit from in all contexts. Taking a person's mind away from their troubles even without takeaways seems valuable and good to me. Certainly, it's at least morally neutral.
I've only ever watched a handful of his videos, but most of them involve humans making choices and there's a lot to takeaway from watching humans make choices.
mr. beast is an inhuman machine
This isn't fair. Don't be the creator that loathes successful creators. Don't be the creator that loathes the successful creator's audience.
You can want more from Mr. Beast. You can choose a different and "better" path than Mr. Beast. But don't strip his humanity from him because you wish he produced things like you would.
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Great summary.
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I know that he is very successful. I just dont agree with his message. Mark Robear makes better videos that arent focused on making money. The only reason why Mr. Beast is famous is because he is able to capture the attention of the younger mind. I think a majority of the people on SN dont watch him, because his videos have no value, but are just entertaining.
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This is good summary. Thank you for this. But he's getting more focused about producing better than before. It may be the result of Ronaldo boarding the YouTube ship. For the first time in years he sees a possible contender to his crown.
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Very good advice on Production!
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