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2 episodes with yia
2 episodes with yia
In this unforgettable episode, we sit down with Chef Yia Vang, the James Beard Award nominee and force behind Vinai, Minneapolis's groundbreaking Hmong restaurant that has captured the culinary world's attention. Named after the Thai refugee camp where his family lived before moving to the U.S. Vinai has earned international acclaim — making Condé Nast Traveler's 2025 Hot List of the best new restaurants in the world, as well as prestigious nods from Time Magazine, the New York Times, and Esquire.Yia shares how his early life, shaped by family, resilience, and storytelling, inspired his journey from a kid who didn't like cooking to a national ambassador for Hmong cuisine. We talk about the power of food to build inclusive communities, the significance behind dishes like Vinai's Hill Tribe chicken and fried catfish, and how every plate he serves is a living tribute to the Hmong spirit of survival and celebration.This episode is a testament to perseverance, heritage, and the transformative power of sharing a meal. If you love stories of identity, grit, and cultural redefinition, you won't want to miss this conversation.
Yia Vang joins the show this week to discuss his award winning restaurant and how growing up in the Hmong community presented hunting and fishing as a way of life, not just a hobby. Yia is a James Beard Award Finalist and creator and head chef of Vinai, one of the top 50 best restaurants in the US. Yia discusses his thoughts on Hmong culture in regard to hunting and fishing, how his perspective on conservation has evolved, and gives tips and tricks to better prepare your birds next time you're in the kitchen. Enjoy! This episode is brought to you by Ugly Dog Hunting Co. Shop now at UglyDogHunting.com.Music used under Creative Commons -Two Step Daisy Duke by Mr. Smith is licensed under an Attribution 4.0 International License.
For years, chef Yia Vang operated his restaurant Union Hmong Kitchen in a trailer outside of a brewery in Minneapolis. Last year, he finally opened his first brick-and-mortar restaurant, and it already feels like a neighborhood institution — especially in the region of the U.S. with the largest community of Hmong refugees from southeast Asia. Over a meal of whole grilled branzino, Hmong sausage, purple sticky rice, and a lot more, Yia tells Dan about his mission to tell his parents' story — and the story of the Hmong people — through his cooking. Yia also talks about his own journey: he was born in a Thai refugee camp, moved with his family to Amish country, and then worked as a church “lunch lady” before breaking out on his own. Now he's fighting tooth and nail to open a new restaurant that will fully celebrate Hmong food the way he envisions.The Sporkful production team includes Dan Pashman, Emma Morgenstern, Andres O'Hara, Nora Ritchie, and Jared O'Connell. Publishing by Shantel Holder and transcription by Emily Nguyen.Transcript available at www.sporkful.com.
The YIA podcast is a lighthearted and informative exploration of the fascinating world of unique brains. This particular episode focuses on ADHD in adults, a widely prevalent condition that often goes undiagnosed or misunderstood. --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/yesimanxious/message
Steven Rinella talks with Yia Vang, Jordan Vold, Janis Putelis, Ryan Callaghan, Chester Floyd, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider. Topics discussed: MeatEater's Live Tour is coming; 75,000 Hmong people in the Twin Cities; dowry; Steve's friend's mobile bar business; when a skunk wins over a mountain lion kitten; feline favoritism; how hmong sausage cannot be made vegan; hurt people hurt people; changing your name to get healthy again; how Yia translates to “iron skillet”; Optimus Prime Vang; growing up in a refugee camp; how every dish has a narrative; waiting for the sticky rice before you eat; how your word means everything in an oral culture; how Hmong love the mountains; Faithful, Available, Teachable; Hmong Facebook; catering Bar and Bat Mitzvahs; how your uncle always remind you who you are; go eat at Yia's current restaurant, Union Hmong Kitchen, and his new restaurant, Vinai, in Spring 2024; watch Yia's invasive critter hunting + cooking show, “Feral”; and more. Connect with Steve and MeatEater Steve on Instagram and Twitter MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater MerchSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
In this week's episode, we're joined by two special guests, Edward and Teetime from YiA! Join us as we delve into their newest production, the group's origins, and their journey since their last play. Tickets are out now the link in their bio! We'd love to see some of you lot there. Don't miss out!
Yia Vang is a multi-nominated James Beard Award chef; the founder & head chef of Union Hmong Kitchen, and he's carved out time to compete on the Netflix show, “Iron Chef: Quest for an Iron Legend,” host the show, ”Feral” on the Outdoors Channel, host another show, “Stoked” on the Food Network, and host the excellent podcast,“Hmonglish” which focuses on the Hmong people, their culture, representation, and Asian excellence overall.Yia and Jonathan discuss all of the above, plus his ‘run & gun' approach to running a restaurant; the history of the service and sacrifices made by many Hmong people on behalf of the USA; patriotism; curiosity; football; the art of Hmong cuisine; and more.TOPICS & TIMES:Managing Restaurants, Flexibility, & Football (8:29)Current State of Food Culture in the USA (22:16)Being Anti "Fusion" (28:01)Hmong / US History (34:02)Hmong Cuisine & Hmong Clans (46:41)The Craft of Hmong Cuisine (51:46)Past, Current, & Future Projects (56:20)RELATED LINKSHmonglish PodcastUnion Hmong KitchenBlister Craft CollectiveBecome a BLISTER+ Member Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
This week Marc is out, so we invited former guest Mara Whack to join us as a co-host. We spent an action packed hour getting to know Chef Yia Vang of Union Hmong Kitchen, TPT's show Relish, and podcast Hmonglish. Of course we talk about food, but also learn about Hmong culture and history, and the importance of communication and grace. A few of chef Yia's accolades: https://www.bonappetit.com/story/yia-vang-hmong-cuisine https://www.nationalgeographic.com/travel/article/partner-content-minnesota-hmong-cuisine #LegacyMatters #RealConversations #GetToKnowYourNeighbor #UpperMidwestStories #EverydayLegacy #AuthenticVoices #LifeStories #MidwestPodcast #NeighborhoodChronicles #HumanConnection #HeartfeltStories #UnforgettableMoments #ThoughtfulConversations #LocalVoices #GenuineStories #Hmong #HmongFood #UnionHmongKitchen #ChefYia #Chef
Yia Vang is the Chef and Owner of Hilltribe Restaurant Group. Yia Vang immigrated to America with his parents when he was five. He studied PR and communications in college and eventually started cooking for church events. Once he was able to cook and prepare menus from his Hmong heritage, he knew he wanted to be a chef. He started pop ups, a food trailer, food halls, and he even worked with past RU guest Chef Gavin Kasen. Today there are four Hmong Union Kitchen locations and Yia has other concepts as well, such as retail and catering. Show notes… Calls to ACTION!!! Join Restaurant Unstoppable Network and get your first 30 days on me! Connect with my past guest and a community of superfans. Subscribe to the Restaurant Unstoppable YouTube Channel Join the private Unstoppable Facebook Group Join the email list! (Scroll Down to get the Vendor List!) Today's sponsor: Ovation - Do you want real-time feedback from your guests instead of 1-star reviews? Ovation uses a 2-question, SMS-based survey, and frictionless integrations with online ordering platforms and other tools to enable restaurants to easily resolve guest concerns in real-time, get more 5-star reviews, discover insights to improve, and drive revenue. Unstoppable listeners who sign up will get$100 off their set-up fee! Visit ovationup.com/unstoppable to learn more. 1Huddle - 1Huddle is a coaching and development platform using quick-burst mobile games to more quickly and effectively level up and fire up your workforce. With a mobile-first approach to preparing the modern worker, a library of 3,000+ quick-burst skill games, and the option to instantly create personalized content – 1Huddle is changing the way restaurants develop their workers by transforming traditional manuals and videos into deceptively simple, highly effective mobile games proven to level up workers quickly. Key clients include Loews Hotels, Novartis, Madison Square Garden, Yum, FB Society, Hakkasan, TAO Group, and the Dog Haus. Restaurant Systems Pro - Join the 60-day Restaurant Systems Pro FREE TRAINING. This is something that has never been done before. This 60-day event is at no cost to you, but it is not for everyone. Fred Langley, CEO of Restaurant Systems Pro, will lead a group of restaurateurs through the Restaurant Systems Pro software and set up the systems for your restaurant. During the 60 days, Fred will walk you through the Restaurant Systems Pro Process and help you crush the following goals: Recipe Costing Cards; Guidance in your books for accounting; Cash controls; Sales Forecasting(With Accuracy); Checklists; Budgeting for the entire year; Scheduling for profit; More butts in seats and more… Click Here to learn more. Contact: Instagram: @yiavang70 @unionhmongkitchen Thanks for listening! Thanks so much for joining today! Have some feedback you'd like to share? Leave a note in the comment section below! If you enjoyed this episode, please share it using the social media buttons you see at the top of the post. Also, please leave an honest review for the Restaurant Unstoppable Podcast on iTunes! Ratings and reviews are extremely helpful and greatly appreciated! They do matter in the rankings of the show, and I read each and every one of them. And finally, don't forget to subscribe to the show on iTunes to get automatic updates. Huge thanks to Yia Vang for joining me for another awesome episode. Until next time! Restaurant Unstoppable is a free podcast. One of the ways I'm able to make it free is by earning a commission when sharing certain products with you. I've made it a core value to only share tools, resources, and services my guest mentors have recommend, first. If you're finding value in my podcast, please use my links!
Hey, folks!You're about to listen to the last episode of season 3. Don't worry, we are already working on the foundation of season 4 and we're even planning a live show in late spring. We're going to be taking a break from regular episodes for a while, but we will drop bonus content in the meantime. And be sure to follow us on social media for updates. Today's episode is one of our personal favorites. We've got Xee Reiter with us. She's an artist based in Minnesota whose life trajectory started on a very traditional route. A traditional marriage. A traditional Hmong wife. But she refused to accept this as her destiny. She took her life into her own hands and threw herself into the art world.Since then, she has produced an incredibly prolific body of work across art murals and exhibits – she's even done some work with Yia. We think you'll find her story inspiring and, hopefully, you'll find plenty of opportunities to laugh because these two are hilarious when they get together.
In this episode, we get realistic and we talk about greek heritage, entrepreneurship, work life balance, energy vampires and personal integrity. Our guest, Kristina Headrick, talks about what keeps her sane in living in the very exciting, full of energy, and very expensive New York City. She shares her professional journey with us but also what lead her into launching her successful business @Yia.Mas and how it all came into play together. Yia.Mas marries Kristina's Greek upbringing with her research on Greek philosophy, dance, design, and culture. Kristina's curiosity and appreciation for self-inquiry inspire her to share Greek folk remedies and ancient traditions and promote Greece beyond the usual diaspora narrative. Follow Along On Video episodes on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCYde5dTzK-msMTuAlH2J0Tw Join the community on Instagram @namastecity : https://www.instagram.com/namastecity/?hl=en Credits The audio for this episode was produced by NuEarth aka @NuEarthOffical. The video for this episode was produce by Nicole Marquez. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/namaste-city/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/namaste-city/support
Listen to Nova chat with Yia Vang. Yia is a James Beard nominated chef, competed on the Netflix revival of Iron Chef, hosted Food Network's Stokes, and has a new streaming show called Feral. He's the chef and owner of the James Bearn nominated Union Hmong Kitchen in Minneapolis. Yia tells Nova what his why is – his parents and their sacrifices. He shares how he didn't like working in kitchens, initially. He found he was good at cooking – even though it was not the path he originally intended to take. After college, Yia had gotten a degree in communications in college, and wanted to use that – but found he was in love with food and working in the kitchen. He realized his legacy with his parents was interconnected with the foods they ate. As refugees, everything that his parents did was for their kids. Narrative and catalyst - It's about people Yia talks about how he got into being a storyteller. He grew up as a curious kid. He loves words and the history of words. He loves to challenge people with food and the story behind it. “Food is a universal language.” Yia gets into how the cultural DNA of the Hmong people is woven into their food. “As humans, we were created for community.” Yia talks about the Secret War and the genocide of the Hmong people after the US pulled out of Vietnam – and the impact that had on the Hmong. When handed the mic, Yia asks Nova if she ever had a moment where she wanted to quit – and what got her through that. What is your why? Making a difference Cooking Narrative Catalyst Hmong Community Unleash Your Supernova
Hey folks, welcome back to Hmonglish. This is episode 3, which means we are halfway through the season because we typically record the show in batches of 6 episodes.As you know, we release the show on Wednesdays, so that means the next two episodes will be released on March 8th and March 15th.Today's episode is with Sheng Elizabeth Lor. It is just about impossible to describe this woman because she is so many wonderful things all at once, so what we'll say is this: she's a good friend of Yia's, she is based in Eau Claire, Wisconsin, and she runs a company called the Social X Change project, which can be described as a digital creation platform that focuses on uplifting marginalized communities in arts and activism.She is also an editor for the Hmong American Experience, which is the largest Hmong media organization in the world. This woman is so incredible and so inspiring, and we can't wait for you to hear from her!-If you like the show, leave us a 5-star review on Spotify or Apple Podcasts, and be sure to subscribe. The same goes for our YouTube channel: if you like what you're seeing, give us a like, a comment, and subscribe to the channel.If you haven't done so already, follow us on social media on Facebook and Instagram: @hmonglishpod.-Support for Hmonglish comes from SolarPod, an Immigrant-founded and owned company that makes and installs the Z-Rack, no-roof-hole racking system.Proudly manufactured in Shakopee, Minnesota, this product is designed to eliminate the use of fossil fuel compounds that are often used in solar installations. Not only that, but the z-rack preserves the integrity of your roof in the process.The SolarPod Z-Rack: revolutionary solar innovation made radically simple.Get a quote for your home or business at mysolarpod.com-All music courtesy of a paid creative license with Artlist
Thank you for stopping by to listen today! We are thrilled to be doing a third season of this show. We have been fortunate enough to step things up on the production side and we now film and record at an actual studio, called Muze, which is in St. Paul, Minnesota.The studio is run by two Hmong women, Milly and Elmo, and they have been a major help in making this season look better than ever.Speaking of looking better, we put a lot of work into the video content for this season, so please, if you are more of a visual person, hop on over to our YouTube channel to check that out.-As for today's episode, we have Tsai Thao, who became the first Hmong model to be featured on a billboard in Times Square in New York City. Not only that, but she has walked in New York Fashion Week and many other shows across the country.She is with Yia today to talk about what it took to become a successful, nationally recognized model, and it might not be what you think.-If you like the show, leave us a 5-star review on Spotify or Apple Podcasts, and be sure to subscribe. The same goes for our YouTube channel: if you like what you're seeing, give us a like, a comment, and subscribe to the channel.If you haven't done so already, be sure to follow us on social media on Facebook and Instagram: @hmonglishpod.We'd also like to offer a word from our sponsor, SolarPod, makers and installers of the revolutionary Z-Rack solar panel, proudly manufactured in Shakopee, Minnesota.The Z-rack is designed to eliminate the use of fossil fuel compounds that are often used in solar installations and preserve the integrity of your roof in the process.The SolarPod Z-Rack is solar made simple. Get a quote for your home or business at mysolarpod.com-All music courtesy of a paid creative license with Artlist
In this week's news roundup, host Mike Cosper and editor in chief Russell Moore dive into the mysteries of bitcoin and fusion, coming up for air to talk holidays and food with James Beard-nominated chef and star of Outdoor Channel's “Feral,” Yia Vang. News of nuclear fusion's latest breakthrough and cryptocurrency's latest bust lead this week's conversation about the benefits and dangers of marveling at things beyond our understanding. Cosper and Moore discuss effective altruism, space mining, and generational cuisine all with a single common thread: Who are we inviting to the table and how are we welcoming them? Joining us this week: One of seven siblings, Chef Yia Vang was born in a Thai refugee camp where he lived until his family resettled in the Midwest. A trained chef who started his career working as a dishwasher, Yia Vang worked at many top restaurants in the Twin Cities before starting Union Hmong Kitchen. Yia brings Hmong flavors to American palates and invites people to change how they think about food by considering the influences in each bite. Yia is the host of TPT's Relish series, Outdoor Channel's “Feral,” and has been featured on National Geographic and CNN's United Shades of America. Resources referenced: “Elon Musk, Twitter and the future: His long-term vision is even weirder than you think” by Emile Torres “America, Can We Talk About Our Guru Problem?” by David French Inventor: Out for Blood in Silicon Valley “A behavioral economist explains why Elizabeth Holmes might not have felt bad lying about Theranos” by Andy Kiersz “The Bulletin” is a production of Christianity Today Executive Producer: Erik Petrik Host and Producer: Mike Cosper Producer and Editor: Azurae Phelps Additional Editing and Operations: Matt Stevens Music, Editing, and Mix: Dan Phelps Graphic Design: Bryan Todd Social Media: Kate Lucky Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Hey, folks!First of all, thank you for your patience in waiting for this one. You're about to hear the sixth episode of season 2, which marks the end of this season. We'll be taking a short break after this but, don't worry, we plan on being back for a third.The second thing you should know is that today's episode features one of the finest Hmong chefs in the Twin Cities: Thony Yang. He is the chef de cuisine at Mara, which is a restaurant in the luxurious Four Seasons Hotel in Minneapolis. It was really fun listening to him and Yia connect on food, and I'm sure you'll enjoy it as much as we did.-If you enjoy the show, let us know by leaving a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.Be sure to check out the show on Instagram and Facebook.-Produced by Gleam Tower MediaAll music courtesy of Artlist
Introducing our new series: Hmonglish Shorts!At this very moment, Yia is overseas working on a few projects, so we aren't able to release any new episodes right now.But, lucky for you, we have some stuff in the vault that you haven't heard yet.Back when we still had our co-host, Gia Vang, she and the producer would periodically interview Hmong people at HmongTown Marketplace in St. Paul to get their thoughts on what their identity and their heritage mean to them.We figured it would be cool to release some of these recordings and call them "Hmonglish Shorts." I don't like to leave you folks hanging when we don't have an episode, so I figured this would be a fun way to stay in touch with you all.And so I am thrilled to debut the first one today, which is one of my favorites.Her name is Kalia Diana Yang, and she is an adorable 9-year-old who was willing to sit down with us and chat.Please keep in mind that there is a bit of background noise since we were at the market during peak hours.- If you enjoy the show, let us know by leaving a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.Be sure to check out the show on Instagram and Facebook.Oh, and our YouTube channel is finally here!-Produced by Gleam Tower MediaAll music courtesy of Artlist
Hi all! Welcome back to HmonglishThere are two quick things I want to mention before we start.The first thing is that we are VERY excited about this guest. Her name is Pahoua Yang Hoffman and she is the Senior Vice President of Government & Community Relations for HealthPartners, which is a massive nonprofit healthcare provider based in Minnesota. She is a good friend of Yia's and she came to the table today with a lot of fascinating insights into Hmong culture. She's brilliant and thoughtful – with a fascinating career history, and I can't wait for you to learn more about her.Second, I want to apologize for not bringing you an episode last week Wednesday.For season 2 thus far, we've been doing a weekly cadence every Wednesday. A season of Hmonglish is six episodes. I'm sure many of you expected episode 5 to come out last week and not today.Our production schedule has been a bit behind due to scheduling issues with guests and trying to work around Yia's super busy itinerary. As many of you know, Yia's career is blowing up right now, and he's being pulled in a lot of different directions, so we're doing our best to work with that. He will be heading out of the country this week and we're expecting him back within the next two weeks. With that being said, I can't promise that we'll have episode 6 out next week Wednesday.Thank you so much for your patience and understanding. We are incredibly thankful to have such a passionate, kind, and engaged fanbase, and we want to make sure we're being open and honest with our communication on all matters relating to the show.- If you enjoy the show, let us know by leaving a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.Be sure to check out the show on Instagram and Facebook.Oh, and our YouTube channel is finally here!-Produced by Gleam Tower MediaAll music courtesy of Artlist
Today we have one of the greatest, contemporary Hmong authors with us: Kao Kalia Yang.Kalia was born in December 1980 in Thailand's Ban Vinai refugee camp, which is the same camp where Yia was born. Her family came to Minnesota in 1987.In 2003, she graduated from Carleton College and then received her Master's in Creative Nonfiction from Colombia University soon after that.Kalia has published numerous nonfiction works and children's books since 2008, and it was in that year that she released one of her greatest works: The Latehomecomer, which is a memoir that tells of her family's harrowing escape from the war in Laos. She's also known for The Song Poet, which follows the life of her father, through his most tragic and most joyous moments.Before we get started today, there's one quick note I want to share about today's episode.Somehow or another, Kalia really got Yia to open up his emotions and much of this podcast is him in a very vulnerable state: speaking about his hopes, his fears, and of course, his family.As a result, Yia speaks much more than Kalia and near the end, it begins to feel like she's the host, interviewing him.There is so much that we didn't cover with Kalia and we hope to have her on again soon. Until then, please appreciate this vulnerable moment of two people opening up to each other.-If you enjoy the show, let us know by leaving a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.Be sure to check out the show on Instagram and Facebook.Oh, and our YouTube channel is finally here!-Produced by Gleam Tower MediaAll music courtesy of Artlist
Welcome back to Hmonglish!This is our second season and things will be a bit different this time around, especially the structure of the show. You'll notice that these episodes will be much more casual. We provide Yia and the guest a very, very rough outline of what to talk about and they usually don't even look at the outline anyways. We know a lot of you will miss our old format with Gia, but we're excited nonetheless to bring you this new iteration. Be sure to check out the show on Instagram and Facebook. We are also working on a YouTube channel, which you will find here in the description once it's ready. If you like the show, subscribe and leave a 5-star review on Spotify or Apple Podcasts. Oh, and if you know someone who would appreciate Hmonglish, please share it with them!Before we begin, I want to set the context for today's episode. Ironically, we began season 2 with a guest who is not Hmong, but still Asian American (specifically, Taiwanese American). His name is Ming-Jinn Tong and he has known Yia for almost a decade. They met at a church they used to attend and have been best buds ever since. The reason we brought on Ming-Jinn is that he's an incredibly thoughtful speaker. He's an expert on addressing cultural issues and we felt he would be the perfect person to bring on as Yia continues to reflect on his Hmong heritage.Sit back, relax, and enjoy.You're with friends now.Welcome to season 2.—Produced by Gleam Tower MediaAll music courtesy of Artlist
Chef Yia Vang shares the remarkable and resilient story of his family, and his journey from being born in a refugee camp to becoming a James Beard award nominee. Yia talks passionately about the pillars of Hmong culture, why balance defines their cuisine, and the childhood initiation of learning to cook rice properly. He shares emotional stories of his desire to assimilate to American culture as a child and why he is so dedicated to celebrating and elevating his family's culture and stories today. Yia talks about the vision behind his restaurants and how his latest establishment, Vinai, is a love letter to his parents and their strength. He shares the inspiration behind his Food Network digital series, Stoked, and why cooking over an open flame is close to his heart and crucial to the Hmong culture. Start Your Free Trial of discovery+: https://www.discoveryplus.com/foodobsessedConnect with the podcast: https://www.foodnetwork.com/shows/food-network-obsessed-the-official-podcast-of-food-networkFollow Food Network on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/foodnetworkFollow Jaymee on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jaymeesireFollow Yia Vang on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/yiavang70Find episode transcripts here: https://food-network-obsessed.simplecast.com/episodes/yia-vang-on-hmong-culture-the-art-of-preparing-rice
In this episode, Folly Rob sits down with Chef Yia Vang for another edition of DTF! In Define the Food, Rob and Yia attempt to define different categories within food and beverage. In this episode the question is, what is the difference between a restaurant and a cafe? They explore the history of restaurants and cafes and ask the most important question...is McDonalds a cafe? Enjoy! --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/follycoffeepodcast/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/follycoffeepodcast/support
Chef Yia Vang is the newest wildly talented and frequently referenced individual to be immortalized on our airwaves, but this is only one of approximately 1000 things this man has been up to in recent weeks. He was at the Beard's after being nominated for best chef midwest, competed in a brand new Iron Chef episode for Netflix, launched a dope new podcast called Hmonglish, and announced his new residency for Vinai at Steady Pour in Minneapolis. That's some serious hustle. And so it was Charles & Ben's distinct pleasure to invite Yia to PNA Hall for some whiskey and relaxed conversation. Previewing the exact contacts of what was discussed won't do it justice. Six shots, since topics of conversation-- as ever. And the results are thought provoking, moving, funny and engrossing. So grab yourself a little something to sip and play along. Let's get after it! #libationsforeveryoneSpirit of ChoiceThe hosts and their guest drank:Buffalo Trace Bourbon1792 Single Barrel Store Pick
For this week's story, we head to Wisconsin. Steve stumbled across a project called “Love Wisconsin,” whose mission is to use storytelling and social media to bring about a more connected, compassionate, and engaged Wisconsin.In this episode, Steve reads and essay written by Yia Lor that was published in the Wisconsin Historical Society Press' book ‘Hope Is the Thing: Wisconsinites on Perseverance in a Pandemic'. Yia, whose parents came to Wisconsin as refugees of the Vietnam War, writes about coming from a long line of farmers and growing up working long hours barefoot in the mud with her five siblings.In this gentle story, Yia contemplates how she can preserve history through her stories. "This past year I've been thinking about how to hold on to what it means to be Hmong. How can I hold on to this part of me that is really important? How can I be that seed that continues?"Special thanks to "Love Wisconsin." For more information, please visit:https://www.lovewi.com/and the Wisconsin Historical Society Press:https://www.wisconsinhistory.org/To become a Better Place Project Member (and receive free BPP Merch) and support our show, please visit:https://www.patreon.com/BetterplaceprojectTo stay connected with Better Place Project and for updates and behind the scenes info, please follow us on social media:Website: www.BetterPlaceProject.org(Leave us a voice message directly from the home page of our website)Instagram: @BetterPlaceProj To follow Steve & Erin on Instagram: @SteveNorrisOfficial @Erinorris
How much does the average person know about the Hmong people? Probably next to nothing. Chef Yia Vang joins us to chat about Hmong culture, his awesome facial hair, and this little thing he did by becoming a James Beard Award Finalist. Ben wants to know if a hotdog is a sandwich? Yia is confused about thirst traps. Lingjie discovers lowkey racism. And we all collectively gang up on Henry Golding. Come listen to The Worst Asian Podcast.Yia Vang, James Beard Finalist www.instagram.com/yiavang70/Union Hmong Kitchen www.instagram.com/unionhmongkitchen/520 N 4th St Ste 4, Minneapolis, MN 55401Vinai (coming soon) www.instagram.com/vinaimn1717 NE 2nd St, Minneapolis, MN 55413-------------------------------------------A couple Asian American millennials give our worst opinions on all things Asian. Come waste your time listening to us discuss what's trending in relevant Asian news, society, culture, lifestyle, race, comedy, and media. The Worst Asian Podcast.-------------------------------------------FOLLOW US EVERYWHERE @WorstAsianPod► INSTAGRAM: https://www.instagram.com/worstasianpod► TWITTER: https://twitter.com/worstasianpod► TIKTOK: https://www.tiktok.com/@worstasianpod► YOUTUBE: https://bit.ly/3Agv8Aj► FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/worstasianpod► WEBSITE: https://worstasianpod.com-------------------------------------------► INQUIRIES: WorstAsianPodcast@Gmail.com-------------------------------------------► SUPPORT US FOR FREE, Amazon referral link: https://amzn.to/3fsNCG1-------------------------------------------OUR PODCAST RECORDING GEAR:► Rode Podmic Microphone: https://amzn.to/3h5HuUU► Zoom Podtrak P4 Recorder: https://amzn.to/3h8OX5z-------------------------------------------#viavang #hmong #unionhmongkitchen #vinai #hmongfood #hmongculture #sunilee #henrygolding #asianpodcast #asianpodcasters #asianamerican #asian #asians #podcast #asiancomedy #asianmillennials #proudtobeasian #asianpride #asiancommunity #representationmatters #asianrepresentation #asianculture #asianlife #aapi #funny #comedy #flushing #asianmemes #yappie #asianmen #asianboy #asianguy #asiannews #asianstyle #millennials #stopasianhate #Asianqualifiers #veryasian #asianpopculture #asianexcellence #japan #japanese #korea #korean #kpop #china #chinese #chinatown #koreatown #ktown #ctown #asiansofinstagram #podcasts #podcasters #podcastersofinstagram #podcasting #podcastlife #newpodcast #newepisode #announcement #podcaster #youtubepodcast #linkinbio #creatorsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy
Pahoua Yang Hoffman, the new Senior Vice President of Government & Community Relations at HealthPartners, talks with Yia and David about her new role working for greater accessibility, equity, and cultural competency in healthcare. You can listen to Pahoua's podcast "I So Appreciate You!" here.The White on Rice podcast is hosted and produced by Yia Vang and David Crabb. For more information, please visit us at whiteonricepodcast.com.
Kristen Mark is a sex and relationship researcher, educator, and therapist. She is the Joycelyn Elders Endowed Chair in Sexual Health Education and a tenured Professor at University of Minnesota Medical School. She talks with Yia and David about her research, current projects, and common sex and relationship questions people have. You can learn more about Kristen and her work by following her on Instagram.The White on Rice podcast is hosted and produced by Yia Vang and David Crabb. For more information, please visit us at whiteonricepodcast.com.
JD Hovland has for years now meticulously documented and chronicled his way across the Twin Cities dining scene via his Instagram and Tik Tok feeds. Yia and David ask him all their questions about the local culinary scene and discover JD's favorite places for pho, New York-style pizza, and much more. The White on Rice podcast is hosted and produced by Yia Vang and David Crabb. For more information, please visit us at whiteonricepodcast.com.
Following up on last year's episodes on dating apps ("Swipe Right" and "150 First Dates"), Yia and David are joined by their friends Matt Gundrun and Betsie Carrow to talk about all things dating. The White on Rice podcast is hosted and produced by Yia Vang and David Crabb. For more information, please visit us at whiteonricepodcast.com.
Alexandra Motz is the Executive Pastry Chef at Spoon and Stable. She shares the story of her career as a pastry chef, and talks about all things delectable treats, chocolate lava cakes, and key lime pie with Yia and David. The White on Rice podcast is hosted and produced by Yia Vang and David Crabb. For more information, please visit us at whiteonricepodcast.com.
For our final episode of the series, we combine (and recline) our forces in real-time camaraderie over 1981's "For Your Eyes Only", Sir Roger's fifth outing as 007 and 00-Chapman's selection for Watch Party #3. Together, we negotiate some of the franchise's most opulent locales and nifty scenes. Don't like biathlon or figure skating? That's alright, FYEO also offers car chases, keel-hauling, submarine conflict, rock climbing and even the pitfalls of awkward relationships! So welcome aboard the good ship BBN! Grab your cocktails and head to the cinema room where our friendly stewards will assist in synchronizing your MGM lions to ours (08:08 in). Yia mas! It's time to finish this series in style!
In this episode of The Great Northern Podcast, we get to sit in on a conversation between Ashwini Ramaswamy and Yia Vang. Ashwini is a celebrated choreographer, dancer, and artist who has spent years steeped in south Indian classical dance, while also creating her own personal vision of South Asian women's representation within the performing arts. Chef Yia Vang was born in a Thai refugee camp where he lived until his family resettled in central Wisconsin. Yia uses food to tell a story and believes that every dish has a narrative. Please enjoy this conversation between two cultural creators who navigate multiple influences.Both Ashwini and Yia are part of this year's Great Northern Festival. Visit The Great Northern for more info.
After overviewing the upcoming podcast episodes and discussing a few shows they're currently enjoying, Yia and David discuss the impact of the Omicron variant on independent restaurants (10:00), and then share ten of their favorite new restaurants that opened in 2021. The White on Rice podcast is hosted and produced by Yia Vang and David Crabb. For more information, please visit us at whiteonricepodcast.com.
Transbro & Transist pernah menjajal moda kereta Bandara? Tau gak sih, Transbro & Transist bahwa kehadiran kereta bandara diberbagai kota di Indonesia semakin memperbanyak jaringan akses dari dan menuju bandara. Kehadirannya dimulai dari Bandara Kualanamu, disusul Bandara Soekarno Hatta, Bandara Minangkabau, hingga saat ini yang baru beroperasi di YIA. Namun, dibalik kehadirannya juga masih banyak ditemui sisi kurang baiknya, seperti tarif yang terlalu mahal sampai kurang reliable. Nah hal-hal tersebut kami obrolin nih, Transbro & Transist di episode ke-118 ini. Yuk disimak yuk! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/transpod-podcast/support
Happy 2022! And what better way to start the new with than with DTF. Yia is back! In another edition of DTF (Define the Food), Folly Rob sits down with Chef Yia Vang to discuss...what is soup? Is cereal soup? Is stew soup? What makes a soup a soup? Also included in this episode is a review of the Cuisinart DCB-10 Automatic Cold Brew Coffeemaker, a home coffee brewer that claims to make cold brew in 25 minutes. Is it legit? Listen here to find out all your soup and cold brew maker answers. Enjoy! @yiavang70 --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/follycoffeepodcast/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/follycoffeepodcast/support
Yia is back! In another edition of DTF (Define the Food), Folly Rob sits down with Yia Vang to discuss the difference between a burrito and a wrap. Is it the type of filling? Is it the temperature? Is it the size of the food? Listen to find out. Enjoy! --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/follycoffeepodcast/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/follycoffeepodcast/support
Welcome to another conversation around truth. This week we explore the three most powerful truths that are arising at the moment for our guest Yia Alias. Yia is an Artist, a Transpersonal Counsellor, and a Ceremonialist who specialises in healing through ritual. She is the holder of space at the Hearthground and beautifully shares the truths that are rising for her at this time. We hope this conversation inspires you and touches your heart in a way that broadens your own truth.
Sure, you can target ads by keywords, age, and gender... but have you ever thought about what all that means? Not every generation is the same or will respond to the same tactics! In this week's episode, we take a look at the different trends of Boomers, Gen X, Millennials, and Gen Z. Where do they hang out online? What are their spending habits? What key phrases will get them to buy your book... or cause them to run away in disgust? You might be surprised at which generation is the most ready to buy your book, what it takes to actually hook Gen X... or why KU might be the best fit if you write YA! Tune in for new episodes EVERY single Monday. SUPPORT THE AM WRITING FANTASY PODCAST! Please tell a fellow author about the show and visit us at Apple podcast and leave a rating and review. Join us at www.patreon.com/AmWritingFantasy. For as little as a dollar a month, you'll get awesome rewards and keep the Am Writing Fantasy podcast going. Read the full transcript below. (Please note that it's automatically generated and while the AI is super cool, it isn't perfect. There may be misspellings or incorrect words on occasion). Narrator (1s): You're listening to the Am Writing Fantasy podcast. In today's publishing landscape, you can reach fans all over the world. Query letters are a thing of the past. You don't even need an literary agent. There is nothing standing in the way of making a living from writing. Join two best selling authors who have self published more than 20 books between them now on to the show with your hosts, Autumn Birt and Jesper Schmidt. Jesper (30s): Hello, I am Jesper Autumn (32s): and I'm Autumn. Jesper (35s): This is episode 143 of the Am Writing Fantasy podcast. And this is a bit of a different topic that I actually haven't seen covered anywhere else. And Autumn, you wrote this a really interesting block series for our patron supporters. So perhaps I can just hand it over to you to share what we're talking about here today. Autumn (60s): So you want me to do all the work again? I see how it is. Well, Jesper (1m 6s): I prefer it that way. Autumn (1m 8s): Well, you've been busy, so that's fair enough. But yeah, I don't even, honestly, I don't even know where this idea came from, but there was at some point I was like, what would it be interesting to look at marketing book marketing by generation? Like, is it different to market, to boomers? Should you be marketing your books to boomers? Cause you know, when you do your Facebook ads, it almost, almost all the trainings, like say two 60 and under, well, why are boomers not buying books on Facebook? Are they not on Facebook? So I'm always curious. And you know, I like to question the status quo and see, well, why does it work this way? So I wrote a series of four Patreon posts looking at marketing to boomers, marketing to gen X, go gen X marketing to millennials and gen Z. Autumn (1m 57s): So I was actually really interesting and it did influence all of my thoughts on marketing. So it'll be really fun to dig into that today, Jesper (2m 6s): For sure. It should be a quite interesting and yeah, maybe we'll learn some stuff that we need to think about here. Autumn (2m 16s): No, I, I, I have to admit that it made me even rethink some of the stuff I'm doing my entrepreneurial sphere in my own life. And I think there is one generation that is like the ideal of who you should be marketing to. And I'm like, oh, I want to try this. So we'll have to get there. Jesper (2m 38s): Wow. Nice. Yes. Autumn (2m 41s): So anyway, how are things for you over in Denmark? Jesper (2m 47s): Well, as you said, pretty busy, I would say. And we also really still struggling with the potty who selling the house that we put in an offer for still Autumn (2m 60s): No definite there. Jesper (3m 4s): Well, we are pretty far from each other when it comes to the price at the moment, we probably have a gap like 45, 50,000 us dollars between us at the moment, which is quite a lot. And if I'm honest, I'm not really sure that we are going to be able to agree. Yeah, we did increase our offer with around 17,000 us dollars, but because the house needs a new roof, which will be very expensive to fix. Like I, like I mentioned in a podcast episode, a couple of weeks back, we have more or less offered now as much as we're willing to offer. Jesper (3m 51s): And if we offer more, we basically risk losing too much money if we won one day, want to sell the house again. So I think with the increased offer, we made, honestly, we're probably, if we want to sell the house again, we're probably going to lose around 50,000 us dollars the day we sell the house. And I don't like that, of course, but it's sort of within F acceptable acceptable range. I mean, we can live with that, but it cannot be any more than that. Right. And, and still, if I didn't look at that, then the selling party still needed to drop their price around 45,000 us dollars to meet us, which I don't think that'll happen to be honest, Autumn (4m 37s): Too bad. Cause I know you guys liked that one, so that's really unfortunate. Maybe they'll change their mind. You know, you're going, we're going into winter. And most people, most houses don't sell in winter. I know in the United States. So I can't imagine that they're selling like hotcakes in Denmark. So maybe they'll rethink that. Jesper (4m 57s): Yeah, usually, usually there's no problem selling houses in the winter here in Denmark that does, it goes year round. But I did talk to the real estate agent today and you know that the selling parties real estate agent, because she called me to sort of ask how things were going and what we were thinking. And I was sort of explaining to her like, you know, you're asking way too much money. And the fact that you had to put in a new roof, you need to account for that in the price, which you're not doing. And then I also told her, you know, find if he doesn't want to drop the price, but at the end of the day, the next buying party, if it's not going to be us, but the next party will have the same problem as we have now. Jesper (5m 40s): So you're not going to sell the house. If you keep insisting on chatting this much for it, because other people will also figure out that, okay, we need to put in a new roof, that's very expensive. We want a price reduction because of it. So you're going to end up in the same place next time. And he's been, they've had it for sale for about six months now. Right. So it's also about time that you start questioning. Maybe your price is too high after six months and you still haven't sold it. Yes. Autumn (6m 8s): Especially in the current. Jesper (6m 13s): Yeah. W w we'll see how it goes. But honestly, I, I don't know. Yeah. So we will, we've submitted the, a slight increase in our offer. And then also said in the email that this is our last offer. So we're not gonna increase the price any more than this. So either you take it off or that's Autumn (6m 31s): It, well, I'll keep my fingers crossed. We'll see what they say. Jesper (6m 35s): Yeah. I think it'll be a no, but, but maybe who knows, maybe they changed their mind in, in four or five months when they still haven't sold it. And maybe they'll come back and say, okay, are you still interested? Who knows? You know, Autumn (6m 46s): Maybe you'll find the perfect house coming up. I know you guys are so busy, so it's hard to look for houses at the same time, but you never know. You might find something else you like even more. Jesper (6m 58s): Yeah. Yeah. Who knows, but you're also trying to work out what to do and what not. So I know you are busy as well. Autumn. Autumn (7m 4s): Yeah. Yeah. Just a, I think it's so funny because we were just joking. I mean, it looks like I'm in the middle. It's like midnight here that we're somehow on the same continent, but it's only three in the afternoon and it is just like gray and raining. We got the fall rains coming into Vermont. But yeah, our housing where we're kind of wanting to leave here around November, you know, my husband spent all summer working in Maine. He's got some good job offers up that way. So we're kind of up in the air trying to look around too. But the housing market, the rental apartment market and the U S is just insane. So we're like, well, you can want to change something, but sometimes it's not as easy as you expected. So I don't know why we're going to end up doing where we'll end up being. Autumn (7m 47s): But I know the next, I know the upcoming podcast will be slightly out of order, but I am going to go see my parents and that'll be fun. So I know one of our episodes we'll be recording soon. I'll have a whole different backdrop and maybe some overhead lighting. I won't look like I'm coming from like, Jesper (8m 6s): Just for a change Autumn (8m 7s): For a change just to, you know, make things exciting and keep my life exciting. It'll be good. Jesper (8m 13s): Oh yeah. Sounds like a good idea. Okay. Let's move on here Narrator (8m 19s): A week on the internet with the Am Writing Fantasy podcast. Jesper (8m 25s): So the most important thing first here, Autumn. Okay. Are you ready? Oh, I'm going to spring something on you. Autumn (8m 34s): I'm taking a deep breath. Okay. I'm ready. Jesper (8m 39s): So one of the YouTube comments on episode 141, that was the one where we went head to head trying to come up with the worst superpowers ever. But one of the comments was from Zayed and he actually declared a winner. Did you notice that? Autumn (8m 54s): I think I did... Jesper (8m 56s): See that one because it made me rather happy. You want to guess who he thought was the winner or him, Autumn (9m 5s): If it's the same post well, no, that's right. I saw a Facebook comment, not a YouTube one. Shoot. So you better not tell me he thought you were the winner. Jesper (9m 15s): Of course. Otherwise. Why would I bring it up? Otherwise I would just have ignored it Autumn (9m 22s): Really? I swear on Facebook he said I won Jesper (9m 27s): No, no, no. He actually said, he actually said, quote, I'm a practicing Christian. And I got to say, I'm confused about Bible Man. I think yes. But wins on that one alone. Autumn (9m 41s): I don't think so. You had, it was a pretty pathetic list. I have to say that you had, I don't know if it's the worst though. Jesper (9m 49s): Well, that was the point of it. It was supposed to be pathetic. Autumn (9m 54s): It was pathetic, but I wouldn't say it was worse, but the dog had weld, whatever that one was, dog welder. I just put the heck arm fall off point. Just know, I can't believe someone even came up with those as like characters ever much less actually wrote a comic where they're included. I mean really, really stretching, cutting the risk guys. There were some really good writers out there. They'll help you a lot. Jesper (10m 31s): Yeah. Yeah. So I thought that was an important YouTube comment into, and that's worth mentioning of course, here on the podcast as well, I Autumn (10m 41s): Think was Jesper (10m 42s): For, no, thank you. Say it for, for being so smart about your choices on who should win. I think that it was a good choice. I would just say that. Autumn (10m 55s): I think you guys have a deal going. I don't believe that one. Jesper (11m 1s): Okay. But something else I wanted to mention was a post I did for our Patrion supporters, because I actually wrote about whether or not Kindle unlimited is good for fantasy authors. So if people want to check out the details of that post, I can, of course join over on Patrion. There's a link in the show notes, but I thought it interesting how in the post that all the top 100 fantasy books in the top 100 chart in, on Amazon, all of them are available through Kindle unlimited. That Autumn (11m 40s): Is pretty impressive. Jesper (11m 43s): What do you think about that? Every single one on the top 100 chart is in Kindle unlimited Autumn (11m 48s): Pretty impressive. I think that is a high stat showing whether or not it's for fantasy. I would have to admit. Jesper (11m 57s): Yeah. Yeah. The post I wrote was based on an article written by a written word media and it's based on some research as well, which I always like when I, she stuff that is based on research rather than on opinions. So, so I think that was a very interesting, and in fact, we have recently enrolled some of our books in Kindle unlimited as well. And I have to say, I'm not very happy about the exclusivity demand for Kindle unlimited or from Amazon there, but we do want to see how it affects sales. So yeah. Autumn (12m 34s): Yeah. I, you know, I'm always up for testing, but it is interesting that, you know, you brought up your path, Patreon posts on Kindle unlimited and then today's podcast is based off of four posts and Patreon. So in if I want to, yeah. If you want to hear more about read those posts, which are in depth and have a lot of market research and links to other sources. Yeah. That's on Patreon. If you want to join. And really, if you were inspired by this episode today, and once you check it out and really get into the links and the stats, that's waiting for you on there for just a dollar a month. Jesper (13m 9s): Indeed. Yeah. And also of course, if, if the, if you, dear listeners should be interested in knowing sort of, if we got any results from placing our books in Kindle unlimited, then do let us know. And I dunno, maybe we can dedicate like a future podcast episode to that topic or something. But yeah, if that interests you, then let us know. Sounds good. Narrator (13m 33s): And onto today's topic. Jesper (13m 37s): So we have some different generations to cover here today. We have boomers, gen X, millennials, and gen C. So I don't know, do we just want to start with the boomers and then sort of work down the list of these generations? Or how do you want to do it on them? Autumn (13m 55s): I, that makes sense. Or I guess maybe at times we can compare and contrast, but I think as boomers are a great place to start because they were, it was not the, what I expected was the result of what came up with boomers. It was kind of fun to get a different perspective on who the boomer generation is, especially with marketing and fantasy book marketing. Jesper (14m 21s): Yeah. So boomers are born between 1946 and 1964. So those are the people we are talking about. So this also means that they are an older generation. Autumn (14m 32s): They are they're my, my parents' generation though. Some people have, you know, there are still a few people alive who are known as the silent generation, which is older than boomers, but I left them off our little marketing analysis. We were letting them be, let them be, but they're still readers, but the boomers, they're the, I said, if you're going onto Facebook and you were choosing your targeting audience on your Shane saying 60 and under, you're totally leaving out the boomers. The boomers are the ones who are actually 60 and older. So they're an older generation and you might be surprised. Cause I think the perception is that they're not online. Maybe they do a lot of research, but there's some interesting stats about where they hang out, how often they buy and what it takes them to actually buy something, which I didn't expect. Jesper (15m 24s): Yeah. And also worth pointing out. Like you said, in the article that the boomers hold almost 50% of the total wealth in the us. So yeah. They have money. These people, Autumn (15m 38s): Yes. There's 72 million boomers still alive. This was a massive generation there and they're called boomers. It's from the baby boom that happened post world war II. So there was a huge amount of children born, still a large base of the population, 72 million. The only one that is larger than this as gen of millennials are also really large generation. So lots of people, they hold around 50% of the U S well, that's a lot of money. And I guess the question is, well, you know, do they read fantasy? Do they buy books online? Those are really the big questions of if they're worth marketing to. Autumn (16m 20s): And what I started to think about it, I mean, this is the generation that the first, when their Lord of the rings was published, these were the kids reading them, this teenagers, they were reading token. I would love that. Can you imagine being alive and Tolkien was writing and producing his books. That would be so cool. But they were alive with Isaac Asimov, if you like. Saifai so a lot of the clot, what we consider now, classic, they were the original fans. They were my parents who, you know, took me to see star wars and were fine with it and thought it was so cool. So they saw the moon landing. They are not anti fantasy. So I I've definitely heard that of some people saying, well, they don't read fantasy kidding. Autumn (17m 3s): They may talk in popular. They love fantasy. They just didn't like Dungeons and dragons. Well, that's another story. Jesper (17m 12s): Yeah, that's true. But the one thing that I'm thinking about, at least I, well, I don't have like a statistical research of it, but at least if I compare to my own parents, for example, I'm reading on the Kindle, for example, that took some convincing. You know, I, I don't know. I mean, of course my parents might not be like the stereotypical, you know, version of, of the boom was meaning that, that this is how all the boomers are not, I'm not saying that at all, but I could speculate, at least that might prefer to have the book in their hands, like paperbacks or hot packs and stuff like that, that I could speculate that. Autumn (17m 56s): I think it would be not disingenuous to say that, that if you want to market to boomers, it would probably be a good idea to make sure you have a paperback version, but they have taken, unlike the perception they have taken to computers and the internet age actually extremely well. A lot of them are like, oh, Facebook is the number one place. If you want to go market to boomers, just go to Facebook. That's where they are. But it was the stats on them. I mean, it was 70% of like boomers are online or on a computer. And of those 70%, like 90% of them are on Facebook. So they're online and what my favorite thing about them. Autumn (18m 36s): So they have their huge population base. So if you want to say, even 10% of them like fantasy and you know, or maybe 10% of will read on a Kindle, that's still a huge number of people. They have a ton of wealth they're retired. So they, they might work part-time but they don't need to work because they already have money and they're in retirement. So they have time to read which show that's fantastic. And they are, tend to be impulsive buyers and they're very brand centric. So if you say something to them that they like, they will immediately go and buy because they've got the money. They're not worried. They just learn what they don't have is time. So they want to make sure, you know, they have, they enjoy their lives. Autumn (19m 20s): They're not going to sit there and him and hall, if they think they're going to like a book, they'll go and buy the book. And then if they like you, they love brands. So they will stay with you and be a loyal follower. I mean, they sound like the perfect person to try to sell your book to, you might want to tailor your ads though, specifically to them, they're going to want different wording. And remember they were alive when token was writing. So you don't want to say, hi, as good as a token. Well, you know, you better, gosh, darn be as good as token. Cause they know who that is. And they were reading it before you were born. So make your ads honest, but make it something where they're like, oh my goodness, I want to go and try this out. Autumn (20m 4s): And they click and they may very well just going by like that. Jesper (20m 9s): Yeah. Yeah. I think you're right. It might be sometimes a bit harder to get them to read the books, but yeah, the various debt, but I was a bit surprised in your post-test worlds that your post pointed out that a lot of them is actually using YouTube as well. That w I mean, not, not creating videos, but watching YouTube. I mean, that actually surprised me a bit because that's not normally what I would think about this generation that they would be watching YouTube. Yeah. Autumn (20m 38s): And we'll see that across all of them. That YouTube is a really big player often next to Facebook, or a little bit better than Facebook. So YouTube, if you can find a way that taps into that market that is engaging. And I think that's the tough thing with selling books is finding a way of selling your books on YouTube. I don't think anyone has hit the perfect formula for that yet, but at the very least you can, if you can try out some videos, you could try them on Facebook and YouTube and see if you can kind of get people hooked in, try your book trailers, just make sure they're really, really good and really engaging and not boring. Jesper (21m 17s): Yeah. I would not spend time on that to be honest. But yeah. Well we had our little spell with YouTube already. Autumn. So yeah, we gave up on that quite a long time ago. Autumn (21m 30s): I don't, as I said, I don't think anyone, there's some people who do very well on YouTube and it takes a ton of work, more work than I think most people appreciate. And I still don't think when it comes to selling actual books, like being there as an author, not trying to sell a service, I don't think anyone has cracked that nut. So Hey, you could be the first one. Good luck. Jesper (21m 51s): Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Well, okay. Should we move on to gen X? Yeah. These people are born between 1965 and 1979. So this, Autumn (22m 9s): Yes, this is us. This is ours. And it's even includes my husband. If you count as you, the years you gave also includes something called they call them Zen, not millennials zinnias, which is starts with an X because they are the, a group that's, they're not really millennials. They're not really gen X. They're kind of squished in between. They call them a micro-generation, but they tend to go both ways. It can be a little bit more millennial. They can be a little more or gen X. And that's my husband. He's a little younger than me. There are some differences, but not much. But what is neat about these two generations or this generation micro-generation is we are the first ones who have an analog childhood. Autumn (22m 51s): We had a childhood of books and playing outside and hearing about computers in the basement of giant colleges, you know, but never seeing one until we hit our teenage years. So our adulthood has been taken over by the internet and the digital age, but our childhood, we remember playing war and kick the can and running through hayfields. At least I do. It was much more, much more a hands-on and physical. And as I say, analog, and we're the last generation who has that memory of the time before computers, which is kind of Sky Net App or something. Jesper (23m 28s): Yeah. Nobody, it's actually quite funny because as well, sometimes I've been, I've been talking to my sons about, you know, when we got the very first computer at home, when I was a kid or like teenage young teenager, we've got the very first computer. And I was trying to explain to them how it actually felt, you know, to get the first compete because they don't understand because computers has always been part of their life and they don't get the fact that once you sit down and for the first time ever, you use this kind of machine that has never existed before. And then I was showing them on YouTube. I found some old clips of what the games looked like back then. Jesper (24m 9s): And they were looking at me like, are you crazy? I was like, but you don't understand. That was amazing back then. Yeah. Just some pixels moving on a screen was amazing. Autumn (24m 21s): If you've been that the first time I did a, a game, that was, it was mushing. So multi-user shared hallucination. I did the college. And the fact that, you know, you could be on at 1:00 AM and you're talking to someone in New Zealand and all you had literally was texts on a screen. We didn't even have pixels for the, some of the sites I was on. And I was just like, oh my gosh, you're in Australia, New Zealand, you're in Asia. This is amazing. I can't, I still have an email that I found recently from my dad, one of the first ones on my account that somehow got saved. And it was like, I can't believe it was when I was studying abroad in Manchester, UK. And I was like, I can't believe you, you know, you asked me for this and I just sent it to you and you have it instantly. Autumn (25m 2s): I mean, mail was two weeks long and I could chat with my dad, like, and get information, something I needed from him like that. Well, as long as it took the attachment to upload and download, which is like still an eternity compared to today, but back then 10 minutes for an attachment, you're like, cut, thank you so much. You just saved my life. It was amazing. And I still have one of those original emails and it's just cool. It's cool to think back saying this was huge, huge, huge, huge. Jesper (25m 31s): Yeah, it is. Yeah. And it's so difficult to explain to people who are not gen Xs, what that felt like, but, but it, I think it's Autumn (25m 40s): Pretty cool. It is. I am sure there is. Jesper (25m 42s): And you also pointed out in your post how sorry I interrupted you Autumn (25m 48s): And I'm sure there's listeners who are like, yeah, this is so cool. This thing. No. Jesper (25m 53s): Yeah, yeah. And also you pointed out in your post to how during the teenage years of G annexes, we were influenced by dragon lands and dragons RPG and stuff. And I instantly thought, yes, that's right. Autumn (26m 10s): Yes. That is, that came out usually most of our formative years. So if we're a fantasy fan, it might've started before dragon lands. For me, it started before dragon lands with Anne McCaffrey. But when it came out, it became this huge phenomenon, especially getting to play the role-playing game. Of course, on the side of that, our parents, we were going through the satanic panic, which I mentioned later in some of the other generations. But yeah, it was such a big donor that we, you know, we often hid the fact that we're into Dungeons and dragons from our parents. Lest we be have our games taken away or not be allowed to see your friends anymore, but it was sort of one of the first, I mean, token was big, but I think dragon lands really defines a lot of our generation and our love of fantasy and the type of fantasy. Autumn (26m 57s): Maybe we still enjoy because it's changed a lot, but there's still a core of those stories that have the ELs, the dwarves that are still so much a derivative of token very closely. Jesper (27m 10s): Yeah. And, and the whole thing about a, you know, like an adventure group, like in, in dragon lands, like there, they are a group that goes out together and all that stuff. Right. That's very trophy nowadays as well. And I also liked, which I also felt like hit home in your article was that we like to do research before we buy. So we are checking on the internet for reviews and, and you know, other competitors, other products and stuff like that, which I definitely recognize because I do that myself, whenever I need to buy something, I'm going to check reviews. I'm going to do some, a bit of internet research to see, you know, is there some, a better alternatives or is this really the best product and stuff like that? Jesper (27m 52s): So, so I definitely recognize myself in, in that as well. Autumn (27m 57s): Yes. I think that is a very funny trait. We weren't born into the internet age, but we helped shape it. And we certainly helped shape it as a marketing platform. So a lot of us that are entrepreneurs, we know our way in and out of the marketplace and in and out of running businesses online and we do our research, we will check out comparisons. We will look at competitors, we will check the reviews, we'll read the reviews. So we're not a spontaneous buyer. We are the one that when they say it takes at least seven to 11 times of seeing an ad before someone will go and look at your book, that's us. Yeah. We will not go buy your book just because you sell it on. Instagram will be like, yeah, that's nice. You don't hook us on the first bite. Autumn (28m 38s): Not even close, we're going to check you out. We'll think about it. And compared to boomers. So was it a lot of more research and we are a smaller generation. We're not 72 million. We're like 68, I think. So there's less of us. And I can't remember what percentage of the wealth we have, but obviously boomers have almost half. And we have about half of what's left somewhere around 25%. So we're doing pretty Jesper (29m 1s): Good. We're doing pretty Autumn (29m 2s): Good. We were getting into our, you know, forties now and we're, we're okay. We're doing well. You know, our most famous, I think gen X-er is Elon Musks. So we, you know, some of us have done really well. None of the rest of us are working on that. We're definitely a generation of doing our research. We have some money, but we're pretty much, we've worked really hard to earn our money at this point. And we don't let it go as quickly. So you can get us with a coupon. We will launch, we will jump into an email marketing to get a coupon. That's fine. We know how email marketing works because we probably set it up ourselves. That's just how we, we know how it all works. Autumn (29m 44s): So we'll sign up for something. We'll get on a list. And I thought it was funny. One of the biggest things about our generation is we'll stick with you. We like brands. We like people until they say something we don't like. And then it was like, you're gone. You have one chance to lose us. And you say something we find offensive, or we don't agree with like, you're gone unsubscribe. So we're the, also the unsubscribed generation, Jesper (30m 7s): Right? Yeah. So I think in overall from a book selling perspective, this is where you're, you know, building up your reviews are really important. That's at least that's going to help to convince a gen X person to actually buy your book. Autumn (30m 22s): Yes. Jesper (30m 24s): Move on to millennials. Autumn (30m 25s): Okay. Well, I want to wrap up one quick thing. So gen X is, are on Facebook, so you can still market to them. We're also on Instagram. And I agree if you're going to try to hook a gen X-er, you're probably gonna have to spend a lot more money than you would with a boomer and reviews. Being able to say other people have liked this, be very open with your reviews. That's how you're going to get them more interested than saying we're great. I write just like token and they're not going to buy that Jesper (30m 53s): Molina. Millennial. Stan is born from 1981 to 1996. So these are the people who actually grew up fully in the internet age. And probably most of them probably don't even know what life before computers. Autumn (31m 11s): No, if they have any interesting to me. Yeah. I can't imagine. So they have any recollection of life before computers. They will have memories of life before smartphones. So they might remember flip phones and cell phones. So that's kind of, you know, I can at least relate to that a little bit, but they grew up knowing computers, building computers, and they they're pretty snazzy and know their way around the marketing. What's surprised me is I thought, for sure, all the millennials, they get such a bad rap as being like the more self-centered generation. But at the same time, the oldest ones are in their forties. You know, they're taking their kids to college, they've grown up, but they are really still really good online. Autumn (31m 56s): And I thought they'd all be off of Facebook, but there's still a majority of them on Facebook. And after that Instagram, I mean, those are the two big ones of where you can find still millennials somehow. I don't know how Facebook keeps everyone, but they do. Jesper (32m 12s): Yeah, they do. Yeah. But also things like Twitter and Twitter and tick-tock and that kind of place, they also hanging out. Autumn (32m 19s): Yeah. They're sick talk is especially coming up, but there are, yeah, there are a little more broad spectrum. So it's harder to find out exactly like in what was interesting. It doesn't that study this statistic. I was quoting didn't show if they were on Facebook and Instagram and Twitter, which most likely they are, but there could be some orders. Like, are you here or here or here? I mean, this is one of the ones. If you're marketing to them, you're going to have to market to our broad base. Cause I'm not quite sure where they are and how often they're seeing you. Jesper (32m 53s): Yeah. And again, the majority is watching YouTube here. Amazing. Again, I'm not so sure about this. I mean, it's interesting of course, to know that the majority is watching YouTube, but I don't think that they are watching YouTube from a book perspective. So they're just using it as it as entertainment. So there's also means that I I'm not, I don't think that you want you to conclude out of this, that you should try to sell books on YouTube to these people. That's not the point here. No. Autumn (33m 21s): Oh, I think you'll good luck with that. If you can find a way, but yeah. I think they're pretty much on YouTube. Like you said, for entertainment, maybe tutorials. I mean, my that's my favorite use of YouTube. I must be so boring, but I'm on it to watch tutorials on how to, to stuff. Yeah. I wouldn't do it yourself or that's how it works. Jesper (33m 41s): Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And, and also for the millennials, you know, they have a very, very large population-based there even lots of than the boomers, but as you pointed out in your article as well, they, on the other hand, they don't have that much cash compared to our gen Xs. We have like five, five times the wealth of the millennials and they are many more than we are. So I think money wise, they usually operate with a fairly limited budget. Yes. Autumn (34m 16s): I agree. There tend to be educated. And I think gen Z are even going to be more educated than millennials, but millennials tend to be educated. Their careers really haven't taken off, even though, I mean, they can be as old as 40, but they're still struggling. We'll get to the statistic when we talk to gen Z, but gen Z and millennials combined, combined, which has a huge amount of population. That's 68 million plus like 72 million somewhere in there. They only have 6% of the U S wealth 6%. So if you're a marketing to anyone who is 40 and younger, we're talking about someone who has only 6% of the U S wealth. They're going to be inheriting quite a lot from baby boomer parents. Autumn (34m 57s): I think it was like 68 trillion. But again, the wealthiest are going to inherit. The most, most people are going to just inherit, maybe a nice modest sum. And then you take out the inheritance tax, which is like 50%. They're not going to be made wealthy overnight. And that was 68 trillion by 2030. So they still have some ears and that's a good a statistic. So that's going to be up and down. It's going to be some sooner. Some later may remind me later. So they're not a very wealthy generation. If you're marketing to them, this is the one you want to be trying free giveaways. They will sign up for free giveaways and free coupons. And again, these are people who have grown up with the internet. Autumn (35m 37s): They have probably started their own businesses in high school. They know how it works. They know what happens when they sign up. Most often they've done it probably a million times and they, but they will do it. They will sign up to check out something and to give a sample, they'll go for the free sample. It might be the best way to hook them. However, they might not be able to afford to go buy all your books right away. They might have the budget for them. They might be the ones on Kindle unlimited. That's going to be the best deal for them because they don't have a ton of money. You want to keep these aspects in mind that, you know, they're the ones who are looking for things. But the nice thing is, is since I grew up in the internet age and because they have a limited amount of money, they're also really good at research. Autumn (36m 19s): They're really into reading reviews. And they're huge at social media, leaving reviews and telling people if they loved or hated you. So these are the influencer generation. They're the ones who, if they like you, they're going to show the unboxing. They're going to give you reviews. They're going to give you a huge shout out. However, they are definitely not brand second shirt. They are quality centric. So they might stick to you for a while. But if they find something better, they're going to move to something better. So you might not be able to hold on to these as tightly, as you might a boomer who was going to basically keep you in cherished for the last breath. Jesper (37m 3s): Yeah. And of course the good news is that the eBooks, at least, I mean, these people are very used to the, you know, technology and so on. So eBooks is not a problem. And then the other part of it is of course as well that they might not have a lot of wealth, but eBooks are like a couple of bucks. So for most of them, they, I think they should be able to afford a couple of bucks for an ebook. Otherwise they have a lot of problems, but not to say that some don't of course, but, but I think there's quite a big, I mean, because they aren't, there are so many of these that a lot of them will have the money to buy a three, four, $5 ebook. So yeah, it's good to know of course, to be mindful that they are operating on a limited budget. Jesper (37m 48s): And like you just said, autumn, this, just to me, that doesn't mean so much about them not being able to afford the books. I think it more speaks to the fact that you have to write really good books too, to keep these people reading. Otherwise they they'll just not buy any more from you. Then they'll go jump on onto another author or something instead, and try to read some other books. But because they might, you might be able to hook them to buy one book, but they're not going to continue reading the series unless they really find it really good. Yeah. So for me, I think that's the important part. Yeah. Autumn (38m 21s): Yeah. I agree. And I'm though, I do, I have met a, quite a few that have mentioned that, you know, they have a book budget, you know, they can only, they, everything is budgeted in their life because they only have so much money and you know, the good ones don't go over, but that's why things like Kindle unlimited are such good deals and they're going for the deals. So if there's a way, if they love reading and they want to be able to read as many books as possible in a month, they're going to read Kindle unlimited. And that's why I think you see Kindle unlimited being such a huge, you know, inducement, why so many people are a part of it because it's a good deal. If you're a serial reader and you only have like 4% of the entire U S wealth. Yeah, I do it. Not a problem. Jesper (38m 60s): Yeah. Okay. So Jen C born between 1997 and two, 2012. So that basically makes them between six years old and 24 at this point in time, they are so there's a lot of them, nearly 68 million people in the U S here. Autumn (39m 21s): So this is another big generation, almost the same as a gen X. So this is like our, our shadow copy gen Z and admittedly they're young. So there's not a ton of market research on them yet, but it's up and coming. They're starting to make their waves known in the world. But again, combined gen Z combined with gen with millennials, only 6% of the U S well, so tiny amount. So they're even less. They have even less than millennials because they're just getting into the workforce. If they finish their education, they almost, all of them have at least one parent that graduated from college and a lot of them are going on to do master's program. They're going to be one of the highest educated generations. Autumn (40m 2s): And so because of that, a lot of them are not in the workforce or working full time. So they have even less money going around. They have also never known a world without smartphones, and that's just terrible by amazing, amazing. They are, you know, they're going to, the next generation is going to come with USB plugs installed. I swear. They just know their way around. Exactly. So they're there. The biggest thing I think in the reason I included them, even though they're not much marketing research is that if you are targeting Y a young adult readers, you're targeting gen Z. So go and look and see what they're doing. Autumn (40m 43s): Of course, I thought it was so funny when I looked at why stats 50% of why readers are adults they're older than 24. So that's, you know, gen X of even boomers, millennials, they're all reading. Why are they just doing a secretly? But technically gen Z is your target audience. If you're Yia. So you should know where they are, what they're doing, how they buy books. This is really important for you to take a look at it and see where they're hanging out, which again is pretty much all over from Tik TOK to F to Facebook, to YouTube, to Snapchat. Tick-tock rising pretty quickly. Jesper (41m 26s): Yeah. I think for these people, you know, think of somebody who's grown up with computers, they grown up with smartphones, they grown up with apps. So it's really important if you want to engage with these people online, which is like the main place where you should be engaging with them, all the, like, you know, nice images, nice user interfaces, eh, corresponding with them through commons and in chats and you know, the whole community building thing. That's the key here. So yeah, to me, like for, for somebody, a, a gen X person, I already feel like, oh, this sounds stressful. Jesper (42m 9s): All the, all the million interactions in commenting on all these different social media platforms. I don't know. It's not my thing to be honest. But I think for these people, for the GNCs, it's important for them, this, this is how they, to a last degree, that's how they view relationships. A lot of their relationships are online. So it's, it's yeah. For, for, for somebody from a gen X, this is just like a different planet kind of thing. Autumn (42m 41s): I mean, they consider their life online almost equal to their physical life. It is about equally important, 50 50, which yeah. As a gen X or having remembered like life offline that I still prefer, you know, to be offline quite a lot. We're the, we're the generation that's like, I'm digging a social media break. I mean, I think gen Z is like, that's half of my life. I would never go offline, but they want the fine touch. They want the, they want community. If you want to get gen Z ears into loving your WIA books, you have to build community. You have to have interaction and beautiful photos and you have to have video. They like video. So they want to see all of these things and you've got to be chatting with them and you've got to be dynamic. Autumn (43m 21s): And you've got to also be really aware. And this is what I've been reading some way books. And the change is so non they're, non token, not at all. If you want to go read like the shadow and bone, the Grisha series of Krisha verse, it's so different from what I was reading as a teenager, there's very few elves, very few dwarves, very few overs. It's almost all humans and different races and their interactions. And, you know, they'll have issues of transgender and homosexuality. It's all there and it's very open. And those are the concerns rather than, you know, a quest group it's totally different. And it's kind of, to me, it was really a refreshing to read. Autumn (44m 3s): It was very exciting to read very different, but it is a completely different audience. And it's interesting. You got to go in and hang out with them and see what they're doing and be on Tik TOK and be very engaged and fun and have that community, and also have the coupons and the free books and Canon limited, because that is definitely how you're going to be able to hook them. At least have one series in Kindle unlimited. If you're doing WIA, because they're in school, they don't got much money. Don't make them pay for everything. They're probably getting it as a Christmas present from their parents. Jesper (44m 38s): It sounds like way too much work on them. I'm already tired. Autumn (44m 42s): And you have kids, your kids are technically gen Z or Jesper (44m 48s): Yeah, but I, yeah, that part is fine. But I marketing to these people sounds like way too much. Autumn (44m 55s): Yeah. I probably is. But just have your train, your kids to do it. You'll, there'll be naturals. That's why you have kids, maybe your marketing managers. True. Jesper (45m 6s): Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I was talking to my oldest son because he's about to, he wants to start his own YouTube channel. He wants to do like a, well, like a true GNC, I guess. Right. So he wants to build a YouTube channel and he wants to, you know, do like those gaming videos and stuff like that. And then I was trying, I w I was trying to be like the good dad who has been, you know, I've been doing the YouTube thing for us as well and all that stuff. So I was, I started talking about something because we were talking about the intro and outro music thing that you put on videos and stuff like that. And I was sort of saying to him, well, just be mindful that you know, that some of that is copyrighted. Jesper (45m 49s): You can't just take some music for wherever. And he was like, yeah, yeah. I know all of that as you do. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. And I also know where to find it. Okay. So he knows all of it. I bet you, like, in, in four months, you'll will know more about YouTube than I ever knew. Autumn (46m 6s): We're going to be hiring him as our social media manager. Just watch the, Jesper (46m 11s): Yes. They just, yeah. They notice stuff. They do know this stuff. Okay. But what can we sort of conclude out of all this order, Autumn (46m 19s): That if you're a gen X-er and marketing to G and you're not doing Y a and marketing to gen Z and millennial sounds too much market to boomers, try it. I would S I would love to know if anyone is specifically choosing like a Facebook audience saying, you know, 50 and older, and, you know, just finding the right words, because again, they will actually spend money. They will go buy your books. Possibly. Like I said, you should have paper books available, but they will read online. As lot of them have adapted to like the Kindle paper, whites and stuff that feel more like a book that look more like a book. I want to know if anyone's doing that because after reading this, I'm like, they have money. They're impulsive, they're brand centric. Autumn (46m 60s): They sound like they have, they're retired. They have time to read. They sound like the gift of book marketing right there. Go for boomers. I want to know if anyone else is because it's totally rethought. I'm like, I now see why, if you're marketing to gen X, you're going to be marketing forever to try to get them to get, you know, give you a try. They'll give you a try, but they're, you know, they're booked, they're tired. They've got kids, they do their research. They're going to be so hard sell to, and the rust, you know, they don't have much money. These are not a huge 6% of the wealth they're going to be. It's going to take some time to get gen Z and millennials to want to spend money on you, unless you've got a really good deal. Autumn (47m 43s): But boomers, you know, 50% of the U S wealth, lots of free time, impulsive shoppers. Oh, I love you. I have to admit in some of my best emails, I put that in the post, some of the best emails I've ever gotten and the lengthiest emails, because boomers will correspond with you and they will stick with you. My biggest fans have all been boomers, but it took until I wrote that article to valet, oh, this is why they care. And they want to get to know you and they will stay with you and they will love you. And maybe they're not going to give you as big as a shout-out as a millennial or a gen Z, because they're going to spread you all over the internet. Autumn (48m 23s): They're going to love you in a really compassionate way. So I want to know if anyone's marketing to boomers. Cause I think it's totally a way to go. Jesper (48m 32s): Yeah. So let us know. And hopefully you got a bit of a inspiration for, you know, well, at least on the Facebook ads, you can target different age brackets. So at least now, you know, for your Facebook ads, at least some things to consider and think about on Amazon ads, obviously there's no way to select certain age groups and so on. So there you, yeah, it doesn't help much, but yeah, but at least with the Facebook ads, I think this is very useful. Autumn (49m 5s): Yes. And in the posts on patron, I actually went into maybe some suggested images because each generation has different traits of the type of images that call to them. So again, come, go check out the post on Patriana. If you're a member or join for a dollar a month, then go check it out and see what the suggestions are. Jesper (49m 24s): Okay, good. So next Monday, autumn has a very special interview lined up for you. It's about how to write fight scenes. And for us fantasy authors that is highly relevant. Narrator (49m 36s): If you like what you just heard, there's a few things you can do to support the and writing fantasy podcast. Please tell a fellow author about the show and visit us at apple podcast and leave a rating and review. You can also join Autumn and Jesper on patreon.com/AmWritingFantasy for as little as a dollar a month, you'll get awesome rewards and keep the Am Writing Fantasy podcast going. Stay safe out there and see you next Monday.
Folly Rob joins Yia and David to chat about Yia's journey to becoming a United States citizen.The White on Rice podcast is hosted and produced by Yia Vang and David Crabb. For more information, please visit us at whiteonricepodcast.com.
Em Cassel is the former editor-in-chief of City Pages and is a co-founder and editor of Racket, a new digital alternative publication. She talks with Yia and David about her career in journalism and journey from the East Coast to Minnesota. They talk about the newly launched Racket and the role it plays in the life of the Twin Cities journalistic scene. The White on Rice podcast is hosted and produced by Yia Vang and David Crabb. For more information, please visit us at whiteonricepodcast.com.
Headline News Metro TV Edisi 562 kali ini membahas hari pertama PTM terbatas di DKI Jakarta. Aksi relawan, sumbang peti jenazah covid. Kereta bandara YIA beroperasi. Perdagangan saham dan rupiah. Membangun kolaborasi pemulihan ekonomi. Dengarkan informasi terupdate hanya di Headline News Metro TV Podcast.
Marshall Paulsen has been in the restaurant industry for over 20 years and is currently the Director of Operations for Vinai. Recording outside at the State Fair grounds, Marshall talks about the Minnesota Farmers Union and their presence at the State Fair. He tells Yia and David about his career in the restaurant industry, his vision for developing leadership in the kitchen, and some of the changes he sees in restaurants post-COVID. The White on Rice podcast is hosted and produced by Yia Vang and David Crabb. For more information, please visit us at whiteonricepodcast.com.
The incredible origin story of Yahoo from start to $850m IPO in 2 years.Source: https://greatness.floodgate.com/episodes/jerry-yang-how-yahoo-went-from-a-hobby-to-the-early-king-of-the-internetYahoo Origin StoryJerry Yang: When the HTTP and the web and HTML came along, it was this moment of aha. All that information can be put together in a graphical way. That is point and click. You don't have to sit in and typing command line and hyperlink.[00:00:15] So you just kept going. You could keep exploring as owns there's links to click on now. Moment for us to say, wow, this is going to be big because anybody can create a website and can link to other websites. So you don't need a lot of content to start. Right. You could just start and say, Hey, here's my Madonna website and here's five other ones.[00:00:34] And it was totally decentral. There was no way of knowing who created what website, when and how was updated and things like that. So, so there were just websites out there. So there's websites that are popping up everywhere. And so we created a little, just the beginning when we called it hotlist and then David started writing the end to get it into more of a database format, more tagging or labeling more keywords and a more directory structure.[00:01:00] And. Publish it onto a webpage in the front end. And so it was called Jerry's guide to the world wide web. And then. And I don't quite remember exactly when it was, has gotta be, early 94, mid 94. And then at some point I got sick of putting my name out there and David doing 80% of the work. So I put David and Jerry's guide to the world wide web, and then all hell broke loose.[00:01:19] So we said, One night, let's not leave until we come up with a new name. Right. So I remember we were, at the office and God, it must've been midnight and we were getting tired and sick of this. And so, so we said fine, let's look up all the acronyms that had yet another Y There's all kinds of computer tools.[00:01:37] I have Yia references and we looked in the dictionary and Yahoo stood out. Partly it was because if you look in the dictionary, it means people who are very uncivilized uncouth, rude, and were like cost. Great. We're just a couple of years. [00:01:50] Mike Maples Jr: And was David [00:01:51] Jerry Yang: from Louisiana. He was from Louisiana. Yeah, he claims his father called him a Yahoo or Yahoo growing up.[00:01:57] So, and so we just thought it was funny. It was short because we were typing our thing. We could get a short Yahoo that, Stanford IDU, everybody thought we were the chocolate drink it's it was it was just a totally zany off the cuff decision. [00:02:11] Mike Maples Jr: And at the time, did you even really think it was that important of a decision or is this just still a hobby?[00:02:16] Jerry Yang: It was absolutely a hobby. And so it was only important because, we had to go and tell people that this is what is now called. You don't have to type in David and Jerry's guide to the world wide web anymore. And it remained a hobby until. Until it wasn't. [00:02:29] Mike Maples Jr: And when you were designing the original Yahoo product, did you draw on any lessons from like library science or attempts pre prior attempts and just throughout history to classify [00:02:41] Jerry Yang: it?[00:02:41] Thanks. Yeah, it was funny. I, as a college student, I, one of the jobs I had to take was working in the engineering library, working in the stocks too. To restack books. So I was very familiar with it, the Dewey decimal system, and a bunch of other ways of organizing information. And it just didn't seem right when we started Yahoo to go to any existing system.[00:03:00]So we created our own sort of ontology our tagging system, our directory tree that I think lived on for quite a while but it was a bit ad hoc. And so we realized we needed somebody that understood organizing information at a grand scale. And that's when you know, , who was a symbolic systems major, Stanford joined us and she like.[00:03:22] Put order into the chaos. [00:03:23]Mike Maples Jr: And I guess, with libraries, you've got some type of hierarchy, I suppose, right. Books are in a classification or sub classification and you're trying to put them back on shelf. Right. So, but the internet, I suppose, you discover pretty quickly, it's different. Right?[00:03:38] You can cross link to [00:03:40] Jerry Yang: lots of different, right. You're exactly right. So it's more of a graph than a tree, in a it's more interconnected graph. It doesn't. We try to avoid circles. You don't want to get in the place where you just can't get self out, but the idea that you can interrelate, you can get to you can get to a music artist from Iceland, from starting with Iceland, countries, Iceland, or you can start with music artists, or you can start with pop.[00:04:02]The idea was to get people where they want to go. If you think of a keyword, why would you. Not let that keyword get you where you want to go, rather than following some crazy hierarchical system that may or may not make sense to you. So, so it was again, this mental and mentality of really focusing on the user needs and creating a system that you will go, oh, okay.[00:04:21] I see how you got here. So next time I know. I could start here. I would start there and making sure that's consistent. And that's, that was, that's why I ended up being a search metaphor too is whatever keywords you typed in allows you to get to the right place, not multiple places.[00:04:36] Mike Maples Jr: When did it start to occur to you? Whoa, like this is starting to [00:04:39] Jerry Yang: take off. Once we became the place known for having a pretty well organized, pretty comprehensive in a very fast site. I mean, David really emphasize making sure that, we had a really quick loading site and that was really important because.[00:04:54] Back then, most computers were dial ups. Most people viewing our stuff wasn't on a fast connection. So yes, you want to put all these fancy images out there, but if it takes forever to load, so he always really emphasized that user benefit. I can't quite remember it, but probably by the end of, mid 94, towards the end of 94, we had IP addresses from over a hundred different countries, hitting our service.[00:05:17]We have millions of unique IPS that were hitting us. We didn't know about users back then. And people started, we started to become this network effect where if you were putting up a website, you have to register it in different places. And we became one of the places you had to.[00:05:29] People know, you have to let Yahoo know that you have this website, or I have this change, or can I get reclassified because I did this. And so we ended up being in this constant communication with a web community that was very human. That was very there's two guys behind it. And that was an important element because I.[00:05:46] You could have easily written algorithms to do all that, but back then, it wasn't, it was a little too chaotic and it was a little, the quality really varied and websites went up and down all the time. And there's nothing worse than hitting a 4 0 4. Right. So it was just, it was, you could feel the energy of the web growing through.[00:06:03] The work we were doing. And that was really compelling. And, we stayed up all night and barely slept. And then, you had to come back, otherwise the list just gets long. [00:06:10]And then I remember finally, one day our system administrator came to us and says, we can't hide you guys anymore.[00:06:15] There's so much bandwidth being sucked up by these two servers over here. You guys got to, got to go find a home. And that's when I think we became more visible and aware of the opportunities out there. And once people realize Yahoo is finding home, that's right. That's when the opportunities avail themselves, whether it's corporate partners or venture capitalists.[00:06:36]So we, we said to ourselves, well, we might as well explore those. We, we don't know what it's going to become of it, but why not? Why not check it out. And so [00:06:43] Mike Maples Jr: how many venture capitalists did you talk [00:06:45] Jerry Yang: to? I would say probably a handful. So consumed and busy trying to keep the service going that we couldn't spend a lot of time fundraising, if you want to call it that we didn't know that was the process.[00:06:55] And I think we pretty quickly settled on. On who we thought understood what we wanted to do the best. And that was Mike Morrison. [00:07:04]Mike Maples Jr: And what was your pitch like? Did you have a slide deck? Did you, or did you say here's [00:07:09] Jerry Yang: Yahoo to the, well, when you, I think someday, if you talk to Mike on the podcast, you have to ask him his version.[00:07:15] But I, to this day, I remember. Who were in that general partner's meeting saying, oh yeah, I remember when you guys come in and present it. And I don't remember a presentation. I remember sitting in a corner of a room, a large table, a bunch of Sequoia partners and talking, and so, maybe I think we show the service or something.[00:07:31] So, so I don't know, maybe there was a pitch deck who knows, but no, it wasn't. In retrospect, I don't think it was a lot of capital for Sequoia. Yeah. But it was also probably an Unconvention. Investment, right? I mean, you got two PhD students that no experience, no business model, no business plan. We had a great service that had a lot of users, but but there were tons of competitors.[00:07:53] Everybody says, look, These two guys put together by hand that [00:07:56] Mike Maples Jr: it's hard to remember now, but I remember in those days, people didn't even think Netscape was going to have a business model, right? Like no, nobody could figure out what the business model of the internet would be. [00:08:06] Jerry Yang: Right. And it was a research and an academic medium that was staunchly believed in non-commercial activities.[00:08:14] And so it was this very tender. Time where, whether you could charge for software, like Netscape ended up doing or charge for advertising. Like we ended up doing those are very non-obvious speculative kind of ideas because the internet community could have easily rejected that. Okay. So [00:08:32] Mike Maples Jr: then Mike just decides to take the risk and he invests.[00:08:35]How much did Sequoyah invest [00:08:36] Jerry Yang: in you? Yeah. They did a million dollars of the $4 million post, not bad. And then I [00:08:42] Mike Maples Jr: think they did all right. I think they did. Okay.[00:08:43] So from the time you raise money to IPO, how long was it? [00:08:47] Jerry Yang: We were incorporated like on March 1st, 1995. And then we went public on April in 1996, right? Yeah. I remember driving down one, went to, we went to Montgomery securities on the day of the IPO.[00:09:00] I was driving back down, one-on-one going to work and it hits you, it's like, oh my God, we're a public company. But because the internet was. He was so competitive and was a land grab and we had to at least, get enough cash so that we're not. So the cash wasn't, that then will be the reason that we didn't succeed.
Yasameen Sajady is the CEO and co-founder of Mazaah Chutney--a bright, bold, and balanced Afghan-style chutney that's been featured by Food & Wine, the New York Times, and the Food Network. She tells Yia and David the story of growing up with her mom's amazing chutney, the decision to share it more broadly, and the incredible success they've seen in response.The White on Rice podcast is hosted and produced by Yia Vang and David Crabb. For more information, please visit us at whiteonricepodcast.com.
Tom Horgen is the Senior Manager of Audience Strategy at the Star Tribune. He talks with Yia and David about his career in journalism, the last year reporting on COVID and George Floyd at Minnesota's paper of record, and the future of journalism. David subscribes to the Star Tribune during the episode, and listeners can do the same by subscribing to the Star Tribune today.The White on Rice podcast is hosted and produced by Yia Vang and David Crabb. For more information, please visit us at whiteonricepodcast.com.
Chef Yia Vang, co-owner of Twin Cities restaurants Union Hmong Kitchen and Vinai, joins Charlie this week on the Cripescast. Yia talks about his love for the Midwest, his family’s journey to America, and how food can help share their story.
We've been asked more than one occasion how an author can get a traditional publishing contract? While Autumn did sign a traditional contract years back, none of us are experts on the subject matter. To bridge that gap, we brought in the award-winning author, Andrea Phillips, to share some insights and advice on this very topic. If you want to learn more about Andrea, you can find here: http://www.andreaphillips.com http://www.deusexmachinatio.com http://twitter.com/andrhia Tune in for new episodes EVERY single Monday. SUPPORT THE AM WRITING FANTASY PODCAST! Please tell a fellow author about the show and visit us at Apple podcast and leave a rating and review. Join us at www.patreon.com/AmWritingFantasy. For as little as a dollar a month, you'll get awesome rewards and keep the Am Writing Fantasy podcast going. Read the full transcript below. (Please note that it's automatically generated and while the AI is super cool, it isn't perfect. There may be misspellings or incorrect words on occasion). Narrator (1s): You're listening to the Am Writing Fantasy podcast. In today's publishing landscape, you can reach fans all over the world. Query letters are a thing of the past. You don't even need a literary agent. There is nothing standing in the way of making a living from writing. Join two best selling authors who have self published more than 20 books between them now onto the show with your hosts, Autumn Birt, and Jesper Schmidt. Jesper (30s): Hello, I'm Jesper. And this is episode 113 of the Am Writing Fantasy podcast. And while Autumn is busy editing one of our stories, I have a great guest on for you today. It just happens on a let's call it, semi-regular, basis that Autumn and I are asked about traditionally publishing contracts. And some are also interested in becoming what is known as a hybrid author, meaning that you are both sell publishing and traditionally published. So I thought this would be quite a good topic to cover while Autumn is busy doing other stuff. And while Autumn did have a traditional contract years back, we don't really have that much experience with this topic. Jesper (1m 17s): So today I'm going to be joined by Andrea Phillips and Andrea is an award winning transmedia writer. She does game designs and her projects have won awards like the broadband digital award, the Canadian screen award, and much more. She is published by FireSIGHT fiction. And her short fiction has been published in escape pod and the juice versus aliens anthology. So welcome to the Am Writing Fantasy podcast, Andrea, and I hope you are keeping safe during these crazy times. Andrea (1m 51s): Hello. Thank you. It's so exciting to, to be here and yes, yes. I'm, I'm keeping safe. I'm a hermit in my home. We're even snowed in right now. So I don't know if I could, well, no, I'm, I'm exaggerating. We, we do a lot of snow very recently, but I could probably escape if my house caught on fire, you know, it's, it's, it's not so bad. Yes. Yes. I am in New York, got a foot into half of snow over the weekend as we, as we record. Jesper (2m 28s): Oh my God. Yeah. We don't really have that much, you know, I'm in Denmark and we have like one centimeter of snow or something like that. And it has been snowing the last couple of days, but then yeah, everyday it melts away again. So it's just gray. That's what it is. Andrea (2m 48s): That's usually what happens to us, but I would have thought, you know, Denmark would be one of the places where it snows and then it just stays all winter. And you have piles and mountains of snow by the end. Yeah. Jesper (3m 0s): Well here between the Scandinavian countries, you know, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, and Finland, the other three countries actually do usually get quite a lot of snow because they're also much further North Norway and Sweden and Finland are huge countries compared to Denmark. It's just like this little dot and we're just slightly more South than the others, so we can sometimes get snow, but, and it does get cold during this winter, but most years actually, it's not that, that much. So yeah. But talking about the weather, we can always do that. No, that's okay. Jesper (3m 41s): It is. I'm the one starting it. So, but yeah, I, I did a short introduction of you there, Andrea, and it looks, or it sounds like you do quite a lot of things, but maybe you could share a bit more about yourself. Andrea (3m 57s): Sure, sure. I always try to find a way to explain how all of the things I do are kind of related. And the transmedia work that I do is, is immersive storytelling. And I do a lot of it for, for brands out of marketing budgets. So I might help to make an app. We're an alternate reality game for a TV show, a movie, a video game, and that's fiction writing. Usually it's, it's in someone else's Storyworld, but it's exactly the same set of tools that I use if I'm writing a novel for myself, in terms of thinking about sort of characters and motivations and so on and so forth. Andrea (4m 40s): And then I've written a nonfiction book about this sort of trans media, immersive storytelling, as well as having, you know, I have a novel that fireside published. I have a couple that I've self published and some shorts, and then, you know, I have a going freelance career. So I, I kind of do a little bit of all kinds of things and somehow together, it all seems to make up a career who knew Jesper (5m 11s): That's pretty cool. Yeah. I want to get into all the hybrid authorizing and contracts with traditional publisher. But, but before we go into all of that, do you find it's different to do the writing for games and, and, and those sorts of things, even though it it's, it's a story you're telling, but do you find the immersive part to be different compared to how you might want to immerse a reader into a novel? Andrea (5m 35s): It is different and it's, it's actually a, a point of view change. I do a lot of writing in, in what amounts to second person. So when you're, when you're doing immersive storytelling, the person that you're telling the story about, and the person that you're telling the story to are the same person, the audience needs to have some sort of active agency in the story to feel like they can affect the outcome to feel like they're really, really there. Like the story is real. And obviously in a novel, you you're a little more removed and everybody knows that they can shout at the page, but that doesn't mean that the character is going to make a good decision instead of a bad decision. Andrea (6m 19s): So it, it, it's, it's just a sort of a different framing and you can use different things in the one way or the other. I am. I actually like to talk about the, sort of the, the emotional palette of feelings that you can make your audience feel and with sort of traditional flat narrative, where the audience is removed from the story, you can make people laugh, you can make people cry. You know, they can feel grief over a character that's died. They can feel, you know, joyous at, you know, a heroes, great, great victory. Andrea (7m 1s): But when you're doing immersive storytelling, you can, you can do other different things. You can make an audience feel guilty over something that they did, which isn't something that you can really do in flat fiction. You can make them feel proud of their, their own achievements of what they've done, which is again, kind of hard to do in, in flat fiction. So it it's, it's, it's not, it's not better or worse, and it's not as different as this may make it sound, but it is definitely different. Jesper (7m 34s): Yeah. But you also have the, a visual medium to play with there, you know, and also of course, the agency of the person, for example, playing the game and, and so on. Right. So, so in that regard, I guess the medium is also quite different compared to a novel where you just have to imagine everything in, in your mind and you don't have any agency on what's going to happen. Andrea (7m 56s): That's even true going from Nala writing to film. So for, for a lot, a lot of my, my kinds of work, sometimes we'll do video content. A lot of it is, you know, of logs or security camera footage, kinds of things to, to make it seem sort of, sort of realistic. And I hadn't realized before I did this, how much more detailed and how much clearer in your vision, you have to be about every little thing. So, you know, when you're, when you're writing on the page, you can say, you know, messy dorm room, you know, there was a bicycle, you know, spoon on its side, whatever, and, and the, the one detail, and then the rest of it, the audience fills in the gaps themselves. Andrea (8m 48s): But in film, in, in script writing, you know, the producers came to me and said, okay, we need to know more. What, what kind of lighting is it? What color are the walls? What time of day is it? What is their hair like that day? Is it messy? Is it like, do they look like they've gotten enough sleep? You know, are there posters on the walls? Is it clean? Is it dirty? All of these things have to be decided on purpose. So I actually have a lot more respect for cinema than I did before, because it really, it really drives home, help. Everything you see in a movie was something decided by somebody to be there. Andrea (9m 29s): Nothing is by chance and then even, even doubly. So in a video game where literally nothing exists, every cloud, every rock is something that was put there on purpose. Jesper (9m 43s): Yes. Yeah. It's, it's a very different style of writing as well. And I think, well, sometimes I hear people say that they're gonna, I'm gonna write a screenplay off of my novel. And always I'm thinking like, to myself, like good luck, because I wouldn't dare do that unless I got a bit of training and insight on how to do it, because I think it's a much more complicated method than you think. Andrea (10m 7s): Yeah. The problem is that novels are very, very internal. The thing that they're good at is letting letting you know about the emotional terrain, the thoughts and feelings of your characters as they go through. And in, in film, you really can't rely on that coming through. So unless you have a very, very good actor and you can't, you can't rely on the actor, seeing things the same way as, as the writer did. It's it's funny. It's funny. Jesper (10m 45s): Yeah. I can see that, but maybe then getting a bit into topic here. So usually when we talk about being a hybrid author, as I said in the intro at the top, usually means that you'll have both self publishing works, but you have also something that you have a more traditionally published. So I was wondering why, why did you decide to become a hybrid author? Andrea (11m 12s): So the first self-publishing thing that I did was actually a little, a little story that I put on Kickstarter because I wanted an iPhone. And this is obviously going really far back. I think it was the iPhone two. And I thought, you know what? I have this story. I could try and sell it to a market and that would take a million years. And it probably wouldn't sell anyway because short fiction is really difficult to sell. So I said, well, if, if I get, you know, enough money to buy an iPhone, then I will really sit on my website free for everyone to read. I think, I think I even put a creative and, you know, people, people will get to read the story and I'll get my phone and everyone will be happy and it works. Andrea (11m 60s): And in fact, I got enough money to buy my husband and I phone also. So I thought, you know, that that's pretty great. So a little bit later, I kickstarted kind of a goofy cereal idea about pirates and it's a, it's a really sort of Gonzo weird light rompy story. And I did a Kickstarter for it. The Kickstarter was, was really quite successful. And afterward I, I made a choice of games game actually with choice script, which was also pretty, pretty modestly successful and did a couple of licensing things. Andrea (12m 51s): And, you know, I had not, not exactly an empire, but, you know, I, I, I made a decent amount of money with, with this, this sort of Lucy smoke cart thing. And then I, at some point in there, I did, I did my traditional novel through, through fireside with, you know, regular contract and then, and so on and so forth. And that was actually a really lovely experience because Brian White, my, my editor at fireside is a really fantastic human being and a really, really good editor. So he, he helped me to, to let it be the story that he could see I was trying to do. Andrea (13m 35s): And he wasn't trying to nudge it into being something that it, that it wasn't, which I think a lot of, a lot of writers are afraid will happen. And let me see, I did a bunch of, a bunch of stuff for cereal box in there too with, with book burners and so on. And my most recent novel is sort of a political thriller that I thought I would try and sell traditionally, but it was very topical. It sort of had to come out last summer because it is about an election. And if you're writing about an election, you probably want it to come out around the time of the election, not after the election. Andrea (14m 19s): Yeah. Yeah. So I actually did give it to my agent and we had it on submission for a bit, but then we pulled it because it was, it was too slow, a process basically. And we hit the points where nobody had, had bought it just yet. And even though it was still under consideration in a bunch of places, given publishing timelines, which are so slow, it wouldn't be able to come out in time. It just wasn't feasible. And I thought, well, I'd rather have the book come out in the reasonable timeframe then than not. And this time I just, I just did it directly on, on KDP instead of doing a Kickstarter first. Andrea (14m 60s): And I actually do regret it because it didn't do as well as my other, other earlier starter things. And this is actually a failure of promotion on my part. Basically, I just didn't push it the same way because it's the year 2020 everyone was fatigued and it felt weird to be shilling a book, even if it's, you know, the book of your heart in that moment. So the stars didn't line up. It has nothing to do with the method through which I published it. And it has nothing to do with the book. It just, wasn't a good environment for me to be pushing anything, I guess, because I actually think it's one of the best books I've written. Andrea (15m 41s): This is the first thing I've written, where, where people came to me and said, Andrea, this is really good. And they sounded surprised, which makes me wonder if, if they'd been kind of exaggerating about how much I had like prior things. Jesper (16m 1s): Yeah. But I'm now that you sort of have a feet in both camps here. So that also gives you a bit of perspective. So I'm wondering from the way you see it, how do you see the main differences, but also, I guess, advantages of being a hybrid author. Andrea (16m 19s): I, I see the, the advantages are, are kind of, you could, you could pick and choose what you, what you want to try for in each category. And as, as a self publishing author, there are things that I know I'm going to want to write, that I will never ever be able to find a publisher for because the market is too niche for a publisher to want to sink money into, but the amount of money that I need to sink into something to get it out the door or self publishing is so much lower that I don't need to make the same amount to make it worthwhile. You know, so for, for an episode of Lucy smoke cart, you know, if I, if I were to sell, I'm going to make up numbers here. Andrea (17m 4s): I actually can't even remember real numbers. If I'm selling, you know, a thousand episodes to make a thousand dollars. And, you know, it's, it's, let's say 5,000 words long, again, I'm just making stuff up here. This has nothing to do with how, how the real things went. Then, then, you know, and I spent maybe $200 on a quick copy, edit and, you know, use the art that I already have. You know, I, I'm making $800 out of 5,000 words. And that's really great where a publisher isn't really going to be able to offer me kind of money for what is essentially a work of short fiction. Andrea (17m 53s): Right. And I can do it on my timeline and I can, you know, just, just kind of suit myself in every possible way. One of the problems that I've I've had, it's not really a problem, but one of the constraints I've had in my career is since I do so much work for other people's intellectual property, I'm used to working in a sandbox and having to take into account. No, what, what, what you're say, what clients say and what the clients bosses, bosses say. Andrea (18m 36s): And there's, there's a lot of Liberty in just being able to decide something on your own and, and do it. Like it's very satisfying to just be able to do something on your own in a really Gonzo way that said, I feel like self-publishing is a tremendously larger amount of work than writing something, submitting it, editing it and letting someone else worry about cover art, letting someone else worry about getting the copy, edit together, getting a line at it together, letting someone else worry about promotion and timing and availability and schedules. And, and sometimes I just don't have that in me, you know? Jesper (19m 19s): No, I understand that. I mean, with self publishing, you are going to get a lot of freedom, but you're also going to get a lot of tasks. Andrea (19m 28s): Yeah. And to some extent you, you get out of it, what you put into it, but, but you have to put in a lot before you start to see much of anything. Yeah. Jesper (19m 41s): But is it, so when you are the sort of deciding your next book, for example, I'm gonna self publish it or am I going to give it to my agent to sell it? Is it about the length of it? Versus for example, also it's a too niche or not, or how do you determine which ones are self puppies and which ones to ask your agent to take care of? Andrea (20m 5s): It's you know, it's, it's, it's sort of, I, I feel like in general, if I'm writing something novel length, I'm probably going to try and publish it through the traditional route. First, if I'm writing something that feels more like a cereal to me, or if it's shorter, probably go another path, but said, I don't know if you consider a short story publishing to be traditional publishing. But my, my go-to for a long time has been, if I want to publish a short story, I'll send it to escape, Potter, fireside, instead of doing like my, my sort of Kickstarter things and that, and that's a traditional route, just not books. Andrea (20m 53s): It's, it's, it's the other stuff, but I usually have a pretty good idea of where I want to send it while I'm writing it. And then at the end, I do have, I have material that my agent hasn't been able to sell. And in the case of my most recent book, I decided to self publish it because I really believed in it. And then in the case of another book, I'm actually just still sitting on it with the idea that we may be able to sell it later. And I don't think it would be a good fit for self publishing for me, just because of the nature of the book. Andrea (21m 37s): It's, it's hard to explain. I it's, it's, it's not even, it's an emotional thing. It's an emotional logic thing and not, and not an objective business decision, if you know what I mean. Jesper (21m 49s): No, no, that's fair enough. And not, not all decisions have to be objective all the time. I do know quite some of our listeners are interested in pursuing a traditional publishing contract. So if you were to give some listeners some advice here, what would you say in terms of how do you get started and what is sort of the best approach, if you want to find an agent and get a more traditional publishing contract and so on, how do you go about it? Andrea (22m 22s): I mean, it's, it's the same, it's the same advice on all of the blogs. And everybody says, you know, you, you do have to find, find a bunch of agents, see people who are buying, find people who are publishing things, sort of similar in feeling to what you would like to publish, figure out who represents them and, you know, write a good query letter or letter, send it out. None of this matters unless your material is already as polished as you can make it. I don't advocate going out and getting an editor before you start submitting and so on. But I mean, in the same with self publishing, you need to make sure everything is absolutely as polished as you personally can make it before you send it out into the world. Andrea (23m 3s): Right? This is actually pertinent advice for me personally, because I have a habit of dashing off a first draft and wanting to run with it. My defense, I do write fairly solid first draft. And then, you know, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's a difficult and slow process. And that's, I think why a lot of people find self publishing much more satisfying because it can take you a year to find an agent just waiting for an agent that will become yours to get around, to reading the manuscript and, you know, reading the partial and then asking you for the full and then reading the full and then, and then offering, it can take months and months to can take a year. Andrea (23m 53s): It can take longer. And nobody likes to feel like their career is on hold for that long. Right. And then submitting can take even, even that long or longer. I, I know, especially in Yia, it was really, really backed up for a while. And people were getting offers a year, a year and a half after their agents had submitted the manuscripts. And I mean, I know, right. And we can publish four novels. And at a certain point, you, you just can't wait forever. So yeah, I it's, it's the information on, on what to do on the, on how to do all of the right things is absolutely out there. Andrea (24m 41s): And none of it is, none of it is, is difficult, which is to say, it's not, it's not hard to figure out what the right thing is to do, but it is to figure out whether or not you can make your book any better than it is. It is hard to wait that long. It is, you know, hard to maintain professionalism in all of your correspondence and essentially become your own marketing person and writing a query letter when the skills that go into writing a novel and the skills that go into writing a good blurb for that novel are really not the same thing at all. Yeah. And what does it mean? Andrea (25m 24s): You're great at the other, go ahead. Jesper (25m 26s): No, indeed. No, that's exactly what I was about to say as well, because even if you say that, okay, I'm going to self publish it. You're going to be confronted with a lot of marketing skills or the need for marketing skills that you don't need when you're writing the novel. So in some extent, I guess to some extent, I guess you could say that it doesn't matter if you go one route or the other, you will be confronted with the fact that you have to put some marketing skills in place and exercise those skills in order to, to get somewhere. But I was also wondering, because we see some, at least some of the big, you know, it used didn't, it used to be the big six and now it's a big five and I guess it's going to be the big four soon as well. Jesper (26m 8s): So those are merging together, but at the same time, we also see smaller publishers popping up in the market space. So I'm wondering, do you see that it's, is it easier? Is it more difficult or is it the same difficulty level to, to find an agent and find a traditional publishing contract nowadays versus what it was maybe four or five years ago? Andrea (26m 31s): I feel like it's about the same level of difficulty, even, even with the publishing mergers, for the most part, the number of imprints is still about what it was. You don't see, you see one of these mergers basically shutting down one of the arms completely, but I feel like the level of competition is about what it was four or five years ago. The, the marketplace has changed some, but only in the way that that publishing has sort of cyclical fads, you know, this is hard. And then that's how it's. Andrea (27m 12s): So, so it goes, I, I don't know. I feel like it's never going to be easier or harder, but also it's kind of a moot question because you, you don't have the option to go back and submit four or five years ago. It's now is what, you know, you know, but Jesper (27m 34s): I was more thinking that it might be a bit helpful to understand the difficulty level. If you have to, if you're sort of, if a listener is sitting there thinking, should I try or should I not try? Should I just self-publish instead of even trying than it is, of course, I think an important input to have in your mind to say, well, it is a lot more difficult nowadays or no, it's actually the same. So you can go ahead and so on. Andrea (28m 0s): I mean, it's, it's a lot more difficult than it was in the 1940s. The that's that's about is as solid as, as I think I could even say it it's, it's very difficult. It is definitely very difficult. It has been very difficult for at least all of, all of my career. It will probably remain very difficult, but that said promoting and marketing and succeeding and self-publishing is also very difficult. And anyone who's done it is there tremendous accolades because it's a ton of work and, and does a ton of work, but it's not easy to do well. So that's absolutely true. Andrea (28m 41s): The problem is if you want it to be a writer and you want it to be published through any means, it's, it's not the sort of career where you were going to be able to kind of Slack off and take it easy and to have your career take care of itself, that that is never going to happen. Jesper (28m 60s): No, I think we've said multiple times on, on, on former episodes of this podcast as well, that if you get into writing, thinking that you're going to earn money, then just quit now because there's way easier ways of earning money than writing Andrea (29m 14s): So many easier ways. Jesper (29m 17s): But one thing I was wondering as well though, was that I can just imagine if I put myself into the mind of somebody who have tried to pitch agents or publishers for ages, and let's say like two years later, some agent comes back to you and say, Hey, you know, I'm actually prepared to take this on. I can imagine a lot of people jumping at the opportunity thinking like, wow, that's wonderful. Finally, I succeeded, but how do you actually know? Because one of the things that we do a lot when we self published autumn, and I, for example, when we select an idiot editor, we are on the opposite side of the table in the sense that we are the one hiring the editor. Jesper (30m 1s): But in this case, it's the opposite of way around. But just because somebody says that they want to hire you, it doesn't necessarily mean that this is a good agent, that you're going to work well together with the person and so on. But I'm just a bit concerned that because of the long timescales and waiting time involved, that some people might just jump at the opportunity, even if they've got feeling a sort of saying to them that there's something off here, but how do you go about, or do you have any advice on, how can you possibly vet a bit about if somebody come an agent comes to you and say, Hey, let, let's make a, let's make an attempt here to get your, a properties in contract. How can you figure out if this is a good person or not? Andrea (30m 43s): Yeah. Agenting relationships are really difficult. They're, they're a lot like a business partner partnership, which is in turn a lot like a marriage. And the power dynamic is also very strange because the agent works for the writer, but the way that the getting an agent happens, it's common for the writer to feel like they work for the agent. And it's, it's resulted in a lot of kind of bad relationships, frankly, bad marriages, where the agent isn't working very hard on behalf of the writer and the writer feels like, well, this is just their, their lot in life, because this is the agent that shows them. Andrea (31m 28s): You always do have the ability to, to walk away. And if you feel like, if you feel like the agent, isn't actually very enthusiastic about your work. If they, if you get the vibe that they're only interested in this one book, and they're not interested in your career overall, if you get the feeling that they think that they can make a quick buck out of your book, if you get the feeling that they're chasing the market and not all in on you personally, then those are, those are red flags, I would say. But on top of that, you know, there are people who love an agent who gives them a really, really detailed set of feedback on, on a manuscript before they even submit it. Andrea (32m 17s): And there are writers who absolutely hate that and just want the agent to sell what they wrote already. And you have to look in your heart and decide if you want a hands-on agent or a hands-off agent. And then maybe do a little bit of research before you even submit to see what working with different agents is like to see if they even sort of sell. We're seeing to like the, the sub genre you work in. One of my problems is I, I have trouble deciding what genre I even work in. So finding an agent that actually, I guess, deals with my kind of work is a little weird. Andrea (33m 5s): But yeah. And the other thing is if, if you write, let's say a lot of horror and a little bit of science fiction, and you have an agent that represents a little bit of science fiction and a lot of romance, but they're interested in your science fiction work like that tells you probably that's not a good match because they don't represent the kind of work. That's the bulk of what you're going to want to try to sell. It's it's just, it's, it's complicated and messy. And unfortunately there's no one true right way to do any of it, which before, before we started recording, I think I said, I said something to you about how we're all just sort of making it up as we go along. Andrea (33m 50s): And it sounds, it sounds like a joke, but it's literally true. We're all making up our stories as we go along, but we're also all making up how our careers work as we go there, there are no rules. There, there aren't any, even many good rules of thumb. You know, if, if your agent isn't sending you royalty statements, maybe fire them. If your agent isn't sending you, your royalty checks, definitely fire them. And beyond that, it's all a matter of fit and suitability and what you want and what they want. And whether it's the same thing. Jesper (34m 27s): It's a lot about, I think being honest with yourself because it is, it doesn't matter. Well, you absolutely right in the sense that the agent works for the author, but I would almost go as far to say it doesn't really matter who works for whom in the, in the relationship, as long as you're honest with yourself and you know, what kind of partners do I want to work with? And you're, you're both sort of pulling in the same direction because at the end of the day, it is a very, very close working relationship. And I say that, of course, without having any agent, we self publish all our work. But, but, but I have heard so many times from those who do have an agent, that it is a very, very close working relationship. Jesper (35m 12s): And, and if you don't feel like, you know, you're pulling equal amount of the weight, then what's the point. Andrea (35m 20s): Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And again, it's, it's easy to feel like B agent picked you. And so that's the agent that you get, but the reality is actually very different. And unfortunately, in many cases you do an agent. There are a lot of publishing houses that simply won't accept material that wasn't sent through an agent. So this isn't the sort of situation where you can say, well, who needs them? I'll just go on my own and keep the 15%. But it's, it's complicated. Everything is complicated. Jesper (36m 1s): Yeah. But let's say you then find your, the agent that you work well with. You have a very good cooperation and then you do at some point land, one of the publishing deals with some publishing house that the agent has sold you, your book to one of the things I hear a lot, and I suppose that's true as well, but maybe you can add your reflections to it is that you can't really expect that much marketing support from a publishing company, unless you are like one of the real big headed names, but otherwise you are almost on your own like UI, if you were indie publishing, it doesn't really make that much of a difference. Jesper (36m 41s): Is that also your view? Andrea (36m 43s): It's, it's kind of true. It's mostly true, but it's also kind of not true at all. One of the, one of the big things to note is that one of the big advantages I should say of, of going with a traditional publisher is that they will be able to get your book on bookstore shelves. And that is incredibly difficult through any sort of a self publishing schema. So simply having your book on shelves does wind up selling more and simply being published through, you know, Hachette or random house. You know, we'll make sure that more people are going to see your book for more opportunities for people to notice because you're, you're starting out at an advantage. Andrea (37m 34s): You're more likely to be sent to, you know, publishers weekly. You're more likely to be sent to Kirkus. You're more likely to be sent to a lot libraries like libraries, journal, librarian, journal, I'm sorry, I'm screwing it up. And you can see things on your own as self published, but it costs tremendous amounts of money out of pocket. And you're not necessarily guaranteed any, any sort of quality good review. And especially you're not guaranteed that anyone will see it where the weight of the publishing house sending you to publishers weekly instantly sort of, sort of gets you up a notch out of, out of the vast sea of publishing that self publishing work. Andrea (38m 26s): And so you're more likely to get noticed more easily. You're more likely to be able to get distribution in libraries, which can, can result in quite a lot of sales, you know, and that sort of thing. It's, it's, it's, it's just being in a publishing house results in, in a bit of a bump up. But, Jesper (38m 46s): But I suppose it also depends on what publishing house we're talking about, because of course, one of, some of the bigger publishing houses, they have, you know, big muscles that they can, they can flex in order to get into airports and bookstores and all those things, but whereas a smaller publishing house, well, they might really not be able to do much that you can't do. I'm thinking Andrea (39m 9s): For a very small house. Yes. But even, even like a small beer, you know, one of the, one of the smaller presses subterranean doesn't do solicited sort of original material, but like the smaller presses even still have the gravitas of sending to the reviewers and in turn selling to librarians, for example, that you have to pay a lot of money to get otherwise. I mean, they're, they're not going to be all sending you out on a book tour, or they're not all going to be putting, putting your book on, on bus shelters or billboards or subway or wherever else. Andrea (39m 51s): Honestly, nobody is going to do that for you unless you are Dan Brown. I think part of that is because publishing advertising doesn't have a history of a specially working very well. I I'd actually be interested in hearing you talk about advertising for self publishing at some point, because it's my understanding that there's a lot of advertising you can do. And very little of it is proven to work Jesper (40m 22s): Well. Yes mean we have, we have multiple episodes on this feed as well about marketing books as a self-published author. But there is indeed a lot of things you can do across Amazon ads. You can run BookBub ads, Facebook ads, all this click to play ads. There's ton of it. But the thing is that it's not, it's not that easy. It's not like you just create an ad and then you start selling books because first of all, there is the return of investment that you have to take into account. So you can't just bit like $2 per click or something because the, the book costs $2, maybe. Jesper (41m 3s): So, so it's, it's pointless. So there's, that's you take into account Andrea (41m 7s): The dollars to make $20. Yeah, Jesper (41m 9s): Indeed, indeed. So you might be able to get to the stage where you're selling books, but you're not earning anything from it. So that in itself is an issue. So from the inter indie author perspective, you can move some sales short-term by click to play ads. If you're short of narrow down to your audience well enough, and you do well enough in your ad copy and so on. But the real trick of the trade is, is to build an email list because that's where your money is longterm. And that's where, that's where our focus, my myself and autumn. For example, we only focus on building the email is we do have some kick to play ads running, but not a lot. And we don't spend a ton on it. Jesper (41m 51s): We just have a bit running. But other than that, all our marketing goes into trying to give people some something for free in order for them to join the email list so that we can start talking to the people, not, not about selling to them, but more over time, build a relationship with them via emails and they get to know us better. And then of course, if they like us, then at some point we hope that they're going to buy some of the books. But again, if you just get people onto the email list with the only purpose that I'm going to send you a ton of emails, promoting some stuff, that's not going to help, you'll have to go into it because you want to have an online relationship. Let's call it that with the readers. Jesper (42m 31s): Otherwise it's, it doesn't matter as, as well because people will just unsubscribe. I'm sure you can. You can recognize if you, the, the email list you might have signed up to where they just keep emailing, you offers about this and that it's, it's pretty annoying. Andrea (42m 46s): The worst one I ever had was for a children's clothing brand, who, who I signed up for, for my, for my daughter. And they wound up sending the marketing email literally every hour. Jesper (43m 2s): No, but, but it, it, it's this very fine balance to walk because on one hand, you have also to get your email list into the mindset that once in a while, I am going to try to make you an offer for, to buy something that is going to happen. But you have to walk this fine balance between I'm not here to push sales in your face all the time. And I'm here to actually, because I want to us to have like a two way communication going over the emails. But at the same time, once in a while, I do hope that you're going to buy something because if you're not, then I can't even keep doing this anyway. Right. So there is that element into it. And I know authors who sell puppies, authors, who either try to sell all the time, which is not good, but there are also those who fear selling anything. Jesper (43m 52s): So they just keep being buddy buddies with the people on the email list forever without ever selling them any of the books. And that doesn't help either. Because at the end of the day, you're paying for the people who are on your email is so you have to sell something as well. So it is a very fine balance to walk. And I think as you said, as well around the traditionally publishing stuff with it, none of this is easy, right? It doesn't matter which route you take, you aid. It is not easy. Andrea (44m 19s): Yeah, yeah, Jesper (44m 21s): No, no. If there, is there anything we S I sort of forgot or didn't think about asking you when it comes to traditional publishing contracts or being hybrid authors that you like, this is an important point that should have been mentioned. Andrea (44m 35s): I just, I just want to reiterate there's, there's kind of no, no right. Or wrong way to do anything. It's, it's what works for you and doesn't work for you and what works for your audience and doesn't work for your audience. So your circumstances may be different. Your, your goals may be completely different. It's entirely possible that you're not in it for money, but for, you know, reach and you want to find a way to reach as many people as possible. It's, it's, it's, it's hard to say, you know, it's, it's all a matter of, of what you want to get out of it. And you have to have that in mind before you start deciding how to do it. Andrea (45m 16s): Just like everything else in life. Jesper (45m 18s): No, that makes a lot of sense. And I also want to thank you, Andrea, for coming on to the, a am writing fantasy podcast here today and, and give us some insights on, on an area where at least autumn and I are not the most proficient people. So that was nice to get some insight inputs on that, because I know, I know some listeners, I interested in this area, so, so thank you for doing this. Andrea (45m 43s): It's been a really good time. Thank you. Jesper (45m 45s): Excellent. Is there any place where people can go on the internet or you want to point people on the internet, if they want to learn, learn a bit more about you? Andrea (45m 54s): I would say you can go to my website, which is , which is a pun in Latin, but you can actually also go there by Andrea phillips.com. It goes to the same place, because I realized I had made a terrible mistake at some point. And I am sometimes on Twitter and D R H I a. Jesper (46m 24s): Okay. That's perfect. So, Andrea, I'm also thinking that if you email me those links, then I will put those in the show notes for you and people can follow them straight from there. Andrea (46m 37s): Wonderful. I'll do that right now. Jesper (46m 40s): Perfect. That was the wrong sounder. This one was the one I was looking for. So next Monday, Autumn will be back and we're going to talk about one of her favorite topics, namely editing a novel. Narrator (46m 56s): If you like, what you just heard, there's a few things you can do to support the Am Writing Fantasy podcast. Please tell a fellow author about the show and visit us at Apple podcast and leave a rating and review. You can also join Autumn and Jesper on patreon.com/amwritingfantasy for as little as a dollar a month. You'll get awesome rewards and keep the Am Writing Fantasy podcasts going. Stay safe out there and see you next Monday.
1:16 – Hmong culture3:50 – Road trip4:58 – Chef Yia Vang joins the show6:15 – Always a chef10:18 – Chef Yia's father19:57 – Coming to U.S.24:13 – Finding his cooking style27:16 – What is authenticity34:56 – Wood fire grilling40:55 - Kamayan feasts44:52 – Hmong food philosophy55:28 – Chef Yia's inspirational quote
In this special episode, we had cast members (Seye and Emmanuel) of theatre production company, Yahweh in Action (YiA). In this episode we speak about their upcoming play Jumala. We also spoke on the birth of YiA, the transition from church group to a theatre production company and so much more! Be sure to get your tickets in the link below! https://www.thealbany.org.uk/event_detail/2347/Hires/Jumala Socials Twitter: @__YiA
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