This was a hard year.

0:00 The Palisades [music] is a complete disaster zone.

0:05 Everything is gone.

0:14 [music] So, it's been a pretty stressful

0:20 year and stress and making YouTube videos, they don't really mix that well.

0:26 Now, to catch you back up, in January of this year,

0:29 both of our homes burned down in [music] the Palisades fire.

0:32 Shortly after that, like days after that, [music]

0:36 Samir and his wife had their first kid.

0:38 And right after that, we took down our entire podcast studio

0:43 and moved into a new building and a project called The Lighthouse.

0:47 And about 3 months later, Colin and his wife had their first kid.

0:51 We've made less YouTube videos than we've made

0:53 on this channel in a really long time.

0:55 [music] And you guys have watched less uh because we

0:57 put out less content and probably because you're less interested.

1:02 You got anything you want to say?

1:04 And we are approaching [music] next year

1:07 10 years of making videos on this channel.

1:10 It's been a while since we've done this like just like talk to you guys.

1:14 Felt like the right time to do it.

1:15 Also, if you're curious, we're standing in the middle of the Palisades.

1:19 So, it's kind of like the town center.

1:21 It is one of the oldest parts of the Palisades.

1:23 that have been coming here since I was about I

1:25 don't know four years old and none of this exists anymore.

1:30 So this is a story about rebuilding and reinvention.

1:36 [music] So Colin and Samir,

1:38 this channel was already a reinvention of ourselves on YouTube.

1:42 [music] We had started on YouTube in 2011 and had

1:45 this really amazing experience building a channel in the sport of lacrosse.

1:50 But after building that channel,

1:52 we just felt like we wanted to make it to the big leagues of YouTube.

1:57 We wanted all the people that we admired on YouTube basically

2:00 just to watch our stuff and [music] think it was cool.

2:03 We just wanted to be seen.

2:05 We also wanted to get this channel to a million subscribers and figure

2:08 out how to make the Colin and Samir channel be our job.

2:12 That's what making it was as YouTubers.

2:16 So, we started really without a plan.

2:18 And if we're being honest, reinvention did not go well.

2:25 Ready?

2:25 Yeah.

2:28 If you could switch hair with someone right now for the rest of your life,

2:32 whose hair would you get?

2:34 We made so many videos over basically

2:35 the course of 5 years with minimal viewership,

2:39 making almost no money, and at one point we almost walked away.

2:43 And so through this process of trying to figure ourselves out,

2:47 we decided to start a podcast.

2:49 And the podcast was about our struggles of making it as YouTubers.

2:54 And what happened next was that a bunch

2:56 of YouTube creators started listening to our podcast.

2:58 And then when CO hit and there was nothing else to film,

3:01 we decided to film that podcast and put it on YouTube.

3:05 This is a really big deal.

3:07 The day we got a podcast set.

3:09 Yeah, that changed everything.

3:10 All right.

3:10 Welcome to the brand new version of the Colin and Samir podcast.

3:14 Lily, welcome to the show.

3:15 Thanks for having me.

3:16 You know, a YouTube channel is a resume.

3:17 [music] Your fans are your focus group.

3:20 Longtime listener, first time speaking to you guys.

3:22 Laserike focus.

3:23 I just want to be the best YouTuber I can.

3:25 And we ended up hitting milestones I never thought we would.

3:27 A million subscribers in front of our entire audience.

3:30 100 million views a year on the channel.

3:33 Part of the wildly popular Colin and Samir show.

3:36 You guys are like the Oprah of YouTube.

3:38 you really are like connoisseurs of this whole creator economy.

3:42 Obviously, I'm just such a big fan.

3:43 I watched these guys on YouTube almost religiously.

3:46 And on top of all that, with the show working came financial success,

3:50 not just to the point of like we could do this as our job,

3:53 but we actually got to build a team around

3:55 the Colin and Samir show and eventually got to buy houses.

4:00 I'm a little speechless.

4:01 And that to me is crazy.

4:02 the fact that we just committed to this YouTube

4:04 channel and that led us to actually achieving

4:07 all this and then we had a physical manifestation

4:10 of all of that hard work in our homes.

4:13 That that was just like a total dream come true scenario at the end of 2024.

4:19 By all measures of our imagination, we had made it.

4:23 We had validation from all the creators that we admired

4:26 and we were able to do this as a career.

4:28 But in 2024, a strange and unexpected side

4:32 effect of the success that we found was fear.

4:36 Now that we got the thing that we always [music] wanted

4:39 and worked so hard for, we were afraid to lose it.

4:42 [music] We made a studio tour of our brand new podcast studio.

4:46 We looked at it and we were like, "Nobody wants to watch this."

4:48 We went golfing with Good, which was a great video that's like ready to go, but

4:52 that's a great video.

4:53 It didn't come out.

4:54 We made tons of videos that just won't see the light

4:56 of day because we were too afraid to put them out.

4:58 And I would say primarily for the show.

5:00 There's a lot of times where people reached out who wanted to come

5:03 on the show and I would absolutely love to sit down with that [music] person,

5:08 but I couldn't figure out if it would make sense in a title and thumbnail,

5:12 if it would actually attract the type

5:14 of viewership that we had gotten accustomed to, that we felt like was the amount

5:19 of viewership we needed to keep the business running.

5:22 All that said, dealing with this fear led us to publishing a lot less videos.

5:28 Now, reinvention itself is stressful, right?

5:31 Like having to actually take a new shape and figure something new out,

5:35 that's in and of itself stressful.

5:37 But reinvention on YouTube is more stressful because you're

5:42 doing it in public and the viewership is public.

5:45 The comments are public.

5:46 Like, this is a comment we just got like right now on the channel.

5:51 says, "The next video better be a hit, boys."

5:55 I don't think this conversation had any

5:56 value to add to a small/aversized creator.

5:59 I didn't learn anything that could help me do better,

6:01 get inspired, or anything like that.

6:03 I liked it when you felt like you represented creators, not billionaires.

6:07 That's an interesting one.

6:08 Okay, here's more of a comment uh than a question.

6:11 Honestly, watching this channel now feels like walking into a seemingly

6:14 local restaurant and then realizing it is a food chain.

6:21 Uh yeah, that hurts.

6:22 That hurts.

6:23 But I understand that, you know, I I I I read feedback like this and I'm like,

6:28 that's uh that's good for us to know how it feels.

6:31 And this is a comment we got on our most recent upload.

6:35 What the are y'all doing?

6:37 Honestly, have a whole channel about how to be

6:39 YouTubers while being dog YouTubers whose channel is slowly dying.

6:46 Yeah, that that one hurts.

6:48 [music] So, it's comments like these that you know even before the fires,

6:52 even before becoming fathers have contributed [music] to fear.

6:57 And then once the fires did happen and once we did become [music] fathers,

7:01 you're now feeling an extra heightened sense

7:04 of pressure to provide and make the right decisions.

7:12 So, we've [music] actually got to talk to some pretty cool people this year.

7:14 One of those people was Reed Hoffman.

7:17 Reed Hoffman was the founder of LinkedIn.

7:20 And in reference to this year that we're having, he said, "Never waste a crisis.

7:26 Turn crisis an opportunity.

7:28 Never waste a crisis." That hit me like a ton of bricks.

7:31 Like right when he said it,

7:32 you just realize that amidst how crazy this year has been,

7:36 it's actually a huge opportunity to reinvent.

7:41 it doesn't like compute in your brain cuz you're standing in the same

7:44 spot you were standing and it had a whole different meaning

7:48 and a whole different feeling and now it's like 100% different now

7:53 at the same time of of navigating like this process of of the houses

7:57 being gone um becoming fathers is a whole other thing I would

8:02 say becoming a father kind of saved me this year because it

8:05 it allowed me to have so much perspective and so much understanding

8:10 of what I'm doing at home is the thing that is my life

8:15 that is the thing when I come to work that is that is

8:18 the other thing that's like almost like the hobby it's a thing

8:21 I do for fun and it's obviously the thing I do to provide

8:24 for my family too for me becoming a father has removed so

8:28 much of the fear it is the best thing in the world

8:31 I feel like life actually just started and looking back it's been fatherhood

8:36 that has provided a new level of comfort efort and stability to create

8:41 from this feeling like no matter what happens, I've got my family.

8:46 Yeah.

8:46 You make whack YouTube videos and your kid still likes you probably, right?

8:50 Until he gets to be 15 and he's like, "Whoa." Until he starts watching.

8:53 He starts leaving the comments, right?

8:54 Good question for Rhett and Link.

8:55 That is a good question for them.

8:58 All right.

8:58 So, here we are just about one year

9:01 after one of the biggest life-changing moments ever.

9:04 Of course, this has been a very dramatic change in our life.

9:07 But if you're watching this, it's possible you're

9:09 going through some type of change right now, too.

9:12 And when we drove back up to the Palisades recently,

9:16 we ran into someone who really helped us

9:19 understand how to deal with change when it's happening.

9:23 [music] His name was Noah,

9:24 and we're driving and we just see him walking with a shovel.

9:29 And we pull over to talk to him.

9:31 So, Noah is a kid like me who's born and raised [music]

9:33 in the Palisades and trying to figure out what's next for this town.

9:38 But what he was doing was just digging holes in this very

9:42 small patch in my neighborhood and just planting [music] trees.

9:46 And while we were talking to Noah,

9:48 Colin shared with him this Dave Chappelle quote,

9:51 and it was the first time I had ever heard it.

9:53 He said, "You can't always change the world,

9:56 but you can make a corner look pretty nice.

10:00 Yeah, literally a corner of this part, all these little things.

10:03 I always like that.

10:04 And that's exactly what Noah was doing.

10:06 It's an incredibly overwhelming task [music] to try

10:10 and figure out what's going to happen in the Palisades.

10:13 7,000 homes are gone.

10:15 But what he's doing is just taking

10:17 small steps that will eventually have larger impacts.

10:20 And that's one of the biggest lessons that we've learned this year.

10:23 When you're dealing with change, you just have to take small steps.

10:28 When big change happens drastically, you can't fix it all at once.

10:34 Okay.

10:34 So, this has been like a totally crazy and unexpected year of our lives.

10:39 And you know, one thing I'll say is like I

10:42 have such immense gratitude for all of you watching us,

10:45 supporting us, supporting this channel over the past 10 years of us doing this.

10:50 Even the comments that are critical show that you care.

10:54 So, in a way, I appreciate that.

10:56 And amidst all those comments, it's just part of the job.

10:58 You're going to get critiques.

11:00 There were also so many uh positive and uplifting

11:03 comments and people just asking how we were doing.

11:06 So, we wanted to take this opportunity and kind of bring you

11:09 more behind the scenes of what this crazy year has been like.

11:13 I also want to say thanks to all of our creator friends.

11:15 like being a YouTube creator has this crazy side

11:18 effect of being a part of a very tight-knit community

11:20 of people who deeply care and helped us out a lot

11:23 this year as well as everyone who works at YouTube.

11:26 This is a crazy thing when you become a YouTube creator like you

11:30 join this this bigger thing and I felt that this year more than ever.

11:34 So, as we move forward now into our 10th year,

11:37 there are a ton of ways where you can watch us experiment,

11:40 where you can continue to keep up

11:42 with us outside of even just this YouTube channel.

11:45 So, we've been releasing audio only episodes on our podcast feeds.

11:48 If you want to check that out, it's on Spotify and iTunes.

11:50 Uh, we've been experimenting with short form content

11:52 on this YouTube channel as well as Instagram.

11:55 We've also been sitting down with creators of all sizes

11:58 and helping them workshop their problems on our second channel, Creator Support.

12:01 That's been super fun.

12:03 And we've been hosting a lot more events for everyone

12:06 who came out to Press Publish NYC in 2025.

12:09 We are doing more of those.

12:11 And when I say more, I mean multiple two two.

12:15 You'll find out about that very soon.

12:17 But that has been really fun is getting together with you guys.

12:20 If you want to come check those out,

12:21 subscribe to our newsletter and publish press.

12:23 You'll find out about those.

12:24 All right.

12:24 Thanks so much for watching.

12:25 Thanks for subscribing.

12:26 Thanks for being a part of all of this.

12:28 10 years of calling and smear in 2026.

12:31 See you.

12:31 All right.

12:32 See you.