150. His Brilliant Videos Get Millions of Views. Why Don’t They Make Money?

People I (Mostly) Admire

Freakonomics Radio + Stitcher

Society & Culture

4.6 • 1.9K Ratings

🗓️ 1 February 2025

⏱️ 59 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Hank Green is an internet phenomenon and a master communicator, with a plan to reform higher education. He and Steve talk about the video blog that launched Hank’s career, the economics of the internet, and how a cancer diagnosis prompted him to become a stand-up comedian.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey there, it's Steven Dubner from Freakonomics Radio.
0:06.0	I am busting into this People I Mostly Admire episode to tell you that we are doing a live
0:12.0	Freakonomics Radio show in Los Angeles on February 13th, and I hope you'll join us.
0:17.0	Guests will include Ari Emanuel, the CEO of the Sports and Entertainment
0:21.8	Firm Endeavor, the filmmaker R.J. Cutler, and the Freakonomics Radio Houseband, led by Luis
0:28.0	Guerra. For tickets, go to Freakonomics.com slash live shows. A portion of our ticket sales will go
0:35.0	to Wildfire Relief Efforts. Again, that's freethonomics.com
0:39.5	slash live shows February 13th in LA. I hope to see you there.
0:48.4	My guest today, Hank Green, is responsible for some of the best content you can find on the internet.
0:56.0	His company, Complexly, which he co-founded with his brother, John Green, has over a dozen YouTube shows, including the incredibly popular Crash Course and SciShow.
1:06.0	Hank operates at the intersection of wildly entertaining and incredibly smart.
1:12.4	He's a fantastic science communicator, but his content is also personal, funny, and empathetic.
1:19.7	My big concern was that it would take over my kind of carefully crafted 15 years of building
1:26.8	a sort of public image of who I am in people's
1:28.9	heads. But then I quite quickly realized that cancer is part of life and we're all going to deal
1:36.8	with it in one way or another in our lifetimes.
1:48.7	Welcome to people I mostly admire with Steve Levitt.
1:53.2	Hank Green's YouTube channels are just the tip of the iceberg.
1:58.6	He also hosts multiple podcasts, as a musician, runs big charitable endeavors, and is the author of two New York Times bestselling novels.
2:02.7	But it all started in 2007 on YouTube with vlog brothers.
2:13.1	In 2007, my brother and I had been fans of this guy called Zay Frank, who had this daily
2:20.3	video project that he did for all of 2006.
	...

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