Locked In & Breaking Out | Ian Bick - Part 2

[00:00:04] So what happened to Ian when he went to jail? He was a 21 year old kid basically going to jail

[00:00:11] What happened to him in jail and then the amazing ways in which he transformed his life

[00:00:17] afterwards, so here's Ian again

[00:00:23] This isn't your average business podcast and he's not your average host this is the James Altucher show

[00:00:40] What are the judge sentenced you to? So he ends up sentencing me to three years in prison

[00:00:45] One year home confinement and three years of supervised release which is like probation in the feds

[00:00:50] And did you think how long did you actually think you would serve? I didn't know

[00:00:54] I mean you hear mixed things especially as a kid and stuff. I thought maybe 50%

[00:00:59] I didn't know but then there was programming

[00:01:01] See like the thing about prison and everything you ask one guy the same question

[00:01:06] You ask 10 different guys like the same question you're gonna get 10 different answers

[00:01:10] No one really knows every person's scenario is different

[00:01:14] Even the idea of COVID changed everything now so many people can get house arrest this and that but in my scenario

[00:01:20] I ended up doing 26 months

[00:01:23] Inside three months of halfway house slash home confinement and then a year on an ankle monitor

[00:01:29] On home confinement under probation

[00:01:31] And were you in like in a low security place or they they put me through diesel therapy?

[00:01:36] I was everywhere. I went from the Wyatt detention center in Rhode Island. I went to Brooklyn

[00:01:43] I went to Fort Dix a low-security prison

[00:01:47] From there I went to the Danbury, Connecticut low-security prison, which is where I was from

[00:01:52] I was in Philly detention Center for a little bit. I was in

[00:01:57] Brooklyn again during transportation. They sent me all the way out to Chicago for a little bit

[00:02:03] I was in Chicago. I was in

[00:02:05] Oklahoma City, I went I why they said you so many places so

[00:02:09] The first time I got caught up in like a cell phone investigation

[00:02:12] Which I was found not guilty of and then they just moved prisons

[00:02:15] But the second time when I got to Danbury, which is my hometown, which was gonna be great

[00:02:20] you know, I was right next to my parents and

[00:02:23] The guard one of the guards ends up reporting that I used to date his cousin

[00:02:29] So it was a conflict of interest so they locked me in the shoe solitary the whole I was there for almost six months

[00:02:35] And then I had my parents calling every day. They get a state senator call

[00:02:39] They get a lawyer to call and that pissed the BOP off the Bureau of Prisons

[00:02:43] So they send me on Conair that the airplane ran by the US Marshals

[00:02:47] That's when they transported me through the system where you go

[00:02:51] It took me two weeks to get to Wisconsin from Connecticut. You go to Oklahoma City

[00:02:56] You go to Chicago and then eventually you I landed in Wisconsin, which the camp was great

[00:03:01] Oxford, Wisconsin prison camp this thing was cushy. You know who I was there with George Papa Doppelis from

[00:03:08] Donald Trump's

[00:03:09] Initial team he was there for two weeks

[00:03:12] But their cell phones getting in people are running through the woods to like hook up with their wives people are smuggling in

[00:03:19] You know McDonald's sushi pizza. I remember eating Chicago deep dish pizza one weekend. We're watching movies. It's crazy

[00:03:26] There's a track. This is what they mean by club fed

[00:03:30] but

[00:03:31] I mean it was crazy and then I got out in January 2019

[00:03:35] And what was the most violent prison you're in like we ever

[00:03:38] Was there a point where you were scared? I would say four dicks would have been the most violent guys were definitely like

[00:03:45] Trying me

[00:03:45] I guess you could call it because I looked like a sex offender in their eyes because in these federal prisons

[00:03:50] There's not that many young white kids in there really at all for fraud

[00:03:55] That's more like the average like fraud guys in his 30s or 40s in these prisons and I'm 21 years old

[00:04:02] Which is hard to believe it's seven years ago now, but yeah

[00:04:06] And when they say when you say they were trying you what does that mean?

[00:04:09] So they would like, you know try to extort me try to get me to buy them commissary buy my cell phone things like that

[00:04:15] So it's really about just like navigating and learning how to survive and get through the system

[00:04:20] How do you survive that so I just played I guess played it smart

[00:04:25] I found this this clip actually went viral and I when I told it on tiktok

[00:04:30] I went out I started befriending some of these big guys in there and they didn't really have much money

[00:04:35] So I started buying them commissary every week and playing cards with them and hanging around them

[00:04:41] And because of that other guys weren't gonna bother me because they didn't want to like say

[00:04:47] Interfere with those guys hustle because the other inmates are looking at it as those guys are hustling me

[00:04:52] But really I'm just paying them commissary as a friend as whatever an acquaintance

[00:04:57] And and that's how I was structured and everyone left me alone at that point

[00:05:01] And then there's the process of like showing paperwork to show that you're not a sex offender

[00:05:06] You're not a rat or anything like that and then guys left me alone and they gave me the nickname McLovin in prison

[00:05:13] Yeah, you do look a little like McLovin. Yeah, McLovin

[00:05:16] Squints and Bieber they called me Bieber for like Justin Bieber

[00:05:21] And so were you were you you're in prison not with like violent offenders, but with other

[00:05:27] Fraud offender. No, you're with the in the lows. You're with violent people

[00:05:30] You're guys that have committed murder sex offenders some of the worst sex offenders

[00:05:35] Anything robberies at the camp. There's no violent people

[00:05:40] So I mean what when someone did you did you know what everybody was convicted of like if someone was a

[00:05:45] Murderer or sex offender or whatever you could find out if you wanted to through the grapevine

[00:05:51] Or you look it up on a cell phone if someone had a contraband phone or anything like that you could you could find things out

[00:05:57] Was it better to just not talk to anybody? Yeah

[00:06:00] I mean if I had a recommendation for someone to go to prison, but I wasn't everyone's business moving around too much

[00:06:06] I was a kid. You know, I was just screwing around. I was gambling. I was doing whatever

[00:06:11] I was trying to hustle make money

[00:06:12] I was getting myself into trouble which I didn't need to be doing but that's just like the type of person I am

[00:06:18] You know, it's like you know that expression where they say like that or like the people that go and smell the shit

[00:06:23] Or whatever to see what it smells like that was me

[00:06:25] And and why would you do that knowing that I could get you into maybe stay in jail more longer?

[00:06:30] I think I was just curious and I missed the adrenaline like I went from

[00:06:36] having so much freedom running this club always getting into trouble and sticking up to authority to

[00:06:42] Prison so you kind of have to I was getting like that fix, you know that high that adrenaline

[00:06:48] And what were I mean you on your YouTube channel you interview various other inmates and stuff

[00:06:55] What were some of the most?

[00:06:57] Like what are the stories that intrigued you that you found in prison?

[00:07:01] Like the stories that I hear about now

[00:07:03] Yeah, I think what intrigues me the most is like the times where guys

[00:07:10] Kind of like get bullied

[00:07:12] Like I had a guy on and he was literally talking about how he got raped in the prison shower

[00:07:17] And just like hearing how like the sit that the the system fails in that aspect

[00:07:22] And why they're they're taking people that are nonviolent and putting them with violent people and and the politics about that

[00:07:29] And the games and things like that like I'm interested in the psychological aspect of it

[00:07:35] And what people are thinking and how they're navigating and how they're moving around and just like where the system fails on that level

[00:07:42] And and did you see that any of that in the prisons you were in?

[00:07:46] No, I didn't physically see it, but I'd hear stories like I heard stories about

[00:07:51] You know, it was always really the sex offenders that would get beat up or someone that like didn't pay a debt

[00:07:56] But there were stories about like a sex offender got a

[00:08:00] mop handle like shoved up his ass in the hallway

[00:08:04] And things like that you would hear about and then you would see fights

[00:08:09] You know the occasional fight but like not some of to the extent of the stories that I hear on my podcast

[00:08:16] Because I was only at that low security prison for like six or seven months. But yeah, crazy things happen

[00:08:21] And in the solitary confinement, what is what does that actually mean?

[00:08:26] Does that mean you can't go outside and you're in a room with no windows and they give you food once today

[00:08:31] Or what is the solitary confinement mean?

[00:08:33] So you're locked down, you know, 23 hours a day

[00:08:37] 24 hours technically on the weekends

[00:08:39] But during the week you get an hour of rec time which they handcuff you and bring you to a cage outside a little cage

[00:08:46] So you're moving from one cell to another cell

[00:08:49] Which is in a cage by yourself. You get a shower three times a week

[00:08:54] No commissary you're getting three meals a day

[00:08:57] No seconds or anything so you get very skinny when you're in the shoe. They're not big portions

[00:09:04] You can get a book

[00:09:05] I was reading like a book a day at one point because that's all you could do all day

[00:09:08] You wake up unless you're doing push-ups or whatever you're reading all day and you're just stuck there laying on your bed

[00:09:15] You're talking to other inmates for the cell next door

[00:09:19] At the Danbury prison

[00:09:21] Because I wasn't there like in the in solitary of the shoe because I was in trouble

[00:09:25] They let me become the orderly so I was painting cells

[00:09:29] It was it looked like Alcatraz with the old bars and they had me paint the cells white

[00:09:34] So that that got me out of the cell but the shoe the shoe is terrible. It sucks. It's mentally draining

[00:09:40] It's just not a good place to be in

[00:09:42] and then

[00:09:44] So, okay

[00:09:45] So then you get out and you you go to a halfway house or whatever like what was your I go to a halfway house

[00:09:52] In waterbury Connecticut, which is like the hood of Connecticut

[00:09:55] Not fun. The halfway house is just like you and me guys

[00:09:59] It's so bad that guys are like I don't want because there's so many rules that they stack up more rules than in prison

[00:10:05] And this is supposed to be halfway to freedom like

[00:10:08] Reintegrating there's nine million rules. So guys would

[00:10:12] Want to say take me back. I'm not following this should take me back to prison

[00:10:17] Just so strict very petty very silly and you have staff that

[00:10:23] You know, either just graduate college or they're still in college. They don't care about the job

[00:10:28] It's a it's a bullshit pay job not even 20 bucks an hour probably

[00:10:32] It's just an intermediate step for them and these are there's kids younger than me

[00:10:38] And I'm young at that time by the time I got out

[00:10:40] But there's people younger than me these halfway houses are very flawed and they're very for-profit

[00:10:45] So it's just it's not a good situation

[00:10:49] At what point do you feel like prison

[00:11:07] Changed you like did you start feeling like oh, no, I'm a convicted felon now for the rest of my life

[00:11:13] I'm never I'm not gonna have a career. I'm not gonna succeed like did you ever lose hope that?

[00:11:19] Life would continue. No, I was I was never I was never depressed about it

[00:11:24] I think that you know

[00:11:25] I remember seeing and hearing on social media when I went to prison or even found guilty people are like wow

[00:11:30] He's a felony his life's over like he's got that on him for the rest of his life

[00:11:36] And like I know my lawyer even played that up at sentencing to try to get me house arrest saying like, you know

[00:11:42] This is extremely as a felony

[00:11:44] You know this affects him for the rest of his life

[00:11:46] And you know, I got to say and I'm grateful for this but it really hasn't affected me

[00:11:52] Like it would to the average person maybe that's just my mindset or maybe that's fate or whatever it is

[00:11:59] I think that what affected me the most was when I got arrested

[00:12:03] Up until after I got out of prison because that's when the media was slamming me hard

[00:12:07] I remember trying to get a job before prison

[00:12:12] After being convicted and not even Olive Garden would hire me as a dishwasher

[00:12:17] Because of the bad press but also I owned the club at that point too. So I was kind of doing my own thing

[00:12:22] But when I got out

[00:12:24] I was very lucky that I went to Whole Foods and they hired me and I was able to

[00:12:29] Go for making 15 bucks an hour as a hot bar cooked to three years later by the time I quit

[00:12:35] Making I was on track to make a hundred thousand dollars last year with overtime

[00:12:40] I was the manager prepared foods 32 bucks an hour great job, and that was just based my dedication hard work

[00:12:47] I was able in those three years. I got an apartment. I got my own apartment

[00:12:51] I got a dog. I got a car my credit was never affected throughout this whole thing because I never used credit

[00:12:57] So I was able to build my credit up got a card did all these things credit cards things

[00:13:03] I never had in my life before my life was significantly better

[00:13:07] After prison because before I was just running a nightclub with no money

[00:13:11] And now I fell in love with the idea of working for someone else and and having my own money and being able to make four or five

[00:13:17] Grand a month because I hadn't made made that since high school. It was so it was great

[00:13:22] Like I was loving the grind. I got a second job making pizzas never affected me at all

[00:13:27] And and did you ever feel like oh, I need to start a business again or get back into the club business and

[00:13:33] When I first got out

[00:13:35] Wanted to get into the club business so bad

[00:13:37] I thought that that was my redemption. That was the only way I could ever like I figured that that was what I was plotting

[00:13:44] That's what kept me going in prison

[00:13:45] I have all these notes still about what I was writing just like the plan for the club what I would name it all of these things

[00:13:52] This was my comeback story

[00:13:54] Simultaneously while like writing a book and selling a book deal and getting a movie made

[00:13:59] I studied Wolfville Wall Street like this is my ticket to success and

[00:14:03] I slowly realized like I had no money to do that and I was not gonna take investors to do it

[00:14:09] So that fizzled out and it's a good thing it fizzled out because

[00:14:13] COVID happened, you know a year later

[00:14:16] so if even if I managed to get the nightclub going it would it it would have been dead and

[00:14:21] Then I got the job

[00:14:23] I finally caved in and got the job at Whole Foods because I'm like, you know, I'm pitching my story actively

[00:14:30] Emailing writers I get some buzz like BBC reached out to me

[00:14:34] Nothing like it was one lead after another and I'm emailing agents and it was no after no

[00:14:39] I remember the I made an Excel spreadsheet and I emailed a hundred and fifty

[00:14:44] Literary agents the first three chapters of the story of my book and a synopsis in the news out of a hundred and fifty

[00:14:52] six emailed me back

[00:14:54] three of those

[00:14:56] Ended up not being interested the other three said

[00:14:59] After requesting the first chapter said they're not interested because there's no relevant

[00:15:03] Media or news the last article written about me was from four years prior by vice and it was dead

[00:15:10] It was a dead story. So I gave it up

[00:15:12] I focused on Whole Foods and I remember the last piece till like getting my whole life together was having a car in

[00:15:19] My own name at that point I was paying for my own insurance

[00:15:21] I was totally self-sufficient and the day I got the car. This was almost a year after I got out

[00:15:27] I get an E an inbox message on Facebook that went to my spam

[00:15:32] from an intern at HBO

[00:15:35] HBO Max and she pitches the whole thing. Hey, can we get on a call and

[00:15:39] Something told me to message her back. I messaged your back. She called me. They said we're doing a docu series

[00:15:45] We want to hear your story. I

[00:15:48] Telled them the whole story on the phone for like three hours didn't hear anything back for like six months

[00:15:54] Nothing, I'm like, okay, whatever at that point

[00:15:56] I'm focused on the job and then two weeks before COVID hit. I get an email saying hey, this is green lit

[00:16:02] This is what's happening. You're a part of the series

[00:16:05] COVID hits it gets delayed

[00:16:07] But they ended up filling filming it during COVID and it comes out a year later

[00:16:12] And I'm thinking still at that point

[00:16:14] This is my big ticket like this is gonna blow everything up

[00:16:17] This is gonna get me to where I need to be at

[00:16:21] The episode comes out HBO Max didn't really promote it that much because it was HBO Max was new at the time

[00:16:27] and I was just one episode of ten other people's stories and

[00:16:31] I got landed on like a big podcast a mine pump podcast

[00:16:35] Which was great and I got that attention but my social media didn't blow up nothing happened crazily

[00:16:42] But the story was out there and then vice ends up doing a documentary on me and that did three million views on

[00:16:48] YouTube but nothing major is happening. So I was like, okay, maybe this is this is not my life. This is not my fate

[00:16:55] This is not my journey. I'm just gonna stay focused on Whole Foods work my way up be a store manager life goes on

[00:17:01] And then a year after that a year after vice a year after HBO. It was last July. I

[00:17:08] Start getting these thoughts of is this really what?

[00:17:11] The rest of my life is gonna be like like I went from owning a nightclub doing all these things making real money in high school

[00:17:18] Like I'm 28 27 years old at this point

[00:17:22] Is there is there more out there for me?

[00:17:24] Can I have the opportunity to build something again because I don't have a family right now?

[00:17:28] I don't have kids like yes

[00:17:30] I'm in debt, you know from the past but it's now the time to take a risk and

[00:17:34] My friend had been pushing me for months the videographer from the nightclub days

[00:17:38] His name is Mike Squires and he said dude

[00:17:40] You got to get on tiktok the way you're able to go viral on tiktok is crazy. It's unlike any other platform

[00:17:46] You got to start telling your story and I was very hesitant

[00:17:49] But I start telling my story on Instagram one day a week or one today

[00:17:54] Doing these selfie videos behind the HBO Max poster

[00:17:58] and I'm just doing a story mapping it out and

[00:18:01] Then I start doing it on tiktok. I'm like four or five videos and I'm getting like a thousand views each day

[00:18:07] This is last July and on the sixth video

[00:18:10] I get COVID and I call my friend and I'm like dude. I can't post a video. I'm in bed

[00:18:16] I'm sick. I'm not doing it because he said you have to be consistent if you're gonna start this and

[00:18:21] He's like dude. You got to do it and I'm all snuffly

[00:18:24] knows

[00:18:25] Whatever and I make the video and it was about my time being in solitary

[00:18:30] The video goes viral

[00:18:32] 1.5 1.6 million views in a matter of days

[00:18:36] Blows my tiktok up like I'm getting more followers this and that like it's getting traction not making any money

[00:18:42] But it's getting traction after that video a producer from MTV reaches out to me and was like, hey

[00:18:48] You know we love your story. We'd love to cast you on this new dating series. We're doing

[00:18:54] So I'm like, okay

[00:18:55] This is it like I'm a big believer in like fate and everything happens for a reason like this is what my life has came to

[00:19:01] This is my opportunity and there was like a whole interview process and stuff

[00:19:05] But I didn't hesitate. I went in the day after I heard from that that producer. I put my two weeks in it at my job

[00:19:13] Wow, no money lined up nothing no deal made

[00:19:16] It was because they were already saying listen if you get casted in this you're gonna have to be out of the country for

[00:19:21] Two months

[00:19:21] I had just gotten my passport back from the government to after eight but in a reality series

[00:19:26] Do they pay you in a reality series? Yeah, so I would have been paid for that

[00:19:29] Not much but the exposure I was looking at you know to go overseas. They would have had my expenses

[00:19:35] I wasn't gonna be able to work and

[00:19:38] They end up ghosting me never hear from them again

[00:19:41] And in hindsight had I taken that opportunity if I got it

[00:19:45] I wouldn't be where I'm at today because I needed to be dedicated to my social media, which is what I did

[00:19:50] kept my head down focused on social media lived off my credit cards for a few months and just started

[00:19:57] grinding

[00:19:58] Three to five clips a day on tiktok on Facebook on YouTube on Instagram

[00:20:03] Just telling my stories from prison and it starts blowing up hundreds of thousands of views by January

[00:20:11] I'm at a hundred thousand followers on tiktok

[00:20:13] YouTube was at three thousand all these different things and there's this I didn't realize there was this huge community of prison tiktokers and

[00:20:21] it's a billion people watching this in the world and

[00:20:25] in

[00:20:27] About late December I

[00:20:29] Start thinking for the first time ever

[00:20:31] I'm thinking about the pitfalls and I'm thinking about long term and

[00:20:36] I'm like this is not sustainable forever

[00:20:39] I cannot talk about my story forever, and I'm not making any real money at this point

[00:20:44] maybe a couple grand a month on social media nothing major and

[00:20:47] So I get the idea to start a podcast and up until this point

[00:20:51] I was very anti-podcast because I felt the market was flooded, you know, and there were already prison podcasts out there

[00:20:57] So what would make mine different?

[00:21:00] Come up with this idea for the podcast

[00:21:02] I call it locked in with Ian Bick kind of the play on prison and the first two episodes

[00:21:07] They were very cringe like looking back on it like the first one two or three episodes. I didn't have a direction

[00:21:12] There was no purpose

[00:21:13] It was just Ian Bick was interviewing people and I remember

[00:21:17] Researching these guests and having like 50 questions and I literally read each the conversation didn't flow

[00:21:23] You know it was just question after question after question

[00:21:25] And we start like pushing the videos out chopping it into clips

[00:21:30] and I make all my own clips do all the editing for the clip aspect and

[00:21:35] No real direction and then I start thinking and you know people start leaving comments and I'm

[00:21:41] garnering feedback and

[00:21:43] That's when everything like clicks like in my brain and the universe in my mind

[00:21:48] This can be an inspirational podcast where you're taking people's stories or life trauma

[00:21:54] About going through the worst of the worst the American justice system

[00:21:57] And telling it in a documentary style way going through their childhood something that other podcasts in that genre are not doing

[00:22:04] Because your average prison YouTube channel starts off with what did you get arrested for this and that we're spending the first half hour

[00:22:11] Learning about someone's childhood. I'm studying asking the questions that no one else is asking and it's true crime or whatever meets

[00:22:19] motivation and the object that very quickly came to me is

[00:22:23] If the average person that's at home that just went through a divorce

[00:22:27] Just got broken up with can't get a job struggling to lose weight

[00:22:31] listens to someone that is borderline

[00:22:34] Dying from an overdose or addiction or goes to prison loses everything and is able to turn that around and become successful

[00:22:41] That's gonna inspire that person that's going through whatever it is they're going through and when I kept pushing that message

[00:22:47] And really honed in on it and made it all about that message

[00:22:51] That's when things started to go viral

[00:22:53] You know, we started getting a couple hundred downloads and then within four months, you know

[00:22:58] We're doing ten thousand downloads per audio episode

[00:23:01] Which is unusual for a brand new podcast and the thing that really stuck out was the YouTube channel

[00:23:07] The YouTube channel when I posted the full-length podcast for the first time on video

[00:23:12] Had three thousand subscribers just off of shorts that I built it. This was January

[00:23:17] We're now in August and it has a hundred thirty five thousand subscribers

[00:23:22] Hundred million plays on the videos and now our videos are doing twenty to thirty thousand overnight

[00:23:27] And it's all just pushing that message and I think the thing that I love about it

[00:23:32] Is that the first thirty minutes of it? It's just

[00:23:37] Conversation about childhood about whatever it's getting to know that person

[00:23:41] It's not based on something delicious like you see some of these

[00:23:45] Podcasts about sex this and that which sells and gets all these downloads, which is great

[00:23:49] But that's in the first couple minutes to get the person hooked

[00:23:52] We're doing this because we have a very dedicated

[00:23:55] Following and it's a group like I talked to agents and stuff all the time

[00:23:59] They're like you have attracted a group of male because it's it's you know

[00:24:03] It's 90% male ages 28 to 34 that don't normally listen to podcasts

[00:24:08] But they relate to me in the way

[00:24:10] I'm telling the story and comparing my story and I'm one of the few

[00:24:14] Podcasters that have actually been a prison that are interviewing other prison inmates

[00:24:19] And they're relating to these stories because these stories have never been told before in this manner

[00:24:24] So it's just a very unique experience and I finally you know long story short

[00:24:29] I found my purpose in my direction and that's what's working and I dropped everything else

[00:24:33] I started producing like this commissary cooking show about prison cooking

[00:24:37] Which you know is getting some views, but I'm like this is not what I need to be doing

[00:24:42] I need to focus on one thing that I'm good at and I need to make myself better

[00:24:46] So every day I'm reading new books. I've been following Jay Shetty

[00:24:50] Listening to his conversations. How do I get better as a podcaster? How do I get better as an editor?

[00:24:54] I've moved from cutting all the clips

[00:24:57] I make 60 to 80 shorts a week from my episodes because we're doing two episodes a week

[00:25:02] We're putting out there so now I you know, I'm

[00:25:05] Learning premier pro I'm doing whatever it takes to bring it to the next level because this is my life

[00:25:10] And it's only gonna keep going and going and going and I'm idolizing people like caller daddy who edits her own clips and

[00:25:18] Watching her growth and seeing people in the business because I'm very new to it

[00:25:23] I'm only a few months in but I'm just like this up-and-comer. That's really no one's really heard about and has paid attention to

[00:25:30] And I like that it's not built on my past like

[00:25:34] HBO didn't give me this platform. Bice didn't give me the platform. No one gave it to me

[00:25:38] I was able to build it through telling my stories on my own and got here

[00:25:47] If people just search on Ian Bick on YouTube, they're gonna find your show. Yeah, that's how I saw you was seeing your your video podcast

[00:26:06] It's pretty intense. You've got a great show and

[00:26:09] again, you have all these like

[00:26:13] Ex-inmates

[00:26:14] Telling these incredible stories. So

[00:26:17] It's it's really like how a police officer is treated in prison

[00:26:21] Another one is kingpin reveals his multimillion dollar crime ring and surviving prison

[00:26:27] Another one mortgage rate mortgage fraud leads to FBI raid in the shower

[00:26:31] Like some great some great stories. Like what's what's the economics of it now?

[00:26:36] Are you making a living from the YouTube videos? Yeah, so I mean I have monetized on every platform

[00:26:42] Facebook Instagram

[00:26:45] YouTube TikTok all of these sites pay and which put me in a unique position as a podcaster because if say you were to Google

[00:26:53] You know how to make money in podcasting the Google results are gonna say, you know, don't quit your day job and

[00:27:01] It takes years to monetize and that's based on the old logic of ads

[00:27:06] Where you know, you need X amount of downloads

[00:27:08] Which are very hard to get to start getting ads on your podcast and I've been able to generate

[00:27:14] You know, 20 or $30,000 a month in revenue without a single ad we started doing our first ad reads

[00:27:20] This past month

[00:27:22] Working with an ad company because our down our audio downloads weren't there

[00:27:27] But the clips are going viral and there's so many ways to make money on the short form clips

[00:27:31] which now push people to go to the podcast and I'm getting into public speaking and

[00:27:37] Just doing all these different things and we just had a call with an agency about doing live shows bring my show live

[00:27:44] Which I think will be great because it has like the comedy feel to it. It has

[00:27:49] My personality feel there's just so many components to it

[00:27:53] I think a big thing too is, you know

[00:27:55] There's a lot of prison content creators out there

[00:27:58] But I'm unique in the sense where say you're an adult scrolling through and I'm relatable

[00:28:04] Because when they stop at me

[00:28:05] They're like there's no way this like white nerdy kid with glasses went to prison

[00:28:08] That gets them to stop and they end up falling in love with the idea that I could have been their son or their grandson

[00:28:14] Or their brother and I'm just I'm super relatable and they like that and I

[00:28:21] Get the message out there in a good way and it's all positive like yeah

[00:28:26] you have to have the clickbait like

[00:28:29] About the titles and thumbnails because that's how YouTube works, but at the heart of it when you look at it

[00:28:34] It's not your normal prison show. This is a real like men's mental health type podcast

[00:28:40] That's the first of its kind. That's really just it's getting out there

[00:28:45] And you know, we're going into other fields. We don't just interview inmates

[00:28:48] We interview victims of crime people that have went to prison. I've had

[00:28:53] family members

[00:28:54] We've interviewed police officers correctional officers. We're gonna get into people that have just struggled with addiction things of that nature

[00:29:03] Wow, it sounds great and Ian it sounds like potentially you could do this for the rest of your life

[00:29:08] This is you're creating your own little industry here. I think so

[00:29:12] I mean the direction it's going in and you know now

[00:29:15] It's just about staying really focused and and you know just being careful with like who I associate

[00:29:20] And getting out there and just like remaining humble because you know how it isn't in today's world like anything

[00:29:26] Could happen like if I make one say one wrong thing or make one wrong move like people are watching

[00:29:31] So I just have to be very conscious of that and and just you know stay focused on that

[00:29:36] And but I know like in my heart that I need to just focus on this

[00:29:40] Because for the first time and I would say ten years or so I have something that's working

[00:29:46] and I want to take that for granted and

[00:29:49] If looking back on your story like all the past ten years

[00:29:53] Is there anything you would say at this point you regret you would wish you had done very differently?

[00:30:01] I wouldn't say regret. I don't live like my life with regret

[00:30:05] I would say I always think about like the things that I could have done differently

[00:30:09] And I feel bad about like decisions I made but also at the end of the day

[00:30:13] I do realize that I was a kid that was never gonna understand those things at the times

[00:30:17] I made that I think it would be different if I made those same mistakes now

[00:30:21] but I now also have this amazing life experience and

[00:30:25] What I find interesting out of this whole thing is that and I think it's just a message to other people that the thing

[00:30:32] That was supposed to destroy me ruin me which is prison that that dread thing that no one really talks about or wants to talk

[00:30:39] About which is why you don't see it like celebrities talking about their prison experience when they go to prison because everyone it has a negative

[00:30:47] Connotation to it

[00:30:49] That's the thing that gave me a career

[00:30:51] Like if I never if I think about if I got probation, I wouldn't be where I'm at now there wouldn't be anything

[00:30:57] So it just it's interesting to think in that perspective like everything happened exactly the way it was supposed to

[00:31:04] Exactly for a reason and it led me to right here

[00:31:07] Dude, do you ever you're in the same town as where you were conducting all your businesses?

[00:31:13] Do you ever run into some of the people who let you money or invest it or whatever?

[00:31:18] Occasionally, I think a lot of people either moved out or you know

[00:31:23] They don't really say anything to me. I'll run into some people maybe

[00:31:27] What I've found is that it's the people that are either

[00:31:32] You know not much of anything

[00:31:35] Like a couple kids from high school that might have been owed like a thousand bucks or whatever or

[00:31:40] The people that aren't owed anything at all that just followed the case that hate on me the most

[00:31:46] Not the people that were out the most amount of money

[00:31:49] Like when you say hey, I knew what did they do?

[00:31:51] I would say like post negative things people still post negative things on like Facebook, you know

[00:31:56] That's never gonna end by the way. I'll just tell you. No, I just interesting to see what people say

[00:32:01] I don't I'm not affected by it

[00:32:03] I mean I get hundreds thousands of comments a day between all my channels, you know and a lot of its hate

[00:32:09] That doesn't affect me anymore

[00:32:11] But people are like because my videos go viral a lot and the algorithm tends to push it out to like your hometown

[00:32:18] From what I've seen

[00:32:19] So I'm sure it makes people mad and they're like, you know, they say the words like he's using his prison experience

[00:32:26] To you know get famous or this and that but they I also know they're not taking the time to go and look at it

[00:32:32] Because it's not about me anymore

[00:32:33] Maybe it was about me in the beginning when I first started on tiktok telling my stories

[00:32:37] But there hasn't been a recent video of me doing a selfie video

[00:32:42] Talking about my prison experience for months

[00:32:45] The message is so much bigger the brand is so much bigger. It's it's a real, you know thing

[00:32:51] And I'm focusing on other people stories

[00:32:53] I'm taking stories that no one's ever heard of and what I found doing this is that

[00:32:58] It's the people have never told their stories before that are coming on for the first time that

[00:33:04] Are the videos do the best the views get the best

[00:33:07] I mean you look at every big podcast in the world when a celebrity goes on that celebrities doing

[00:33:14] 10 different podcasts that whip that week that all come out on the same time

[00:33:17] Who wants to hear the same person tell the same story, you know

[00:33:22] It's true. I will say the least watched or listened to podcasts that I do

[00:33:27] I'm mostly just audio format the least listened to

[00:33:30] podcasts I do are the celebrities and

[00:33:33] Cuz also by the way, the celebrities aren't that interesting

[00:33:36] we already know their full story and

[00:33:39] If you're a celebrity because you're like an actor, you know, you might not have much personality of yourself

[00:33:45] so

[00:33:46] There's lots of different kinds of celebrities, but they're not really

[00:33:49] You know the best podcast guests. I mean, I think the other strength I have is that I have a story

[00:33:55] Behind me like I have an interesting story that supports me

[00:34:00] Yeah, which I think make will make my value go up as I get into the realm of because I haven't done

[00:34:06] Anyone's like huge platform for a podcast

[00:34:08] Like I haven't done any of the main stream podcasts yours is probably gonna be the best

[00:34:14] Podcasts I've done since mine pump, you know in relation to numbers and reach wise

[00:34:19] I got a lot of people that are that reach out to me to do podcasts like

[00:34:25] People that are just starting and I was doing those all at first

[00:34:28] But I'm slowing down and stopping on those because it just gets oversaturated

[00:34:31] And they all say the same thing and they don't direct the conversation in the right way

[00:34:35] And and that's you know, no hate on them. They're new and they're starting

[00:34:40] But I prefer not to go onto a podcast where they just say so tell me everything

[00:34:44] Tell me the whole story, you know, you got a you got to guide it and direct it

[00:34:49] But you know, I think that it's gonna increase my value my ability to tell stories and have an interesting story

[00:34:56] Because I could be a great podcast host but not have a story

[00:34:59] What's the value in another podcaster bringing me on just to talk about the guests?

[00:35:03] I've had on or whatever that I think that would get old after a while

[00:35:07] No, and I think you having the background you have makes you a better interviewer of course on your podcast

[00:35:13] So, you know, that sets you apart as well. Definitely definitely

[00:35:18] Well, Ian Ian Bick

[00:35:22] Thank you so much for coming on my podcast of course and look I watch the YouTube version of your podcast and it's great

[00:35:30] You're doing a great job. I

[00:35:33] Wish you every luck and success and thank you for thank you for putting up with mine. Tell me everything

[00:35:40] Approach to your story. So I really appreciate it and thanks so much for coming on the show. No, thank you James

[00:35:46] I appreciate it man. You directed it very good. You asked different questions than the than the average person asked

[00:35:52] So that's what I that's what I like and I remember talking to Jay about that too

[00:35:56] So, no, it was a fun conversation. I appreciate the time man. Thanks Ian