INFLUENCE

Sneaking into abandoned buildings and filming urban decay may not be the newest trend, but obsession with so-called “urban exploring” and “abandon porn” has skyrocketed alongside the widespread accessibility of social media.Today, millions of viewers eagerly await the videos of intrepid explorers like Bob Thissen, who travel the world in search of abandoned power plants, coal mines, theme parks, hotels, and shopping malls. Thissen’s mission is archaeological: to document places where no one has set foot in years (or decades), and tell the story of their abandonment through found objects.Often, Thissen’s videos show meals half-eaten, clothes hanging in closets, and machinery in working order, left to rot for a variety of reasons: business failures, safety concerns, and even political revolutions.Visit Bob's site: https://www.bobthissen.com/YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC73dVtWf9mpjiWYkXyIlm7AAnd check out his beautiful books: https://www.mijnwebwinkel.nl/winkel/exploringtheunbeatenpath********If you're in Los Angeles on February 13th, come see Alli perform live in HOW TO BREAK UP BY TEXT. You can also submit screenshots of your own text breakups to be included in the show!Go here for tickets and submission info: https://www.howtobreakupbytext.com, or text your break-ups to: 818-392-4759Support 2G1P on Patreon! https://www.patreon.com/2G1PJoin us on Discord: discord.gg/2g1pEmail us: 2G1Podcast@gmail.comTalk to Alli and Jen:https://twitter.com/alligoldhttps://twitter.com/joonbuggerCall the show and leave a message! (347) 871-6548 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In 2008, Mike Merrill divided himself into 100,000 shares and offered them to the Internet for $1 a pop. After the initial wave of friends and family bought in, online strangers began to acquire shares of Mike⁠ — a regular person, not a company.With those shares come voting rights. Shareholders were allowed to decide Merrill's diet, his romantic decisions, even whether or not to get a vasectomy. Any personal life decision for which Merrill would seek advice from a friend, he instead posed to shareholders, who would vote on legally binding decisions.The experiment led him to global news coverage and an appearance on the Today Show, which raised the price of his shares significantly. These days, shares of Mike trade at around $5.Alli and Jen talk to Merrill about the origins of the experiment, how crowdsourced decision making has shaped his life, and what he might do differently in the wake of newer online commodity trading models like Bitcoin.Support 2G1P on Patreon! https://www.patreon.com/2G1PJoin us on Discord: discord.gg/2g1pEmail us: 2G1Podcast@gmail.comTalk to Alli and Jen:https://twitter.com/alligoldhttps://twitter.com/joonbuggerCall the show and leave a message! (347) 871-6548 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In 1997, an 11-year-old girl set up a website with HTML tutorials and guides for Neopets. Within a few years, "Lissa Explains it All" was serving 500,000 monthly visitors, its forums hosted 75.,000 users, and Google was sending her big fat ad revenue checks. Alyssa Daniels, a kid from Orlando, was teaching the world how to make websites long before YouTube tutorials and Squarespace — and making legit money in the process.Alli and Jen talk to Daniels about her childhood entrepreneurial spirit, early Web culture, what her parents and friends thought of her startup business, '90s Nickelodeon shows, and what she's up to these days.Lissa Explains it All still exists: http://www.lissaexplains.comAnd Daniels now streams on Twitch! https://www.twitch.tv/LyssateeSupport 2G1P on Patreon! https://www.patreon.com/2G1PJoin us on Discord: discord.gg/2g1pEmail us: 2G1Podcast@gmail.comTalk to Alli and Jen:https://twitter.com/alligoldhttps://twitter.com/joonbuggerCall the show and leave a message! (347) 871-6548 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Romance novels get a bad rap, probably due to a history of stereotypical characters, plots, gender roles, and an all-around "trashy" look on supermarket and drug store shelves. But the genre has changed radically, and romance fiction now spans a wide variety of sub genres and writing styles. If you love romance, but not sure where to find the best authors and titles, start with Smart Bitches, Trashy Books, a community co-founded by Sarah Wendell nearly 15 years ago. The site (and podcast) is a social gathering hub that connects voracious romance readers with literature they love, and provides a safe space to gush with other fans.Wendell talks with Alli and Jen about busting romance stereotypes, the power of the Smart Bitches community, and recommends great books for everyone's tastes.https://smartbitchestrashybooks.comSupport 2G1P on Patreon! https://www.patreon.com/2G1PJoin us on Discord: discord.gg/2g1pEmail us: 2G1Podcast@gmail.comTalk to Alli and Jen:https://twitter.com/alligoldhttps://twitter.com/joonbuggerCall the show and leave a message! (347) 871-6548 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Happy New Year from 2G1P! We're taking a break this week, but wanted to re-share another one of our favorite episodes: Bronies! Enjoy and we'll see you in 2020.Original publish date: July 23, 2018 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Portraying Santa Claus in the modern era takes a village. What's the best way to whiten your eyebrows? Growing a beard, or applying one? How jolly is too jolly?That's where ClausNet comes in. It's a social network, online forum, marketplace, and community where Santa performers can trade tips, tell stories, and learn the best ways to communicate with excited kids.Michael Rielly has been portraying Santa Claus since he was 12 years old, and founded ClausNet in 2007 after identifying a strong need for online Santa resources and camaraderie. Rielly shares his personal tales of playing Santa, the evolution of ClausNet, and we're visited by a VERY special additional guest...Support 2G1P on Patreon! https://www.patreon.com/2G1PJoin us on Discord: discord.gg/2g1pEmail us: 2G1Podcast@gmail.comTalk to Alli and Jen:https://twitter.com/alligoldhttps://twitter.com/joonbuggerCall the show and leave a message! (347) 871-6548 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The rise of powerful, free 3D modeling software has emboldened a cottage industry of VR enthusiasts to create custom sex avatars for virtual porn. But what happens when members of this community start requesting models that look like celebrities, ex-girlfriends, classmates, and co-workers?Samantha Cole covers VR and online sex for Vice, and her recent piece titled "They Can't Stop Us," chronicles the sometimes well-meaning but often seedy underbelly of a marketplace that trades in virtual belly buttons, boobs, and bespoke faces that VR pornographers can't get enough of.Read Samantha's piece here: https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/j5yzpk/they-cant-stop-us-people-are-having-sex-with-3d-avatars-of-their-exes-and-celebritiesSupport 2G1P on Patreon! https://www.patreon.com/2G1PJoin us on Discord: discord.gg/2g1pEmail us: 2G1Podcast@gmail.comTalk to Alli and Jen:https://twitter.com/alligoldhttps://twitter.com/joonbuggerCall the show and leave a message! (347) 871-6548 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Instagram account turned multi-million dollar media company @FuckJerry is notorious for stealing funny tweets, memes, and other content from creators, and posting them — without credit or compensation — to their own social accounts. Fuck Jerry's following has exploded in recent years (14.5 million Instagram followers at the time of publication), but so has the backlash. The #FuckFuckJerry movement became an anti-piracy rallying cry across the Internet. Two comedians (Davram Stiefler and Jason Selvig) known as The Good Liars, have taken the movement a step further by creating @MugJerry, an Instagram account that steals back the stolen content from Fuck Jerry, then contacts the original creators to pay them for their tweet, joke, or photo.Alli and Jen chat with The Good Liars about their mission of social media justice, the time they walked into Fuck Jerry's NYC offices and stole an actual mug, and the other ways they've created social commentary through comedy.Mug Jerry: https://www.instagram.com/mugjerry/The Good Liars: https://goodliars.com/Support 2G1P on Patreon! https://www.patreon.com/2G1PJoin us on Discord: discord.gg/2g1pEmail us: 2G1Podcast@gmail.comTalk to Alli and Jen:https://twitter.com/alligoldhttps://twitter.com/joonbuggerCall the show and leave a message! (347) 871-6548 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We're taking the week off for the Thanksgiving holiday, but we hope you enjoy one of our favorite episodes. Sit back, relax, and enjoy a conversation with a very popular social media influencer: God. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week, we prank Jen, when her boyfriend Adam pretends to be an adult baby who knows a little too much about her personal life. Get ready for some epic 2G1P hi-jinks.Support 2G1P on Patreon! https://www.patreon.com/2G1PJoin us on Discord: discord.gg/2g1pEmail us: 2G1Podcast@gmail.comTalk to Alli and Jen:https://twitter.com/alligoldhttps://twitter.com/joonbuggerCall the show and leave a message! (347) 871-6548 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices