Uploaded and Unfiltered: Conversations about Personal Growth, Mindsets, and Advice with BIPOC Creators for Creators

Building with Authenticity [Guest: DJvsEverybody]

• Jermaine Pulliam • Season 1 • Episode 34

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Dive into the captivating world of content creation with DJ vs Everybody, a dynamic figure from Detroit, as he shares his journey from a potential career in computer science to becoming a streaming sensation fueled by a love for gaming and a competitive spirit. Uncover the pivotal moments, including his transition to a communications major and the investment in his first capture card, marking his full-fledged entry into the digital gaming arena. Join us for a treasure trove of insights on setting personal goals, balancing life and streaming, and the surprising power of networking over streaming hours. This episode goes beyond competition, celebrating collaboration and support in the content creation realm, offering invaluable advice for those looking to make their mark. 

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Speaker 1:

Welcome. Welcome back to another episode of uploaded and unfiltered the podcast where I, your host Jermaine, interviews another content creator in regards to their content journey thus far. Tonight, as always, I have a special guest and before we get him introduced and on, I'm going to read their bio and then we're going to start this awesome conversation. Dj is a chill, try hard neighborhood variety streamer and youtuber. He plays plenty of games on his channels but leans towards single player action and adventure games. His community are mostly chill over there, but things get wild and a bit toxic. But who doesn't love a little toxicity? Enjoy the good vibes over at IRF 313. With that, I like to introduce my guest for the evening DJ vs everybody. Thank you, welcome to the stream. How are you doing today, sir?

Speaker 2:

I am very well Happy to be a part of this, been listening to other episodes and just happy to continue this.

Speaker 1:

That's awesome. I don't know why. It's surprising when people tell me to listen, but I appreciate that, Thank you. So, DJ, we're going to start this before we get started, before we get into your origin story. I've been asking people this and if you've been listening, you've noticed I need to know what is the origin story of DJ vs everybody. It kind of says what it is at least I think it does but explain to the people what is your origin story of your name.

Speaker 2:

So the origin story is the name. My nickname is DJ. It's based on my real name, just the first two of my initials. So that's DJ vs everybody, detroit vs everybody. A lot of cities kind of took that, but the versus everybody part started in Detroit, where I'm from. So I have a lot of pride in my city and where I'm from we're slowly Detroit, slowly making a come up. And yeah, I just decided to just set a Detroit vs everybody and DJ vs everybody, because I'm a competitor and a variety of things, not just video games, basketball, for sure I like to compete and I figured you know I'm from Detroit. It just everything makes sense.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, no, it makes sense. I like when a name is thought out and it's not just an auto generator. I need the Xbox name now and you hit. These are the things I like. Go, no, this is something that is personal to you and it has a story behind it, because I didn't realize it vs. Everybody started from Detroit. I did not know that, so I learned something new today. That's awesome, cool, cool. So now, okay, we got that out the way and you mentioned a few things right there and the explanation of your name, so let's just get into it. What is the origin story of you creating content? How did you start, what's that look like and why did you do it?

Speaker 2:

So I would say we're going to throw it all, go all the way back. So my mom took me to her job one day and it was a normal office job. I was 9 to 5 and I'm 19 year old. I don't really know anything about the workplace or anything like that, but I was so bored that day Sounds about right and just seeing I couldn't do anything. I couldn't make noise and I hated school. But I'd rather be in school than just sit in an office all day just watching her type on a computer and get an hour of lunch.

Speaker 2:

So fast forward to me graduating high school. They always ask you what do you want to do after high school? And it's just like. I mean I'll go into computer science for college and all. So I go to Michigan State and I'm not really doing too well in my major, and I think it was around 2014, like end of 2014,. I kind of just hit that crossroads where it's just. I do not seem. I do not think I would survive Strictly just working a nine to five for 60 years for a company that I don't like for a job, but I don't like working for other people right at all.

Speaker 2:

So in 2014 I had a friend who introduced me to a person named ashy that she Games on YouTube, love that she so you know that Kind of got me through like some depressing times in college because I'm struggling with work in all, struggling to Just keep myself happy, you.

Speaker 2:

So YouTube was kind of like that escape point and that she was that person that Got me through those dark days. That she started collaborating with other creators and that's how I got to introduce to like Corey Kenshin, who is also from Detroit and also went to Michigan State, so started watching Corey and Dashie and Find myself watching every single one of their videos they uploaded. You know I'm very consistently, almost on a daily basis, and you know I'm the my friend at the time Kind of brought up the idea of like potentially doing YouTube. So I wasn't, I didn't see myself as a youtuber. I always felt like I was gonna be, you know, just a watcher of YouTube. But then that that she uploaded a video and he kind of showed like some of the equipment that he has he was basically a tour of his office and what technology he uses to upload gameplay, because I always wondered, but I never really got into the nitty gritty.

Speaker 2:

So that was like in 2015. So 2016, I switched my major to like communications and all. But it's just like, okay, let's see, let me take a leap of faith. You know I didn't see myself as, like you know, person with personality. I mostly stay quiet, like I play video games all the time. But let's just take a leap of faith. So I checked out that YouTube video. I saw that you bought a capture card. So I bought an Elgato capture card in college. Right, how expensive Elgato was. But it was the only capture card that I knew. That you know actually made those. So the plan was to Get my friends at the time at my front we're still friends now but get my friends to you know, potentially make these type of videos with me because you know when, when we're together playing video games, it can make for hilarious time. But I mean, now that I know translating, you know what you do in real life. To like content is Completely different. But at the time, you know we were aspiring to be like the next RDC world.

Speaker 2:

Okay, yeah so that was the idea that I had in mind, but they weren't committed to the idea.

Speaker 1:

Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2:

So it was just like, okay, I'm gonna just have to take a leap of faith of my own. So I started doing, you know, youtube content and For four and a half years I was pretty much just trying to upload YouTube content, get my personality. Originally I kind of imitated dashing yeah, cory, okay, and that didn't work out for me because I was being someone. I wasn't right and you know that she's very loud. He's not as loud now, but back then he was definitely a loud personality, but then that's just not me, cory, you know, very expressive and I can be expressive at times, but again, that's not, that's not me, mm-hmm. So it took a minute to kind of just find myself within YouTube and then get comfortable like talking, you know, by myself. Yes, early YouTube videos. Definitely there is a lot of gaps of silence In between it, but now I know how to, you know, be comfortable and, you know, get used to kind of just talking to myself right.

Speaker 2:

And I think that eventually helped because I've been, believe or not, there was gamma. That's how we met. We met on YouTube.

Speaker 1:

That's dope, okay there was it.

Speaker 2:

You know I would join these Facebook groups and you know it'd be like oh, you know, we're all here to support each other and all that no one really support exactly.

Speaker 1:

I.

Speaker 2:

Would be watching other people's content and the ones watching mine, you know, any chance of a collab happening. I was left on red, so whiz was like my first Like youtuber who, like actually supported me and I've known I think I've known her now for almost six years now.

Speaker 1:

Oh, that's dope Okay.

Speaker 2:

So you know I would watch her content, we will, she will watch mine. And then in 2020, you know, during the pandemic yeah, that's when we collabed on our first video met J Kelly the demon, okay, and then later that year I actually met chicks and giggles Mm-hmm. All right, dude among us. Okay, true, did twitch. I didn't know, jah had a twitch. At the time job I'm mostly was still collabing with him through youtube.

Speaker 2:

But I didn't know crew did twitch and it was crew doing twitch and kind of just lurking in her streams. That kind of gave me the idea. Let me see what live stream is all about, because originally I was strongly against live streaming.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, same, I was definitely scared, because it's one thing to you know record yourself, because you know if you're quiet you can take that out, edit that out. But live streaming there's no taking anything out there's no second takes. There's no anything like that right. But you know that required me to take another leap of faith. So late 2020, I started on twitch and crew Uh definitely was helped me out with that because we also got whiz to do twitch.

Speaker 2:

And now whiz does nothing but twitch exactly but eventually you kind of, you see, like other creators of color, and shout out to parkoury, because parkoury introduced me to real mama ego, who kind of didn't introduce me to a bunch of other creators of color, and it was just like, okay, I see this network of black creators, and then I was able to kind of get my name out there.

Speaker 2:

people Kind of knew how I, who I was and that kind of brought me to where I am now Took a minute to kind of get used to live streaming. I still have my shy moments, People will always tell me that but I definitely think I have a comfort level now with both streaming and Uh recording.

Speaker 1:

Oh yeah, definitely. After so much, so many like trials and tribulations, time and Doing it, you do definitely get comfortable and you develop your own style when it comes to streaming, because I thought I had to be one of those loud F nauseous people when I was streaming too, and for the most part, I'm not. It depends on what game I'm playing.

Speaker 2:

But, uh, definitely the game.

Speaker 1:

Yes, oh, but you mentioned something and I don't know if you did this on purpose. You started with going to the office with your mom. Did that inform? Like, do you think that event was like? Nah, fuck, that I cannot.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, because it was just. I was so bored and it was just because I work from home now, and when I graduated college, I was working from I used to go to an office. My first two jobs were working in an office and you know, I would complete my work within like the first two hours and then I have to like pretend to be busy just so that they wouldn't give me more work or give me more stuff to do, and it's just like I can't do this for 60 years, like I'm like I don't know how my mom was able to yeah, it was. It's still able to do this and she's in her fifties. She's been working since her twenties, just going into an office, exactly Working eight, nine hours in the office and then just come home, and it's just, even if I never become full time.

Speaker 2:

And I decide after work. I have something to look forward to. It's something I'm passionate about, yes, and I'm glad I developed this passion, because I just I could not.

Speaker 1:

Exactly I. There was a job when I was doing the corporate office gig stuff. I had a job. It was cushy, it would take me literally 45 minutes to finish my job and then the rest of the day I didn't have anything to do and, just like you, I can't sit in the office and not do anything Like I need to be doing something. So I eventually started using that time to make content. I left that job, went to something more challenging. But to your point, like I don't think that there are certain humans in this world who are not meant to sit in an office nine to five and do that brain dead work, and I'm glad that you found you found out that you are not one of those people and you're doing something about it. So I love that. That's awesome, thank you. With that, we're just going to go ahead and jump right into the current mindset, because I feel like I felt it, but now we're going to get it officially. What is your current mindset in regards to your content right now?

Speaker 2:

So right now I actually about a month ago I kind of just got back came back to streaming. December I had to take a month off. Work Does kind of get in the way still when it comes to creating content and sometimes work. You know my job still pays the bills still, so I have to put some things secondary, temporarily Right. I completely stopped making YouTube content and then I came back to Twitch about a month ago, been fairly consistent, just streaming about two days a week and actually this past Saturday I was able to finally record a YouTube video.

Speaker 1:

Nice.

Speaker 2:

My current mindset is to slowly and you know, make the stream more interactive, more channel point redemptions for the community to use, be more active in you know discourse, not just my discourse, but you know other people's discourse, their communities, just so that, because that's just what I typically enjoy. Yeah, the goal is because we've had that busy point now but, as the year goes on, it's going to get less busy for me for work. I can't wait, because then I can definitely start uploading again, start streaming again, start, you know, playing with people again.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, for sure, okay, so that's definitely the current mindset.

Speaker 2:

I don't really have like goals in terms like followers or subs or subscribers or anything like that. Obviously, everyone wants to grow and all, but it's to just be more, being a participant in more communities.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, okay, no, I get that. I'm actually that's one of my goals this year as well too. Like, I have the time to be in people's streams and usually I'm in a lot of people's streams I just don't say anything because, like, and I'm making excuses and I'm going to say it this is the last time I say it. It's excuse, but I feel like when I start a conversation, I, if my kids come in the room and they need something, I'm out, like it don't matter who I'm talking to. I'm like I'm going and that's. Everybody understands that.

Speaker 1:

But I don't like doing it Like. I don't like starting a conversation and then, like two weeks later, I'm like hey man, what other thing was talking about? So I need to figure out a better way to just start those conversations and being in discord, cause I have a love hate relationship with discord. But I'm working on it. So I'm glad it's good to hear that other people are. I might even call it a struggle. Other people are working on those talents as well, so that's dope, okay, man. So DJ lessons. I know, I know you had at least one or two lessons that you've learned because you started creating content and I'm going to put you on the spot and ask you for at least one of them. Most definitely.

Speaker 2:

I think the most important lesson I've learned is I have to be myself. I, even when I started streaming, you know, I developed that that comfort level with YouTube would just being myself. Yeah, but even on twitch I I started off trying to be someone. I wasn't and it didn't make me enjoy streaming. It wasn't until, I want to say, late 2021, beginning of 2022. That's when I kind of started being myself and I think that's when the real growth for me started. That's awesome. So definitely that's the one lesson I've learned I'm always, just, always just be me.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I think that's a lesson. Not everybody has to learn that lesson. Some people come out the gate and it's just them, but I definitely I was. I don't know who I was trying to emulate, but I know that Once I slipped back into me and like, no, this is what I like to do, and I don't have to put up that facade of oh yeah, I care about that when I really don't like at this point Is you know what I like? You know what I don't like? And if you're not for it, then there's like 4,000 other streamers you can go check out.

Speaker 1:

So it's definitely it's so much easier to be yourself. You don't have to. There's a lot of stress that is relieved with not having to worry about faking that shit. Okay then. Well, I am a new inspiring streamer. I watched one of your youtube's and found out you had a twitch, and now I kind of want to do both as well. What would your advice be to that person? Or I just gave you a whole ass fake person. What would your advice be to anybody you want to give advice to?

Speaker 2:

No, you're good. Um, I guess the best advice is it's gonna start off slow. You know, unless you've already built yourself from another platform, no one's gonna really watch your streams and then best advice I've kind of had is actually, maybe it's a good idea to stream less and Network more.

Speaker 2:

You know, see, you know who's out there. See, you know who plays the same type of games that you do. See who is interested in the same topic as you and Don't. Hey, I'm interested in the same topic. You know, let me, let's, let's be friends, let's collab and all that. But you know, get to genuinely know people and yeah, just get to genuinely know people, and then that's how you can eventually, you know, work through your content, build your community, and then, you know, the growth is better to always grow, you know, naturally, in my opinion, to grow artificially.

Speaker 1:

I agree.

Speaker 2:

That's the word of advice I would give to someone that's, you know, newer aspiring.

Speaker 1:

I 100% agree with the stream less and network more because even now, like I think, I streamed two days, three days if y'all are lucky, but two days a week Because I don't need to be on the camera every day to a maintain my community or grow the community, because when those streams pop up, you know it creeps in from 10 to two, that's it. So if you're coming through, come through. But to your point, the networking piece, like at first and I'm going to this is for anybody who feels this at first I thought networking was. I just had a negative connotation with it. I don't know why I'm going to blame TV, but I had a negative connotation with it. But now I look at networking is like you a, you're getting your face out there and you have no idea who you're going to talk to, just going to be like I fuck with everything that you're doing right now and I know five people think of benefit from this and then that sets off. Hey, you got invited to like I got to, I was.

Speaker 1:

I did the Wild Now show with Gamma, was that last week?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I think yeah, it was last week and the only reason that happened is because I met. I met, so I think crew is my entry into the only whole crew. But I just me and crew hit it off. And then I went to her streams. I'm seeing people chat and I'm like, oh, who's this guy? I go check out Boom. Oh, who's DJ? Oh, and that's how you just everybody that they that they are interacting with, are cool people. So you naturally want to go see what they're talking about and go jump into the communities and chat, and that's it. Like I didn't like DM her but let me be on this show. God damn it. No, it was just. Hey, I think you'd be a good fit here. Yeah, all right, it was hard as shit, but it was fun. So don't be afraid to network, that's no it's not as hard as you think.

Speaker 2:

You'd be surprised how, how, you know, just spending 15 minutes kind of just asking some questions and not, you know, making it seem like you're trying to steal people's community members or viewers, just like spending 15, 20 minutes in a stream just getting to know the person and you'll see how, like how far it can get you.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, exactly, I tell everybody if you want to practice networking, come to my streams and just start just doing what you normally do and like I'm not the be all end all of tests for networking. Everybody has different personalities, but I'm not going to shut you down immediately, like because I want to generally have open conversations with people who are willing to have them and everybody wants to talk. So you don't want to force that, but just come try it. It's fun With that. I'm going to make you do it. Well, you make YouTube videos. You should be used to doing this called action. I want you to give a call to action to get the people rolled up to go see your content.

Speaker 2:

You guys can find me on Twitter at DJ versus everybody 13. On Instagram, dj versus everybody 313. Youtube and Twitch and TikTok, dj versus everybody no numbers after that Been doing, you know, content creation since about 2016. As I said, I play a variety of single player action adventure content, but also I dabble into multiplayer content as well. Always welcome to check out a stream or video. You know we're open. As I said, things do get a bit toxic, but Hello, toxicity never hurt anyone. Thank you to Crip for allowing me to be on this podcast.

Speaker 1:

And with that I'd like to thank DJ for being my guest for the evening. Once again, I appreciate you and thank you for finding the time to do this and, as always for you, creators out there and anyone in life, protect your mental, keep creating content and I'll talk to you on the next one Peace. Thank you for listening this deep into the podcast. I truly do appreciate it. If you enjoy what you heard and you want to get this Podcast to a state where I can actually make even more changes in creators lives, please share the podcast with those that you know they probably can get some enjoyment or some information from the podcast. Head over to UPON dot buzz sprout calm, that is, upun dot buzz sprout calm, to check out where the podcast is hosted. On that website There'll be a variety of different places where you can actually subscribe to the podcast.

Speaker 1:

If you do subscribe, I would appreciate a rating and a review on whatever platform you listen to this on. Those ratings and those reviews help the podcast Elevate into a higher level so I could become more discoverable in searches and things of that nature. Also, check out the website uploaded and unfiltered calm If you want to check out. Every guest has been on the podcast, as well as links to their content as well. Last but not least, if you want to financially support the podcast, you can do so at. Buy me a coffee. Calm Slash, uploaded and unfiltered. Set up a donation site there. All money that goes there will be Directly poured back to the podcast to help for hosting and things of that nature again. Thank you for listening. This has been a Project that I have dreamed about building and it is here and we're doing it and I am nothing but excited for its future.

Speaker 1:

Until then, I'll see you on the next one. You