While trying to grow our YouTube channel I have become aware of some gender bias issues with YouTube's algorithm, which we suspect are making it challenging to find success for our storytelling series.
 
If you'd like to help combat this problem, please click to watch an episode on our channel. While we work hard to make entertaining content worth watching, you could actually just click and play a video in another browser tab in the background with the sound off if you're too busy to pay close attention right now. Even the activity of playing the video is helpful. If you want the more specific details and how I arrived at this conclusion, read on, because it's story time!

Most Boredwalk fans know we put a lot of time into making amusing video content. While we've been able to get in front of tons of new people this way on Facebook, TikTok, and Instagram, YouTube has been unusually difficult.
 
When I first started posting content to YouTube, I posted the short form humor videos you've probably seen on our TikTok, Facebook, or Instagram accounts. While those videos did great on the other platforms, they kept flopping on YouTube. Not only did they flop, but they were getting tons of hate comments from men.
 
While we are no strangers to hateful comments from poorly behaved people on social media — internet gonna internet, after all — overwhelmingly we get comments from a lot of women who enjoy our content, along with some men who also get it and appreciate our point of view and sensibilities. In case you didn't know it, Boredwalk's customer base is 80% female! This makes sense. I am a woman, our work has a woman's point of view, and I am our head creative.

Noting that YouTube was going in the wrong direction, I decided to change our content format and develop the storytelling‌ videos you've seen us mention and link to here in our newsletter in recent months.
 
This is a format that has an audience on YouTube, aligns really well with our Delve Deck conversation starter card sets & beach balls, and when I checked on the comment section on videos in this style I saw lots of female commenters. This seemed like a good direction for us to move in, so I got to work, but still no luck. The hate comments were less of a factor, but getting picked up by the YouTube algorithm just wasn't happening. I thought maybe it was a skill issue.
 
I signed up for a class with a widely respected YouTube strategist. I thought maybe I just needed to learn more. And while creative professionals like me can always continue to get better at our craft, I started noticing a pattern.
 
The first thing I observed is that my classmates were 95% male. The next thing I noticed was the example content the class used for training material. Nearly every example video the instructor showed us was about sports or video games or cars. I understand women can be interested in these things, but it's not what's most likely the case.
 
One of the few women in my class is a lesbian making videos about her dating life. She complained that her videos get flooded with hundreds of hate comments every time she posts and she cannot seem to get in front of her target audience. So this woman can't get her channel in front of her target audience, I am struggling with it too. The class is full of men, the training material is all examples of content for men. Do you see a pattern here?

On the first day of class the instructor told us the YouTube algorithm is so great at helping you find content you're interested in, that he wanted to demonstrate. He showed us some car video and then showed us how you could go to YouTube in an incognito window of your browser — a view of YouTube that knows nothing about you — and get to this car video in just a few clicks. He opened an incognito window and showed us how he could click a challenge video, then a truck video, then a few more vehicle videos and ultimately YouTube would lead him to this specific car video he had in mind without searching. He summed up the demonstration by exclaiming "Isn't that amazing?!"

I was... less impressed. I sat there thinking "what if you are interested in makeup tutorials, or craft projects, or interior design, or some other thing men aren't stereotypically interested in?"
 
I decided I needed to know. I opened an incognito window and went to the YouTube home page (if you wanna try this experiment yourself, open an incognito browser and tap the "Shorts" icon, and then tap "Home" to get it to show you a bunch of videos it would suggest if it knew nothing about you).

 
Here's what I noticed:

1. The vast majority of the faces on the home page was male.
2. None of the videos suggested were likely to be interesting to the average woman. (Please spare me the reflexive & snarky "what is an average woman?" response — you know what I mean; don't be obtuse.)

I noticed there was a "suggested topics" bar on this home page. The suggestions were gaming, podcasts, news, power tools, action thrillers, trucks, tourism, sports tournaments, cars, and sports video games. Every time I've tried this experiment the lineup changes slightly, but the pattern does not: the suggested topics are always things that are most likely to be interesting to men.
 
Tourism, news and podcasts could be interesting to anyone, but the rest of that list is very gendered. Does YouTube genuinely believe the average internet user (who is just as likely to be female as male) is more interested in power tools than something like pet videos or late night interviews or some other more popular topic?
 
Could I get to content that's likely to be interesting to women? Yes. Does it exist on the platform? Of course. Are there successful female creators making content for women on YouTube? Yes. It's not a matter of does it exist, it's a matter of whether that content is given an equal discovery opportunity as a default setting.

 
I searched "comedy" in the search bar, which should be an interest that could be for men or women, yet I still had to scroll down 5 long form videos to see a thumbnail that wasn’t a man’s face. I finally got one with a bunch of faces of both genders. I scrolled through 50 videos and was not suggested a single female comedy creator’s account. I did get a Matt Rife video suggested right at the top, a man who is best known for writing domestic violence jokes. YouTube was not only showing preference for male content creators, it was showing preference for male creators who are actively hostile to women. It could have suggested content from many male creators with way more followers and/or views, but it chose Rife.
 
I searched “stand up comedy.” The first video was of Chris D’elia. D’elia is best known for soliciting nude photos of underage girls. Under D’elia’s video — and a video by another man — I finally saw a female standup comic. I then saw another 26 male comics suggested to me before I saw a woman’s face again.
 
Next I tried "movie reviews." I got all male creators talking about action movies. I did not say “action movie reviews.” I got 20 men on the results page and 1 woman at the end, and that woman was talking about an action movie. I could have searched "rom com reviews" to give it more direction, but I wanted to see if there was a bias for a topic that is pretty gender neutral and there it was.

Earlier this week Taylor Swift dropped a new music video. I found out about it from her Instagram story and clicked and watched. I thought to myself "Swift is a massive star, I bet this video is racking up views like crazy on YouTube. I wonder what happens on that incognito home page when she posts a new video. She is definitely what is trending on YouTube today." I tried it.
 
Swift collected millions of views on her music video in a few hours; her channel has 59.7M subscribers. I opened YouTube in an incognito window while this was happening and I got the same content suggestions: a ton of dude stuff. I saw Joe Rogan being promoted front and center; he'd posted an episode of his podcast around the time Swift posted her video.
 
Swift has more than three times as many subscribers as Rogan does, and her newest video got over three times as many views as the video Rogan posted around the same time. If the YouTube algorithm is really interested in showing a new user what's hot on the platform because it doesn't know them, why would it suggest Rogan and not Swift?
 
It is important to note here that YouTube pays creators for views. Obviously neither Swift nor Rogan cares about that revenue because they mostly earn money in other ways and have tons of money already, but what it does signal is a bias in the algorithm that even Taylor Swift isn't immune to — which is itself an extension of software engineers who programmed it. If the bias in the algorithm is affecting how likely it is to recommend a video posted by Swift think of how it could impact less famous female creators?
 
It's unlikely Swift got those millions of views simply because the YouTube algorithm treated her video fairly. I suspect it did not. She likely got to those numbers because she linked her video on other platforms and her fans came to YouTube to watch it. I now understand I probably have to do the same to support YouTube videos.

I obviously do not have Taylor Swift's influence, but if everyone reading this watched a video on our channel it would impact metrics and give it a visibility boost that we wouldn't otherwise get.‌ It would also unlock the ability for me to link our online shop to our channel, a feature I cannot access because I cannot just get views by making good videos the way I do on Instagram, TikTok, etc. I have to bring my own audience in to start pushing YouTube to give me more views.
 
Once I realized this was an issue I wondered if anyone else was talking about it. I found this Reddit conversation about it and this academic study about how YouTube is indoctrinating young men. This is bad, and evidence I'm not the only one noticing this. It's a problem that needs more attention.
 
This is an inequality issue and it should not be happening. It impacts the ability of women to be served as users on YouTube. It impacts the ability of female creators like me to earn money.
 
We don't see this issue playing out on other platforms like TikTok or Instagram, and as far as I could tell from my findings, Instagram has 4x the active users that YouTube has. That is unsurprising when YouTube is going out of its way to send the message that they prefer creators/viewers who are male and fit into their narrow conception of masculinity.
 
People can pressure YouTube to change, but we can all take smaller actions every day to support female creators, simply by watching and sharing content. Every time you watch or share the videos of a creator you like, it helps that creator's account. I hope sharing what I've observed will help this issue gain more awareness and maybe affect some change.

Alright, HUGE thanks for reading this really long screed, and for anything you can do to help us fight the good fight!

A RODENT OF UNUSUAL CLAIRVOYANCE

It's the Vernal Equinox, proving once again that the prognosticator of prognosticators was right on the money. It's almost like the whole "six more weeks of winter/only six more weeks until spring" thing is rigged!

Either that, or we should be asking groundhogs for input on WAY more subjects. Punxsutawney Phil has unlocked the key to immortality, mastered evading law enforcement during high-speed chases, AND been 137 for 137 at predicting the first day of spring. It's really quite astounding.

Paws at 10 and 2, checking the side mirrors... Phil is safer than 99.9% of human motorists, tbh.

GIF courtesy Groundhog Day / Columbia Pictures

It's also National Ravioli Day, and that is exciting because who doesn't love pasta with a delightful surprise inside? It's like a savory Advent Calendar for your tummy, but available year-round and without the religious baggage.

Before we get to those amusing links, let's take note of some interesting historical events and celebrity births & deaths from March 20ths of yore, shall we?

• In 1916 Albert Einstein published his and first wife Mileva Marić's general theory of relativity. Look, I get that some scholars dispute the claims that Mileva had a hand in Einstein's scientific work, but the dude agreed to give her all the Nobel Prize money he won in 1921 as part of their divorce settlement two years earlier, before he'd even won it — valued at approximately $2.5M USD in today's dollars. I'm sorry, but that just doesn't happen if you're simply a "supportive homemaker."

• In 1985 Libby Riddles became the first woman to win the 1,135-mile Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race.

• In 2015 a solar eclipse, equinox, and supermoon all occurred on the same day. I'm sure pagans & astrologers had a grand time luxuriating in such celestial largesse!

• Birthday ravioli (it could be a thing!) all around for: Roman poet Ovid (43 BCE), dreadfully boring Norwegian poet & playwright Henrik Ibsen of "A Doll's House" infamy (1828), behavioral psychologist B.F. Skinner (1904), actor & bandleader Ozzie Nelson of The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet fame (1906), actor, filmmaker, and 2000 year old man Carl Reiner (1922), television host, puppet enthusiast, and all-around icon of swellness Fred Rogers (1928), Jamaican singer-songwriter & producer Lee "Scratch" Perry (1936), children's author Lois Lowry (1937), Canadian hockey legend Bobby Orr (1948), actor, filmmaker, and New York Knicks enthusiast Spike Lee (1957), actress Holly Hunter (1958), model, actress, furniture designer, and swimwear enthusiast Kathy Ireland (1963), English-French actor David Thewlis of James and the Giant Peach fame (1963), actor & director Michael Rapaport of True Romance, Higher Learning, Deep Blue Sea, and Beautiful Girls fame (1970), and Linkin Park singer-songwriter Chester Bennington (1976)

• Pour one out for: Singer-songwriter, gambler, and roasted chicken enthusiast Kenny Rogers (d. 2020). His condition may be "deceased," but his music will live on forever! (Or at least until people tire of re-watching The Big Lebowski.)

Alright, on to the amusing links!

*****

1. 🏀 Just in time for March Madness!

Install your Wallpads before you submit your brackets! Your drywall will thank you!

For more LOLs from our team be sure to follow us on our OG social accounts such as Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, and/or Facebook.

2. ✈️️ Leg room? That'll be extra.

Josiah Schneider discovers that modern airline seats are also designed for groundhogs. Phil has so much to teach us!

3. 🐈 Pretty privilege pioneers

Speaking of entitled diminutive mammals, Zay Dante has some choice words about cats. I love them... but he is not incorrect.

4.🐻‍❄️ We'll just clone the polar bears, it's fine

Chaz May gives us a celebrity house tour. Whose house? It doesn't really matter. They're all the same, and they're all terrible.

5. 😆 Can't keep up with Gen Z slang? Fight fire with fire!

Sam Salem is a comedian in LA who moonlights as a teacher, and he has been making up new slang words and convincing his students that they are real, very much slay, and not at all cringe.

*****

We'll be back here in your inbox on Friday with more nonsense holidays to dissect, more notable birthdays (and maybe even some notable deathdays!) to celebrate, and more witty content in general. Until then...

Peace, love, and spring vibes,

Matt

WELL, IT'S NATIONAL AWKWARD MOMENTS DAY

I fully approve of this silly holiday because awkward moments are almost always hilarious in hindsight and I am happy to squeeze any drop of amusement I can from the trauma-verse.

An awkward moment that sticks out for me took place ages ago at a party I attended with my at-the-time boyfriend. He and I had been chatting with a few people when I stepped away to get a drink. When I returned I came up behind my boyfriend and affectionately grabbed his butt, only to realize it was not his butt.

My boyfriend had been talking to a guy with the same haircut/hair color who was around the same height and build and wearing a very similar outfit that looked the same from behind. They'd switched where they were standing while I was off getting a drink, so random guy was now where my boyfriend was a few minutes ago.

Random guy either didn't notice the butt grab or pretended not to, but this did not prevent me from profusely over-apologizing to him. You know how when you get a little pimple no one will notice but you mess with it and now it's red and puffy and everyone will notice? Yeah, that's me with an awkward moment. I will find a way to make it weirder.

Alright, that's mine. Send me yours, because I love an awkward moment story, and I will share some favorites next Monday. (I can of course share anonymously for anyone who wants to keep a low awkwardness profile).

The struggle is real

*****

Let's take note of some significant historical happenings and birthdays from March 18ths of yore:

• Caligula became the third Emperor of Rome on this day in the year 37; his name has since become synonymous with hedonism

• Russian cosmonaut Aleksei Leonov became the first person to walk in space on this day in 1965 (this was also the day that Poppin' Fresh Pillsbury Dough Boy was introduced)

• On this day in 1984 Vanessa Williams resigned as Miss America (on her damn birthday) when old nude photos of her appeared in Penthouse Magazine. The same issue is notable because it was the first time the magazine featured a man on the cover (George Burns) and the centerfold featured an underage Traci Lords. The issue is now illegal to own or look at in most countries.

• Birthday cake all around for: US President Grover Cleveland (1837), author John Updike (1927), singer Wilson Pickett (1941), model/actress/singer Vanessa Williams (1963), rapper/actress Queen Latifah (1970), comedian Dane Cook (1972), and actress Lily Collins (1989)

*****

OK, that's it for today! No new customer Q&A due to lack of volunteers, so if you're feeling even moderately outgoing and would like to be featured in an upcoming Monday email (and are a customer with some Boredwalk tees, tanks, hoodies, towels, bags, books, or Delve Decks to show off), just reply to this and let us know and we'll send you some fun questions!

And if you're looking to shop today — like for that Malaise Fro Days tee featured up top — be sure to use code SAVE15 at checkout for 15% off orders of $95 or more, and don't forget that U.S. shipping is FREE for orders of $75 or more!

We'll be back here in your inbox on Wednesday with some more random holidays to observe, historical tidbits to acknowledge, and fun links to entertaining content! Until next time...

Peace, love, and awkward moments,

Meredith

LOOK ALIVE, JULIUS!
(OOPS, TOO LATE) 💀

Happy Peanut Lovers Day! It seems like it was just yesterday we were celebrating National Peanut Cluster Day, but in point of fact it was just yesterweek that we did that. March sure is nuts for peanuts.

It's also National VO Day! VO — voiceover, if you're "in the biz" — is such a cool talent. Sadly, it seems to be going the way of the buffalo. Sometime around 1988,* animation studios stopped hiring ultra-talented career voice actors that could adopt a wide variety of personas and switch between them at a moment's notice and started replacing them with big name Hollywood stars that were supposedly more "bankable."

*I chose this year in particular because for some reason my inner child blames the film Oliver & Company for kickstarting this trend, even though my inner adult is sure it began before then. Boredwalk co-founder Meredith will be quite pleased that I have finally found fault with Billy Joel (aka Artful Dodger) for something. I guess he made up for it with that indomitable street savoir faire of his.

The joke's on those studio suits, though, since soon even Hollywood A-listers and former Grammy winners will be iced out by AI-generated deepfake voice tracks.** Weird how the more things change, the more they stay the same, hmm?

**They would probably love this, actually, since they wouldn't have to pay robots scale (that's minimum wage, if you're in the biz). Suits are gonna suit.

Whatever happens, I hope whomever future generations of suits try to screw over financially — be they human or machine — take a cue from that soft but deadly tee up top and choose retribution.

Speaking of that tee, tap the pink button below and get one for yourself so you are properly attired when the revolution comes!

Was this a long way for a joke that combined a reference to a 34 year old peanut butter commercial AND a 20 year old reference to a 1,980 year old assassination of a Roman emperor on the Ides of March/National Peanut Lovers Day? Yes. But was that journey worth it? Also yes. 

You can thank me for my next-level comedy stylings by
purchasing some shirts, books, and Delve Decks.

WE GET IT

Happy Sensible Time Day! This is not an official holiday that is observed by anyone besides other people who agree with me that Standard Time is infinitely superior to Daylight Saving Time. That said, I still feel sympathy for all the DST stans out there. May your day be full of as much caffeine as you require!

Now that we've got the positive stuff out of the way, we now return you to your regularly scheduled Monday, wherein you may observe:

• National Immune System Day

• National COVID-19 Day

• National Funeral Director & Mortician Recognition Day

All of those seem related to some degree... and guaranteed to prompt a persistent feeling of malaise.

Not all of today's random occasions are a bummer, though! We also have:

GIF via The Office / NBC

*****

Let's take note of some significant historical happenings and birthdays from March 11ths of yore:

• In 2020 the World Health Organization declared the COVID-19 virus epidemic a pandemic. BOOOOO!!!

• Birthday oatmeal nut waffles all around for: Actor Mark Metcalf of Animal House and Twisted Sister music video fame (1946), singer-songwriter & producer Bobby McFerrin of "Don't Worry, Be Happy" fame (1950), English author & playwright Douglas Adams of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy fame (1952), German singer-songwriter and punk icon Nina Hagen (1955), Canadian actor Elias Koteas of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Some Kind of Wonderful fame (1961), singer-songwriter Lisa Loeb of "Stay" fame (1968), actor & producer Terrence Howard of Iron Man, Hustle & Flow, and Empire fame (1969), actor Johnny Knoxville of Jackass fame (1971), singer-songwriters Benji & Joel Madden of the band Good Charlotte (1979), actress & filmmaker Thora Birch of American Beauty and Ghost World fame (1982), and Russian-American actor Anton Yelchin of Star Trek, Fright Night, and Odd Thomas fame (1989; RIP!)

*****

OK, that's it for today! No new customer Q&A due to lack of volunteers, so if you're feeling even moderately outgoing and would like to be featured in an upcoming Monday email (and are a customer with some Boredwalk tees, tanks, hoodies, towels, bags, books, or Delve Decks to show off), just reply to this and let us know and we'll send you some fun questions!

We'll be back here in your inbox on Wednesday with some more random holidays to observe, historical tidbits to acknowledge, and fun links to entertaining content! Until next time...

Peace, love, and bonus daylight,

Matt

GOOD, I HOPE IT EATS ME 😒

Happy Peanut Cluster Day! Unless, of course, you are allergic. If you are and are something of a grammarian, consider instead celebrating National Proofreading Day instead. If you are allergic to both peanuts and well-constructed sentences, it is also National Retro Video Game Day. So many options!

Meanwhile, I am waiting for the lions March promises to come eat me and put an end to my problems before the lambs arrive with their soft, downy false hope. Pass the bottle, Tin Man!

Chandler gets it.

GIF via Friends / NBC

*****

If you're in the market for some Boredwalk goodies — like that cute, soft Wizard of Oz-inspired Liquid Courage tee up top — be sure to use code SAVE15 at checkout for 15% off orders of $95+, not to mention free U.S. shipping on orders of $75+ — no code needed!

(We also wanted to mention that our vendor who prints our books sent us a bunch of copies of our 1990s Adult Activity books with the wrong paper type. They are still usable, but the paper works best with pens and color pencils (not as well with markers and crayons). Anyway, we are selling them at cost to get them out of our warehouse to avoid throwing them in a landfill. Grab one if you want one.)

*****

While you're waiting for your new Boredwalk gear to arrive you can also treat your earholes to the latest episode of the Boredwalk Podcast!

Meredith & Tess discuss gross eHarmony ads, Boredwalk's most recent burglary, ineffective law enforcement, and the general bad vibes swirling around Boredwalk for the last several months.

They also debate which is more powerful: capitalism or misogyny? Meredith is pretty sure it's misogyny and lays out why, and Tess supports this hypothesis with some first-hand experiences working on ads for some of the worst companies on the internet.

They then check in with the internet troll contingent, and the trolls did not disappoint. (They never do.)

Thankfully, Karen left a 5-star review for her new Grievance Journal, which helped the troll pills go down a bit easier.

Our co-hosts move on to reacting to fan answers to the Question of the Day "what fragrance do others like that you can't stand?" and patchouli was the runaway 'winner' among fans, but Tess & Meredith had their own strong opinions on this question.

They wrap things up by trading answers to the Delve Deck Venting and Joy Edition questions "what problem can you not believe technology hasn't solved yet?" and "what's your favorite guilty pleasure right now?"

Get in on the action and listen to the hilarity on the platform of your choice!

*****

Here are a few historical tidbits and famous birthdays to kick off your weekend:

• In 1910 French aviator Raymonde de Laroche became the first woman to receive a pilot's license

• In 1917 the US Senate voted to limit filibusters by adopting the cloture rule. LOL, problem solved, no notes!

• In 1950 the first Volkswagen Type 2, aka VW Bus, aka every hippie's favorite mode of transportation, rolled off the production line.

• In 1979 the compact disc, aka the best audio media format ever invented — I AM NOT ENTERTAINING CHALLENGES TO THIS ASSERTION, VINYL FETISHISTS — was demonstrated publicly for the first time by Dutch manufacturer Philips

• Birthday peanut clusters all around (unless you're allergic, of course) for: Singer-songwriter & actor Micky Dolenz of The Monkees (1945), singer-songwriter & bassist Randy Meisner of The Eagles (1946), English singer-songwriter, guitarist, and car enthusiast Gary Numan (1958), Irish-American actor Aidan Quinn of Desperately Seeking Susan and Benny & Joon fame (1959), actress Camryn Manheim of The Practice fame (1961), actor Freddie Prinze, Jr. of She's All That, I Know What You Did Last Summer, and Scooby-Doo film franchise fame (1976), actor James Van Der Beek of Dawson's Creek and Varsity Blues fame (1977), tattoo artist & model Kat Von D (1982), Uzbekistani-American actress & comedian Milana Vayntrub of AT&T commercial and Werewolves Within fame (1987), and English actor Kit Connor of Heartstopper fame (2004)

• Pour one out for: French composer & conductor Hector Berlioz (d. 1869), German businessman & fragile airship inventor Ferdinand Zeppelin (d. 1917), Grateful Dead keyboardist & songwriter Ron "Pigpen" McKernan (d. 1973), jazz singer Billy Eckstine (d. 1993), baseball icon Joe DiMaggio (d. 1999), and English composer, conductor, record producer, and "Fifth Beatle" George Martin (d. 2016)

*****

OK, that's it for this week!

We'll be back here in your inbox on Monday with another email and maybe a fresh customer Q&A if any brave soul (perhaps you?) volunteers! If you'd like to be featured in an upcoming email, reply to this one and let us know!

Peace, love, and courage (liquid or otherwise)

Matt

YOU DA REAL MVPs

If you missed Monday's Boredwalk email, well, it was a doozy. I'll spare you a repeat of the gory details, but our offices were broken into and burglarized (again) for the second time in as many months last weekend.

I and the entire Boredwalk team have been overwhelmed by the outpouring of support in response, from placing generous orders to messages of encouragement and empathy to sharing what happened on social media to help spread awareness about our weird little brand.

A HUGE thank you to everyone who replied to the email or reached out via DM over Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, and elsewhere. We are by no means out of the woods, but we do have a much-needed spring in our step as we continue to navigate all the challenges 2024 has thrown at us so far.

Thank you so, so much!

No, seriously — thank you

GIF via CBS

Random occasions? Have at them:

• National Dentist Day — Seriously? Gum reaper is out here looking for a statue? Hard pass.

• National Frozen Food Day — I don't know about you, but I would not have made it out of my teen years without fish sticks and frozen peas.

• National Oreo Day — My annual opportunity to remind you that Hydrox were first and Oreos are cookie-come-latelies riding their coattails!

• In 1836 3,000 Mexican troops finally succeeded in storming and capturing the Alamo following a 13-day siege defended by a mere 187 volunteers comprised of US colonists and Tejanos rebelling against the central Mexican government. Shoulda tried hiding in the basement!

• Dmitri Mendeleev presented the first periodic table to the Russian Chemical Society on this day in 1869

• Birthday sandwich cookies all around for: Italian painter, sculptor, and teenage mutant ninja turtle Michelangelo (1475), French author & playwright Cyrano de Bergerac (1619), English-Italian poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806), songwriter, bandleader, and King of Western Swing Bob Wills (1905), actor & comedian Lou Costello of Abbott & Costello and "Who's on first?" fame (1906), famed illustrator & publisher Will Eisner of The Spirit fame (1917), comedian, actor, announcer, and large check enthusiast Ed McMahon (1923), legendary jazz guitarist & songwriter Wes Montgomery (1923), singer Mary Wilson of The Supremes (1944), English singer-songwriter & guitarist David Gilmour of Pink Floyd fame (1946), actor & filmmaker Rob Reiner of All in the Family, This Is Spinal Tap, The Sure Thing, The Princess Bride, and When Harry Met Sally fame (1947), comedian, actor, producer, and screenwriter D.L. Hughley (1963), actress Connie Britton of Friday Night Lights and Nashville fame (1967), basketball icon, savvy businessman, and walking hilarious soundbite Shaquille O'Neal (1972), English singer-songwriter and guitarist Guy Garvey of the perpetually underrated band Elbow (1974), and rapper Beanie Sigel (1974)

• Pour one out for: Colonel & knife enthusiast James "Jim" Bowie and frontiersman, politician, and raccoon hat enthusiast Davy Crockett (d. 1836), who just couldn't make it to that elusive basement in time.

Also dribble a tipple in honor of novelist & poet Louisa May Alcott of Little Women fame (d. 1888), conductor and composer John Philip Sousa of marching band music fame (d. 1932), Mount Rushmore designer & sculptor whose name sounds like the result of a bet his parents lost Gutzon Borglum (d. 1941), novelist & Nobel Prize laureate Pearl S. Buck (d. 1973), Russian-American "philosopher" and professional whiner Ayn Rand (d. 1982), painter and "flower" enthusiast Georgia O'Keeffe (d. 1986), singer-songwriter & guitarist Mark Linkous of Sparklehorse fame (d. 2010), singer-songwriter & guitarist Alvin Lee of Ten Years After fame (d. 2013), and surgeon & Tommy John surgery pioneer Frank Jobe (d. 2014)

Alright, on to the amusing links!

*****

1. 🍸 Sir, she bought you a drink. You know the rules!

Tess woman-spreads all over the place and explains the transactional nature of this "free" cocktail. Now be a good little boy and grab your rubber mallet and socket wrench set — that weird noise isn't going to fix itself!

For more LOLs from our team be sure to follow us on our OG social accounts such as Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, and/or Facebook. But if you're looking for merch, just buy directly from a brand's website. These social media jabronis don't deserve to get a cut.

sdsd

2. 🗳️ And the nominee is...

Matt Buechele has thoughts on this that are funny, but less funny and more depressing is the fact that I literally wrote in "Lucifer Morningstar" on my ballot for a couple of uncontested seats the other day and am more confident in a fictional literary character's bona fides than those of whichever living, breathing jabroni just got elected because no one else felt like running against them.

3. 🍌 The ultimate side hustle

Evy Kay reveals the secret to untold riches on social media (and killer banana bread)!

4. 🧙🏽‍♀️ If they didn't want to get eaten, they should've left the house made of candy alone

It's 2024, and social media users are still being judgmental AF about non-mainstream dietary choices. I thought we were past this!

5. 🧌 Riddle me this, taxpayer!

Gabe has run afoul of the tax troll, and while this is a comedy sketch, it sure does also seem rooted in fact. Shout out to Tess for writing some awful(ly funny) poetry!

*****

We'll be back here in your inbox on Friday with more nonsense holidays to dissect, more notable birthdays (and maybe even some notable deathdays!) to celebrate, and more witty content in general. Until then...

Peace, love, and thanks,

Matt

I'm changing things up with our usual Boredwalk email format today. No product photos. No random holidays to enthuse about or make fun of. No notable historical events or famous birthdays to celebrate. No humorous GIFs supporting my inane ramblings. No customer Q&A.

I'm tapped out. Everyone here at Boredwalk is. 

In case you missed it in our (since-deleted) Instagram post over the weekend, our offices were broken into and burglarized early Saturday morning for the second time in as many months.

We're pretty sure it was the same perpetrators of the first burglary on January 4th. We're also pretty sure the Whittier Police Department will be just as ineffectual in finding them as they were two months ago. As excited as the small army of SWAT officers who arrived on the scene shortly after the suspects left seemed at the prospect of being able to fill other humans with lead, they were equally disinterested in doing the less violent procedural tasks of taking crime scene photos and dusting for fingerprints.*

* Look, if you yourself or someone you know and care about works in law enforcement, please don't @ me about the above comment. I was actually here and saw how disappointed they all became when they confirmed the building was empty and realized they weren't going to be able to shoot someone and instead have to do actual police work. The unsubscribe link is right down below. 

The reason I asked Meredith to delete the Instagram post is because in addition to the very kind words of sympathy and care we received in the comments and our DMs, there were many of instances of people giving a lot of unsolicited, uninformed, and wildly impractical "advice" about what we should do to prevent this from happening again. Well-intentioned though it may have been, it still stung to be confronted with a wall of notifications like that, as though these were all obvious and easy-to-implement solutions for a business of our size. And this, after having spent hours going through security cam footage with the police to file the incident report.

• Get a guard dog: Commercial leases, including ours, don't typically allow for that. This is an office park, not a scrap yard. The last thing we need is some snarling hellhound pooping all over the carpet and chewing all our Delve Decks and Grievance Journals and activity books to bits every night.

• Get a shotgun: A shotgun is only of use if I am physically present at the office to discharge it. I already am here 12+ hours a day, six day a week (seven this week, as I am here now typing this). I don't think it's reasonable to expect anyone to live at their office 24/7.

• Spend the night so someone is here to scare them off next time: See above. These degenerates don't really give us advance notice of when they plan to strike, so that would mean I just start living here around the clock indefinitely. Again, I don't think this is a reasonable or practical solution.

• Replace all the windows with steel: Again, we are renters, we don't own this building. The landlords will not allow us to make substantial changes to the construction of our unit. Plus, our lease is up in roughly 18 months. Spending tens of thousands of dollars on building upgrades for such a limited period of utility is not something we have the money for.

• Move to a more secure building: We are under lease until July 2025. Breaking that lease will be prohibitively expensive, as would paying for such a move, and this also assumes that other buildings in different areas will be more secure. They aren't. Criminals are literally everywhere. Even Mayberry had dozens of them on The Andy Griffith Show. This would also likely have a detrimental impact on our staff members. If our next office is very far from our current one, they may not be able or willing to make that commute on a daily basis, and we don't have many roles at Boredwalk that allow for working from home on a full-time basis, especially when it comes to printing shirts, towels, and bags, and packing & shipping orders. We all have great chemistry together and want to maintain that.

• Set up myriad booby traps, Home Alone-style: This is not a Hollywood movie, this is real life. I am 100% confident any booby traps we set up will only serve to injure myself or the other members of our staff. 

• Get a private armed security guard to patrol the premises overnight: That's an extra 84 hours a week in payroll, and we do not have the budget for that, either (see below).

The other thing that a lot of the people leaving these comments seemingly fail to understand is that everything listed above costs money, and not an insignificant amount of it. We are already out the thousands of dollars in shirts that were stolen. Plus we will have to pay another insurance deductible to file a claim, not to mention the cost to replace the glass that they shattered in order to break in here.

That money has to come from somewhere; we can't just conjure it out of thin air like a wizard or the Federal Reserve. So that would entail either finding a LOT of new customers overnight who are willing to spend what we currently charge for our products, or raising our prices significantly.

We also get so many comments on our ads about how "high" our prices are already, but they really are not. We set our prices to be competitive with the rest of the market (read: similarly-sized businesses selling similar-ish products) and to cover the costs of the products themselves, the labor, the rent, the utilities, the shipping materials, and the marketing & advertising costs associated with putting our stuff in front of people (which are a LOT higher than folks seem to know), but people seem to believe Boredwalk prices should be in line with what they see at Walmart or Amazon or Temu or Shein. We are not any of those companies.

Boredwalk is a small business. We have been struggling mightily for several months, and we are on a knife's edge right now. Candidly, if there are items of ours you have had your eye on for a while, I would strongly consider ordering them now or in the near future and not just taking for granted that we will still be around and in business come November or December when you are looking to do holiday shopping. This is not a marketing ploy or a trick — this is just the reality of the situation.

Meredith and I love working on developing fun new products that delight our customers, but we have been struggling so much for months and months trying to shore up other areas of the business that are less exciting but just as (if not more) important to its ongoing function that we have not had time to even discuss new tee designs or Delve Deck expansions or our next activity books, let alone actually work on them.

We just get punched in the face in some new, unanticipated fashion each day. It's getting hard to want to even wake up in the morning.

Look, I'm sorry to slump into your inbox and whine about Boredwalk's problems to you, and on a Monday to boot. I hate doing it. I would much rather share funny jokes and unveil rad new tee designs and games and books that make you happy (or at least marginally happier).

We are still working (extremely, insanely) hard to turn things around. Hopefully we are able to do so. If not, it's been a pleasure sharing time in your inbox with you, whether you've been a subscriber for ten years or ten days.

Peace, love, and tacos,

Matt Snow

Chief Creative Officer / Co-founder

Boredwalk

WELL, IT'S RORY COCHRANE'S BIRTHDAY, FOR ONE

The last time I used "What's with today today?" as an email subject line and failed to specifically mention the 1995 film Empire Records in the email — the movie from which the quote was pulled from — it did not go over well. We received a LOT of replies from subscribers who did not shy away from registering their disappointment.

As much as I love the movie (and, even more, its soundtrack), this was quite surprising given the film was released almost 30 years before I sent said email, and was an utter flop at the box office upon release. I just looked it up, and it only made $303,000! And it cost $10 MILLION to make!

Apparently the Venn diagram of Boredwalk's email list and the people who saw Empire Records in the theaters is essentially a circle, and the math backs this up — the average price of a movie ticket in 1995 was $4.35, and 303,000 ÷ 4.35 ≈ 69.5k, which is about how many people receive our emails.

SO, to all my fellow Empire Records dorks, this one's for you! Please reply and share your thoughts. But ONLY if you know unequivocally where those thoughts come from.

Happy birthday, Rory.

GIF via Empire Records / Warner Bros.

Weird holidays? We got 'em:

• Inconvenience Yourself Day — You mean "life?"

• National Chocolate Soufflé Day — Nothing says "inconvenience" like making chocolate consumption as stressful and anxiety-inducing as possible. Pro tip: skip the soufflé and just eat a chocolate bar.

• National Pancake Day — Perhaps the antithesis of the soufflé, the pancake can be as thin as a crepe or as fluffy as a spongy frisbee and satisfy your sweet tooth no matter how it turns out. As long as I can drown it in maple syrup, who cares?

• National Essay Day — If you've been reading Boredwalk's emails for a minute, you know we celebrate essays three days a week (though my AP Language & Composition teacher Ms Gazda might take issue with me describing... whatever this is... as an essay). Do they make for great marketing emails? Who can say? (My bank account can, and it says "no.") But they are (usually) fun to write!

Want a few interesting historical tidbits and famous birthdays from February 28ths of yore before we get to amusing links to brighten your day? Have at them:

• The final episode of M*A*S*H aired on this day in 1983 and was watched by almost 110 million viewers. For perspective, Super Bowl LVIII had an estimated 123.4 million viewers, but in 2024 the estimated US population is approximately 342 million versus 233.8 million in 1983.

So roughly 47% of the population tuned into the final episode of M*A*S*H compared to 36% of the population watching this year's Super Bowl, and without the benefit of streaming or widespread adoption of international satellite broadcasting. In summation, football is dumb. Long live baseball!

• Birthday pancakes (or chocolate soufflés, if you must) all around for: French philosopher, author, and original essayist Michel de Montaigne (1533), chemist, peace activist, and Nobel laureate Linus Pauling (1901), English guitarist, producer, and Rolling Stones founder Brian Jones (1942), English graphic designer Storm Thorgerson of Pink Floyd album cover fame (1944), football player and actor Bubba Smith of Police Academy film franchise fame (1945), actress, singer, and author Bernadette Peters of Broadway musical and The Jerk fame (1948), comedian, actor, and supplemental insurance enthusiast Gilbert Gottfried (1955), actor & director John Turturro, who is most notable for his work in the films of Spike Lee and the Coen brothers (1957), singer-songwriter Cindy Wilson of B-52s fame (1957), Canadian-American actress Rae Dawn Chong of Beat Street, The Color Purple, and Tales from the Dark Side fame (1961), actor Robert Sean Leonard of Dead Poets Society and House fame (1969), actor Rory Cochrane of Dazed and Confused and Empire Records fame (1972), and actress Ali Larter of Varsity Blues, Final Destination, Legally Blonde, and Heroes fame (1976)

Alright, on to the amusing links!

*****

1. 🐍 We don't hate men, we just hate "men."

True story: this video started going viral on TikTok the morning of Saturday 2/17 and we got a bunch of orders for the Female Gaze tee Tess is wearing in it. Yay!

But only for a few hours before TikTok flagged it with a policy violation for being "misleading." Boo!

What made it misleading? Well, we tagged the video with a link to the Female Gaze product listing in our TikTok Shop, and because Tess didn't explicitly mention the shirt she was wearing or tell people that they could buy it in our TikTok Shop they deemed the content "irrelevant" to the product that was tagged. Even though she is talking about gender politics in the video and the shirt featuring the mythical avatar of feminist rage occupies at least 50% of the frame throughout. sO miSLeAdiNg!

Show of hands: who has EVER opened the TikTok app on their phones HOPING it would be a never-ending scroll of "influencers" gushing about how "obsessed" they are with whatever product they're trying to sell like some sort of lo-fi QVC? Anyone? Anyone?!

Truly, this is the stupidest of timelines.

For more LOLs from our team be sure to follow us on our OG social accounts such as Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, and/or Facebook. But if you're looking for merch, just buy directly from a brand's website. These social media jabronis don't deserve to get a cut.

 2. 🧐 Book recommendations that guarantee business success!

The content creators at Almost Friday TV list five books every "entrapranure" should read. The Scroll of Flesh to Coin sounds riveting!

3. 💸 Inflation is out of control

FlossyBaby accurately depicts my experience every time I check out at the grocery store now.

4. 😼 Cats rule, and councilmen drool!

Content creator Jenn, aka ThatGoodNewsGirl, makes videos highlighting uplifting news stories, so her whole account is worth a follow, but in this one she shares a story about how Browser the library cat got evicted from his job but ultimately was reinstated, much to the chagrin of the cranky cat-hating Texas councilman who initially pushed for Browser's ouster. Huzzah, Browser!

5. ♂️ How to manifest a hostile takeover

Gabe is the apex of alphas. He made gravity his b!†©h! Follow Boredwalk for more empowering knowledge!

*****

We'll be back here in your inbox on Friday with more nonsense holidays to dissect, more notable birthdays (and maybe even some notable deathdays!) to celebrate, and more witty content in general. Until then...

Peace, love, and soufflés pancakes,

Matt

JUST FIX YOUR HOME PLANET AND STAY THERE!

Happy National Invasive Species Awareness Day! Fun fact: every species on this miserable mudball is already acutely aware of the most invasive species of all EXCEPT for the one that is doing the invading! Three guesses as to which one I'm referring to, but I have hunch you'll only need one. 

Thank goodness brilliant walking talking viral loads Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos are hard at work trying to export the carbon-based cancer that is humanity off-world. It's like they're trying to answer a question no one asked: "What if we took the universe but made it, y'know, significantly worse?"

This guy knows what I'm talking about:

Sure, he was a rogue computer program, but was Mr. Smith actually wrong? I think not.

GIF via The Matrix / Warner Bros. Pictures

*****

We FINALLY have a fun new customer Q&A down below from Julie L., but before we get to that, let's take note of some significant historical happenings and birthdays & deathdays from February 26ths of yore:

• In 1616 astronomer Galileo Galilei was formally banned by the Roman Catholic Church from teaching or defending heliocentrism (the view that Earth orbits the Sun). At the time it was believed that all celestial bodies orbited Earth. Typical Main Character Syndrome, even in the 17th century.

• In 1919 Grand Canyon National Park was established

• Ten years later in 1929 Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming followed suit

• Birthday cake all around for: French author, poet, and playwright Victor Hugo of The Hunchback of Notre-Dame and Les Misérables fame (1802), German-American fashion designer Levi Strauss (1829), soldier & hunter William "Buffalo Bill" Cody (1846), surgeon and cereal enthusiast John Harvey Kellogg of corn flake fame (1852), singer-songwriter & pianist Fats Domino (1928), singer-songwriter & guitarist Johnny Cash (1932), singer-songwriter Mitch Ryder (1945), singer and psychotherapist Sandie Shaw of "(There's) Always Something There to Remind Me" fame (1947), singer-songwriter Michael Bolton (1953), Rage Against The Machine & Audioslave bassist Tim Commerford (1968), singer-songwriter, producer, and actress Erykah Badu (1971), and Swedish-American record producer & songwriter Max Martin (1971)

• Pour one out for: Comedy legend Bill Hicks (d. 1994)

*****

OK, scroll on down to learn a bit about fellow Boredwalk fan & customer Julie! If you're feeling even moderately outgoing and would like to be featured in an upcoming Monday email (and are a customer with some Boredwalk tees, tanks, hoodies, towels, bags, books, or Delve Decks to show off), just reply to this and let us know and we'll send you some fun questions!

We'll be back here in your inbox on Wednesday with some more random holidays to observe, historical tidbits to acknowledge, and fun links to entertaining content! Until next time...

Peace, love, and self-awareness,

Matt

*****

Julie looking well-read in her Ban The Fascists Save The Books tee!

1. What's your actual day job and what's your dream day job?

"Darling, I have no dream job, I do not dream of labor!" 😉

(Editor's note: Fair point.)

2. What's your biggest pet peeve?

Slow drivers in the fast lane— keep up or get out of the way!

3. What's a book you think the Boredwalk community should read?

I've been recommending Legends and Lattes a lot recently— If you're a fan of T.J. Klune, you'll probably enjoy this!

4. If you could have any super power what would it be and why?

The ability to manipulate probability. For example: likelihood that I win the mega-millions lottery? 100%, likelihood of stepping in fox poo when I walk my dog in the dark at 5AM? 0%

(Editor's note: This is one of the most creative and unique answers to this question we've ever received. Well done! Not too many Longshot references out there.)

5. You can curse your nemesis with a minor annoyance for eternity; what do you choose?

He would get shocked every time he touched something. Just a constant overload of static electricity.

(Editor's note: Interesting that you went with male pronouns specifically here...)

6. If you could make a mundane wish (meaning, a wish for something seemingly inconsequential that you still believe would benefit you immensely), what would it be for?

I wish foxes didn't poo on sidewalks in areas where there are no streetlights.

(Editor's note: Awfully demanding for an invasive species, but OK.) 🤣

7. What experience do you most want to cross off your bucket list?

I would love to be able to visit every country in the world.

8. What is something you wish you could go back in time and say to your younger self?

I beg you, do not perm your hair! 😩

9. Clear up a misconception (about your job, where you are from, some other topic you know a lot about).

Corsets: the vast majority of women did not tight lace their corsets, and they would very often add padding to the bust and hip areas in order to achieve the popular silhouette at the time. Also, MEN wore corsets too!

10. Where can the rest of the Boredwalk community find you?