YouSaid · the spoken record

BJ Novak

lines on the record
130
first
2015-11-25
most recent
2015-11-25
sittings or episodes
1
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podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

  1. “To go. I think the best place is to list that because that's where I am. So I would say download the list app on the App Store or it'll be on Android and web soon. And that's just three words, the list app or go to li.st. And my profile there is all my favorites and ideas and thoughts on this and that. I'm also on Twitter. Yeah.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  2. “This is very, very special. Like, own it, be in it, enjoy it, instead of, you know, being so nervous. And, you know, all for nothing. None of the things I tried to do on the side of the office ever got anywhere because I just didn't have time.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  3. “To anybody else at all. You think everyone is, but they're not. So take as long as you want if you're talented. It's not really, you know, you'll get their attention again if you have reason to. And so I do wish I had told myself back then.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  4. “So I take that, that was the same job. But, you know, it's important. It means the writing is really for the whole show is part of your responsibility. So I wish I could tell. And now people ask me, did you, what was it like wearing the office? Was it so much fun? Were you laughing all the time? Yeah, but I have to admit that's buried under, I was so anxious and always trying to write some extra thing on the side that I never finish and never a time for. And I really didn't just enjoy this incredible once-in-a-lifetime thing. And, you know, as soon as the office ended, I was talented enough to write a book, and I'm proud of the book. And I made the app and I worked really hard and I was able to pull it off. Like, you know, if you can do it, you can do it. You're not really on someone else's schedule ever. And, you know, I also tell people all the time, like, if Will Smith isn't in a movie for three years, you're not walking around saying, where's Will Smith? No one's paying attention.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  5. “At thirty I was on the office I wish I had told myself on the office and this might be specific to me. The whole time I was on the office I thought Well this is my duty. at whatever I'd ever want to do. So I better not waste a second. I better write a screenplay. I better, you know, make avant-garde film. I better get cast in something. I better do my big thing while I'm still in the office because I don't want to be that guy who used to be on the office. But I didn't have time. I had two jobs on the office. Either one of them takes up, should take up your focus.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  6. “The Simpsons or whatever, just to show that if you were on that stuff, you'd be able to know the voices, you'd know how to format it, you'd know how to craft a story, you can write hard jokes. So have, you know, a spec script and it'll probably take you a few to get a really good one, but back it up and get their attention. Now that's for anyone starting out. I don't know if I'd advise a high school senior to go right into TV writing. So this advice is probably more for someone who just graduated college or someone whatever stage of life they're just ready to start this. So, you know, if you're really going to go to college, I'd say, you know, stay funny. Be around funny people, come up with funny ideas, make your friends laugh.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  7. “Sent you this internet video, or you just don't know, or you'd ask around and someone would send you something. So the first thing is get their attention. That means could mean be friends with somebody or have collaborated with somebody. Another thing is you might want to make something. For me, it was stand-up, but I don't know what it is for anyone else. It could be probably some internet video. I feel like that's the best way to you can be completely wild and get seen. But make something truly great that could be anything, absolutely anything. Then once you have someone's attention, they're going to want to be sure that they're not taking a crazy bet on some kid who made some funny video who then gets in a writer's room and doesn't know what to do. That generally means have a spec script, which is a speculative, a script that could be for a TV show. So you write an episode of the office or”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  8. “Bunch of things. One piece of advice that I stand by that I've given to a bunch of people is really two, think of it as two things. You need to get people's attention and you need to be able to back it up. So this is especially for getting, I feel like most people who want to get into comedy what they want to do these days is get a staff job on a TV comedy show. So to do that, you need, think like the person hiring you. You're going to want, if you were given your own show, you'd panic. This is my one big shot. It's got to be hilarious. You hire your most loyal, funniest friends first. Then you'd ask around who worked on my favorite shows, who's the best, best, best person, you know, and those names would come to you through an agent or something. And then you'd like anyone that you saw or heard or you were at a stand-up show and this guy was hilarious or someone”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  9. “Oh In my hopes, Ben Franklin, because he started in comedy, and then I make a joke about this in my stand-up act, like he really took it to the next level. I mean, he wrote poor Richard's almanac, and he was known as a comedy writer. And then he ended up, you know, discovering electricity and having his face on money. Like that is really, and he remained like a witty guy. So my hope is that I could do some shadow where I can have ambitious, positive, spirited ideas, but it won't be like, oh, now like he lost a sense of humor. Like Ben Franklin always had a sense of humor and he wasn't ashamed to like experiment with, you know, lightning, you know? Yeah. Like that, that's really cool. But I, I... Even in my most egotistical, I don't actually identify with him. He's just like, you know, if I'm stacking myself ball.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  10. “I love this show right now called The Grinder with Rablo Fred Savage. That's a very, very good writing. Season four of Mr Show is brilliant sketchwriting.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  11. “It's hard for me to get myself to work later in the day, so probably my most productive time is like 11 to 2. But The creative ideas can come anytime. I never know when those are coming.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  12. “You know, then I just start looking at my files, and then I finally get going. So, yeah, the power up can have a happy ORZAD ending.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  13. “Another one that Yeah, I will often do Pandora of Early Blues. Early blues. Good to just. So yeah, I listen to music or serious XM35 is like indie music that I like. So listen to music. It's just about being in a good mood. I slowly drink that Starbucks. I sometimes take a walk around Runyan Canyon or my neighborhood. You know, text, email, if there's a book I'm kind of reading and read a couple chapters. And then eventually I'm just like. All right, like either I'm excited by an idea or it's like 330 and I'm like this powering up turned into lunch, turned into a workout, you know, and I'm like, God damn it. I cleared out my whole day and it's 3 fucking 30 and I haven't written anything.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  14. “Morning becomes a collective. Yeah, it's this great show from 9 to 12 every weekday, commercial free, like just cool new music. I also have a list on the app of music that I work to. And they have a 24-hour station.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  15. “I either drive to the Starbucks. No, it takes an hour because I will sometimes read the paper, the Wall Street Journal, or recently the Wall Street Journal, which I find really good, especially on weekends, or The New York Times is my favorite. And I often read that. I usually read that online. And just emails and I turn on music. I usually listen to Morning Becomes Eclectic on KCRW.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  16. “Yep, Black, I find that brewing my own coffee at home is so unpredictable. It's like getting artisanal tylenol. I want to know what my dose is, you know? Like you wouldn't be like, oh, I made some tylenol for it. No, give me two tylenol. So I want a standard dose of caffeine.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  17. “The back in oil fields, which is probably bigger than the gold rush in the 1800s, it just like now that you can frack, there's so much oil in North Dakota that a whole like culture, like you can rent a garage in North Dakota for like $250,000. There's so much money there in such a rush to be close to it. And that's a really interesting”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  18. “It's brilliant. It's generation defining, and it's just become a term, but it earned that term. Brilliant movie to be have is on my list, a beautiful. Beautiful, simple film about a one-room schoolhouse in France and just what happens over the course of a year. There's really little story, but it really holds your attention and gives you a spirit of a place. And if I choose one more. Oh, you know, it's a really cool one? It's called The Overnighters, and it's about the oil fields in North Dakota. Came out a couple years ago, and this pastor who has a church there.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  19. “An ice cube tray that has giant ice cubes in it. Anytime I'm at a bar and they have like a big ice cube, I feel like, oh, this should cost like $100. This is so nice. And then I thought, well, wait. The rubber ice cube tray shouldn't be any more expensive, it's just a different shape mold. So I go on Amazon and sure enough, Tivolo, I think, is the company, you know, for like $7.6 huge ice cubes. And if anyone comes over and I make them a drink, they have one huge ice cube in their glass. And it's like I have a fancy bar. Love it.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  20. “Yeah, it's something I learned on the office too. If a scene should be two pages and it's four pages, it's a bad scene. Because you keep writing when you haven't hit it. So if it's a great scene, it might just be a two-line exchange. I love you. I don't love you. Like, whoa, that's a scene. But if the scene is like, so I was thinking the other day, my feelings, you know, like that's not a scene. No, it's not.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  21. “Sure. I overwrite a lot and I need to pare it down. Got it. But no, no, I mean, I just do stuff like that because it sounds, I don't know, it kind of gives extra elegance to a stupid idea. And then I need to go back and be like, you know what? Put some on Guyana.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  22. “Yeah, that's a fucking I overuse like, which is so embarrassing because it's not a very masculine word to overuse, but I do.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  23. “I zone out easily. I just love daydreaming and I think it is so indulgent in a good way to the creative process, but then you get used to that indulgence when someone else deserves your attention. So I try to be better at that.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  24. “I'm saying it's a handsome family. Tim, if I could have whatever I wanted, I could lie and say, oh, I'd learned to be better at empathy. No, I'd be like fucking awesome looking. And, you know, then I would like, you know, if you're James Franco, you can do anything. And people are like, well, it's pretty interesting. Anything. And I wish I had that extra.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  25. “I'm not terrible looking. Thank you. But, you know, I look at James Franco and he does all the things he does. And I'm like, man. James Frank.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  26. “And I'm going to give daily rituals, that book we mentioned a lot too. Anyone who's creative or ambitious. You take so much solace in seeing all the different processes people just do. What does Charles Dickens do every day? What did he do every day? What did Darwin do every day? What does Steve Jobs do every day? It's just so reassuring to see like everyone's got their own system.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  27. “There's a book called The Oxford Book of Aphorisms, which I love. It's just the most well edited brilliant one-liners from history. And you can just spend hours on a page. Or you can just flip through it. I give that one a lot.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  28. “Very specific. In the films of Hamlet, how they treat the line to be or not to be. Because that line already has a lot of mystery within the play, exactly what it means. But then you add all the culture. Like if you pay to see a movie of Hamlet, you're waiting for it to be or not to be the whole time. So how do the cultural expectations affect the interpretation of that line?”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  29. “Types of content. What I would suggest just it's a very quick sign-up flow, just sign up, and there's a recommended follow menu and you can, they'll take you to that screen automatically, but one of the things you can do is you can hit follow all. It's our top like 100 diverse accounts. So I'll read them right now, not all 100, but the first batch. Lena Dunham, Mindy Kaling, The New York Times, Jimmy Fallon, The Onion, Anthony Burdain, The New Yorker, CNN, Andy Cohen, Vogue, Snoop, Cheryl Strade, Rachel Ray, you know, people. Not everyone's John Mayer wired TED Talks. Not everyone's going to like all of these, but then just unfollow because it will give you a real, you know, assortment. And there's a lot of civilians on there too, just people that are making, you know, crazy personal or advice lists. So it's a real, I would just say sign up, hit recommended, hit follow all recommended.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  30. “There's two people at least have made lists of the best rooms at the Bowery. 1403 has this and 1401 has that. Oh, that's very good.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  31. “There's a lot of lists of New York hotels. But there's also a list of, if you ever say the Bowery, which is my favorite hotel there.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  32. “He did that. He's a big reader and writer, obviously. His most recent one is called Hotel Slut. That's me. And, you know, it's He will make an excuse to go to that town if he can say in the following hotels, including one in Port Aprince, Haiti, Chateau Mermont here in LA, the Raleigh in Miami. So his lists are great. Anything in New York?”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  33. “Howard Stern interviews Lady Gaga, Bill Hater, Billy Joel, which was a great one. I heard that one. Jonah Hill, Jerry Seinfeld, great interviewer, James Taylor, I did not know that. Although I've seen him be dark and funny, Chris Martin, apparently. So, you know, some of them are very helpful recommendations, a lot of books lists.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  34. “He's called for a lot of boycotts over the years. It's very interesting, including the company that makes his clothing line, which he didn't realize. Vox made a list what NASA picked to explain our world to aliens, so what they put on Voyager 1 and 2. Just, you know, a cool list. A girl named Jenna Martin, I know, made a list of favorite Howard Stern interviews, and that's an open list. So you can make a suggestion on that list. And if she likes it, she double taps it.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  35. “Itself. Yeah, that was great. And she also did a list that was very moving, which is objects found in my mother's car at the moment of her death or the time of her death. You know, just like a pen, you know, a lipstick, tickets to this play. I don't remember exactly what it was. But I remember being just so stunned by the simplicity of that power in list form. And, you know, there's a lot of writers on it so that, you know, there's a literary thing, but I'm looking here. You know, it's a mix of publications doing lists, celebrities doing lists, and of course, mostly just regular folks. But trending right now, the Washington Post made a list of the things Donald Trump has called on America to boycott.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  36. “For all my taste all the time, but 90 plus percent of the time Dev has already arrived there and added more things that I should have thought of.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  37. “He said, Lena, let me think about it, let me think about it, and then his wife kept getting up for jobs in Hallie Gross's fantastic writer. I think she's a fantastic writer, a fantastic talker and thinker, and she's on great shows, so I assume she's a great writer. So she kept getting more and more attention in LA, and then she was up for this huge writing job in LA on an HBO show. And no one was rooting for that job harder than me. I'm praying that Halle gets hired because I know if Dev moves to LA, I'm sure he'll do this. And sure enough, she got the job and he finally committed to doing this. And, you know, he's really been leading sort of the overall why I think this is so good is because of Deaf. I have a lot to do with the community. I obviously have a lot to do with the conception. And I argue.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  38. “And he could talk and his wife was a television writer and he was interested in what I was interested in. And he was telling me he was a Parkson recreation fan, but not an office fan. So he liked the kinds of things I liked, but he was not impressed by me, my celebrity. He heard I was somebody, but he didn't care. He cared about Ron Swanson. So, you know, he was like adjacent. He was the perfect match.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  39. “Like a nice simple watch with great design, great classic design. We ordered a bullet bourbon, each of us, so we have the same taste, you know. And just like Matt Woodheiler, he was hard on the idea and respected the idea, asking all the right questions.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  40. “I'm like, what am I doing? I'm here to do press for a TV show. And why am I pursuing this crazy tech thing? Everyone wants to do a startup. I almost cancel, but I didn't. I show up to meet him. And he says, I know the co-founder for you. I don't think you can get him, but it's worth a try. I've been trying to convince this guy to leave his job forever. But I think he might like this because he's done stuff I just before. And his name was Dev Flarety. He ran product at Fab. He had previously worked for a sort of a map-based travel startup, and the original idea for this was travel lists, of course, would be big. So I said, let me try. I was leaving the next day. I emailed Dev, had dinner with them at the Ace Hotel in New York, the Breslin. And we sat down right away. Yeah. Right away, I was like, I'm doing what this guy. I'm not doing it. You know, we were the exact same watch and IWC pilot.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  41. “And they couldn't because it was just a mock up. And that's how I knew, okay, they want to be using this. I showed them that I'm serious. They know what it feels like to want to see the next screen. And then I went to the guy toasters, Simon said, I host a tech breakfast in New York once a month. I was going to be in town for that tech breakfast. So I went to it, talked to everyone. I'd say about 49% of the people were way too nice to me because I was a celebrity. About 49% of the people were way too hard on me because I was a celebrity and what am I doing here? Then there was like one guy who took me seriously, who met me at my level and said, I like it for these reasons. I think these are my concerns, you know, and his name was Matt Whitheiler. He was a VC at Flybridge, which doesn't do this kind of thing generally, but he was interested. So I asked if I could have lunch with him. I almost canceled. I was hung over.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  42. “I asked friend after friend to know anyone who could make mock ups for me, so I hired this great company called Two Toasters. Yeah. And apparently it was named after coincidentally an office reference where Stanley ends up with two toasters because he bought one for Phyllis's wedding. But I didn't know that when I met. I didn't even remember the reference when I met them. So I drew up, I'm not a good artist, but I drew very simple. You know, again, this is not anything innovative. I drew up what a list would look like, very similar to Twitter, to Instagram, to Tumblr, you know, a very vertical feed of lists and how you'd search for them and how you'd add a suggestion to someone else's and how you'd compose. And I ask, can you make sort of a nice mock-up of each of these main screens? So I paid them to make them. And then I would walk around and I tell people the idea and they'd say, yeah, it sounds good. I'd show them. And they would try to tap.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  43. “We built. So in this case, yeah, like I'm right. You know, I'm not saying I'm a genius or anything at all. It seemed like this was something worth testing. And if you do it right and someone shows you an idea and you say, oh, not that, but yes, that. And like anything else, the most important thing is. Is who you partner with. And so I knew I didn't know this field. And I hired a company to make screenshots because everyone I pitched this to treated me the way I would treat them if a tech person pitched me a good idea for a TV show. I'd say that sounds like a good idea. I don't think you understand what it takes to do. Do you have a director? Do you have funding? Do you have a cat?”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  44. “So this is, I've tried to get you on, and I know we'll get you on when we have the Android. This is the list app, and it's as simple as it sounds. It's li.st is our domain. So eventually when we have web, we'll probably just want to be known as list. But it's really that simple, and we aim to be that universal, just a place for lists socially, so that my original idea was we all have these lists in our phones, in our notebooks, in our minds of what are the good restaurants in LA, et cetera. I wish I could see those lists on the phones or whatever of the people I care about, or occasionally a celebrity or a publication that I would turn to for this type of thing. And I wanted a place, it seemed so simple to me, why hasn't it been done? I thought, a place where you could put these lists and everyone would put them, and then you could search them and read them. And that is essentially what.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  45. “If you had an idea for a store 20 years ago you really put your whole life on hold to pursue that a compromise of a compromise of that idea for a store and now you can you can make that sort.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  46. “Whereas in other fields a huge idea you need to be at a huge scale to even try it out. So that's why I always had like, you know, that's why I met Blake Ross is because in 2006 or 7, I had a friend Charlie Cheever who worked at Facebook. And I said, can I see Facebook? You know, can I have a tour? And I would cultivate these friendships and these guys to me, that was, I think, what a lot of people looked at show business in the world I was in and thought that's so creative. I would look at this world and think, wow, you can have an idea and then if it works, it works. That's so beautiful.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  47. “And who picked it up and why and who funded it and how much do they get and is it going to make syndication? And that noise has nothing to do with the product and the audience. And I think tech is leading the way in removing that. And I think tech is really, the reason I've always been drawn to it and always pitched every idea I ever had in tech to my friends in tech is because it seemed like a utopian version of you have an idea and you see if it's a good idea, you know, just like with standup, just like with writing scenes for the office, I think this is a great idea, but I won't know until it goes to the set and it succeeds or fails or I bring it on stage and no one laughs or everyone does laugh. That to me is the biggest pleasure is having an idea and if and seeing if you're right. And so tech seemed to me you could have a huge idea and it could be right.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  48. “I find tech, and again, this is sort of the formal rules of anything. First of all, tech is the best field at being the first to tell you that there are no rules. It's about what you make and how people respond to it, which I really love. And I think tech is leading the way for entertainment. And you realize, oh, everything is about very soon on the Apple TV, you'll be able to say the MIDI project and you won't have any idea what network it's on. It's all about whether Mindy Kaling, full disclosure, a good friend of mine, it's all about whether Mindy Kaling has made a good show, gotten the budget, gotten the cast, convinced them to do it. That's a big deal, and made it well. That's a very big deal, and gotten enough publicity for it that you are curious about it. But that's it. And there has been a lot of bullshit in terms of what night is it on and what's the competition like and how is it?”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  49. “A movie should be a pleasurable experience. That is my one sentence answer, and I find his movies cold and formal, and I find his demeanor as a public director cold and formal, and please make this a headline. If someone listens all the way here, they can see everyone's opinions. But I find his movies completely unpleasurable. Exclusive to TMZ. Yeah, and I feel that the formality has conned people into reverence when in fact no one was smiling at any of these Batman movies that everyone gave such a claim to, and no one was smiling at inception, and no one understood interstellar. I am well educated guy. I have a real interest in science. I write screen stories for a living, and I could not follow this. So who is following this? You know, a movie should be entertaining you. and inviting you in.”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT

  50. “I think it's a great, if I were him, if I were Nolan, I would, and that was my first big movie, I'd be very proud that I got everyone's attention. It's extremely clever as an idea. And if that's enough to give you pleasure watching it, or if that's enough to get your attention to watch it and then you get pleasure watching it, I agree the premise is fantastically clever. I just wasn't personally, especially moved watching the story. And I, you know, he's so big it won't matter if I criticize him, but I have a real problem with the Chris Nolan worship in cinema. I think that's a screenplay. That's a writer I would never teach if I were teaching screenwriting, says the guy who's never written a screenplay because”

    2015-11-25 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT