Hey, Jeremy, let's get going. We're really excited to have you on today. Jeremy Hassell-Wood is President and Founder of Fundraisers Unite. Best name ever. Just got to say. We're going to get into what you're talking about with us today, the importance of digital fundraising, hot topic. And so we're really excited to hear your wisdom and how we can navigate this. It's not even a choice, I think. It's something that we have to do. So we're going to get into that. Hey, we want to thank all of our presenting sponsors. Without you, we would not be here having our robust discussions as we do every day. Five days a week. I was telling Jeremy we're coming up on our 350th episode. And our sponsors have allowed us to be here.  Again, I'm Julia Patrick, CEO of the American Nonprofit Academy. My interpret co-host is not with us today, Jared Ransom, but she'll be back with us tomorrow. And so we are missing her today, but we are wishing her safe travels as she comes back from somewhere in the South. But more importantly, we have Jeremy Hassell-Wood with us. President and Founder, as I said, a friend-raiser's Unite, best name ever because I think anyone that is in fundraising oftentimes feels alone. Yes. So tell me how you came up with Fundraiser's Unite. Sure, yeah. Fundraiser's Unite came from really just my experience working for marketing and fundraising agencies that cater specifically to nonprofits. And just seeing a lack of need, especially for digital fundraising, and there seemed to be a lack of resources. No one focused specifically on digital that I could see. And so I wanted to create really a community and a membership site so that people can plug in and get resources for digital fundraising, even though it says Fundraiser's Unite, it cares more towards online fundraising and digital fundraising. So it is. It's like we're all in this together. And when we come together, we're making a bigger impact in the world. You have individuals that can make individual impact. But when we combine our superpowers, it's like that's when we really see change in the world. And that's why I created Fundraiser's Unite. So dig in a little bit more with us on this. This is a membership-based community? Yeah. So there's multiple. It is membership-based. And I created it to provide monthly training so different digital fundraising topics, whether it's how to create test plans for email or walking through a Facebook ad template, or even have a whole Giving Tuesday session on there with how to really plan and execute your Giving Tuesday. And then in addition, I have some exclusive interviews on there. And I have a lot of templates and tip sheets and downloads that people can really plug into. And it's like, if you're starting from zero, it will give you all the resources you need to build a digital fundraising program. And if you already are up and running, it's additional tips just to kind of point out those blind spots you may have with your organization. Because even myself, it's like I'm still learning from what other people are doing. So it's like, let's come together, let's share these tips. There's a community where people can share their own tips and connect with other members of the community. So I'll try to make it just this one stop where fundraisers can get together or share best practices and learn and have fun along the way. I love it. And you and I were talking about this in the Trudy Chat Chat. This is really where I think in our sector, it's kind of the missing link. Digital fundraising, especially as we are going into Q4, we've had this major impact of a pandemic. If you are not engaged in this process, you're behind. You're behind. For sure. Yeah, and I would say like, especially this last year with COVID and by the time people watch this, I may have watched this five years from now, but I'll still look at like the whole epidemic or pandemic as a shifting point in digital, hopefully. And I look at nonprofits even like restaurants who are not nonprofits, like people were exposed this time around. Like if you were a business or a nonprofit that didn't have your digital stuff together, you've been exposed and your learning curve is like so much more than the ones who are already doing it. But it's not too late. And that's a good thing about it. So, you know, I'm hoping that nonprofits will now start to engage a little bit more, learn more. And then, cause that is what the future is going to be. Not the same direct mail's going away anytime soon because it's not, but you want to position your nonprofit for the future. And that's what digital will allow you to do. So let's start off with this question. And I think it's, I never like to start off with a negative aspect, but why do we fear or we have feared this process? It seems to me that the nonprofit sector, Jared always says we're due for a disruption, but the reality is we've lagged behind. Why is that? Yeah, and that's the question Julie on the table is, I like how you position it with why they fear online fundraising. And to me, it comes down to two things. One, which I believe is the bigger issue is culture. And the second one has to do with just lack of resources. So really attacking the culture piece. If you're a newer nonprofit that maybe started up in the last five years, then digital is probably woven into your fundraising. But a lot of mid-sized and larger nonprofits that have been around for a decade plus, they've done digital or direct mail so long that that's the culture. We know what works. We know we spend money on direct mail. Here's what we can get back. And this is how we're going to be. They talk about digital. We know we need to get in digital, but it's a culture shift more so than it is a technology shift and culture is so hard to break. So until you get leadership in those roles that are willing to put a flag in the ground and say digital is important to us, then it's still gonna be slow to get there. The other piece dealing with resources, let's say there's nonprofits that have made that digital shift, talent is not cheap. So you have to look at the price to put your team together whether you're hiring internally or using consultants, it's still going to cost money to get that expertise. And the market value of somebody that knows digital to work at a nonprofit, they really have to have a heart for the work and the gratification that comes with it versus doing the same kind of work somewhere else than getting paid more. And that's the balance that you really have to strike there. So when I hear you say that, and I'm kind of chuckling because that's true, this makes me think that this is the opportunity of a lifetime for consulting relationship. Yeah, I think it could be. I think there's what the consultant piece you can tap into third party people to number one, help you start up your digital fundraising or to get better at it. And the second one is to train your existing talent because ultimately you don't necessarily want to run your nonprofit and your digital off of a consultant doing all the work for you. It's more expensive to do it that way. But if you can get the training, whether it's from a consultant or somewhere else to actually learn it, now you're able to reduce your costs as a nonprofit and really maximize your returns from your digital fundraising. But also when I say digital fundraising, I don't mean to cut out direct mail. Digital is just we want to include direct mail with it. You know, if you're doing a direct mail piece, what's that digital components that's going to work with that one? Because we don't want to just focus on one particular channel. We want these to work together because there's been countless studies that we'll show you. If you're playing in both of these channels, you're gonna see a lift overall in your giving. You know, it's so interesting. I was talking to a CEO, probably about six months ago, they operated nonprofit about $45 million budget, old. So they've been around for over a hundred years. And they have an older demographic who supports them. And one of their big fears is that they would leave behind that older demographic and they were really fearful about having patrons support them. And they're cut offline. They were thinking 55 on up. And I was like, you know, everything that I read is that that sector, that segment of our population, they're really embracing the digital world. And so not to your point, not to just cut off, you know, the snail mail piece, but I think you're underestimating your donors. What's your sense of that? Yeah, and looking at the BlackBot giving report for 2020, the average age of the digital donor, I want to say with 63. So you do have like 50, like 60 year old plus. And so we're talking average here, meaning that there's people older than 63 who are adapting to it. And it's interesting what you say because there's another nonprofit who will remain nameless. And this was really highly publicized maybe like five years ago that they actually, so we're not going to do direct mail this year, we're only going to do digital. And they made a huge shift to do that. And as a result, they lost millions of dollars. So you don't want to put all your eggs in digital. Like I'm a digital fundraising guy, but I'm not going to sit here and say put everything in digital. Like my whole thing is let's start it, let's get better at it because one day it's going to overtake it. And when I say overtake, I don't mean it's going to eliminate. We're still looking at the same BlackBot report, digital fundraising only comprises about 13% of overall individual giving.  And it's been double digit growth for years. If you look at the M&R benchmark report, they based on the nonprofits that they've tracked revenue grew 30% last year. Now there's some COVID things that I'm sure have to do with this with people taking events online. But still, now that you have them online and people have given online, now you can start marketing to them online with email and with digital ads. But we have to start to shepherd these people online so that now we can have a more comprehensive fundraising program. Okay, Jeremy, I got a backup here. Yeah. What is the percentage that digital fundraising, did you say 13%? 13% correct. Wow, okay, so that's great information. So as we are looking at, and so many of us are in the budgeting period right now for 2022, we really should be looking at our revenues and setting a goal or understanding that 13%. If we have a functioning system, right? That's not like on steroids and that's not starting out, that should just be a baseline, do you think? 13%? I think so, and it's likely going to continue growing. So 13% is what it was for 2020. If we look at how 2021 will play out, it may jump to 15%. And part of me thinks that people that see these reports, they could look at this as good or bad news. They may say, well, it's only 13%. So we're just going to still focus on direct mail because that's what we're making most of our money anyways. But other people may say 13%. Wow, I thought it was smaller than that. So let's go ahead and put more into it. So to your discussion or your point about how should we budget? And every nonprofit will do this different, but if you're putting 90% of your budget into direct mail, maybe you should put less into direct mail because you're seeing that digital is starting to grow. And maybe you eke out a little bit more of that budget for digital to invest in, keeping in mind, and this is something that is also frustrating in nonprofits when they're just starting digital, when they first really heavily invest in it, you're probably not going to make that money back in the first year. But you also don't usually make that money back in the first year from a big direct mail acquisition campaign. It usually takes about 18 plus months. So let's not look at it because it's digital and we may not make our money back this year and we shouldn't do it because you're not going to do that in a direct mail acquisition program. So let's look at this as a fundraising channel that is growing versus one that is shrinking like direct mail is. Why would you invest in a shrinking program versus a growing program? In terms of increasing your investment, I'm not saying you shouldn't invest because you should, but just looking at how you're investing in those different channels. Okay, wow. Okay, so you have blown my mind with so many great ideas and just what you said in so many ways has reduced my sense of fear in making this critical investment in jump. I think one of the things that I find the most interesting is the understanding that this is not a magic bullet that you're going to have to make an investment. I love that you said that, which kind of leads me into my next question. I mean, you've given us so many great pieces of information data oriented so that we could help measure where we can, where we're going or help plan what that would look like, but where do we start?  Where do you start? Yeah, and it is overwhelming. It's very overwhelming, especially if you have never done digital before, and I say that in quotes because doing digital is what people say. We need to do digital, but that can mean so many things. I mean, yeah, first and foremost though, it's like you have to have a vision. And I say this a lot when I talk to clients, it's like it all starts with the vision. It's like, what do you, if you haven't created a vision for your nonprofit, which a lot of them have, there's probably a smaller amount that haven't, you know, we want to make sure that we're creating a vision overall for our nonprofit. And then let's create a vision for our fundraising program and then our digital piece. So it's okay to have multiple visions because you want each vision to all be in sync because if you're building out your digital program and it's out of line with your overall goals and vision for your nonprofit, then you're starting it the wrong way. We don't want to start with tactics. And that's a mistake that I see a lot of nonprofits make is like, let's get an email program together. Let's do social media. Again, that's another word that's thrown around. Like what does that mean to do social media? So let's be intent and temple about what we do and let's start with a strategy instead of a tactic. So first and foremost, gosh, you've got to start with that vision. And then second, you really need to look at what your internal resources are, like what you have the ability to do in-house versus what pieces you may need to plug into. And if you are aware of even where to start, then maybe tap into some consultants and have them help you work on your plan and help identify here are the steps that you need to do. I have a program that actually walks nonprofits through that. It's called 21 Day Digital Fundries and Quick Start. But I'm not here to talk about that. I'm just throwing that out there. But it is something that can reduce like the overwhelm. And then you want to understand these different digital marketing channels. And in particular, certainly email, certainly website content, social media from a organic standpoint to digital media, which would be social media ads, pay-per-click ads, which would be your Google ads, your Google ad grants. There's so many different places to start. And there's not necessarily, well, I was gonna say there's not a bad place to start, but there probably is. But the thing is like just start, do something, but start with the strategy first. And then it's like, how do you eat an elephant one bite at a time? This is gonna be that one bite at a time with your digital program. And let's get email up and going. Let's work on our social media, fine-tuning what we wanna talk about and putting some parameters around that. Let's look at our advertising online, whether that's Facebook ads or Google ads. And let's just knock these things off one at a time. And then we have resources, whether it's internally or externally, who can keep an eye on all these things and help to manage each of these different pieces. So it's not easy, it takes time, but it's 100% necessary for nonprofits today. I know, but you know, it's so funny.  I have a Chinese ceramic blue and white elephant on my desk. It's pretty big for that very reason. Because there's so many choices, there's so many things to do in a day, and it's really easy to get overwhelmed. And I love how you framed that, is really work on the strategy point or where you wanna go and realize that you can add these different pieces in as you have adopted them and been successful or learned or whatever words you wanna use, because it's not just a golden faucet. It's not. And it's also like understanding your donors because there's so much digital that's thrown at you so quickly. Like for example, let's say TikTok. TikTok is a great platform, but it may not be a great platform for your nonprofits. Like let's look at the demographics of who uses TikTok and let's look at the demographics of your donor. I look at nonprofits that are really heavy on Instagram. And like honestly, I don't think that's the best place for nonprofits to play. If you have a limited budget, like let's put more of that into Facebook because those people have money to actually donate to your nonprofit. Instagram, you'll get brand awareness, but they may not have the money there. And it hasn't proven out to work successfully yet. I think Instagram in five years may be a good place for nonprofits to play. So that's, I'm not saying that. Don't do anything on Instagram, but don't make that your focus of your social media. Well, I also think it's really what your sector is. I mean, if you're in the culture and arts, I think Instagram can be great because you have a lot of visual stories to tell. But let's say you're a school and you're working in the medical world where you have HIPAA laws or you have child, minor and children's laws that you have to protect. You can't put children's faces. You can't put or discuss patient outcomes. I mean, so you have to be thinking about what it is that you are trying to communicate. And it goes back to what you said, which was wonderful. Start with a strategy and not the product. And yeah, that's like for me, that's a huge, huge thing. Okay, now you've given us some really great ways. I'm encouraged to get going to start this off. I'm a small nonprofit. Okay, yay team. What are some things that we wanna steer clear of and what not to do? It's like, what not to wear? What are some things that you can talk about? Yeah, it's interesting because it's like all the things you shouldn't do are the opposite of the things that you should do. So don't start with tactics. Don't look at what's popular and say, we're gonna do this because you wanna know what's going to work for your nonprofit. And kind of to your point a moment ago, like maybe animal related nonprofits will be a great place to market on Instagram and put the images out. But there's marketing channels and there's donation channels. So if I'm marketing to an audience and I'm a animal based nonprofit, then yeah, let's do our website. Let's do Instagram, maybe even TikTok because you can get some viral videos. But TikTok, your video can get a million views on TikTok but you probably will get very few donations but you'll get brand awareness. But if I'm investing money in a fundraising program, I'm going to invest ads on Facebook because Facebook is where more of my donors live and I'll still market it across Instagram and Facebook and everywhere else. So what not to do not start with tactics. Do not invest in digital without having the support to actually execute it because another thing is nonprofits don't want to get involved with digital. It's like they keep hearing we need to invest, we need to invest so they get this really expensive maybe email system, but there's no expertise that can actually execute it or knows how to use it. And now you're tied to a big bill of technology plus even higher bill of the consultant has to actually, that you have to pay to manage that for you. So you know, those pieces. Also what not to do is this is going to sound strange. So I'm trying to think about how it works. Do not not test. So this would be like maybe a do make sure that you test do not only create one Facebook ad if you're doing Facebook ads, don't just create one. If you're sending an email, don't send just one. Always test with digital, it's so easy to test. So if you're sending one email, split your file in half and meaning if you have a thousand people send 500 version A the other 500 version B every single time you're communicating on digital you should be learning something. So a Facebook ad you can, I will create three to five different versions and maybe you're just changing the headline. It could say give today could say $50 equals X or it could be something else but make small tweaks and always learn don't just do an ad and not test anything. So those would be some kind of, I guess low hanging fruit of things not to do. You know, I would love to have you come on at a future time to just talk about A.D. testing because it seems like, and correct me if I'm wrong it seems like such a major piece that I hear consultants and experts talk about but for those of us on the other side it seems overwhelming. It seems like a duplication of work to the point where I'm like what do we look for to even learn about? And so we don't really have a lot of time but could you address that somewhat about the A.D. testing? Yeah, sure. And I think about the agencies that I work for that were direct response. You know, you could test direct mail and send out one version versus another version. The version that won last year versus let's test this one and it can be expensive. There's production fees and everything like that but from a scalability standpoint let's just amp up the numbers. Let's say you have 100,000 donors which is a lot more than maybe a smaller not probably that may have 1,000 or 2,000 donors but at 100,000 donors even if you're small you should be testing but at 100,000 donors small little incremental changes that you can make that even change your response rates or your donation rates by 3% or 5% could be tens of thousands of dollars. So and you also you can take what you learn in digital. So let's say we're testing different creative different calls to action, different images, different offers and we find one that really works and you can learn so much more quickly in digital than you can direct mail. You don't have to wait months to get the results you can find out within days or weeks and once you fine-tune that offer well now let's test this offer in direct mail because it's proven to work in digital whereas traditionally direct mail it's a creative director or someone that's like I think this might work so let's test and see if it works. You know now let's take direct mail which is still the lion's share and let's go with a message that's proven to work in digital and let's test that against the creative that has worked and just see if it works. Maybe it will, maybe it won't but at least there's data to support your test. Okay. When you're talking about AB testing do you have a percentage, a percent to total of what you should of your group that you should be testing? You know honestly I'm like I'm a 50-50 kind of guy and you can do multivariate testing if you want to do like 33, 33, 33, 33. So I'm not a statistician but I can't even say that word. So I'm not even a statistician by any make or mark but at a bare minimum like 50-50 that's why A and it's B let's just put 50% into them and if you look at the file sometimes you can have within that 50-50 the randomness can weight certain sides of it different than others and I don't again I don't do statistics so I'm not necessarily as invested in that piece from an emotional perspective I just want to get tangentially like is this messaging working? Is A outperforming B and having some kind of statistical significance that you can base that on? Interesting. Which I would say 95% or better if we're looking at statistical significance. Okay, okay. Well there's so much to delve into and I think too that as we look at these different aspects of the tools that we can be using the point of this is the more educated we become the more we can anticipate stronger results and we can migrate our, that whole thing go to where your donors are reach your donors where they are. I think this digital piece of it is speaking, right? It's screaming at us really it's screaming at us so we've got to be looking at that. Wow, I've learned so much this time has like blown by I haven't told you to go by fast. Yeah, like so quick. It does, it goes by really, really quickly. Jeremy Hazelwood president and founder of Fundraisers Unite really a cool website and I really enjoyed looking at all the different things that you had going on. I love that you've made this a membership portal. I would encourage everyone to take a look at it and see what's going on. We're going into this Q4 period where we all know in the nonprofit sector this is where the rubber meets the road we have amazing opportunities and I think this digital component it's where we need to be. Yeah. We really need to be. Jeremy thank you so much for joining us it's been great. Again I'm Julia Patrick CEO of the American Nonprofit Academy. Jared Ransom CEO of the Raven Group also known as the nonprofit nerd will be joining us tomorrow. Again thank you to our presenting sponsors. We have so many of you who joined us from the very beginning now more than a year and a half ago and we are eternally grateful for your support. Again as we always say if you weren't here we wouldn't be here. So thank you so much. We've launched a new show called Fundraising Events TV check us out. Really interesting. It's all about the fundraising event side. Our host on that is I always call him Jason champion or Jason Ransom is Jason champion. He's been on our show before talking about a lot of different things around fundraising events and it's really an amazing opportunity to learn about what the new trends are get new ideas and so check out fundraisingevents.tv. Another great episode. Jeremy you've totally inspired me to look at my own digital communications in a different way. Cool. Thank you Julie for having me. It's an honor to be here. So thank you for this. Well it's been a lot of fun and as we end every episode we want to remind everyone to stay well so you can do well. Come back and join us tomorrow everyone.


The Minister for Education, Richard Bruton, has said third-level education is set to receive its first significant increase in funding after almost a decade of cuts in the 2017 budget. He has said an additional 36 million will be allocated in 2017 and a further 17 million the following year. We asked students whether they would like to see the money best spent. I don't know, it's about like 36 million between all our universities. I don't know if that's enough right now. All the Irish universities are falling in the rankings. And they have done kind of slides down over the last year, so I don't know if that will be enough to keep us afloat. But yeah, I just like to probably go into science background myself, so I like to go and kind of research in that kind of area. It could probably, I mean, and being in Dublin anyway, I know as a student, accommodations are a big issue. Accommodation needs to be sorted because other, because people are like, are being abused by landlords and stuff like that. I think mental health services as well need to be improved because just for some people who are suffering, there's nothing there for them. Another area they felt personally affected by was the incoming sugar tax, as well as the 50 cent increase in cigarette packs. I'm hoping that by raising the price continuously, that eventually that will occur with the money that has to stop. Because it's gotten to the point where we're all trying, they've tried all the good stuff. Hopefully it gets too expensive to be able to keep it up and make a difference. But I support my family, we'll be involved in convenience stores and that sort of thing. So the sugar tax is going to have an effect on us in a roundabout way. I don't agree with it. I think that the sugar tax is not going to solve the problem. I think the problem is a lifestyle problem. It's about education of, you know, how to train properly, how to be healthy. I don't think putting the tax on it is going to make a lot more difference. Liam Ashton, DCU-TV News.


Na kai, k Aura eu maili i padar, Aura maili i padar, Aura maili i padar, So they may choose a book out of their book box that they've already read with a little note for Mum or Dad saying, try this with me, read this to me or I'm just learning to read this, can you help me when I get stuck? What I call a reading contract is when I have about a weeks worth of activities that relate to one book and the children have control. I have to get it done by the end of the week and they can do it all on the first day if they want to but they work through the activities and then we check in Monday, Wednesday, Friday and we do a wrap-up of the book at the end and then we see what falls out of it and because there's a glossary I talk to them about alphabetical order and I've given them a little alphabetical order activity so that they can try and put some words into alphabetical order so they have to write their own wee story too. I usually try and do something that's quite specific to a story like a retelling or a sequencing activity broadly related to what the story was about, something kind of fun like a word finder or a picture. That particular book I've selected for a really big group of children, it's a turquoise book but I've got children who can read through to gold. They're doing a reading contract and they want to learn a little bit about Samoa for Samoan Language Week so I've just found a couple of websites that back up some of the stuff that they've read using the iPad. They just hold it over the QR code and it takes them to a website that shows them some examples of siapa cloths that they can then draw a picture of their own and then the other one actually asks them to do some more reading so they get to read their book then go to the website then read the website and then find some information in that text.


A novel synthetic method was used to prepare a V4 plus V205 cathode with mixed vanadium valences, which exhibits excellent zinc ion storage performance and is attributed to the presence of V4 plus, leading to higher electrochemical activity, lower polarization, faster ion diffusion, and higher electrical conductivity. This article was authored by Feilu, Zixian Chen, Huizhao Fang, and others.


We recently covered the perplexing, yet little shared ancient artifact which can be found at the ancient site of Patara. We cover the fact that some of the inventions accredited to the Romans within the modern day, may have been borrowed concepts with origins located far within our distant past. As with the supposed ancient Egyptian sites on the Giza Plateau, many ancient ruins contain megalithic blocks, whose movement into position not only evades modern explanation, but lacks any detailed recording of the mammoth task by any of these so-called culprits for constructions. Rather, it seems a worldwide conspiracy has occurred. It is well known that history is written by the victor. Maybe this is a fitting explanation for the academic ignorance witnessed on a daily basis. Perhaps it's laziness on the part of academics, put with the task of explaining these sites? Or perhaps as we have detailed on many, many occasions, a covert effort to occult the truth from modern society. Our claim is not made lightly, but upon the witnessing of talented individuals having their careers and future opportunities crushed at the hands of those who fund, and therefore steer academic study in the directions of their pleasure. The stolen artifacts which tell of this story, the vast documented efforts of the many organizations around the world, tasked or rather funded to gather, pillage or steal all such items, merely to paint a picture they are told to. But the truth remains, human history is far more interesting than you have been led to believe. But be warned, paradigm destruction can often be distressing, and the popularly regurgitated marketed phrase, Roman columns, after being presented with the following evidence, may begin to feel more like programming than historically truth. The Baalbek Trilathon, a group of three horizontally lying stones which form part of the podium of the Roman Jupiter Temple of Baalbek Lebanon. Numerous archaeological expeditions have gone to the site, starting in the 19th century, primarily German and French groups, and research continued into the 20th century. Each of these stones is 70 feet long, 14 feet high, and 10 feet thick, weighing around 800 tons each. And conveniently, each of these modern academic studies concluded the same thing, completely absent of any explanation as to their placement. The entire foundation of this ancient structure is unexplainable, with a number of stones weighing over 350 tons, thus indicative of lost knowledge, not modern architecture. It should seem obvious that to declare otherwise would be foolish, yet this is what's witnessed all over the earth every day. And we are yet to mention the world-famous, yet equally perplexing stone of the pregnant woman, also at Baalbek, and weighing in at an astonishing 1000 tons. In 27 BC, the Roman Emperor Augustus supposedly took the unfathomable decision to build in the middle of nowhere the grandest and mightiest temple of antiquity, having no obvious reasons for selecting Baalbek as the temple's building site. The much greater erosion of the big Baalbek blocks qualifies as material proof of their much greater age. It seems that as we suspected, the evidence is mounting to support the far more logical claim that an advanced lost civilization's heritage has been stolen by different, more modern civilization all over the world. A great civilization did once flourish here on earth, one which has been actively suppressed, stolen from, exploited, and hidden for far too long. Thanks for watching guys, and until next time, take care. The Baalbek temple is undoubtedly the variety of ancient stones that were somehow incorporated into the structures. Although modern academia, and indeed its supporters, who are all seemingly suffering with selective research syndrome, claim that Baalbek is a Roman ruin, we feel, as mentioned, the sheer size of the ancient megaliths that were installed masterfully into its construction are obviously far too large for our Roman ancestors to have transported from distant quarries, and who have installed into the structure. We are more than open to this proposition that they were indeed installed and built by Romans, if we can be provided with one single logical explanation as to how this was done. But, as of yet, this remains elusive, absent any academic explanation as to the side. As mentioned, the astonishing array of ancient stones is also an area that is rarely covered by individuals attempting to convey an air of all knowing to the masses, as these features are, just like the enormous megaliths present at the site, currently unexplainable. Specifically, it's the pink granite columns. The reason for our focus on these particular stones is the fact that this pink granite is only available at one known ancient quarry, that being the famous quarry of Aswan, located within modern-day Egypt, an astonishing 1,500 kilometers away. Some of these stones, weighing in at more than 10 metric tons, this achievement, we feel, is a clear indication of the fact that the builders of these ancient sites were far more capable than that of our more recent Roman ancestors. For example, as previously covered on our channel, Henri Léard brought two lamisu weighing in at a similar size around 10 tons to London. This task took over 18 months of arduous suffering for hundreds of our modern ancestors, placed a mere century ago to complete. It included several near-disasters, and included loading them onto wheeled carts, complex systems of modern polis and levers operated by dozens of men, the utilization of over 300 men in total, a barge and a custom-built ramp to haul them up the steps and into the museum. How these same curators, historians and academics alike can continue to claim that our Roman ancestors completed such tasks, along with the placement of such enormous stone megaliths, is to us absurd. Was the unfinished obelisk found within Aswan the work of the same civilization? We feel that these pink granite columns could, in all possibility, be a link that connects these two ancient sites, and in particular, the Great Pyramids. Is Baalbeck, with its enormous granite megaliths, built by the same people as the Great Pyramids? Is the giant megalithic exoskeleton of the Great Pyramids, which we have already exposed, built with the same techniques as Baalbeck? We find the evidence to suggest such highly compelling.


Hey everybody it's Hari Swaminathan from optiontiger.com we're looking at a Baidu swing trade here you can see it as a profit of 13-32. Now Baidu the markets are going to go up a little bit so we want to close this this is a put position which has done very well it's a 100% return actually. So this might come down a little bit by a hundred dollars or so but regardless it's about a 100% return. Five contracts we got it at 2.66 it's going for 5.32 so I'm closing it today. We'll book the profits on this one and close it out. Thank you.


Equip your general for the front line with the all-new Expedition and GP Gen 2 racks from Razorback Off-Road Hi, my name is Andrew Varga with Razorback Off-Road and today we're going to be doing a rack installation video for the Polaris General Recently at Razorback Off-Road we came out with two brand new racks for the Polaris General We have the Polaris General Cargo Rack, which does not include a tailgate And we also for the first time have included the Polaris General Expedition Rack, which it does include the tailgate So we're going to be doing the video for the Expedition Rack today But this video will also work for the Polaris Cargo Rack, Polaris General Cargo Rack, and I'll just get right into it So to begin what you do is you want to tilt the bed back And the reason why you want to tilt the bed back is so that you can have access to these panels And what you're going to want to do is when you you want to start with the sides and you want to take these Panels off so you can have access to these mounting holes right here on the bed rail So when with the bed tilted back, you're going to want to take off this side bolt here a lot of the newer machines have a quick Disconnect bolt here, but for this instance, you're going to want to grab a T40 Torx fit and you're going to want to remove this bolt So once you remove this bolt you're just going to put this off to the side And you're going to gently lift up this panel like so And it'll just pop off just like that And then this gives you nice access into the bed panel here So included in your hardware kit that we provide you, you're going to want to grab the 516th bolt and the large washer And what this is is this is the anchoring system that holds the rack onto the bed And you're just going to be installing one of these And so you're going to want to have The bolt the washer and you're going to want to put that onto The forward most hole on the rail of the side rack Then you're going to take your anchor And you're going to place that on the bolt We've included this laser cut piece here And you're going to want to put this on first And then this is the nut that actually locks the rubber into place so that way it doesn't spin When you're tightening tightening it down And what you're going to want to do is you're going to want to Give it a squeeze and then you want to just kind of start this bolt onto the rubber not all the way But you just want to get it started so that way it kind of Holds it on there when you go to install the side onto the machine So once you have that What you're then going to want to grab is we have This longer 516th bolt and same thing make sure you have the large washer on top And you're going to want this plastic Anchor that goes on the bottom side of the bed and this will go on there like this And then you want the smaller 516th washer To go on the bottom there And then we include this nylock and it'll go on the bed in that order Okay, you want to kind of have this on hand with you when you go to install the side Of the rack So I'll go ahead and do that So you want to grab your rack Okay So you're going to want to place the side onto the bed rail up here and with the hardware in hand you're going to go ahead and Place the hardware through the front of the bed here in a place The bottom plug here You need to place your washer and nylock On the bottom and then just Just gently tighten it for now. You don't need to worry about tightening it just yet And now once you have that installed you're going to move to the back part of the rack And you're going to grab the same hardware And you're going to Place it on this back hole In the bed and you're going to do the same thing Put the plug in the bottom rail here And then just get everything started Okay Once you have that on there Now you can go ahead and begin to tighten the side And what you're going to want to do is you're going to want to grab a Half inch socket and a half inch box wrench to tighten down These anchors onto the bed What I typically do to start tightening this down is I start with this front rubber plug And I just make sure that the side is pushed up against the bed We have a flange bent right here. So you want it up against the bed And then it's got some holes here in the middle and they're their access holes And you can see the other holes in the bed rail right here And just just try to align them as best as you can and then once that's there you go ahead and just start tightening this front plug And then this is where you're going to need your box wrench And you're going to go ahead and tighten the front anchor On the side up here You're going to want to tighten this to where it's fairly snug But you don't want to tighten it too much to where it starts bulging the bottom side of this bed rail where this hole's at So you want it snug But not so much to where it starts bulging out the bottom of the bed itself and then you're going to want to kind of snake kind of snake in this box wrench a little bit It's going to take kind of a little bit of finesse here And then you'll hold it on the bottom of that nut and you'll do the same thing as you'll tighten up This bed So once you have this final anchor tightened down here in the back You're going to want to go ahead and reinstall your side panel So grab your side panel It does have one tab in the back and then it has four tabs on top So you want to slide it in slide in this back tab first And then the other hole the other tabs will fall right into the holes and you want to kind of Push it in see how it popped in there like that Then you're going to push it down Grab your torques your torque screw here and go ahead and Tighten this side panel back onto the machine. All right And once that once you have the panel on and the screw tightened down You're going to do the same exact thing to the other side So once you have the other side installed what you're going to want to do is flip the bed back up Okay lock it into place and now you're going to put your basket tray on top So you'll grab your tray and you'll lightly place it on the brackets on the sides okay And now you're going to want to grab your quarter inch hardware So we included quarter inch bolts and nuts and you're going to want to Fasten the basket tray to these brackets that are on the sides now So take your quarter inch hardware place the bolt Through the top hole here in the front and you're going to want to take your washer And just get it started don't tighten anything down yet because you may need to make some adjustments to the basket When you're going Or when you're done placing all these bolts in there Okay So we have two quarter inch bolts That are going to be on in the inside of the tray and then you're going to want to place two on the back part of the tray back here So once you have these bolts started on this side The reason why I want you to leave them loose is just in case you need to kind of shift the basket A little bit to get the holes to align on the other side So once you have these bolts in place, I just want you to move immediately to the other side and then same thing Just put put the bolts in place So once you have all the bolts in place what I want you to do is is to take a step back And look to see how your tray is justified in between the two sides So what you're going to want to do and you're what you're going to want to make sure is You're going to want to leave a gap On each side Of the tray here. So there's this outer flange That is in the on the tray And you're going to want to make sure that there's about In this case, I have about a quarter of an inch or so on each side It's going to vary from machine to machine But you're going to want to leave a little bit of gap there that way When you're going down the trail or wherever you're riding it doesn't vibrate or make noise You want to leave a little bit of gap there So once you feel comfortable with how you place your tray You're going to want to have these tools on hand You're going to want to have a 3 8 socket which is going to be used for the bolts You're going to want to have a 7 16 box wrench which is going to be used for the nylof nuts And what you want to do is you want to start with the bolts in the back of the tray And then you're going to want to do the bolts that are on the bottom of the tray So go ahead and start on the on the back The reason why you want to start on the back Is so that it pulls the tray and makes sure that it's seated up against this back bracket Towards the cab Once you have one side tightened just make sure that The other side has about the same gap And then go ahead and begin to tighten The backs So once you finish tightening the bolts on your tray For the general 1000 cargo rack people This is you're done at this point, but for those who have bought the expedition rack You're going to want to now move ahead to installing the tailgate So to begin installing your tailgate, you're going to want to grab the latch receiver bracket You're going to want to grab your quarter inch hardware So that would be the quarter inch bolt and the nut And you're going to want to install it on the welded bracket on the left side of the rack And when you do once again, don't tighten this down all the way But it makes it easier if you Tighten it a little bit So you're going to want your three-eighth socket and seven sixties box wrench And just lightly tighten it Don't tighten it all the way So once you have this snug you want it to be able to adjust a little bit So that way when you install the other components on your tailgate, you can make your adjustments necessary Now we're going to go install the hinge brackets on the other side So next we're going to install the hinge plates And you're going to want to grab your hinge plate You're going to want to grab your five sixteenth socket cap screw and your nylock Five sixteenths nylock nut And you're going to want a quarter inch allen wrench to tighten these down Okay When you take the bracket be sure that it's underneath Make sure that these hinge plates Are on the bottom And and same thing you're going to want to Start all these bolts, but don't tighten down all the way just yet So I would get all the bolts started first once again. Make sure it's on the bottom So go ahead and get all these bolts started So once you have all the bolts in place for your upper and lower brackets You're going to want to take your quarter inch allen wrench and your half inch box wrench And you're going to want to tighten them down But not all the way you're still going to want to be able to move this bracket left and right And the reason for that is so that you can make any adjustments that are necessary to get your tailgate to align just right All right now that you've tightened your bolts a little bit and make sure that these brackets can still move freely You're going to want to now go and grab your tailgate But before we do install it, there is one more thing that we need to Make sure we install before we put it onto the machine. So we'll go ahead and do that And what you're going to want to do is you're going to want to grab some blue thread locker Okay, and you're going to want to dab a little bit on there And the reason why you want to do that is so that way it does not vibrate off When you're on the trail and once you've done that Now you can go ahead and place this on the machine A little trick if you're by yourself, I would recommend that you Have a buddy use the buddy system to install the tailgate that way it doesn't fall on you when you're trying to put it in place but a little trick to do when you're by yourself is you can actually Install it onto the latch plate Over here and it holds it pretty well. But like I said, it's much better if you have two people and then what you're going to do Is the reason why I left those brackets list is now you can turn the brackets to align it with your tailgate So the trick of this is you're going to want to take your shoulder bolt And you want there's smaller washers and these are The washers you're going to want to put place in between the upper hinge plate on the tailgate Okay, so you're going to want to install that and then you're going to want to install it also underneath in between there Okay, and sometimes it takes a little It's a little tricky, but It's doable So you want to make sure that you have the washer Washers in between all of the plates And then you'll take your five sixteenths flange nyloc nut and then you're going to just Just get it on there so that way it doesn't pop out And you're going to do the same thing to the bottom So to tighten down these bolts, you're going to want to have a three sixteenths Allen wrench and a half inch box wrench And you're going to want to go ahead and tighten these down all the way This one go ahead and tighten them down all the way Okay I'm going to now go into how to align the tailgate onto the back of the machine So to align your tailgate what you want to do is you want to take a step back and look at your tailgate In relation to the sides of your machine and what you're going to want to do is you're going to want to kind of just make sure that it's evenly a place between the two sides And that's why I let you leave these brackets loose because now you can see how I can make the adjustments Necessary to make sure my tailgate is centered on my machine Once you once you're happy with your tailgate placement What you're going to do is you're going to tighten down this left-hand side bracket You're going to go ahead and snug that down now Once you have this left bracket tightened down You're going to move over to your hinge side. So now that you centered it One little trick that I like to do is I Like to begin and I'll tighten Maybe two out of the four bolts on each one but It's kind of a little feel And I'll explain why So I'll tighten two of these Two on the bottom and then I'll tighten two on top And this this trick always just has worked for me And I'll explain why So you get get them to tighten but you still can move it up and down So you want it to be able to kind of hold where you stick it And what I like to do is I'll actually raise kind of cheat the tailgate In the up position the reason why I do that Is so that when I let it go the weight of the tailgate will actually bring it to where it's perfectly centered Into this receiver bracket on the left And if you do have a spare tire or anything else that you're going to be placing on the tailgate You'll want to cheat it even more right because the weight of the the weight of those Objects on the tailgate is going to make it sag even more So like I said what I try to do is I try to cheat it Cheat it up a little bit to where it holds in place and then Once I do that I'll go ahead and begin To tighten all these bolts down So once you've made sure that all of your Bolts are tight here You're you're going to want to go back to your receiver bracket And if you notice that it doesn't quite latch Correctly, but you notice that okay My plate is centered within the receiver bracket, but it still is not the The pull handle here is still not closing. All right So part of the reason why I tighten that at first is just to kind of hold the tailgate in place and kind of give us a Reference point to where we kind of cheat the tailgate up. So that way when it sags, it'll be in the middle. So now You're going to want to loosen up this receiver plate again So once you've loosened that up Now just kind of move it And then hear that click. So once that thing clicks into place That's when it's perfect. That's when it's true Okay, and then You're going to tighten this down So now You can test your tailgate and you'll notice That it'll just snap right into place every time now So I know it's a lot of back and forth But that's the best way that I know how to make the adjustments to the tailgate and to make it function right So like I said tighten the left bracket Tighten the hinge brackets and then you might need to go back to this Receiver plate and then just make that slight last adjustment and once everything's tightened down Okay, you should be able to just snap your tailgate right into place and it should set right there All right last but not least we do include a gas shock on the tailgate So you can go ahead and open it all the way So if you notice on these gas shocks, it has this retaining pin on here And so what you want to do is you want to pop it off. Okay, and you'll see that it rotates And then it'll slide right out. Okay. There's one on this end And there's also one on this end. So you're going to want to do the same thing on this end. Okay, keep these clips handy Okay So what you want to do is you want the larger end To go underneath the tray and what you'll do is you'll take your thumb And it literally just pops right in Okay, and you're going to take your tailgate Do the same thing you could take that Pop it right in. Okay. Now you take these retaining pins And you're going to just slide them in over there Over that ball screw and then just make sure that you securely attach it when you're done Okay, all right So once you have your gas shock in place You go ahead and close the tailgate and Just like that. You're done So that concludes the installation video for the general 1000 expedition rack If you have any questions about whether your machine is compatible with our products You can visit our website at razorbackoffroad.com Also on our website, we have other accessories that you can add to your general But other than that, we hope you enjoy our products out on the trail and we hope to see you next time


What's going on guys got call here with late in sports cards, and we are ripping three boxes of personals for Sam a gonna be 2022 Donner's optic football Good luck Sam. Let's see what we got sir. These are the last three in the shop like I said See some nice rated rookies here. Ah Darren Waller to start off on the orange to 199 Johan Dotson base rated rookie elite series rookies of Drake London Cam Taylor Britt rated rookie Yeah, come on downtown that is right Silver of Deontay Foreman hollow grease haul on the rated rookie got a hollow rated rookie Jake Ferguson Cowboys and Kenny Pickett on the base rated rookie. There is my house. Naji Harris hollow insert George Carloffus Jordan Davis on the light blue rated rookie number two nine two ninety nine Birds Tariq woollen there's the one twenty two silver circles Chris Jones one twenty five Chris Jones silver circles Rashad white Kyle Pitts pierced strong rated rookie. Come on. Let's see some low numbers Let's see some low numbers. Can't say Ingram rated rookie. There is easy easy easy kill Elliot number two a 179 blue Sauce gardener rated rookie It's hollow Alan Robinson trust an Ebner rated rookie. There's Martin Emerson on the orange to 199 rated rookie for the Browns My J. Sanders Tony Homer There's a gridiron Kings of Traylon Burks got Bailey zappy rated rookie This is auto gonna be sensational six of William Perry the fridge for the Bears on the silver auto Petrie I'd read to 99 Josh Allen Brian Cook There's a hollow legendary logos DK James Cook to 179 we got Josh Pascal on the dark blue rated rookie and Desmond Ritter base rated rookie green to 149 JC horn JC horn Daxon Hill They do have Patrick in here to your Definitely is Patrick in here Demarcus Lawrence Derek Stingley can get low numbered Patrick can't get autos on Patrick hasn't signed for Punea in a while No autos Kyler Murray Logan Hall All righty sandbox to see a downtown some short print here low numbers come on now Money yeah, not enough money for what they think they don't want to sign a thousand cards for whatever they're gonna pay There is Drake London nice one there to 199 rated rookie orange Louis scene Dickie It is the 25 gonna be dual auto Johan Dodson and Brian Robinson. That's pretty sick. Nice one there Sam on the commander's rookies Very nice one there to 25 Alante Taylor rated rookie. That's pretty cool. Nice one. I haven't seen any duels yet Like blue Corey Davis to 299 Logan Hall Yeah, definitely starting off better for sure Karen Williams on the hollow rated rookie a son Haskins Pink Velocity it is Roquan Smith number to 79 pink velocity Ravens Christian Watson base rated rookie Jalen Petrie to 179 rated rookie Texans and Brock Purdy base Sean Watson Wanda Robinson James Conner Arnold Ebbaketti a rated rookie Isaiah Spiller rated rookie hollow of Jalen Hertz Tyler Gordon rated rookie to 125 silver circles Christian Kirk Malik Willis rated rookie Come on. Let's see a downtown here Sam There's the rookies Desmond Ritter Maddie Corral Lighted up Hertz cave-on Thibodeau. There is Roger McCreary on the pink velocity to 79 for the Titans rookie Jordan Davis Got a diamond hands hollow Sydney lamb Dolchich say hollow Brian Burns go Knowles Jelani Woods Red to 99 Alex Hightower for the Steelers Jalen Tolbert There's a Kenny picket legendary Locos nice one there insert for the Steelers Vila Jones And George Pickens nice one here to 299 rated rookie light blue for the Steelers as well Troy Anderson and downtown Kenny pick it Boom there you go Sam Sam don't miss Downtown KP get that mag for you, sir Downtown Kenny pick it. Oh, yeah Here we go Sam Sam never misses man box three optic. Come on now Let's just get another low number or something here nice rated rookie Otto Come on now Sam. Good luck. Good luck, sir. God Joe Thomas to 199 Sky more rated rookie that blue to 179 Christian Kirk Hi Chandler Chris Jones Jaquan brisker Trayvon Walker rated rookie Pandora time. I like it Steve. I like the uh, I like the outlook there got to 125 Joe Montana Josh Pascal rated rookie. It is going to be to 125 hollow rated rookie Otto Kyler Gordon Kyler Gordon to 125 on the Otto Chris a lava base Yeah, I'm not sure T. R. He's been a rumored about everywhere in the league. So kind of hard to tell at this point There's a to 65 Jacobi Meyer electricity Jima Williams. Yeah, it's really up in the air. I really don't even I mean I think the bills just because I've heard some rumors there Aiden Hutchinson hollow rated rookie, but I have no idea Good pretty much end up anywhere. I guess Depending on his how much contract he's looking for to 299 Chris Godwin light blue Kobe Bryant got a light blue to 299 Wanda Robinson rated rookie Evan Neil Davis Mills Brian Robinson Sam Williams rated rookie hollow Jeffrey Simmons. There's Pat Nick Minotto to 199 Montez sweat Traylon Burke's rated rookie base John Taylor lighted up Aiden Hutchinson There's rookie Kings gridiron or sorry gridiron Kings rookie of Desmond Ritter. There's a Deshaun Watson hollow Kyle Phillips Three packs left Sam Held it with that candy pick it downtown. Oh, this will work to rated rookie a silver circle. So 125 Sam howl Sam for Sam nice one there. It's 125 Great hit. There's a retro series Steve young easy E in Last pack Sam cows Brock Purdy on the hollow on the back Jalen nailer Alrighty Sam that will do it for your three boxes of 2022 Optic football. Thank you so much. We'll get those right out to you


Photography and the American West came of age together, so as European Americans were exploring and moving into the West in even greater numbers in the 1840s, 1850s and just after the Civil War, they were lucky enough to have their disposal, the camera. And this has given us a unique insight into how a world that had been unchanged for thousands of years, and obviously it was populated for thousands of years, could be absolutely, well, changed beyond all recognition within the space of just a few hundred. The book we're talking about today is this one, it's called Into the Sunset and it says Photography's Image of the American West. And this was a catalog, it is a catalog that was put out by MoMA in around about 2009 I think, about an exhibition where they were looking at that history of the American West told through photographs, so about 150 years worth of images. And it was, I was really excited to get it because I quite like the American West, I like the mythology around it, you know, the base mythology of cowboys and all that kind of stuff, the western sort of feel, if you like. And I thought, well, this will be a book full of just these kind of photographs and how wrong I was. The first page is a triptych of three images by Ansel Adams, Midler White and then Stephen Shaw. And it's interesting to see these photographs because you look at the two, the Ansel Adams and the Midler White images and they are very much a landscape. They are a landscape that says, come and look at this landscape, come and join, see the wildness rather of the area, right? It's raw, it's untouched, it's nature in its most basic state. And then you compare that with a photograph that Stephen Shaw took about 20 years later, where the landscape itself, while the landscape, I would love to be in that landscape, it's got a wide open sky, it's got those dusty roads, you know, those, those telegraph poles and stuff that go off to the horizon, they promise so much more. But in the middle of this is a billboard saying, look, there's somewhere even better you could actually probably go and look at. So it's a picture of a, of a snow capped mountain. And the billboard itself is kind of broken down. And I love this idea that whoever laid out this book is choosing to juxtapose these three photographs because what they're sort of saying is that look, you know, this is how people's perceptions of the West have changed so quickly. In that early period of expansion, the European Americans were sort of driven by this idea of wanting to have part of that manifest destiny sort of feel going on. And a part of the photography of that time, it has an almost propaganda sort of feel to it because the photographs are real. We can see quite clearly this is a real place, but they are constructed in a way that says, look, there's nobody here. This is quite nice and gentle. This is, this is yours for the taking. It fits into the narrative that was around at the time, which was sort of saying, look, you know, these photographs suit what we're trying to say. And it's interesting that I would never have considered prior to this that landscape photography can be a tool for propaganda, but here it quite clearly is. In these early photographs of the West, you see a huge sense of scale that in a lot of them, you get a feeling that this is a landscape that is unlike anything that you would have seen up until this point. So if you put it, if you think about the eyes of somebody in that kind of 1870s, 1890s sort of turn of the century period where they wouldn't have seen, you know, the world on television, these photographs give that sense of scale. You can see here in this Edward Curtis image of the native Americans walking across the canyon floor and they are literally dwarfed by these giant sandstone maces. And here on the left, you've got Timothy O'Sullivan's photograph of these ruins, which I think have been photographed a number of times. But something that I find is interesting, when I look at this image, and we compare it to some later on in the book, that the photographs that come back from this period of the native Americans and how they have adapted to the landscape is that they have suited their lives to suit where they live. So they have made their houses in the cracks of these this this cliff face. And they are they are one with the land. Then the next page, you have the railroad, because the railroad is coming, we know it's coming. And then the telephone probably the telegraph pole, two things that revolutionized the opening up of the West to European Americans. And that must have changed the landscape so dramatically overnight. They're having these two abilities to to move quickly across the landscape but also then to to communicate back to people rather than you know, having to rely on Pony Express and all that sort of sort of good stuff. So you can see how there's a theme running through these books. And that's what I love about these kind of books rather than say like a monograph of a famous photographer, where it's all their images that sort of work together but don't necessarily have a narrative that goes through the entire book. With the coming of the railroad, of course, then there are comings of the car later on. And with the car, there are all the accoutrements that come with that. So we've got Edward Western's hot coffee there, which is juxtaposed against the scrubland. And already we can see the world that with a man is changing what's leaving his mark on it in a way that is not necessarily in harmony with his surroundings. I think it would be safe to say that you can't really talk about the American West without talking about cars. And this is Robert Frank's little contribution here. We have his very famous car covered Long Beach, which is that sort of that car that's been draped in looks like parachute material. And then the ubiquitous gas station. Now the gas stations show up within the American West, certainly latterly with great regularity. And that's hardly unsurprising given that the the Americans love their cars and this to everybody these days. But America seemed to take to them with with an absolute vengeance, which is hardly again anything, anything new. But I love photographs of gas stations of automobile infrastructure. There's something about it that draws me in. And that's a bit of a an uncomfortable feeling as we're going to see. This collection of three images, you've got a Dennis Hopper image, you've got Stephen Shaw and you've got an Adam Bartos. And here we are now beginning to see the problem with the car that the wonderful open empty natural landscapes that we saw at the beginning of the book are being destroyed by these swathes, these seas of concrete that come all over that that pristine landscape and have eradicated anything that lived there, you know, and shoveled it to one side in the name of progress. And that's maybe just in the way from talking about the photography itself. But I think it's important when you look at photographs, that you kind of think about the social context that they're in, because obviously, throughout the history of the American West, cultural norms have changed the way that people think about the West and its people and the people who were there originally, all of these things have changed. And photography, I believe has been the great motivator in doing that. Because not only can we see through the medium of photography, where people have come from, you can see what the land looked like before the Western man put his mark on it, like in the photographs of Robert Adams, for example, that tract housing going on. So it's a unique, certainly as far as I'm concerned, perspective of being able to see the transition of a world from its natural state into what we find today, which you don't tend to see in European history because that history has been so long. And so much of it was conducted prior to photography, boxy here. But here's a photograph of some mining that's going on in the turn of century 1904. And contrast that with images that we saw earlier, where is that empty landscape? Now, European Americans have discovered that there are resources, there are natural resources to be mined and to be stripped from the land. And this is the beginning of what I think is kind of like the end of the old mythology of the West, because, you know, things are starting to be industrialized, it's starting to have this feeling of being not a landscape that looks or inspiring, but a landscape that suggests the potential for overnight riches. And of course, you get the, you get the oil wells to get the derricks or the burning, what it says here, burning sludge by the Robert Adams image. And I can't think of a, of a better word, this sludge that man has stopped really caring about the world. And there's an interesting photograph here by Frank Gothic, Gothic Gothic of the, the, the trees that were blown down when Mount St Helens exploded in the early 80s. Now you look at that and obviously we know that that was done by natural cause, but you could almost imagine, almost imagine that this scene of desolation of these trees that have been felt in one go, could be manmade, that it could be something that man just comes along and sees a forest that has taken hundreds of years to grow up and just, and just destroys it overnight. It's a real shame. And of course, this is, there are many things with the modern world. But when you do look at photographs in this, this lens of using as social discussion, and you look at these images where people go, what is just a picture of a rubbish tip next to a highway? Why, why is that an inverted commas, an important photograph? It's because now, now you can see that man is just, it's really scummy, really. Isn't he just, you know, we just take so much for granted and just don't care about the environment. We don't look at it in a way that say, you know, the people who were there previously, the native Americans and people have been there for thousands of years, they were there for thousands of years and worked in harmony with the landscape, but they didn't destroy it. And here we are within the space of, you know, 100 years or so. This is 1997.  But it draws into sharply, absolutely sharply, how much of an effect that we have on our landscape that originally, you know, people were told, you can't change this sort of thing. This is, this is a landscape in which man is secondary because he's so overwhelmed by the size and the sheer scale of everything in that world. The second part of the book is all about the people of the West. And I find that this book probably would have been more solid, more, more focused. Had it just been about the land, because I do find when it starts looking at the people, I don't feel a connection to most of these people. I find it they're interesting photographs. But I don't really see the themes coming through that you do see with say the landscape images. And, and there are there's no getting away from this. There are a lack of certain people in these in the photographs of the people of the West. The Native American photographs are almost conspicuous by the absence beyond the photographs that I think we would expect to see those kind of, you know, the Indian or the Native American study, as it were, you know, photograph back in the 1800s when that sort of thing was culturally acceptable. So while there are an interesting collection of portraits, and there are, you know, there's some interesting ideas there that everybody seems to look extremely confident, and, and actually at ease with the sort of things that they're doing, I don't feel that that connection to these images in the way that I do with the landscape. And that's of course, that's an interesting example of how you don't need to like everything. Some images and some exhibitions, because this was an exhibition, will have parts where you are very captivated with stuff and other stuff is just kind of like, man, I'm not really feeling this. There's nothing specifically wrong with the photographs, but they don't connect with me, don't resonate with me, possibly because I don't have a point of reference for them. As I mentioned, I have not been to the American West. My experience of America is limited to the East Coast and of the East Coast, only Florida and really sort of the DC area. So it's an extremely limited set of points to reference things. But anyway, it is it is a wonderful book. I do like it, except simply because it has given me an insight into the photographs of the early period of the West and how that has all changed. And it's introduced me to some wonderful photographers whom I was not aware of whose landscape photography is totally up my street that those things of desolation where despite man's ability to destroy the landscape, we are reminded that nature will always win.  On my bucket list of things to do at some point in my life is drive across America in a car and do the ubiquitous American road trip. I did a video recently about the photographs that sum up those ideas of the road trip. It's really interesting. I suggest you check it out. I'm going to link to it up here. And as always, it will be linked to in the description box below as well. Thank you ever so much for watching and I'll see you again soon.