Opening My YouTube Play Buttons (and improving them).

Greetings, and welcome to an LGR procrastination thing. This is the top of my desk, and this is a YouTube Play Button for a million subscribers, which I never did anything with. In fact, I never actually did anything with this one either. This is my 100,000 Play Button. It's not that I am ungrateful or don't care about subs at all, it's just that I don't put too much stock in these rewards. But they're kinda cool and it's neat to have 'em both, and I thought, yeah, maybe I'll put 'em on a wall or something. So yeah, let's open this up, because this is actually one of the older 100,000 sub Play Buttons. I don't remember when I got this, been a long time. Yeah, this one was signed by Tom Pickett, the VP Global Head of Content Operations at YouTube.

100,000 subs. That's more than double the size of a packed Roman Colosseum and more than 10 times the number of people who set the human domino world record. That's an odd comparison, but sure. Anyway, Silver Play Button. So yeah, YouTube sends these things out if you reach certain subscriber levels, in case you're not aware.

100,000, one million, 10 million, and then like, if you're really insane, then I don't know, they make you something custom or something. But this is just the one that everybody got back in 20 something.

2013, maybe, I think is when I got this. Wow, it's in a metal frame. Actually, that's a custom frame. I guess there's nothing else in here. They also sent me some chairs. Like, YouTube, well they were like camping chairs, little tripod chairs. I don't think they do any of that kinda stuff anymore. But, yeah, this is the Play Button portion of it. Hi. It actually says phreakindee on there because back then they didn't even ask what you wanted on your Play Button. They just sent it to you and it took like, I don't remember how many months to get this, like nine months after I passed a 100,000 subs. But yeah, that's a little, very simple, kind of humble thing, honestly, looking at the modern Silver Play Buttons and I kinda like it for that, because it is, this is very old school YouTube. Look at that. Got the text printed on the back of the glass there. But yeah, mostly impressed by this frame thing going on. I mean, I was a custom framer for years, so it's got those, you can see like, they used a marker there. They didn't use the right one. You're supposed to use one that doesn't have that sheen to it. This almost looks more like a Sharpie, but anyway. And then here, yeah, this is the one that I got six or seven months ago, beginning of 2019. Oh yeah, I did take it out of the plastic. It was all wrapped in this nice plastic bag. Yeah, this is, I mean it's just higher quality all around. They've obviously come a long ways on YouTube, you know. You're bigger than Vancouver, you're bigger then Venice, you're even bigger than Las Vegas. A million subscribers. Indeed. Yeah, I like this too, this little kind of business card that these newer Play Buttons come with, or at least the million ones, I don't know. Congrats on your milestone. Your award was inspected and package with great care by Rick. Thanks, Rick! It's definitely a different process now. In fact, I've seen some videos of the process. I'll put one up here in the little card, 'cause it's actually interesting to see these things get made. But, yeah, here is the modern Gold Play Button. I forget how much this weighs, I think it's like, seven pounds. Let me go get the scale really quick, but, yeah, check that out. This is uh, it's much more intense. Yeah, six pounds, four ounces, or about 2.84 kilograms. And you can see there now, they actually do ask for what you want put on here. So I could've typed in anything. I just put LGR 'cause that's what I was known by now, but, yeah, that was a nice little touch. And, again, it's just like much better quality overall, and just way more reflective too, I mean, check that out. It's like a straight up gold mirror on this thing. So, yeah, I dare not even breathe on it for fear of ruining everything. Check this out. So it's got this metallic veneer all over it. Almost reminds of like a name tag you'd see on a desk of an 80s employer, like a boss. Almost tacky thing going on, but it feels good. It's all solid. It's just like a big old MDF block. I mean, comparing the two is just, again, I think it's quite amusing and it reminds me of where YouTube came from, where LGR has gone, you know. All the time that has past, the 10 years doing this. It's just like first half of LGR. The first generation. And then the modern generation. I guess with a little bit more time having passed, a little more maturity perhaps. A little bit more. Not too much. I have a different sort of appreciation for these things now, even though I've never really cared about them too much but something about hitting 10 years has really made me think. And I know, I don't wanna reiterate too much of what I said in my 10 year anniversary video but once again, thank you very much for all your support, and I'm that glad my work has not gone unappreciated. Even though this is gonna bother me, I just know it. I better, you know. So I'm gonna clean these up. And lemme stick 'em on a wall. I don't know which wall. But I'm gonna pick a wall. As I've mentioned before, making custom picture frames was my job for years before doing LGR full-time. And yeah, I'm just particular about certain things when I hang stuff on my wall. Like for instance, I hate sawtooth hangers. Especially these stupid kind here. They're just garbage. And like I mentioned here, they used the wrong marker on there, I mean some of these corners are just really bad. Like look at that sheen. Usually a bit of rubbing alcohol or a degreaser or some kind of thing like that will get rid of it, I like using a microfiber cloth. See, it's way better already. You definitely wanna use a cloth thick enough too, because these edges are really sharp. I've cut myself many times. It's not where I cut myself here, that was another project entirely, but, yeah. Yeah, it's just so much better. Ugh, this stuff annoys me. Nothing here, I'm gonna put wire hanger instead of the whatever the stupid sawtooth was. Thankfully, you only need to separate this part here vertically because that's all I'm gonna be removing. Wow, they really were lazy with those edges. They didn't even put anything. So yeah, I'm guessing they used something like a Sharpie. Don't use these. You need something with a pure black. These aren't the ones I used in framing, but they'll do the job. These are just black paint markers but they will actually paint the pure black. There's also some like flat black Prismacolors that work perfectly for these. Basically just wanna get it so that you will cover cover up the silver part. Because otherwise, you will see a little bit of silver in the gaps. And I don't know, man. It doesn't bother everyone but it bothers me, so. Still a little bit of that Sharpie left on the side, but. Better than it was. That is just plexy or acrylic. Eh-heh. Or you know, that's how it goes. I do kinda miss the detail work on frames. I just don't miss like... everything else about it. The actual building and designing and like... this kind of stuff, totally my jam. And now I guess we are just gonna take the whole friggin' thing apart. Get this down here so we don't scrape up the corners of the frame or the table top. Okay, we will let that dry and uh, yeah. I've never actually seen the Play Button all exposed. It's got a bit of, a-- Oh yeah, that's better. Ha-haha! Okay, they should be about done. Yeah, one of the annoying things about acrylic is how staticky it can get. Still cracks me up with that Play Button is just screwed into some particle board and that's it. Okay, so what I was gonna do however long ago is use these little guys right here that are just gonna slide in place and provide us a nice mount for a wire. Put it at about 2/3 of the way up. And I've got some of this 30 pound wire here which is coated in a nice plastic so it's nice and soft. And this will give so I make it pretty tight on my frames, 'cause I don't like it to shift around too much. I also really like wrapping these tight as well. I don't know man, I just like my frames to look and feel a certain way. There we go. So now, it'll hang nice and centered. And of course, I need some of these rubber bumpers. These aren't my preferred brand but whatever. This is what they had. They're like a millimeter too large. Here we go, I call that Pac-Maning. It makes it fit. Pretty perfectly right there in the corner. And there we go. In my opinion that is far better than it was. So yeah, check out the corner now, you don't have any of that marker going over the edge or anything and the black is all the way through if you look at it from the side or whatever. So yeah, yeah. Now the gold one. Not as much to do really. Just gonna put some of the bumpers on the bottom, of course. Is this like a fuzzy backed thing? But, yeah. It'll stick. I'm just gonna use some of these more standard metal hangers for the wire. Right about there will do. And yeah, this knot, I couldn't even tell you how to do it. It's just like muscle memory at this point. I remember trying to teach new framers and I'd be like, "I don't know, I don't know." and I'd just do it and they would be like, "What?" "What is that?" So, anyway. Perfect! See, like I don't know about you, but to me that is just way more satisfying than that. I mean, c'mon now, no comparison. Okay, let's get this on to a wall. Yeah, I'm thinking like right here.

100,000 above it maybe. So, yeah I'm happy with that. That's right here in my main office space. Edit over there, do computer capturing things over here. Cool. So yeah, that really is it for this video. Pretty simple stuff just through a Monday here as I work, I'm more involved LGR things. I don't know, felt like puttin' 'em up after the whole 10 year passed by. Definitely has me feeling thankful and grateful and just excited to continue doing this, because honestly, it's kind of unbelievable that it's still working as well as it is. Thanks again for watching LGR and I hope that you enjoy the stuff that's comin' up here, because yeah, I mean there's some interesting things. All tech and gaming related and all sorts of things. So yeah, thank you very much for watching. See you soon.