Hello, my name is Becca Versace and you may know me from The Verge's YouTube channel or theverge.com, but as of today I no longer work there. And I'm gonna tell you why I left and I can't wait to tell you about where I'm going, but first I want to tell you why I stayed. So I started at The Verge in June of 2017. I was 23 years old and there was so much I didn't know, including how to edit video. And when I started The Verge was like chock-full.
Of creative, ambitious folks who had every resource they could imagine at their fingertips and no one to tell them no. What's up everyone? Here I am next to a shiny red car and we're gonna take for a spin.
So let's go. And this is the environment where I learned to take big risks, try pretty much anything I wanted to, and of course, nerd the F out. Whoa!
Sick! Sick! But it wasn't just... the boundless creativity and freedom that made The Verge so special. It was the people.
I met some of my best friends and greatest mentors within the first week of being there and within a few months I was traveling the world with them. Like there was this time that Alex and I had 24 hours between having to be at CES and having to be at an auto show so we jetted off to Death Valley and just ran down the sand dunes. Or when we got to go to the middle of nowhere Sweden to film at the very first IKEA.
We got to ride electric scooters in London, My first and my last. go to baseball games in San Francisco, get lost on a hike in Yosemite, drive brand new EVs all around New York, have heart-filling conversations over dinner in Copenhagen. But most importantly, we spent endless hours at our desks, like into the wee hours of the night, making silly tech YouTube videos.
Because We cared and we just wanted to make the absolute best thing that we could together. And it's you that gave me the confidence to start being on camera. This is the first video I hosted for The Verge.
Oh man, I was so nervous. Yeah, I'm nervous. You got this. And that's Phil Esposito who's directing me.
I would later win an Emmy with him. I... Becca. Be Becca. And I gotta come down.
The first few years I was hosting videos, my very best friends were behind the camera giving me notes and guidance. Don't try to set it all up right because that's not how you were sitting. I'm just trying to look good, Mel.
It looks fine. Do one that's like, but. Check this map out. Like, a tiny bit slower.
They really are the reason I am any good at being in front of the camera at all. Perfect. Beautiful. That was the best. That was literally your best take without a doubt.
Can you clap? And then when COVID happened, everything changed. Instead of making videos with my friends, I was alone in my home. And instead of every take ending with a laugh, a little bit more innovation, there was just silence. For me, The Verge lost so much of what made it special when it lost its people.
And by lost its people, I mean everybody went indoors and they stayed indoors. For example, I am someone who... who is about the places I work.
I like to get to know people, I say hi, I like to make videos with them. And now I maybe know 70% of the staff at The Verge. I mean, I'll see bylines and like, I've never heard of that person because we don't get together anymore, or I should say we didn't get together anymore. It was just faces and names on Slack. And when that happens, it's hard to Feel a connection, for me at least.
So that was a huge problem. And without being able to make stuff with my friends, I just didn't feel as creative. So I bought an A7C and I decided I was going to start making videos for myself. Hi buds, how are you? It's really good to see you here, welcome to my channel.
More on that later. The more on that later actually refers to now. Now is actually later. And I'm still using the a7c.
I love this camera. It's so incredible and so small But as soon as I posted that video I got pulled into a meeting at the verge and I was told that at any point in time They could make me take down any videos they wanted and that I shouldn't even be sure that I owned anything That was on any of my social media channels and that really scared me Because that point in time I was not looking to jump. I was also not looking to compete with The Verge.
I signed a non-compete when I started at The Verge. But I didn't feel that what I was doing was competing. Yet every time I posted a video, I lived in fear of being called into a meeting and being told that I couldn't do that. And in a weird way, it made me feel like The Verge owned me.
And that fear stayed with me for, I mean, it's still sort of... with me truthfully. But even when I announced to them that I was leaving around three weeks ago, I thought for sure, I don't know, that they were gonna tell me that I couldn't.
I don't know what I thought. I was scared. Even more so than the fear that it stoked in me, I knew for a fact that there was other folks at The Verge who were posting videos to YouTube or, I don't know, any sort of tech content to their social channels that didn't get the same talking to that I did.
And that's just not fair. Because if there's going to be a policy, it has to exist for everybody. And I didn't see that happening. The other reason I'm leaving is because everything I made for The Verge is theirs.
And I'm taking nothing with me. I owned nothing. And a lot of what was preached to us was that The Verge is great because it's its own website.
So it's not tied to any of these social platforms that could change at any time. And that's true. The Verge is a great place to Host your work.
But The Verge also owns all of your work. And that's tough. That's really tough to leave behind.
So I'm excited to build something that's mine. Because the other thing that happens to your content at The Verge is that it has a Verge logo on it. And I really love The Verge.
It does great work. But there's lots of folks that have lots of opinions about The Verge. And as long as I was making content there, that logo was going to be in front of my work.
And it was going to have an effect on how someone watching my work felt about me. For better or for worse. And of course, careful what you wish for, but I'm ready to build something that's mine.
And if you don't like it, that's okay, but it's because of me. And if you like it, that's amazing. And I hope it's because of me. And again, careful what you wish for. But if I never try, I'll never know.
And I want to try. The other thing about The Verge is that it's a website. And it is full of the written word. And I am not a writer.
I was always the kid in class that was like, hey, instead of writing the paper, can I make the video? And at The Verge, I had to make the video and write the paper. It was such a chore at times.
And I got a lot better, and I am grateful for that. But the other thing about not being a writer is that no matter how long I was there, I was never going to get the big written reviews. Because again, I don't write. So when big products came out, flagship products, I knew that there was always going to be someone else in front of me.
And a lot of times that was because they had more experience, which, totally fair, I understand that hierarchy. But there was many products that I knew really well. I know really well.
And I'm excited to have a place where I get to review them. And I don't have to wait in line or put my name in the hat and hope that someone's on vacation or doesn't feel up to doing it. The Verge is a great place full of incredible journalists.
And media at large is going through a very rough period. It's perpetually going through a rough period, if we're being honest. And I am grateful that I am in a place where I feel like I can take a step outside of that. I'm taking a big risk, and I'm really hoping it works. And if you want to support me, right now the best way is to just show up.
I appreciate you so much for doing just that. There's more to come there. I'm hoping to launch some sort of Patreon or subscription service where you can support me more directly, and we can interact in an even more meaningful way, I should say.
So look forward to something like that. But for now, what you can expect is that I'm going to keep making the videos I was making at The Verge. But I'm going to put more of me in them because this is my thing now.
It doesn't belong to a big media company. But more so than that, you can trust that we're taking tech outside. The way we use devices is not in a studio or, in this case, my bedroom, under a giant light. It's out in the world. And so I'm taking tech out there.
And I'm trying it where it will be used. And I'm going to show my work. And just know that every time you tune in...
We're going on an adventure together. I'm so excited about that. Oh, I'm so excited. And if you liked the thousand photos series, we're gonna keep doing that in some way. And if you liked my full frame series, well, full frame really just meant that it was a Becca video on the verge, so it kind of had to be branded.
So like every video is a full frame video now. I'm Becca Versace. It's like Versace, but far away.
This is my YouTube channel. Here goes nothing. Here goes nothing.
Appreciate you.