Inside JMS

Kevin Stoker

Our guest today is Ben Morse. Benjamin Morse. aka, social media guru. Comic, knowledgeable...

Dave Nourse

Aficionado?

Kevin Stoker

Aficionado.

Ben Morse

Sure.

Kevin Stoker

I mean, this is a guy that knows what it's like to to write about comics and talk about superheroes.

Ben Morse

Absolutely.

Kevin Stoker

So the first thing we need to ask him is, why is Magneto, your research subject?

Ben Morse

So yeah, I went, I went, when I came here to UNLV, I did not have a master's degree. And you Dr. Stoker encouraged me to seek one out which I appreciated. And early on, I was told that if you're going to be writing, in excess of 80 pages about something, it's got to be something that you're interested in. So I had initially my outside looking in perspective was I've got to do something very, you know, academic, and very, and then I forget who it was, he told me but someone said, Well, why don't you just do it about comics, because, you know, comics obviously, worked in comics for years. So Magneto was near and dear to me in the sense that I grew up in a Jewish suburb in Boston. And I was one of the few non Jewish kids because my, my mom was Unitarian. So I learned a lot about the Holocaust, from X Men comics, because Magneto was a Holocaust survivor. And this helped me, I felt a little like adrift when I was a kid, just in the sense that everyone around me had their shared faith. And I didn't really have that. And being able to tap into it somewhat by experiencing, experiencing that through X Men was something that always stuck with me. So when I had the opportunity to do a research project, I thought, well, Magneto and the X Men were such an incredible teaching tool. For me when I was younger, why don't I see if I can write about this and do some research about it, it turned out there was quite a bit of research already done on the subject, which is very helpful. So that's great. So So what sparked this interest in comics as a kid, um, I initially, initially it was pure, kid stuff, just like, I like the superpowers. I like the costumes. I like that. Honestly, what I was talking about is really rare came about in about 1992, the X Men cartoon series debuted, I was 10 years old. And it really struck a chord with me that I was at the right age to be exposed to something that this is not just something about superheroes, per se. It's not just Superman, saving a cat from a tree or something. There's some really interesting discussion going on here about marginalization and bigotry, and how you kind of push back against that. And I think I was always a very, even as a kid, I was very socially conscious in the sense that I was like, I want to do good in the world. And superheroes to me was, that was kind of my end, I like I wasn't surrounded by a lot of like, my, my father was in health care, which I thought was very, you know, is a noble profession. But this idea of like, making the world a better place always stuck with me, it was something I was always fascinated by was like, how do we help people? And how do we, you know, affect things greater? How do I become something greater than myself? And with superheroes, particularly the X Men, I felt like I saw that and it really attracted me. So on one level, it's like, oh, cool, they have bright red and yellow costumes. And now on another level, it was another effecting change in a positive way and actually making the world a better place.

Dave Nourse

Is there a particular storyline out of any of the comics that you have kind of paid close attention to where you really felt like okay, I kind of see myself in the storyline. Yeah, actually jumping completely over because I know ducks Joker is going to ambush me at some point anyways, and say, Why is the flash your favorite superhero? And the reason?

Ben Morse

Even though I was so into X Men, my ultimate favorite superhero was the flash. And what stuck with me was not everyone knows this. If you watch the flash TV show, it's Barry Allen, is the flash. But when I was reading comics as a kid, Barry Allen, the original Flash from DC Comics had heroically given his life back in like 1986 So I'm reading comics in the 90s. He's been dead for 10 years, and his sidekick, his nephew, Wally West, took over and always saw myself in Wally, I always saw myself because I saw myself as being like a younger person trying to live up to the expectations of the generation ahead of me, I saw that like with my parents were both incredible people who I looked up to a great deal. A lot of like uncles and stuff like that, just like I looked up to the people above me, and I really wanted to live up to their legacy. So I always connected with Wally West, on that level. And then, when I started working in comics, I was again, I was fortunate enough to get a job working at wizard magazine, right after college. And then I was at Marvel, by the time I was like, 24. So I was one of the younger people there. And I always had this this younger person trying to make a given where I ended up as a college professor, it's like spun on its head now. But I always felt like the I always felt like the kid in the room trying to prove himself. So for that reason, a lot of the Wally West flash stories, particularly, there's one called Return of Barry Allen, where it seems like his uncle comes back. But it turns out, it's really a villain impersonating him. And it's kind of a big crucible for him because it's him finally facing the fact that, oh, even though I thought I was my own man, I've really been just waiting for him to come back. And now that I know, he's not coming back, how do I kind of like forge ahead with my own identity? Well, you know, Ben gets pretty deep on. This is all I think about, you know, the thing is, we'd hired Ben from Marvel, essentially, he was the digital editor there and acclaimed had been there 10 years, and everything else and really had some fascinating experiences there. But, you know, I think it's interesting that you started out as a journalist and a writer, right, and wrote and wrote about what you knew, which was comics. Yeah. I mean, I went to school at Connecticut College, and they did not have a journalism program there. I went there, because I liked the campus, my parents encouraged me to look at other schools, I definitely probably would have had a very different path if I had gone to Syracuse, or Boston University, or some of the other places I applied to, but I was really diehard about going to this college. And once I got there, I got my English degree. But there weren't a lot of journalism classes. But journalism was what I was interested in. So I really had experience working on the school newspaper like that was, to me, the most important thing I was doing in college, was working on the newspaper. The classes were kind of as long as I could pass them, I really wanted to get experience working on the newspaper. And then when I was about to graduate, I've told all my students this story, but basically, I interned at my local paper, the Newton tab. And the difference between working on your school newspaper where you can kind of write about whatever you're interested in, versus working on the local beat, or it's kind of like, go take the minutes of the school board meeting and stuff like that. I just was like, I don't know that this is what I want to be doing with my life right now. And I had a very fateful lunch with my father, who I kind of expressed this to him. I was like, I don't know that the traditional newspaper path that I've been preparing for myself is really where I want to go. And he was the one who said, Well, you should to what you were just saying about soccer. He's like, Well, you're very passionate about comics, because you're passionate about two things. You're passionate about professional wrestling, and comics. And I don't want you doing anything with professional wrestling. So is there anything you could do with comics, and I ended up, I already at that point, I had my own website that I ran that did like comic reviews and stuff like that. And I was fortunate through the website to be connected with some of the people working, like the writer of flash had reached out to me and said, you know, if there's ever if you're ever looking for any opportunities, let me know. And so what I did was I basically I reached out to him and summer after my senior year, he said, Come out to San Diego Comic Con, like, pay your own way, figure out a way to get out here. I stayed at a hotel motel about 30 minutes away from the convention, because everything else was booked. But I met this guy, he introduced me to the people at wizard said you're into journalism, you're into comics, this is a combination of the two. And that was kind of Yeah, exactly what you said. I started out as a journalist, but a journalist covering comics, which is exactly what I wanted to be doing.

Kevin Stoker

So how did you connect? Initially connect with the writer of flash? It was kind of like, were you this kid that was kind of like, okay, I'm interested in this. I'm gonna write a letter to that person. I'm going to email him.

Ben Morse

Well, I was I was talking with suits the other day, and they were like, oh, did you just did you connect on LinkedIn? And I said, there was no LinkedIn. At this point. I know you guys are spoiled.

Have your ability to connect online, or, you know, literally what I did was the the website I ran would run reviews of different comics. And we happen to love this run on flash. So we gave very heavy praise to it. And literally just at the end of the column, it said, you know, to contact, it had my email at the bottom of the contact info. And it wasn't me reaching out, it was him reaching out to me, and actually saying, like, hey, I really appreciate, I think he was just coming up as well, he ended up being a really big deal. He actually ran DC Comics for a little while. But at the time, he was kind of on his way up. And I was, you know, trying to make my way. And it was just this confluence of him being like, you know, I appreciate the kind words, if there's ever any, this is where I learned a lot of lessons about like paying it forward. Because he was like, if, if there's anything I can ever do for you, let me know. And I tried to use that philosophy. Through my whole comics career if there was ever, you know, someone who had met on social media, or at a convention, a kid who was interested in wanting to intern, like what? One of my former interns is writing Captain America now, one of my former interns is working at MTV, doing all their social media. So I tried to make it a big thing of like, you know, if I saw someone who was younger than me, who had a passion for this, like, how can I help them because my wife hates it when I say that. This guy got me my job in comics, because he's like, You got yourself a job in comics, but I'm very, if he hadn't been kind to me, and open the door that I had to walk through, I don't think I would have had the opportunity.

Kevin Stoker

So you got into comics hero for this magazine for a few years. Yes. And then the magazine folded, right.

Ben Morse

So I got out before they folded, but they did fold soon after he read the writing. Yeah, I saw it was coming. I mean, you I mean, you could argue that they folded after I left. But I would I would contend that no, they Yeah, I was at wizard for two years. It was a great like job to have when you're 22 you go and you know, play frisbee with the guys like at lunch. And it's it's all wonderful. But then I was the Marvel contacts. And I was going into New York City every month and meeting with all the Marvel editors. And basically, they were pitch me on, you know, coverage. They were like, We want you to cover this comic and wizard. And I was there one day, and I got pulled into an office by the guy who was running the digital department who said like, hey, I need someone to run the website, do you want to come do this. And it was, it sounds like it's an easy decision, because it's Marvel. But I loved my job at wizard, I just knew to Dave's point of seeing the writing on the wall, that it was a print magazine in 2007. And they weren't making any inroads towards digital. And I just like I was like, I don't feel like this is something that's going to be around much longer. So as much as I love it, I'm going to move on. I mean, it was it was working at Marvel to start was challenging because first and foremost, I lived in New Jersey, so it was a you know, it was an hour and a half commute two ways on the train to get into New York City, where he's when I worked at wizard, I just drove 20 minutes to the office. So the commute was tough. And working for a corporate entity, as opposed to working for a magazine is very different. It was a lot more, a lot less journalism and a lot more marketing, which I didn't necessarily understand when I signed up for it. But I adjusted pretty quickly. But just the idea that I always give the example of like when I was working at wizard, if I didn't like something I would say I didn't like something. When I was working at Marvel, if I read a Spider Man comic that I didn't think was great, I still had to market it as the greatest thing in the world. And that's challenging, especially when you've got like 60 Comics coming out every week. And you've got to try to convince people like, every one of these comics is worth your you know, your money. So it was it was a shift.

Dave Nourse

We often hear about it. We've had the great pleasure of getting to work with Ben Morse for the past several years. And we know not necessarily the listeners have you know, and one of the ongoing jokes our students have is how long is it going to take for Ben mentions Mark happened just yesterday? Yeah, the question I wanted to take

Ben Morse

10 minutes. They pointed their watch and they go take you 10 minutes.

Dave Nourse

Okay, well, you know, they're holding you to it. You have a reputation to keep.

Kevin Stoker

Which class was this?

Ben Morse

This was 112 enjoyed digital and social media. It usually comes up quicker there than in podcasting. Because in podcasting, there's a lot of other experiences I can draw on. But with the digital media, it's gonna come up at some point.

Dave Nourse

So what about your experience at Marvel? You know, give us give us kind of the inside look at to as to you alluded to, while this was hard, or maybe this wasn't as easy as I initially anticipated. Somebody who loves comics is going to get to write about comics, but all of a sudden you have 60 Different comics coming at you a week and you pretend not pretend but you'll find a way to say why Each one is great. What else about that job, kind of, as you reflect back on, it really pushed you to grow, where you kind of made maybe weren't as comfortable initially, or maybe you thought you'd be really comfortable. But instead, you were like, wow, I really am surprised that I don't like doing this, or I used to not like it. But now I don't mind it as much the biggest

Ben Morse

lesson I learned early on at Marvel was being part of a machine, if that makes sense being part of a larger entity. And this was a hard lesson to learn. But it was also incredibly valuable lesson to learn, in the sense that I was coming from a small company where I was a big fish in a small pond, I could kind of do whatever I wanted. I said, I want to write an eight page article on Captain America this month. They're like, go ahead, do whatever you want. Now, suddenly, I get to marvel. And it's like, okay, so these are our priorities. These are the things that we're pushing you it's not just write about what you want to write about. And then I think the bigger lesson was, because I wasn't a marketing guy, per se, I was more of a, I was a writer. And I had to lean heavily on the PR team to kind of show me the ropes of like, alright, well, how do we morphed this journalism stuff into, you know, it's still kind of journalism on the website. But really, at the end of the day, we're trying to sell something. And I, initially, one of my best friends, he's spoke to my classes a couple of times to get into Rutan Singh. Brilliant PR guy currently works at Skybound, which is what the they put out the walking dead, but was previously at Marvel with me. And we hated each other at the beginning, because he was a PR guy. And His thing was, alright, we're announcing the new writer of Avengers. We're gonna get the most bang for our buck by going to Entertainment Weekly with this, but me head of marvel.com I'm like, Well, why aren't we breaking the story on marvel.com so we can get more eyes on the website. And moving from whatever is most important to me is not necessarily what's most important to the rest of the company, was a huge shift. But when I figured it out, and it clicked, and a ruin, and I started really getting along, and it started becoming a thing of Alright, well, if you're going to announce the new writer, Avengers and Entertainment Weekly, at the end of the Entertainment Weekly interview, can you put a blurb saying heads marvel.com, for more, and then I don't get the announcement, but I get maybe the first in depth interview, and that we were working together synergistically. That was like a huge thing. And then as he likes to point out, I ended up being not his best man. But I was ushered into rooms wedding. So we ended up working things out. He was in Vegas couple of weeks ago, we had a great chat. But I think that was the biggest thing was just learning to be. And this reflects today, because it's i i learned to be part of a team. I learned to not be like, what I need and my wants. And my desires are not the end all be all of what's going on. And I think that reflects honestly, like I even even here at GMs I feel like you know I am, I recognize that my top priority might not be in the department's best interests might not be in the school's best interests. And I've tried to make myself a more valuable team player. Because when I was 23, I was not a valuable team player. I was very selfish. And I had to learn those lessons. I learned the hard way. But I appreciate what I got out of that.

Kevin Stoker

So you know, learn to be unselfish is is that, you know, we can tie that back. The fact is you have two kids now. sweet wife, mega, and tell us about how you met her and how that how that changed you.

Ben Morse

We started dating when I was still in college. Someone asked me the other day they said oh, did you did you? Did you get your wife by use it by playing the Marvel card. And I said one she was with me before I was at Marvel two. If you've ever met her, you know she would not care. But we met in college. I'm two years older than her. I'm we started dating right at when I was about to graduate. So we were long distance for the first couple years. I was in New York, she was still in Connecticut. But she changed everything for me. You know, someone who supported me and kind of, you know, was able to achieve hated living on the east coast. But did it for 13 years, because she knew I was working my dream job. And when it came time to part ways with Marvel and it wasn't acrimonious or anything like that, but it was more of a veneer. 10 years I think I kind of want to do something else. When that came about, she was so supportive, she did immediately say could move to Vegas right away, because that's where our family is. But she really you know, kind of helped me through finding that she adjusted with me like you said, I have two kids now i i spoke at VA last week and I was talking about podcasting and I'm thinking about starting up a couple, I have a couple projects, potentially in the hopper right now, as far as new podcasts, and they someone in the crowd asks, they're like, Well, how do you balance that with, you know, school and family and all that stuff. And I go, you know, last time I started a podcast, I think I was 27. And I didn't have any kids. So it's gonna be interesting to see how this experience plays out. But I, you know, it's, it's, it's the best I was thinking the other day about the this is completely off the rails, but I was thinking about, like, best years of my life. And I was thinking back to, you know, really good times with Meghan, with Marvel, all this other stuff. But honestly, my son is going to be a year old, in about a month, you guys both know, because I texted you both from the hospital. But he's going to be a year, coming up in a few weeks. And this past year of having both kids because I feel like my family is really complete, I'd really wanted to have to, and, you know, being with Megan and, you know, settling in here to the job and everything like that. I honestly think like the last year has been one of the one of the top five, we won't say it's necessarily best, but it's up there. It's up there.

Dave Nourse

That's great.

Kevin Stoker

Well, you know, it was really fascinating. You know, how you ended up here, there, you know, I got here in fall of 2017. And the dean, I says, I need to find somebody to run our social media agency, I want to create a social media agency. And he says, how about this guide you through your resume down there, and I go, Oh, this looks interesting. It was meant to be I think, and then we brought you out in November, and you came. And keep in mind, Ben had never taught before. But Ben was this wonderful sponge, and wanted to know everything. And I really appreciated in fact, I would say that the way you learned about how to teach how to you know, it was would be a good model for anybody who wants to make that transition to teaching. Talk to us about that. Talk to us about that transition in those early days teaching and how you kind of really now you're excellent teacher, and you've hit your stride. And tell us about that, that transition into academia.

Ben Morse

So it was not a transition I was ever expecting to make, because like you said, I had never taught before. I didn't go to school for teaching, and I had no real background. But when I spoke to you, I had great conversation with the dean. I had a great conversation with you. Clark Dumont was actually the one who connected me. Initially, he had worked with my brother in law. My brother in law works at MGM. And I was kind of hitting the wall as far as I knew I wanted to be in Vegas, but I didn't know what I wanted to do job wise, because that was the hardest part of leaving. Marvel was just like, Well, what do you do as a follow up to something like that? And my brother in law said, You should talk to Clark, smart guy spoke to Clark. And he was the one who kind of put the bug in my ear. He's like, I think that they could maybe find a place for you over at the journalism school.

Kevin Stoker

Now keep in mind say tell Clark at that time, was the VP of communication at MGM.

Ben Morse

Yeah, he was. So he was I had thought lame dropper. Yeah, I thought I thought like, oh, maybe you can get me a job at MGM. Instead, he was like, No, that's not what you need to be doing. This is where you need to be. I think he could really, he thought very highly of you in the deal. And he was like, I think these guys are really, you know, you'll mesh well with them. Like you said, I came out, we figured out that it was a good fit, and that I could potentially teach from my experience. But I think the key to learning to become a good teacher was willingness to listen to everyone. And by that, I mean, you listen to everyone, and then you kind of parse through it and figure out what the good advice is. But I listened to you, I listened to people like Dave, but also some of the students. Like I said, I was like, I want to make every class kind of a discussion and understand like, what's valuable to you guys? Like what? It's going to be me talking for 20 minutes about my Marvel experiences, great. If it's gonna be me doing some legwork, and you know, doing some reading and bringing this to you guys like what can I do to make the class most valuable for you. And I definitely fell into like a lot of men when I when I started when I was here that first, that first winter. And I remember just being like, three weeks straight, just making my syllabus and just like trying to plan out every element of everything, like we're gonna have a test here. We're gonna have a paper here and I'm gonna talk about this here and talk about this there. And it was probably like, two semesters in a lot of guidance from students. A lot of guidance from you guys. That got me more to the point of, it's good to have a broad outline of what you want to do. But you should allow for things to kind of develop on their own. So I became a lot less rigid. And I think that's like the new teacher thing, though, I think when you when you're a new teacher, particularly at the college level, you just get overwhelmed with, the more I can throw at these guys. And the more I can plan, the better I'll do. And what I've learned is having just like, I know, these are the things I want to do, the way I get there will be kind of determined by what kind of class it is, what the students are, like, you know, how receptive are they to conversation, and just stuff like that. So I feel like it's about, it's about listening. It's about adaptability. And it's about accepting that if someone gives you constructive criticism, it's not the end of the world, it's actually an opportunity to improve, which is like the most valuable thing you can get in this job.

Dave Nourse

Well, I can attest that none of Ben's students actually like him

Ben Morse

now. Yeah, they're there. Oh, they're

Dave Nourse

usually lined up out his door. And he's talking, he's talking to them after class in between classes, it's, it's really great watching your interactions with your students, because it's clear that they like you, as a professor, it's clear that you also have developed a relationship with them, where you really see them, right, you get to know them kind of at, at, at, at the level where they are at, and to the point where you talk about kind of that philosophy of, you know, kind of what the outcome of the class is going to be, you know, you eventually want to get from A to Z, right. But that path isn't necessarily set in stone. So the way in which you do that can really be molded, based upon the students that you have, and kind of what's the dynamic like inside the classroom, so on and so forth. And the students I feel like really responded well to that. Ben, Kevin talked to us a little bit about one of the reasons he was looking at you specifically to come to UNLV was to start up our digital and social media agency, right. And we call it RMG rebel Media Group. For folks who are listening to the podcast that aren't familiar with our mg, maybe talk to us a little bit about, what is it? What do you guys do? And you've been running it for five years now. So

Kevin Stoker

So talk about your evolution? Yeah,

Dave Nourse

we'd love to hear about kind of really how this has developed over those five years.

Ben Morse

I mean, it's been literally I'd never done anything like it. I don't think any of us have done anything like it, I got a lot of good guidance. early on. I remember, we went to BYU, and you sent me to Oklahoma. And I got a lot of good guidance early on about like what this could potentially be. But what I always liken it to was when I'm pitching it to students is I say, you know, when I was in college, I did the college newspaper, because I thought I wanted to get a job working for a newspaper. Here, we're fortunate to have K Monday, we're fortunate to have UNLV. TV, that if you want to do these things, like if you want to be a broadcaster, if you want to work in radio, TV, the best way for you to get prepared to do that is to actually do it in college. And Kevin made a very good point when I got here that we didn't have that for the students who were like, you know, I maybe want to work in social media, I want to work in digital media. So the idea of RMG was, how do they get experience doing the things they're going to do, you know, out in the real world, while they're still at college. And the evolution I would say, was just that, when I started, I didn't know what I was doing. So it was a lot of hand holding. And it was a lot of kind of, alright, well, I'm going to give you guys this real client, but I'm going to be over your shoulder constantly, because I don't want I was running more like a business than I was running at, like a learning opportunity. And I think that was like, the biggest thing I learned was, it is in some ways a business. I mean, we make money, and we have real clients who if we let down, they're going to fire us. So we do have to run it somewhat like a business. On the other hand, my staff consists of, you know, 20 year olds who are learning as they go, and if I'm every step of the way micromanaging them, they're not going to learn anything. And the whole point of rebel Media Group is for them to learn something. So I think the most valuable thing I've learned over the last five years is how to strike that balance between running a business responsibly, but also allowing my students to kind of a fail, but learn. And a big part of that has been finding the right clients. And a lot of times we've had clients who have been not the best fit, because they come in expecting professional level work, which is great. But at the end of the day, I've got you know, 30 college students who are not necessarily going to be able to give you the same experience you'll get from a full service agency, or that's all they're doing. 24/7 These guys also go to school, you know, they also have jobs like they have a lot of stuff going on. So finding the right clients who are like, Hey, we understand we're getting kind of a bargain. As far as the financials, like you're not charging us what a professional agency would charge, but we also understand that we're taking on college students are going to kind of like learn in the process. The best clients are the ones who want to be interacted with the students who want to like have weekly calls with them, and basically be like, Oh, no, this is what you're doing wrong. This is what I would like differently. Like, that's the best clients. And I think we've really, after five years of doing it found like a really good sweet spot of that, it means taking a lot more of UNLV clients. So we might be working with a Department of Criminal Justice, or we might be working with Student Affairs, those are usually the ones that I find work best, I think the thing we're still trying to figure out is how to best forge the same relationship with external clients. Because we've had a lot of external clients. But it feels like after a while, a lot of times what happens is where they're their starter agency, and they'll stick with us for a year or two, and then they'll move on to a professional agency, which is fine. But I'm still kind of finessing that. And honestly, the biggest challenge, I tell everyone, that's the biggest challenge of running rebel Media Group is if you have a social media agency, typically, you are building up your staff, and then you're training that staff, and then you're running with that staff, as long as you can, my staff turns over every three months. So I can put a lot of time into training these guys. But I've got to make sure that I'm also having them train, you know, the people are going to follow them. And it's just like that churn is the most difficult thing to deal with. But it's also kind of nice, because I get to work with a lot of different people and you know, get exposed to different things.

Kevin Stoker

And they've been letting you know, when they get jobs as well, yes,

Ben Morse

I've been, that's the best part of my job is getting the emails from our alumni who are now out working. And we've had literally, I mean, we've probably had at this point, hundreds of students come through RMG. And there are so many incredible success stories, so many that are working in social media professionally now, and they'll keep me posted. And it's just a wonderful thing. I don't even like you know, when. And you know, what's cool, too, is that a lot of them have kept in contact with each other. So they'll get each other jobs, or they'll work somewhere and they'll always and then they'll tell me they're like, oh, yeah, we tell all our co workers like we read, we met through this thing. RMG. And it was this great thing we got to do in college. And you know, that's always nice to hear and the fact that they're successful, and they'll say, going back to kind of what I said, where I was always like, Oh, I owe this guy my career in comics. They'll say like, oh, yeah, I totally owe you, I wouldn't have my job without you. And Negan is quick to every time I say, oh, this person said they would another job without me. She's like, they got their job. She's like, she's like you, you helped. She's like you didn't do it. She's like, stayed, they call

Dave Nourse

you do have a very supportive wife, she's the best keeps

Ben Morse

me very grounded. She keeps me very grounded.

Dave Nourse

Ben and so you think about the classes that you teach, and podcasting and digital and social media, what excites you about this field right now.

Ben Morse

Um, what excites me the most about digital and social media is what has always excited me the most about digital and social media. And that's the ability to we talked about it earlier, the ability to connect with people who are not necessarily they might not be geographically close to you. But that's just this, this this opportunity to bring the world kind of closer together. The fact that if I love comics, I can talk to, you know, so many people who are passionate about the same thing I'm passionate about. And I also think for the students from their perspective, going back to what they said about the whole LinkedIn thing, the fact that they can use social media to gain employment too, I always tell him I go, the thing you should be doing is what is the job you want, find out who's doing it right now. And then find them on social media, because odds are, you will be able to connect with them. And odds are, they are going to want to help you believe it or not like these, these people who have been doing this for a few years are flattered when a college student reaches out to them and says, you know, I admire what you're doing. I want to learn how to do it. So I just, I think that level of connection is very exciting. I also talk a lot in my digital media class about kind of the future of digital literacy. And I think that this next upcoming generation is going to be a lot better than necessarily our generation not to bag on our generation. But I think a lot of the problems that we discussed in class dealing with fake news and information pollution and stuff like that. I think these guys are a lot more savvy, because they grew up with this stuff. And there are a lot more they'll pay attention like my you know, my father might believe the first thing he clicks on, because he remembers a day when you can kind of trust any new source. But a lot of my students are a lot more discerning. They're gonna go look at point counterpoint, and different sources, which I think they're better about. That's my hope, at least that's my hope for the future is that we're headed in the right direction.

Kevin Stoker

And we should mention that you wrote the book about this.

Ben Morse

Yes at your prompt As I wrote, so last summer, I'm fond of saying that my son was born in May. And then I had my third child, which was a textbook in July. It was supposed to be done in June. But I got a little bit thrown off. But yeah, I did write a digital textbook on digital and social media. I'm super proud of it. It's available digitally, through top at my collaborator, and I'm actually looking forward to hopefully, getting in there and changing some stuff this summer. Because the thing about digital media and the thing, the reason I think it was so savvy is to have a digital textbook, as opposed to a hardbound textbook is that really this should be changing every semester, because obviously, the landscape of things like Twitter and Tiktok, completely changed in the last three months. And they change every three months. So I want to be able to give the most up to date information. And really, you know, give it give an accurate depiction of what's going on in digital media. But I love my textbook. And it's great. I'm a big fan.

Kevin Stoker

That's great. Well, you also teach podcasting. I guess, the last question I'd be interested in knowing about is, so you did get your Masters while you're there. And tell me about that experience and how that may have changed you.

Ben Morse

i When I was younger, I always wanted to get my master's. And I think the thing that stopped me from doing it was the thing I think, stops a lot of people right after you graduate undergrad where it's just the sense of, I've been in school for so long, I want to go and get a job, I can come back to this later. And getting my master's degree at the age I got it with the kind of the interesting experience of having professors like yourself, who were also my colleagues during the day, and then at night, I was taking classrooms from you from Ben burrows from a bunch of people and then also being in class with some of my former students. Like I remember Brittany Barksdale was in my class with me. And she had just graduated. And we would do group projects together. And she would just kind of look at me like, What do we do next professor? And I'm like, No, we're both students are on the same level. I'm not doing all the work. But I loved the opportunity to teach during the day. And then at night, getting these incredible discussions with people with what I always tell people about the master's program, specifically here, Janice, was you get to talk about stuff you love and are passionate about with people who feel the same way for like, several hours a week. And I'm like, and that's just the best. Like, you can't replicate that. Like, you're not, you might get to that especially I was fortunate, like when I started working in comics, I was around a bunch of other 20 year olds who also loved comics. And we talked about comics all the time. To me, the master's program was as close as I can get in my 30s and 40s, to that experience that I had in my 20s of just being immersed in something that I love. And I could go and I could talk about Magneto for three hours, or I could you know, debate with someone about digital media. And I was always whenever like there would be these classes where people would just be bagging on how social media was destroying the world. And then they'd remember that I was there. And I remember Greg Miller always used to be like, Oh, Ben, do you want to speak on behalf of digital media? I'm like, Sure, no problem. And then I would, you know, give my spiel, but it was cool. It was it was fun. It was a great experience. And I'm looking to continue my education. It's not something I thought I would necessarily be doing. Like when I was five years deep at Marvel. I didn't think I would be coming out and going back to school. But it's been an incredible experience. And I'm looking forward to continuing on with it.

Dave Nourse

Great. Anything we didn't ask you, Ben about yourself?

Ben Morse

No, you got everything. All right.

Dave Nourse

Anything, anything that that we should ask on behalf of Meghan. Before we let

Ben Morse

you go, Well, you Dave, you know what it's like to get in trouble with Oh, yeah, you've been in her dog. He's been in the doghouse with nagging before. So now I think it's all good. I mean, I'll end on the note I said earlier, where I just feel like personal life, professional life. Everything has been great for me. I'm actually grateful to both of you for helping me so much with this journey. And I'm just thrilled to be here. And hopefully someone got something out of this podcast. I know that like I told you guys when I told my mom this morning that I was going to be talking about myself for an hour. She said oh good, your favorite thing. So hopefully someone other than just me enjoyed the experience.

Kevin Stoker

Well, we enjoyed it. And it it was great to have you thanks for joining us Ben.

Ben Morse

My pleasure.