Programming Lions

Ep.88 The Protest Playbook: Mobilizing For Causes w/ Adam Swart

• Matt Morstad • Episode 88

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In this episode of the Programming Lions podcast, we dive deep into the world of organized protests with Adam Swart, founder of Crowds on Demand. Founded in 2012 while he was a student at UCLA, Adam's company specializes in advocacy campaigns, PR stunts, business launches, and more. Discover how nearly all protests are funded and include paid participants, and learn about the strategies and logistics that go into organizing these events. Adam also discusses the dynamics of political protests, the involvement of media, and the intriguing world of professional agitators. If you've ever wondered how protests work behind the scenes, this episode is a must-listen!


Website: https://crowdsondemand.com

X: https://x.com/ceoadamswart


TIMELINE

00:00 Intro

01:08 The Role and Impact of Crowds on Demand

01:48 Bipartisan Nature of Crowds on Demand

02:56 How Protests are Organized and Funded

06:03 Challenges and Strategies in Protest Organization

12:00 Client Relations and Ethical Considerations

18:42 Balancing Optimism and Realism in Business

20:03 Media's Role in Amplifying Protests

22:47 Social Media Influence and Trolls

28:06 Professional Protesters and Agitators

34:52 Funding and Legitimacy of Protests

37:03 Conclusion and Final Thoughts

Welcome to the Programming Lions podcast. Have you ever seen a protest on television and wondered. How does this work? Who funds this thing? Well, we get a treat for you. Adam Swart joins us today. He founded Crowds on Demand as a college student at UCLA in 2012 because he understood the power of a crowd to shape people's perceptions. His campaigns have helped secure multi-billion dollar agreements shape public policy and more. Adam helps clients advocate for important causes, build their businesses, settle disputes, or amplify their message when their other strategies have fallen short. If you're curious how these protests get organized, funded, you are gonna love this. So let's get into it.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

Adam, welcome to the Programming Alliance podcast. We're excited to have you on, founder of Crowds on Demand. And so this is a really interesting topic, how some of this is done and coordinated and funded. And so we got a lot of questions for you today. But first of all, like just welcome to the show. You wanna give us a couple of minutes about your background?

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Yeah. Hey, thanks guys. Pleasure to be on the show. Little bit about my company. Crowds on man, largest protest company in the country. Probably the world we are have been around for 13 years. So about the age of your oldest son over there. You were just a baby When I got this thing started in 2012 when I was a college student. We specialize in advocacy campaigns. That's probably what we're best known for. Putting together protests, demonstrations, but we also do PR stunts, business launches, product launches, kind of clever marketing and advertising type campaigns. Anything to get the right sort of attention for a business or for a cause.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

Mm-hmm. And your clients, are they bipartisan type type of clients and a little bit of everything or what? What's that like?

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Sure. So we are bipartisan. Now, we would never work the same, like different sides of the same issue or campaign of course. So, but we. We'll work with, I mean, I'm an independent person. My history was definitely more on the Democrat side, but I would definitely consider myself a political independent at the moment. And I think there are areas where both sides make sense and I. In those areas, we'll work with those customers. And where I see a winning campaign now, I don't have to a hundred percent agree with something to take it on. Think of it as if you're hiring a lawyer. Hopefully the lawyer believes in you, but they don't need to agree with you a hundred percent.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

Correct. Correct. Okay. Mm-hmm. That makes sense. Alright, well we looked at some of the, I know you've been highlighted in some you know, news channels and everything lately. We saw some of that and anyway, the boys came up with some, I think, clever questions, so we'll look at, well, I guess we'll get right into it. Yep. So, I heard that since you have the crowds on demand, right. So, how basically does the left like weaponize protests. Yeah.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

So basically both sides use protest effectively, but the left probably uses it more. Still a little history about the left, right? The left is naturally more what a I call an oppositional movement. So they're generally meant to be sort of fighting the power, right? Have you guys heard that slogan fight the power? Right? So naturally. Protests are gonna work more to the benefit of the left. I mean, and, and that's not necessarily a bad thing. So like, maybe just a little bit of how I see the left versus right in America. So if you guys have ever seen football players doing sled push drills, right? You see them pushing this giant sled with this person on top of it oftentimes, right? The people pushing the sled are the liberals. They're trying to move society forward. The people trying to, people standing on the sled are conservatives. They're saying, Hey, let's think carefully about what we're doing to make sure we're not going too far or pushing too fast. Right? What happens sometimes is that when there's no one. Sitting on the sled. So no one's saying, whoa, wait a second. Then things move too quickly. And then there's like a MAGA type movement emerges of like a reactionary conservative to say, whoa, we've gotta move things to, we've gotta totally reverse things. So like, an example of this is this whole kind of trans, the gender sort of debate. I know you kids are in school, like I didn't know how much this factors in to the school, but a lot of people. Kind of like, Hey, we, for it started with saying, Hey, we should be accepting of people who are different, which I think is 100% critical. But then that goes into, oh, someone says they're a boy, but they're, they're a girl, and vice versa. And now it's like, oh, we don't have to ask the parents if we're doing gender transition. So that's an example of, and conservatives were nowhere to be found when these changes were happening. So then it, it creates this reaction. So it's all kind of a long answer to your excellent question about protest movements, which is that the left often does better when it's pushing against something. Like we're against the Iraq war, we're against, invasions of liberty, right? We're against the, wiretapping, domestic wiretapping. More so than when it's in power, so that they've been able to use protests very effectively in that way. Conservatives are more likely to kind of have other responsibilities that get in the way of them participating in protests.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

Mm-hmm. Yeah, I think that makes sense. That that's a good explanation. I am curious who kind of like, like who exactly funds the protests? I. If, if you have people or like makes the message or whatever, right? Like who, like makes the whole design of how it works and things. And three, do you like have people, do you like hire people to come or like, do you have like social media things that reach out to people saying, Hey, come here.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Okay, cool.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

it work?

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Yeah. I'll answer it one by one. So first, who hires it? Typically, someone who has. A cause that's important to them. And it could be important to them for multiple reasons. It's, it could be because they're just a very wealthy person who is funding something that is of personal importance to them, right? Or it could be someone who has a financial incentive, right? If you are a business that. There's the government is contemplating a policy that might put you out of business or hurt your business. You might wanna push back against that policy. So you might really have an incentive to put a lot of money into protests to stop that policy. You ask, how we organize is we have a, I mean, we've been around for 13 years, so we have a lot of people we know already. But we always try to recruit people who are going to be passionate about the subject matter and informed, right? So if we're doing an event that is saying, Hey, that you're gonna build this big power plant that is gonna cause a lot of pollution, then we would have environmentalists doing this. If we're saying we want to push for police funding because we wanna have safe streets. We would've, people who support the police, maybe people who've been part of their neighborhood watch, right? So we often proactively reach out to people who we think are going to be really good advocates for the cause. Because what I want is anyone who's coming by and you see a protest, you are gonna look at the people and say. Who are you? Right? What are you doing here? What's your story? And can you convince me? And if we don't hire good people, then no one's gonna be convinced. And ultimately the client is wasting their money.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

Yeah. So do you hire people to like come there or do you just reach out and say, Hey, do you wanna come?

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

We typically, we, so the way that we do things is we typically compensate people for attending, right? And that provides a significant benefit. To the client because how, how many times have you said you're going to an event and then you don't go to an event? Right, so the reality is it's very challenging. A lot of times you might see a hundred people say, I'm gonna, especially if you're not even RSVPing to someone who you know, well, a friend, but maybe someone you don't know well and you say you're, oh, I'm really interested in protesting. But okay, actually I have soccer practice that day, so I can't come out.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

How do you know that they went or not? Did they, you have to get some kind of verification that they

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

It's a good question. We have a supervisor on site at every one of our events, so we send people in and sign people out. And we we pay people for coming. It's not because they don't agree with the cause, but if you think about it, I could hire or I think doctors are really passionate about saving people's lives, but they don't work for free. Right. Talk show hosts are very passionate. If you're Tucker Carlson, I think he's very passionate about his views, but he doesn't work for free. Right. So I think there's been this expectation that a protest that people should just spend hours of their lives on a protest for free. And I don't think that makes sense. And it also prevents a lot of people who may have, may need to. Work hard to earn money every single day from actually going out for a protest that they believe in, but they couldn't afford to go to.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

Mm-hmm. What's like the average amount of protesters that you guys hire to come?

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

That's a very good question. The average is probably about 25 to 50. Sometimes it's about 50 to a hundred. It's, it's, it's in that range. But a lot of people think most of what we do is thousands and thousands. We do that, but that's more the rarity. Because it's very expensive. Sometimes we'll actually just have like a single protester outside somewhere. We've had people, places where it's literally like one guy, two guys for like a year at a time, but they're just holding a sign and as a way to keep a presence every single day. So it's as little as one, it's as many as thousands, but certainly in the sort of 25, 50, a hundred ranges is typical for us.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

Do you do both? Like both protests for rights for right and left like liberals and conservatives?

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Yes, but again, but not on the same issue, right? We would never work on the same side of the same issue. So let's just say. You are having a dispute between unions. So like a union is, is like a group of employees who get together and are advocating for more pay, more benefits. Right. Versus management who wants to make more money, wants the company to do really well. So they're, they're always at odds. Right. And typically unions are left and management is right. But we've worked with unions and we've worked with management right. That not on the same issue, but in some cases the unions are right, like about bathroom breaks. I think it's important to be able to use the bathroom when you want at a job, and some employers don't.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

it's like most things in life, there's, there's good points on both sides and well,

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Correct.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

I don't think people see that as much. But have

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Correct.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

had a situation, this is, and you don't have to give away too much secret sauce here, but a couple of like detailed questions. ever had a situation where the opposing parties both contact you for help and then like you have

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Yeah,

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

one of'em and say, Hey sorry, we're, we're busy.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

it does actually happen crazily enough. That does happen.'cause we're well known enough that does happen. But what I'll say is typically the first person to, assuming that I don't, that I don't find one of them repulsive. Right. So. Because if I found one of them repulsive, then I wouldn't consider working with them regardless, assuming it's a situation like a union and management dispute where I'm like, okay, well it could go either way. Right? Then typically the first to lock down the contractor the most compelling, but I would never share. Personal details of one with another, right? So we're under no obligation to do that like an attorney is, right? If you contact an attorney, even if they don't work with you, they can't share what you shared with them. But with us, we're not attorneys, but we still abide by that code and it benefits us to do that because we wouldn't be in business 13 years if people felt like they're contacting us and we would divulge their information.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

able to trust you. Right. And so that kind of begs a, another question in terms of the people or the, let's say the database of individuals that you work with. How do you build that database? And then do you maintain it? Is it, or is it a database of people? And then it shows like sort of their interest levels in environmental causes or different causes. And then when you have an event come up and it's environmental as, as the example I just mentioned, you do a query for that. Highlight, you know, environmental, and then those names come up and then you reach out to them. And, and how does that work? And do you reach out to them through a certain, like email? What, what kind of means do you reach out or do you have an app or? Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

people are always changing. It's constantly changing. And someone who might have been active and working for us two years ago, if something else that now it works better in like bigger cities where we're constantly doing things like New York, la, San Francisco, Miami. Right. Let's just say we have someone in Omaha, Nebraska. We do some stuff over there, but not every day. So we might have had someone who worked for us six months ago, they might have other things to do now, but we definitely have those lists.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

Well, how are protests kind of coordinated these days? Like is it like kind of just like. I like you, you get a text and or like an email and then you're just like, all right, I'll send out like 50 guys over there. And then,

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Yes.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

do they, certain stuff like.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Well, kind of like you described, by the way, kind of like you described, where we'll get it. Like prospective customer, potential customer will reach out to us and say, Hey Adam or hey crowd zone man, we are interested in doing an event, right? We wanna protest and we want it done like three days from now. And here's the cause we'll assess and make sure that it's in line with our values and. Assuming that it works with values and works on a budget standpoint. Sometimes they'll say, we want a thousand people, but I'll say, guys, that's gonna be really expensive. You probably get what you're looking done with 50 people. Right? And then we'll kind of go back and forth on the price a little bit, like in any other business, right? People often think about if you're building a home, you tell the contractor, I want a beautiful home and I want it done for a hundred thousand dollars. The. Contractor will be like, well, it's gonna cost a little more than that, you know, and you go back and forth. So it's kinda like that because a lot of people will come with wanting thousands and we could kind of convince'em that you don't actually need quite as many as you think, but then we'll deploy the, then we have to decide on the signs, and then we have to decide on the location. And and then we have everybody meet typically in advance. I think your question was about the specifics of how, and so we have typically have how we meet in advance, sign in, kind of get pepped up, right? Like you would get Pepped up for a sports competition, right. And get really excited about the cause and their shared interest in the cause, and then kind of march over to where the, where the location is.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

Okay. And so you, you also help facilitate things like making signs and the messaging around the event as well. Like what are the

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Yes,

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

or phrases that we wanna highlight as part of the event? Is that all kind of part of the protest strategy?

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

that's correct. We do. We do all of that. Now, in some cases, the client will more or less come in and say, I have all of that already done. We just need you for the people. But I would say in more cases than not, I. They're coming in at an initial stage and saying, this is our cause. Help us get it all done. Of course, like in any other thing, the result isn't guaranteed. What I try to do now that I've been doing this for 13 years is. Be as open as possible with my projections for what is or is not attainable. Like if you're coming in and saying, I wanna pass a bill through the United States Congress and get it signed, and my budget, it is like enough to do one rally, I'd probably say I, I don't think that's enough. Because what you're asking for is a multimillion dollar endeavor. Right? So part of it is setting expectations with the client.'cause I always try to avoid that situation of where the client's not happy with our work. But part of that is actually even saying no to some business where the client might be unrealistic based on the budget that they have. Almost anything is accomplishable with. A budget and enough patience though really, truly anything is a.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

will you then, just like if they're saying if then like they're saying that like they want to, as you just said, your example of like passing a bill through Congress and they don't have enough for one rally, but you think they should need more, would you then just say, you shouldn't do this and just like turn down their offer

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

I guess the way that I would That's a very good, that's actually a very good business question. Wow. Okay. This is the challenge of being a business owner is you have to, you wanna be optimistic to your customers, but not. Delusively, so, so what I will typically say is, I don't believe this rally will accomplish your intended goal, but if ultimately you, what you want from the rally is more visibility, where maybe you can bring in more people who will fund. A few more rallies and then those people will take it to the next level and to the next level. Then it's doable. As long as they are okay with the idea that this one rally probably isn't gonna get a bill through Congress, but rather might stimulate more conversation around the subject, which could indirectly lead to that. Then, then it's fine. But I generally would be pretty candid with them. And if they're saying, okay, I still wanna do it, then, then that's fine.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

Yeah. So kinda just like open communication leads to

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Yes.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

sort of expectation setting and all that? Yeah. How can like the, like a party or like, oh, all of that. Like how can they control like the media, like if they're doing it so then people will like come or something.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Well, certainly media plays a lot into it, what media does is media can grow a protest and media can make a protest look bigger than it's, I think what you're getting at is I. Left wing media boosts left wing causes, right wing media boost, right wing causes. So for example, the Tea Party. Which was 2009 and 10, right? Is a very, was a very big movement, especially in Arizona where a lot of people were really upset with President Obama's policies, right? So the Koch brothers, these very wealthy conservatives among others, funded these demonstrations. But the initial demonstrations. We're fairly small. They were 50 people, a hundred people dressed like Revolutionary War people like Revolutionary War enactment, people kind of saying the government's taxing us too much, et cetera. But Fox News, which is the sort of conservative media outlet, cover these protests a lot. And then they grew and a lot more people came and it. The liberal media, like if you look at this, these protests under the Trump administration, so over the past few months, a lot of them started with a couple hundred people. But then M-S-N-B-C-C-N-N, all of the liberal media is covering it. So then it's gonna get more people see. We humans go where other humans are. Right? Do you wanna go to a restaurant that's empty or do you want to go to a restaurant that's popular? Most people wanna go to a restaurant that's popular. So it's the same thing with a protest. If you're out there seeing this is a big thing, then you want to come. If you're out there and you think, okay, this is kind of lame, then you might not want to come.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

Well, and I suppose part of your package or toolkit is media communication.'cause you'll want to have media there to blow, blow things up and, and bring presence and all of that to a,

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Yeah.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

That you're representing.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

That's correct. Not in all cases. Some cases, this is simply a business to business dispute without necess need for media coverage. For example, certain businesses that are trying to collect unpaid bills from other businesses, right? Not necessarily a media issue, but. Yeah, and, and by the way, media, doesn't always have to be national media. There's a lot of, you might do a local protest with 25 people and get on the local news or the local paper. So it's not all about Fox, CNN, M-S-N-B-C, that kinda level. It's sometimes just very local level stuff.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

I'm curious because you, or you know, you do this thing, but it's like in real life it's, we find that on our channel, and Dad actually has an interesting theory about this, he claims it's kinda like a hive, right? Where like there's one person that has it and then like suddenly a bunch of other people come on and they also sometimes try to attack our stuff, right? Saying mean things and stuff in the comments. So I'm curious, do you, do you think that there's like other types of things that can do the same thing as you, but on the media? On social media? Yeah, social media. I think that the, If I was to say it slightly differently, it's, are there organizations that do the same thing on social media to suppress or boost certain type of content on media? I,

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Absolutely.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

I feel like we've seen it, so it's, but I'm not sure.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. And a lot of it, unfortunately, a lot of it on social media, it's not even boosted. It's just very bored, lonely, unhappy people who spend too much time on there and who see someone doing something that's cool and they wanna take'em down. Right. Which I think is just lame. Like, I mean, it's why I think people should be careful. With social media I wanna answer your question, which is do people do this? Yeah. I mean, it's something we've really shied away from for two reasons. Just a business case. It's just kind of. Difficult to do. It's not as inexpensive as you'd think because the social media companies have cracked down on creating like the bot kind of accounts. So actually harder to do than you'd think. So it actually costs more money than our clients would actually like, be willing to pay. So there is practical side of it, whereas like people are, well understand that you have to pay for protesters in the street, but to actually like. If you actually quantified how much it would cost for like mean comments or whatever, it just doesn't make sense as a business. I think there are people who do it, not as a business, but just like for hate and, you know.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

I think I've seen it a couple ways. I I think there are these click farms where

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Yeah.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

low, low cost regions have a

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Package.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

and they are instructed to go and

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

It's true.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

certain things or boost certain type of content or suppress other, or ratio other type of content. And it's definitely an interesting world'cause we've had some, let's just say edgy. content, and we'll see almost like a coordinated effort come in. In fact, a couple of people have forwarded messages to me that, that have distribution group, our post, and then it says raid this post keywords, you know, da, da, da. so I don't know if it's a paid thing or if it's just they're organized about how they wanna boost and suppress different information. But I imagine there's organizations that do that out there. Huh?

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Definitely, definitely. But you know what? If they, if you are a target of organizations, I always say you should be flattered if they're coming after you because it, like no one comes after someone who's not making a difference. You know, people only, I. Come after people who they think are effective. So I always say that it's like, you know, don't, don't worry about that, but how do you ki like, how do you like kids feel about, like, some people's writing mean comments about you guys? Like, do you feel like, is that hurtful or are you able to shrug that off and say they're just kind of losers?

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

Off. I'm able to shr it off. Off. Yeah. My mom has a very interesting phrase. She calls them pathetic, low lifes.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

That's true.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

so we don't, yeah, we don't really care. It's not if, like, if we meet them in real life, just like if we see, see somebody bad online, they're gonna, if we see somebody bad online and like we see in real life, we won't go up to and be like. I hate you. Right. They, so they probably wouldn't do the same thing to us, especially when they see that like, you know, it's just two children walking on the street and they're just like, oh, I hate you. Yeah,

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Very true. And they wouldn't by the way, and they would never, but that's what I think I agree with your mom makes them kind of pathetic, is they wouldn't ever do that in person. Like they only would do it behind this screen. Like to me, if you're willing to actually put your name on it and say, Hey, this is what I don't like about your program. Here's my challenge to you. Okay? That's legitimate dialogue. Let's talk. But if you're just gonna write something nasty, you would never say that to my face. By the way, I've had this happen where I've actually called people sometimes who write me hate mail. I'll call them and be like, how do you feel about that? Like, let's talk about it. Let's talk. Felt the need to write something so rude about someone you don't know.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

We've had a lot of critics and similarly I've entertained interactions with some of the critics and doing them live on our channel, on our show. And

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Wow.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

ends up that we see more things in common than we don't it. That's what's

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Yes.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

interesting. There's always nuance in things. And so when you put out, for example, a 32nd clip on something, it doesn't capture all of the. Background or depth of the issue. And so you find, usually when you talk through things and give people an understanding, you, you're, there's a lot more common ground. So, but I have another question that about the protesting, protesting movement and the people that do this, are there people that. Live in cities that have a lot of opportunity to do this, that are essentially just professional protesters. Like this is, they just wait for the next gig. They get ready for it, and they will morph into whatever they need to do. Do you have people like that that are part of the, I guess like force?

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Well, I guess it's a complicated question because some of our campaigns last for a long time. So those campaigns will sometimes involve the same people who really get to know an issue very well in regards to somebody who, like one day they show up to BLM, another, they show up to Greenpeace, another, they show up to Palestine. I mean, we tend to shy away from that just because some of those people are a little bit volatile characters.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

I imagine.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

I think a lot of these people, class that I think people should be more worried about is what I call kind of professional agitators, they attach themselves to anything, right? Left, like they were at BLM, they were there January 6th. They were there at every single time where they see chaos because they see is an all they, they're actually just violent sociopaths, psychopaths, arguably. And they just wanna create havoc and violence, right? So they don't, the issue is actually just provides them the cover to do the thing that they want to do, but they would burn down a house or a police station no matter what the, cause Those are the people who are truly, truly depraved individuals. But they're not even doing it for the money though. They're actually doing it because they're, they're psychopathic people.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

Do they get funded somehow? Like are there dark organizations that fund

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Yeah.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

like that?

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Yeah. There, there. I think there are, and I'll tell you how it works. So, do you guys know what a Russian doll is? These are like little dolls that fold into bigger dolls that fold into

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

yeah. Oh yeah. Yeah. We've seen those.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

so, so think about it this way. At the center is the littlest doll. That's like, let's just say some billionaire who's funding something and there's a bunch of layers. Maybe the billionaire has like a foundation. The foundation gives money to a nonprofit group. The nonprofit group gives money to a corporation. The corporation gives money to another group, and then that other group gives cash to someone to throw a malt, all of cocktail or whatever or do something violent. That provides a huge benefit on both sides of the equation because that agitator doesn't want to think that they're working for a billionaire who has some other motivation, right? The billionaire has what's called plausible deniability. Now, don't use this kids to get away with something in school or something, but plausible deniability is the idea of saying it's a belief, somewhat believable excuse that they didn't know what was gonna happen, right? So the billionaire says, well, I never ordered this, right? So there's, there's no evidence. The billionaire says, let's just say. I'm really upset about Tesla. I'm a billionaire. I say I'm really upset about Tesla, right? I'm allocating$20 million to fund programs to raise awareness about Tesla, right? My people take it from there, right? They understand what I mean. Just like when a mafia, Dawn gives an order. His people understand what that means, right? But again, not accusing any individual of any legal wrongdoing because this practice is legal because this person has enough layers between them and that other person to, to insulate them, right? So, so in some cases, I do think that these are planned, but it's very hard to prove because these people didn't get to be billionaires by not covering their tracks, right?

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

Yeah, that's, yeah, it's very suspicious, but it's, I, I imagine, that happens. And so, well good on you for staying out of that mess. But it does, it does seem that some of that happens because you see these violent events unfold in similar ways, frequently, and yeah, it's.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Happening, by the way, guys, is with, I used the Tesla example because. The biggest ones is where there's a ton of money on the line. So Tesla, right? There have been people who've like done violent acts to Tesla owners and to Tesla, like vandalism and all of that. And I, again, not accusing any individual or firm in particular, but I do believe, and there's more evidence that just came out today, we're in late April today just came out. I said this like. Two months ago on Newsmax I said, I suspect Tesla short sellers are behind this push. So what a short seller is, is someone who makes money, not when the stock goes up, but when the stock goes down. it's like betting for like on a team to lose a game, right? So basically these guys have been losing. Tens, hundreds of billions of dollars because overall the stock has gone up even like over the years. I mean, it's been a rollercoaster, but overall been going up and these guys are really pissed at. Tesla, right? But these guys aren't political. They're not Republican or Democrat, but they see an opportunity with Elon Musk and his affiliation with Trump and they say, okay, let's do this boycott, right? Let's do these, this broader campaign, because by taking down. Musk, right? We're taking down Tesla, and then if Tesla, if people don't buy Teslas, then the stock goes down, then they make money and it's actually worked very well. So there's, there's a article that a gentleman sent me just today that actually provides the statistical evidence around the, the fact that short sellers were involved, which is something I called without even knowing it because I just know. You're, if you have billions on the line, why wouldn't you spend tens of millions of dollars on a campaign? It just, it wouldn't make any sense. Not to, frankly.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

Yeah. And as you said, there could be this Russian doll scenario where the hedge fund that has billions at risk of short positions on a stock could have somebody like far disconnected running certain campaigns this might be maybe our, one of our last questions, but, around the legitimacy to protests. At the end of the day, it's almost like. The cause it has the most backing or money will get the most people out to push it forward, and that is a little scary,

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Think of a problem movement like a bird, right? Money puts the bird in the air, but it still has to fly on its own wings, right? So money can force you to pay attention. Right. And by the way, there's been money in politics in this stuff. It's not really a new phenomenon, right? And by the way, there's been money behind a lot. Basically every movement, civil Rights, gay rights, maga, tea Party, right? Everything. It's BLM, I mean, BLM. That's a more extreme example, but. They've all had a ton of money behind it. Right? Now, that doesn't mean by the way that the people on the street don't support the cause, but there are a lot of great movements that actually do have people out that just don't have the money, that never really, that never get to fly. And there are a lot of movements like. Case in point, money can't buy you success. Look at a gentleman by the name of Jeb Bush. Right? Jeb Bush ran for president in 2016 and I wanna say he spent hundreds of millions of dollars. He got about 1% in the poll.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

Or even

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Yeah,

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

the presidential election, I think Democrats outspent Harris, outspent by like five to one, or

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

he.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

it was an incredible amount and, and so yeah, it doesn't always work. I think that's a good point.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Yeah, Michael Bloomberg tried to spend his way to being the in 2020. He got like 1%. So again, it gets you on the date stage, it gets you, it gets people to listen to you. Money can force people to listen, but I wouldn't necessarily worry about it as much as a lot of people do because. Ultimately a movement. What our company does and what other people who might do something similar do is we make sure something gets seen. But if it is not compelling and no one's interested in it it's gonna die because the donors will only fund it so much if it's not getting traction.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Matt-webcam-00h_00m_00s_352ms-StreamYard:

I think it's a great note to close out on and we really thank you for coming on. Founder of Crowds on Demand, Adam Swart. We're gonna put your information in the description so people can check it out it's really interesting to learn more about protests and how they get organized and how they get funded. And so we really appreciate you coming on. I think our audience is gonna love this so, really thanks so much for taking the time and and doing what you do.

ADAM_SWART_Podcast-Adam_Swart__Founder___CEO_of_Crowds_on_Demand-webcam-00h_00m_00s_308ms-StreamYard:

Yeah, my pleasure. It was absolute pleasure to be with you guys and answering all your questions some really good questions.