ALY: Hi! I hope you’re doing well. You’re in New York City, correct?

FELIPE MENDEZ: Correct, in New York City. And then it’s Aly and then Anh?

ALY: Yeah, Annie. 

MENDEZ: Annie. Alright, lovely to meet you two!

ALY: Lovely to meet you. Um, a little background on me, I was a fan editor for a long time and I still fan edit for fun, but I work at AEG Presents now. I did a lot of festivals and tour stuff, so that’s the kinda the pipeline I was on, 

MENDEZ: You don’t edit for them, you just, like, work on them—

ALY: No, I edit for them. 

MENDEZ: Oh interesting. How is it being in-house?

ALY: Uh, it’s actually really cool! I actually really like it, so I’ve been working on a lot of cool festivals and tours, um… but, I live in L.A. now, so I moved from Louisiana a year ago—not a year ago, last year! 

MENDEZ: Wait, are you from Canada? 

ALY: No, Annie’s from Canada, I’m from Louisiana. 

MENDEZ: How’d you two meet?

ALY: Uh, online!

MENDEZ: Annie, are you an editor as well?

ANNIE: Uh, I used to be yeah, it’s a very long story!

ALY: But yeah, so basically I did fan editing and that was the whole thing, and then I got into the festival world by accident and I did Gov Ball, Lollapalooza, and All Things Go, so that was the kinda vibe, and then I’ve kinda somehow—

MENDEZ: I’ve been to Gov Ball, like, the last three or four years. We work closely with Verizon.

ALY: That’s crazy! I worked with Respective whenever I did that, I don’t know if they’re still doing that work with them because I work with AEG now, which is crazy because AEG does like Stagecoach and Coachella and all those things. But, um, Annie and me met from online, and we started this publication, and we’re gonna be interviewing people in the industry but also interviewing fan editors. We’re kinda bridging the gap between both of them…Annie, tell him how you’re from the same place as him!

ANNIE: Okay, so, I’m currently at Schulich now, I just finished my accounting tutorial and I hopped on this call. Um, I used to be a fan editor, and now I’m focusing more on photography as my creative outlet, and I’m aspiring to get into entertainment marketing, so you’re, like, literally the perfect person for me to talk about this to. 

MENDEZ: I think the opportunities are much slimmer in Canada, it’s tougher to get into the industry in Canada. I mean, I got pretty lucky. 

ALY: Yeah, we will ask those questions because I’m interested to know what the luck was like! Because, I can kind of relate to you. 

MENDEZ: Also, I know you’re doing this for an interview and stuff, but if you guys want to have a coffee chat or mix the two I’m more than happy to do that.

ALY: Yeah, let’s mix the two! I’m actually so down for that, I think as I ask the questions I’m kinda just gonna bounce back off of you and et cetera so it’s gonna be less, like, interview like one-on-one.

MENDEZ: Is the publication tied to your school at all, Annie? Or is it something you guys, like, is it a blog you guys are starting?

ALY: It’s just a one-off, yeah, it’s just a blog we’re starting. 

ANNIE: Yeah, because I think the thing is, is like, I feel like it’s better to, like, build something myself rather than—because I’m not interested in case competitions, because with my school, it’s like, very general as in general marketing, general accounting, general finance, but it’s not the niche that I want to go into, it’s not the niche that I’m interested in. 

MENDEZ: I did DECA all four years while I was in college.

ALY: DECA?

MENDEZ: Yeah. 

ALY: I didn’t go to college, so I know nothing about this. 

MENDEZ: It’s ACE now, right? 

ANNIE: I think so, yeah. 

MENDEZ: You didn’t go to college, Aly? You’ve just been doing it?

ALY: I’m 21, I didn’t go to college, I was from Louisiana, I just somehow did this. It’s really crazy.

MENDEZ: Congratulations! You should be very proud of yourself. 

ALY: Yeah. Very, very cool.

MENDEZ: So, what platform are you guys gonna be posting on? Substack, or?

ALY: We’re posting on Instagram, and we’re making a website with a bunch of designers right now. So, we have a bunch of fan editors that know how to make websites and are designing graphic design for everything. So, we have a whole team and everything, me and Annie are just doing interviews. 

MENDEZ: Post everything on Substack, too! I would love to re-stack it, or repost it on Substack.

ALY: No, yeah! We’ll put it on Substack, too if you want to repost it and everything. We can figure out that all. 

ANNIE: We’re using Readymag for the platform. 

ALY: So, that’s the kind of vibe. Anyways, I’m gonna get into questions, because I am on my lunch break! But, I am so happy to meet you. 

ALY: Being a fan editor, past fan editor, still in the fan editing world, but also bridging the gap between the professional world and actually doing the editing job it’s very, very weird and interesting and everything’s moving so quickly, so, it’s very cool—

MENDEZ: I have a few qualms about in-house editors. I feel, a lot of my job is protecting the editing process, and being video-first, and being an editor myself, so—

ALY: No, I know what you mean.

MENDEZ: So, the reason I ask the initial question and the story that I’ve continuously seen is that a lot of times with an in-house editor, a lot of the times when you’re in-house you’ll be getting feedback from people that aren’t video-first and don’t understand what feedback actually means. So, it can be tougher when you’re just kind of getting barreled down as an editor in-house.

ALY: It’s interesting, too, and again I’ll probably get into this when I ask questions, but with marketing, going from fan editing to actually editing for other people are two very, very different things, and the aspect of that is like a battle. 

MENDEZ: And, I think when you’re making a video that’s not your own idea, it can be difficult ‘cause it’s like, I don’t know what I’m bringing to life. Like, what are you guys even talking about? Whereas, if you have the idea from the start, and, like, so much of an edit comes to life while you’re in the file. Like, let me rewatch it, let me figure it out. I don’t know what the f—— I’m making before I make it.

ALY: When did fan edits come on your radar? Were you a fan editor or video editor prior to creating this type of job title?

MENDEZ: Yeah, so I come from an editing background. I’m 26 years old now, but a lot of my college career, of like, making a few bucks throughout college was through editing. I would even do, like, events, or like this marketing piece, or somebody has this campaign, or small business campaigns; I was making videos for them. So, that was probably my introduction to this space. Like, I was always an editor first. And then the way that this came onto my radar, roughly…I want to say three years ago? But we’ve been running the Lionsgate account for about five years, since 2021 or 2022. And, when we first started on that account it went really well, but a bunch of our posts were like—we were leaders in the space. Business Insider labeled us one of the top ten brands on the platform, and we got continuous press like that. We were posting pretty much only like clip pulls and memes, but somewhere around three years ago to two years ago I was like, alright. Every single brand is on the platform now, and everyone’s kind of doing the exact same thing of, like, hey! This trending audio’s working, let’s do it; hey! Everyone’s posting, like, ‘the Gen-Z intern made this.’ And, I think it came to a moment where, of course the posts were still doing spectacular. Like, we were not lacking views, things are still hitting a million views. But, like, I wasn’t laughing anymore. And I was just making them more formulaically, and I felt that was really a difference maker. So, as I was scrolling and trying to figure out what’s next as I always was with this account—and you always are when you’re kind of an editor—I was just saying, like, hey, where’s the platform evolving…I started seeing fan edits. And, both of you being native to that world, um, I hope I don’t offend anyone…they weren’t that good! Edits were not that spectacular. 

ALY: I heard you say that on a Spotify podcast, because I did my research! And, I have to disagree because you weren’t here for 2018, you weren’t here for 2017. We were going crazy in 2019 with the Marvel edits! Were they good? Not so much, but were they nostalgic to the time? Yes. 

MENDEZ: I agree, I’m talking more on the aspect of, like, technical ability. 

ALY: Well, yes. 

MENDEZ: In terms of, like, how far After Effects has gone, an in-school editor has gone so far with technical ability. 

ALY: I have to send you some older edits just to school you on some cool stuff that you’re, like, wait I have no seen this. Because boca.aep…like, motion design was a huge part of editing in the very beginning of transitions. Tik Tok—the one you were introduced to—was way more dumbed down, way more, like, text, way more blurry videos…

MENDEZ: Yeah, very, like, CapCut filter heavy, and I think the argument there would be, like, maybe the technical ability was there but the platform was not yet rewarding it…

ALY: No, not at all. 

MENDEZ: …to where it was gonna come on to everyone’s For You Page, so it was tougher to make the bet in that instance because the platform wasn’t rewarding the most technical fan edits. But I kept seeing them! And I was just like, hey, they’re gonna keep coming. I don’t think this is a trend, I don’t think this is something that’s gonna go away. Once I dove deeper into the Discords and into the actual communities I was like, no, this is something that’s alive and well that people are sticking their whole lives on. That’s where I made my bet, I was like, I think they’re a new genre of content that we need to be adapting with. Lucky for Lionsgate, we had some of the titles that, of course, fan editors were already loving. Like, Twilight, Hunger Games, Divergent, are some of the most edited titles in the world outside of anything that we were doing beforehand. So, it was really about tapping those communities. It’s like, I’m an editor first. I know the work that it takes. I’m a fan of The Hunger Games, I’m a fan of Twilight, but, like, am I the number one fan in the world? No, I know there’s people that are bigger fans than me, and I know there’s editors that know the titles better than me. In a lot of sense, it was like giving that trust out to these things and into these people. It’s like, hey, rather than try to mimic what they’re doing let me just empower the best person in the room and, uh, kind of make sure that they’re working with the official resources. That’s kind of how the plan erupted and and birthed.

ANNIE: Piggybacking off go what you just said, this is basically, like, UGC marketing. You’re contacting the direct consumer of this thing and then allowing them to be in the space where they can market it to other people who are consuming it. So then, how do you think this specific form of fan editing to market, like…is it sustainable in the long run? And then also, how does a corporation avoid doing it in, like, a fake way? Because I know some people are getting tired of it now, some people are saying, like, ‘oh, this is so done and tired…it’s like beating a dead horse essentially.’ So, what do you think about that?

MENDEZ: A note to your first point—the beating the dead horse I’ll have to ask more questions on that—but to the first point about, like, distinctions with UGC and this fan editing stuff we’re doing…I actually think they’re very distinct things and I would put them in the exact same strategy. With UGC, what you’ll often see—or at least my understanding of UGC which I think is a rather in-depth understanding—is, like, you’ll go to creators whether they’re, like, micro…people that don’t really have platforms and say, ‘hey, this is the message we want you to send.’ And then you’ll give them that message, they make the video on their platform. And a lot of times it doesn’t come off most organic, of course sometimes it does really well. Whereas the fan editing community that we’ve built is, we go to people that are, like, hey you’re already doing this, you’re already talking about this, like, we just want to platform you and amplify what you’re doing. And, that’s the big distinction in terms of like, giving them the idea and then saying, like, hey! Go send this message for us. Versus like, hey! We actually want to platform the message you’re already sending. 

ALY: It’s kinda like not doing in-house work and just actually doing the people that are, like, already interested. 

MENDEZ: Exactly. And I think, also, working with fans is not something that’s new. Think about it, like, 20 years ago there were fan-made posters that became official posters. And it’s really just, like, the adaptation of kind of what video-first has done. And I do think there’s a rather large distinction with, I guess, technical ability when it comes to fan edits versus UGC content. Whereas traditionally TikTok was known for lo-fi, lower production type content that was being platformed the most, whereas now I think the platform has evolved quite a bit to platform premium and best-quality content. So I think there’s actually, like, pretty large distinctions between the two. 

ANNIE: And then where would you classify, like, fan editing under, then?

MENDEZ: Um, I don’t think I’ve thought about that. I would just be, like, fandom and kind of just connecting with it. Like, realistically, this sparked because I was seeing stuff that I loved, and like, I mean I was in the discord group chats. 

ALY: You were running it like the Navy!

MENDEZ: I was tossing my edits in there and saying, like, “hey, rank this!” And then I realized that there were people who were much more skilled than me and, like, I couldn’t put one hundred percent of my time into editing because I had this full-time job.

MENDEZ: So I think, yeah, as a social media marketer you have to be seeing the landscape and then building based off just, like, assumptions and bets that you have, and if you’re not doing that you’re going to kind of fall behind. With that comes a lot of disruption; I think if you want to be the best in the game, if you want to leaders in the game, a lot of the content you’re posting you are going to be the first person to be posting that stuff, and then just hoping and fingers crossed that it works. Um, at least that’s the model that I’ve really developed—and I have a lot of bets hedged right now, and I’ll figure out if those end up turning out and if those end up doing well, but we’ll figure it out. 

ALY: Definitely, definitely. 

ANNIE: I want to ask you about, like, your journey ‘cause—not to glaze you or whatever—but what you’re doing is really inspiring to me because it’s such a new, exciting form of marketing and definitely it’s something I would have never expected to come from someone who graduated from U of Guelph—

MENDEZ: I went to Guelph, yeah! I got lucky ten times over, I got really lucky across the journey. 

ANNIE: What was the process of going from, like, a non-central city like Mississauga, right, to be able to work in New York and manage this social media of a high profile company? What was your journey like, essentially is what I’m asking. 

MENDEZ: This is not that exciting, but I’ll give you the full story. Back in college, I was in University of Guelph, I was graduating through Covid times, basically—I wasn’t too smart of a kid, I don’t want to say smart because there’s so many different levels—but I wasn’t as focused on my career as I think I should’ve been in college. And then somewhere around third year, fourth year—that’s what we call Junior and Senior year in Canada, third year and fourth year—I was like, alright I’m graduating I gotta lock in, and then of course Covid stuck some fear in there, like, oh my God the job market’s even worse! So, fourth year I just locked in. I became as cringe as you could be, like, corporate bro of, like, waking up at 5 am, cold shower, gym, locking in. My girlfriend always tells a story when I’m telling this story to friends, it’s like I used to pencil her in for fifteen minutes, thirty minutes in the day being like, oh this is my girlfriend time. 

ALY: Why is this like…um, what’s that Christian Bale movie? Sorry to relate you to that!

MENDEZ: Maybe “Limitless” with Bradley Cooper? 

ALY: No, I’m thinking, like, the bad one! American Psycho?

MENDEZ: American Psycho! Yeah, oh, for sure. I think there was many people that met me in that era who were like, it gives American Psycho. And I did, it was very cringe—but necessary! So I locked in for like, a year, and then in that year I was gonna go full suit-and-tie. I had verbal offers, they weren’t formal, from Accenture and from Deloitte. So, my ego was huge. It was like, everyone who had been trying to get these jobs their whole life, I tried for a year and I was able to land some of these offers. So, my ego was really, really big and I got it, I ended up accepting an Accenture offer. I was at a new hire event for an Accenture offer, so before my first day, and it was virtual because it was Covid—the reason I say I got lucky was because it was an eight-hour event. Eight hour event, and every hour you had the choice to be in three rooms. I only went for two hours, and of those two hours that I went, one of the rooms that I selected, my now-boss Ziad Ahmed was speaking. He inspired me, and he kind of burst my bubble. You know, the reason I said my ego was huge was I got this job after trying for one year, he’s the same age as me, he was on stage, and I was just happy to be in the room. And I was like, alright, the bar changed a little bit. I shouldn’t be as confident as I am in this spot. Not to say it’s not a great achievement, but in my mind I was like, alright, there’s levels. So before I had started my first day at Accenture, I applied to JUV consulting which was the startup that we worked at. I started at part-time for about six months, and then shortly after I got full-time. A lot to thank Ziad, he taught me a lot this world, it was very much dive into the deep end and figure it out, sharpen your axe by practicing, and, changed from full suit-and-tie to now this Gen Z consulting agency where the ethos is a lot of what my business is now, like, instead of talking about Gen Z, talk directly to them and, even better, build with them. A lot of the fan editing community thing is built off that same business foundation. And then from that startup, JUV consulting, we got acquired by United Talent Agency about two years ago, and that’s just continued to scale it. That’s the origin of the story, I found the white space in social media management, then it comes to life and everything else kind of happens. 

ALY: You were in the room and that’s what’s cool about it. It’s like, you were in the room and then that opened a whole new opportunity to the rest of your life.

MENDEZ: Say yes to everything, go to everything! You never know what’s gonna happen. 

ALY: Until you’re saying yes and it’s a ‘no’ for something else.

MENDEZ: Yeah, for sure. Yeah, I was almost gonna have a very different career. And like, honestly, like, in Canada they don’t push these types of careers. That’s a qualm I’ve had with the Canadian education system for so long is, like, I had no idea any of this existed. I didn’t even know consulting really existed in Canada. They push the big four accounting firms as, like, the top-tier jobs and then nothing else.

ANNIE: I still don’t know what consulting is, if I’m being honest to you! 

MENDEZ: No, one hundred percent, they don’t teach you. Like, UTA, CAA, WB, don’t have offices in Canada, most of big tech instead of having one hundred roles in Canada they’ll have, like, one or two. Like, the opportunities are just much less, much fewer in Canada. 

ANNIE: I totally align to what you’re saying, I feel like there’s a lack of opportunity here and I’m, like, really trying to go out of my way to build something like I Heart Fan Edits.

MENDEZ: Build your thing! Build your stuff, get out there, toss stuff out, I mean at this point there’s no excuse, like, with the internet you can get everywhere. Of course, you’re in a harder spot being in Canada, but like, with the internet you can get everywhere. 

ALY: No, but I agree with that point because, I mean, I’m from Louisiana. Timbuktu…Baton Rouge…the only cool thing they have is sports, and food, and drinking, and Mardi Gras, which is all good things but none of those things really correlate to marketing unless you’re, like, a really cool dude bro or an LSU alumni that can work with the LSU team in editing and all the things. So it’s, like, a very hard process—it’s cliquey. So, I relate to you when it means you were in the right room at the right time but also online putting yourself out there and things just aligned. 

ALY: What is your favorite marketing campaign? It can be something y’all have done, but like, just in general. Something that you’ve been, like, damn they did a good job. 

MENDEZ: I mean, like, I hate this answer but I’ve been so head-down on edits for two years and I really think what we’re doing is the most exciting thing in the world. Of course, I’ll give my applause to a lot of people doing really great stuff. I think Ramp and Rohan Kumar when they did the stunt where…I forget, the guy from The Office was doing, like the hundred receipts, that was absolutely spectacular and I’m a fan of great marketing. But in terms of, like, my passions, I love this stuff so much. 

ALY: I’ve sent some of my fan edits to you, I need to see you tune into mine. 

MENDEZ: I think about this stuff every hour of every day, like, there’s not a second that goes by. 

ANNIE: Marketing is seen as either, like, entirely fluffy or a creative role, or about pushing products. From the outside looking in, some people will think, ‘wow, that’s so cool that you’re able to achieve this and that…wow, fan edits—that’s so cool, that’s so Gen Z!’ But, what is a side to your job that not a lot of people consider that a lot of people overlook?

MENDEZ: The amount of effort that went into building the community and how intentional about that I am every single day. We’ve gotten to the point where a lot of the editors that I work with every day have become some of my best friends, and I’ve never met them, ever. I think a lot of people online can advocate for that as, like, some of your online friends become the best. Like, I get emotional thinking about this ‘cause it’s, like, an idea that I had a year and a half ago—or, two years ago—has now changed my life so much where, like, these people are going to be at my wedding. So, I’ve been very, very intentional about the community that we’re building and just going in, making sure that they feel appreciated, again most editors are doing this on the side; it’s not their priority. Yes, it’s their most loved, but they’re a student, they’re a full-time worker, they’re managing other things in their life. So, like, I want to make sure that they keep the love for the art and not just treat this like, ‘I need edit now, I need edit now,’ and really work around their schedule to be flexible, so I’m just very, very intentional about the community we’ve built. We get really lucky in the sense that we’re working with social media, so like, if we miss, no one really sees it. And, I want to give that advice to anyone working on social media, is like, try things out a hundred times, a thousand views is not anything crazy, you can toss that to private and just try again and repurpose it. Whereas, like, so many other aspects of marketing are like, you’re tossing a billboard out, you’re tossing a commercial out, like you’re putting millions of dollars behind that.

ALY: It’s almost like ink, but this is more, like, trial and error. 

MENDEZ: You can’t afford to miss because you have that investment, so really take the perk of, like, working on the internet.

ALY: We have one more question, and then we’ll wrap this up. 

ANNIE: What is a skill that can give a competitive edge for a fan that wants to make it into entertainment, whether that’s for editing or for marketing?

ALY: Good question, because I’ve kind of answered it, but I’d like to hear your opinion on it.

MENDEZ: Advice to editors that want to work with the studios?

ALY: Work with the studios, work with the people in the studios, work professionally in general. The professional pipeline of a fan editor to a professional. 

MENDEZ: Understanding that it’s a rather different thing I think is really important. A lot of the times when you’re editing for yourself, you can get really deep and really niche and you’re editing, again, for yourself and creating the edit for these communities. Sometimes when you’re working on the brands that have to be a little bit more broad, a little bit more specific, you’re gong to have to deal with restrictions that you’ve never had to deal with before. It’s just the reality of working with a brand, you know…they’re a really big brand, they’ve gotta deal with stuff. And we want to complain and say that’s not how the world should work—that is how the world should work! Brands shouldn’t be able to move the same way an individual should because that would just create a really big difference when brands have billions of dollars versus competing against an individual who doesn’t have that. So just understanding, yeah, the corporate aspect of it all, I think it’s a really good blend to have both professionalism…like any creative, I think a lot of the times when you’re super, super creative you can lack the, like, timelines and communication parts, you know the different parts of the brain, and there’s that unique person that has both and it really helps out when you have that. But again, like, just fully dive into your creativity, you never know who’s watching your edits. Post cool stuff that you love and that stuff will just, like, I’ve gotten stuff from my For You Page, or that has been sent to me, or just by scrolling. 

ALY: Yeah, definitely. I totally agree with that, that’s something I can attest to especially because it’s just putting yourself out there and that whole thing. 

ALY: Thank you so much for doing this with us, I’d love to keep this friendship if we could, because I do think we’re doing similar things in our aspects of our actual careers. But, yeah, thank you so much for taking time out of your day to talk to us, sorry if there were any hiccups, this was our first time! 

MENDEZ: It was beautiful to meet both of you, consider me a resource for both of you.