Shadowing Practice: This is everything that's wrong with consumerism - Learn English Speaking with Video
Les maken...
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Question number one.
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Are we f*ed?
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I've never been into fashion.
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Maybe that's obvious from the fact that I wear the same t -shirt and jeans every day.
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But lately, probably because of a midlife crisis, I've been trying to dress better.
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So I had to ask the question, where do people even buy clothes today?
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I pulled at that thread
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and learned the unsettling truth about just how bad the fashion industry has gotten over the past decade.
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The most problematic thing is the social programming that's gone on
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for the last generation every day they turn up wearing something
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new you only have to look at those kind of posts
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and see the hundreds
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and hundreds of comments the engagement promoting constant mindless consumerism clothes
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are now cheaper than toilet paper there are options in every style
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and color you can imagine people are buying five times what they used to
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and even then it's not enough to fill people's appetite they've got a totally new system of fueling desire
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and over producing what we're supposed to wear.
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What's happened to the fashion industry over the past decade is a perfect example of how bad consumerism has gotten
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and why I'm feeling more and more like, yeah, we might kind of be fucked.
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This video is sponsored by Squarespace.
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It's hard to look at where things have come over the past 10 years and feel optimistic.
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So can you rewind the clock back a little bit uh take me back a decade ago
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and talk about how we got here today you know i often try
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and ease people into this conversation because the reason
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that people are attracted to fashion is
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that it's fun it's a way of expressing yourself it can be very joyful
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but if we're honest i think it's fair to come in with
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that because this is a disaster
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so how have we got here we used to produce clothes seasonally and even
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if you're not interested in fashion you probably have this kind
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of sense of oh spring summer you get new stuff
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or it's time to refresh your wardrobe
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and traditionally that's been the buying kind of tempo
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so twice a year you might shop for new stuff fast fashion came along about the turn of the millennium
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and what it did was sped up that cycle
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considerably and of course because companies want to make money
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so they're like why are we just getting new drops in two times a year
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or four times a year what if we did it every month
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and so in the last 20 years that's what we've seen
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that you get new refreshed product in the stores every few
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weeks now what's happened in the last four i want to say five years
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but certainly ramped up in the last two years is we've got this new phrase
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and we call it ultra fast fashion so all that is just out the window.
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Instead of new drops in the store physically that you might get excited to go and see every few weeks, you've got new styles online every single day.
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These companies are chucking out new choices, new styles at rates that are dizzying.
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They've got a totally new system of fueling desire and overproducing what we're supposed to wear.
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A small Chinese retailer named sheen led the charge with ultra fast fashion in 2020
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and quickly reshaped the entire industry it came in hot with a new model
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that allowed them to produce clothes faster and cheaper
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and had an even larger scale than zara or h m
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and as a result they started to eat up the market
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share of the fashion industry sheen came out of nowhere growing
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its net sales from 1 .4 billion dollars in in 2018 to $41 billion in 2025.
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Shein.
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Shine.
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I say Shein.
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It's Shein.
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Shein is known for $2 t -shirts and $7 pants.
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As with any formula that works in business, others quickly copied it.
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Amazon Shopping, Timu, and others followed along with their own versions of ultra -fast fashion.
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The speed and scale that clothing was now being produced at quickly reached numbers that are hard to imagine.
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Now with ultra -fast fashion, you have these companies companies and brands who are putting out 10 ,000 styles every single day.
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Like how is that scale even possible?
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It's hard to wrap my head around.
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How does that even work at that scale?
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I think what Shein did was recognize that fashion can be a tech proposition and say, well, we don't need to pay retail staff.
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We don't need retail stores.
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We don't need designers.
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And that cuts costs exponentially.
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Then there is the supply chain, which is concentrated just out of Shanghai,
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which is about lots of small producers where you can test these styles, these huge numbers of styles that you're putting up on the website every day,
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and see if they fly.
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I downloaded Shein's app for the first time to see exactly what the experience was like.
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I was quickly escorted into their discount mania, the nonstop casino prize wheels that land exactly where they're designed to, to trigger the biggest rush of dopamine.
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Countdown timers blasting every time you try to close out the app.
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Free shipping.
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Why not?
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I knew what I was in for.
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I had no plans to buy anything, and yet for some reason, my heart started to pound a little faster.
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They've removed so much friction and created so much urgency that most people never take a second to ask themselves, do I actually need this thing?
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I'm guessing that with the sheer volume, they are algorithmically based, similar to TikTok or Instagram,
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where it's like, yeah, all 10 ,000 maybe aren't being consumed, but it's the ones that are rising to the top are being purchased by most people.
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Absolutely.
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You know what? it's inhuman so it's designed by algorithm
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if you can call it design it's scraping the internet for inspiration another word for
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that is stealing and then chucking it in the ai blender that's not a technical term
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and spewing out stuff that has no soul no craft and i would say no human connection.
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We found for us putting our workshop on the ground floor in the window
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so that people could see what we do just gave the business absolute transparency.
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We walked in here and we knew that your jacket was being made by Taylor because you could see it.
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I traveled to Melbourne
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which is really at the heart of fashion in Australia to speak with people in the industry
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that have been impacted by the rise of ultra fast fashion.
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Jared Cuff says he's one of four bespoke tailors left in
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the city watching you now sewing this jacket like this is
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this is slow fashion this is a slow methodical process i
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wonder how challenging it is to to make it as a business owner running a shop like this
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when you're doing everything slowly by hand compared to the way
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the industry generally works it is slow fashion in a way
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like it will take us several weeks to put a suit
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together like this gentleman's suit like i just put the sleeves on today
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and like just putting that shoulder roll in is just to get
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that curve on the top of the shoulder we sell it as this romantic sort of slow handcrafted
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but you need to race against the clock and me
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and marco are constantly racing against the clock to get things
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done uh you you can't move your wedding date back
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so we will work through the night to get that that finished How much is this jacket going to cost?
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So this jacket cost $3 ,800.
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It's going for a wedding up in Byron Bay.
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So we've seen this gentleman about four times now.
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That's the jacket and pants.
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Jacket and pants.
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And this is a perfect example of we had less than a month.
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If you look at historical data of apparel prices, you'll see something really interesting.
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From 1994 to 2024, they basically didn't budge, even as inflation doubled the price of almost everything else.
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To give you an idea of how low the prices have gotten with ultra -fast fashion, the average item at Zara is $34.
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At H &M, it's $26.
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And at Shein, it's $14.
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As I had these conversations with retailers, it was this shift in expectation that's clearly become one of the biggest challenges they've had to face.
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The most problematic thing is the social programming that's gone on for the last generation.
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The average person, let's say the average guy, has been programmed to spend $10 on a t -shirt, $50 on a pair of pants, $100 on a jacket.
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And he's been programmed to then turn them over every season
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or every year or however long he's been programmed to accept that that those garments that he's buying for peanuts
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he's going to throw them out pretty soon
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and he's going to buy some more i've always resisted this
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term consumer you consume food you eat it you need it to survive
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but we're not doing that with clothes like the idea of consumption of something
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that is a physical non -biodegradable product
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that doesn't give us any sustenance is really weird it's attached to this idea of clothes as disposable
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which is a relatively new idea for most of human history
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clothes were really precious they were hard to acquire you either made them yourself
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or you saved up later on from the 19th century
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and you bought them in small numbers unless you were royalty
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but now we've got to this mad sort of flipping of
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that where everyone thinks that they deserve to dress like royalty
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and that status is about having more
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and more overly sumptuous amounts of stuff today i'm in the og room
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and i'm doing a two hundred dollar sheen haul did i
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just spend four hundred dollars on sheen i'm going to be
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replacing my entire wardrobe only using sheen now we can literally open our phone scroll shop
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every second of the day creators influencers every day they turn up wearing something new
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and it's this is my outfit comment shirt
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and i'll send you the link you only have to look at those kind of posts
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and see the hundreds and hundreds of comments the engagement and there's no value behind it.
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It's just promoting constant mindless consumerism that has created a whole new culture of buying now but not necessarily buying better.
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I always think it's good to kind of turn this on yourself think about
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and I know that you're atypical shall we say
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because you're just buying less stuff generally than other people
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because you've switched on to this idea that you don't need to over consume
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but for most of us think about what you might buy
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in a few months right you might say well I just bought a pair jeans but
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if you really think about it you very likely bought exercise
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gear a four pack of t -shirts a load of new
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socks kids clothes some going out outfit some new shoes some
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sneakers actually it all adds up to crazy numbers we're filming this in australia
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and australians consume on average i always remember this particular number
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56 new items of clothing every year what like that's more
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than one a week that's buying a new thing more than once a week
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so we're buying more than we need
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and we're using them for much less time than our parents and our grandparents used to.
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Looking at how most of the fashion industry is organized today, it's hard not to make the connection to social media.
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It isn't news that they've gotten monetizing our attention down to a science.
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Just recently, Meta agreed to a massive settlement that accused them of deliberately getting children addicted to their platforms.
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The company behind Facebook
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and Instagram have reached a settlement totaling nearly $18 billion to
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end a lawsuit centering on the harms of social media to children
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and this feels a lot like what's happening with online shopping
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retailers are using algorithms to find viral trends they're experimenting with increasingly aggressive ways to drive engagement
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and with the billions of dollars
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that people spend every year on these apps they've clearly figured out how to turn shopping into an addiction as
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if it wasn't bad already i don't think it's
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that our grandparents had better values than us it's that But they lived in a completely different system, one where wages were higher, one where they could invest in better clothes,
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and one that didn't have a freaking mystery wheel pop up every time you go to buy socks.
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So my little sister has her very own slow fashion brand, where she takes pre -loved clothing and tries to give them a new life.
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The only problem?
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She doesn't have a website.
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So I asked her if I could build one for her using Squarespace, my sponsor for this video.
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Oh my god, I'm so excited.
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Yay okay let's start with the domain name bingo I like this template she's already got brand color
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so I'm gonna plug those in no website is complete without
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some really strong copy I asked her to send me through some photos
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and videos and so I'm gonna be adding those now to the about page the home page
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and the contact page finally
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and most importantly we need to set up her online store through Squarespace
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so we're gonna do that now by importing her entire catalog and here's the the final result.
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Let's see what Madison thinks.
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So if you want to see why I trust Squarespace and why I trusted it with Madison's website, then go to squarespace .com to start your free trial.
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And when you're ready to launch, go to squarespace .com slash Matt D 'Avella to save 10 % off your first purchase of a website or domain.
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Better yet, just click the link in the description below.
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Thanks for considering.
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I went on Sheen for the first time.
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Oh, did you?
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Yeah, like a week ago.
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Did they have, like, the gambling wheels?
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They did, yeah.
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It's like a casino.
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Yeah, a pop -up comes and it's like, you can get 60, 70, 80 % off.
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But quick, act now, press this, press this.
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That's exactly it.
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They throw you right into it.
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You can go on a Sheen and get a plain white t -shirt for $7 USD.
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Can I say, actually, except today, it's 90 % off if you buy now.
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Yes, that's right.
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Yeah, yeah, $7 is the listed price, but you could probably get it for $3 dollars.
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What does it take to make clothes that cheap?
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Such a good question.
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In sort of sustainable fashion activism circles, we love to say somebody always pays the price for too cheap.
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The way to think about it is to consider the physicality of that t -shirt.
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What's it made of?
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If it was cotton, a farmer has to grow that fiber.
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Then that fiber has to be picked, ginned, processed,
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spun, woven dyed before it becomes fabric at
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which point you can then cut out
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that t -shirt now those processes in themselves should be adding up to more
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if they're done responsibly
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and without cutting masses of corners it's not hard to imagine
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how much the worker the garment worker is squeezed in this
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equation retailer Sheehan is in hot water once again Sheehan has
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faced accusations of worker abuse the brand has recently come under fire there have been allegations of forced labour.
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They themselves have found incidents of child labour and there are accusations that their staff are overworked and underpaid.
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Workers are working something like 75 -hour working weeks, according to some investigations, paid piece rates.
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There's obviously no benefits, no pensions, no holiday pay.
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It's always the worker at that end of the supply chain that pays the greatest price.
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I always try and think about cheap, but at what cost and at whose expense.
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A lot of people try to, they don't like to make people feel guilty about their purchases.
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I'd like to make them feel guilty.
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We should feel a little bit guilty, right?
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Like we should feel a little bit bad.
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We should know about what's going into making these clothes.
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And, you know, we don't seem to care.
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So it's not entirely up to you obviously it's about brands it's about regulation
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and it's about you but you can't just park
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that responsibility you choose you choose now of course there are
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mitigating circumstances of course some of us have the privilege of being able to make more expensive choices
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or even have the time to dig into this I get
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that however people over buying crappy fast fashion are largely not doing it
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because they're worried about the cost of their kids school uniforms
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or the need a t -shirt
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and this is the only one they can afford they're actually buying five times more than they used to buy
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and that's your choice
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so i've stopped worrying about making people feel guilty we get the system we choose we get the brands
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that we support and buy from i don't know i think i sometimes
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unfairly judge the fashion industry in general
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when I see you know these fashion runways and I see commercials
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and I see anything revolving the fashion industry I think consumerism bad
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but then and you know in speaking with you and
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and hearing about the passion you have for fashion it it
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changes my look runways are fun I was the same
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when I first came in the industry I'm like oh god the runways are like
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and then I started to meet people in the fashion industry
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that were pushing back back on
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that they were like no we don't we don't want our industry to be like
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that we want it to be better seeing
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that being practiced it's like okay well this is the group
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that I want to be part of I've never had a
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shopping addiction I've never made a purchase from a fast fashion
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retailer my entire wardrobe fits neatly onto two shelves in my closet not to brag
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but I've also never been very conscious about where I shop.
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In the past, I've just found something that fit, was comfortable enough, and seemed like decent quality.
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Knowing what I know now, I feel compelled to do better.
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Although I'm still trying to process the idea of buying a t -shirt for $100, we're figuring out how to find time to thrift shop with two little kids at home.
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It's obviously very easy to be overwhelmed today and trying to do the right thing, but if you were to give people watching this video one piece of advice, one thing
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that they could do after watching this video what would you
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say i think buying much less is the best solution
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and maybe this is just what i've i've come to in
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my own life i don't know what everyone else should do
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but i've just stopped being interested in fueling a system i find revolting
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and it feels quite powerful to reject it
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and just not get it you know i'd rather
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and this sounds a bit worthy and i'm sure get some grief for it
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but i genuinely having spent 30 years in the fashion industry
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feel much more delighted by going for a walk in nature
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and looking at the birds than I do by buying a bunch of feathers and dressing like one.
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Woordenschat en spreektips bij deze les
Deze video bevat 273 zinnen en 3288 woorden om na te spreken. Het gesproken deel duurt 18:39. De spreker praat in een natuurlijk tempo van ongeveer 176 woorden per minuut, dicht bij een alledaags gesprek. 84% van de woorden hoort bij de 3.000 meest gebruikte Engelse woorden; de rest kun je beter vooraf bekijken.
Belangrijke woorden in deze video
15 woorden uit de video die het leren waard zijn, met uitspraak en betekenis:
| Woord | Uitspraak | Betekenis |
|---|---|---|
| jacket zelfstandig naamwoord | /ˈd͡ʒæk.ɪt/ | jas |
| retailer zelfstandig naamwoord | /ˈɹiteɪlɚ/ | middenstander |
| pants zelfstandig naamwoord | /pænts/ | broek |
| worker zelfstandig naamwoord | /ˈwɝ.kɚ/ | arbeider, arbeidster |
| consume werkwoord | /kənˈsum/ | consumeren, verbruiken |
| clothing zelfstandig naamwoord | /ˈkloʊðɪŋ/ | kleding, kledij |
| clock zelfstandig naamwoord | /klɑk/ | teller, kilometerteller |
| runway zelfstandig naamwoord | /ˈɹʌnweɪ/ | catwalk |
| domain zelfstandig naamwoord | /ˌdəʊˈmeɪ̯n/ | domein |
| outfit zelfstandig naamwoord | /ˈaʊtfɪt/ | outfit |
| casino zelfstandig naamwoord | /kəˈsiːnəʊ/ | casino, speelhuis |
| addiction zelfstandig naamwoord | /əˈdɪkˌʃən/ | verslaving, verslaafdheid |
| sponsor zelfstandig naamwoord | /ˈspɒn.səː/ | sponsor |
| algorithm zelfstandig naamwoord | /ˈælɡəɹɪðm̩/ | algoritme |
| problematic bijvoeglijk naamwoord | /ˌpɹɑ.bləˈmæt.ɪk/ | problematisch, twijfelachtig |
Phrasal verbs die je zult horen
| Woord | Uitspraak | Betekenis |
|---|---|---|
| figure out werkwoord | uitvogelen, er achter komen | |
| pop up werkwoord | opduiken, te voorschijn komen | |
| come over werkwoord | langskomen | |
| get off werkwoord | van ... afgaan | |
| go out werkwoord | naar buiten gaan | |
| put out werkwoord | buitenzetten, uitwerpen | |
| set up werkwoord | /ˌsɛt ˈʌp/ | bereiden, voorbereiden |
Grammatica in deze video
De structuren die de spreker het meest gebruikt, met de exacte woorden uit de video:
| Structuur | In de video |
|---|---|
| “Used to” used to + werkwoord — een vroegere gewoonte of toestand die niet meer klopt | used to produce · used to buy |
| Present perfect have/has + voltooid deelwoord — iets uit het verleden dat nu nog telt | I've never been · has gotten · have come |
| Lijdende vorm be + voltooid deelwoord — het gaat om wat er gebeurt, niet om wie het doet | be fucked · is sponsored · are attracted |
Uitspraak om op te letten
De spreker gebruikt 82 samentrekkingen en verkorte vormen, zoals don't, I'm, I've. Spreek ze kort uit, zoals je ze hoort.
- De “th”-klanken: clothing /ˈkloʊðɪŋ/, algorithm /ˈælɡəɹɪðm̩/, thread /ˈθɹɛd/, worthy /ˈwɝ.ði/, feather /ˈfɛðə/
- De klanken “sh” en “zh”: addiction /əˈdɪkˌʃən/, accusation /ˌæk.jʊˈzeɪ.ʃ(ə)n/, rush /ɹʌʃ/, passion /ˈpæʃən/, inspiration /ˌɪn.spɪˈɹeɪ.ʃən/
- Lange woorden — let op de klemtoon: problematic /ˌpɹɑ.bləˈmæt.ɪk/, accusation /ˌæk.jʊˈzeɪ.ʃ(ə)n/, necessarily /ˌnɛs.əˈsɛɹ.ə.li/, inspiration /ˌɪn.spɪˈɹeɪ.ʃən/, experiment /ɪkˈspɛɹ.ə.mənt/
Zo oefen je met deze video
- Luister de hele video één keer zonder te spreken en noteer de woorden die je niet kent.
- Begin op 0,75× snelheid, spreek zin voor zin na en ga terug naar normale snelheid zodra het makkelijk gaat.
- Neem jezelf op en vergelijk met het origineel; let daarbij op woorden als jacket, retailer, pants.
Wat is de Shadowing-techniek?
Shadowing is een wetenschappelijk onderbouwde taalleermethode die oorspronkelijk is ontwikkeld voor professionele tolkentraining en gepopulariseerd door polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. De methode is eenvoudig maar krachtig: je luistert naar native Engelse audio en herhaalt het onmiddellijk hardop — als een schaduw die de spreker volgt met slechts 1–2 seconden vertraging. In tegenstelling tot passief luisteren of grammaticadrills, dwingt shadowing je hersenen en mondspieren om echte spraakpatronen tegelijkertijd te verwerken en te reproduceren. Onderzoek toont aan dat het de uitspraaknauwkeurigheid, intonatie, ritme, verbonden spraak, luisterbegrip en spreekvaardigheid aanzienlijk verbetert — waardoor het een van de meest effectieve methoden is voor IELTS Speaking-voorbereiding en echte Engelse communicatie.