As The Pokeball Turns

TRAINER'S EYE #58 - "A Snorlax's Wayfarer Adventure" ft. Professor Glaw from Wayspotters Podcast

• David Hernandez • Season 1 • Episode 60

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Professor Glaw, a Pokémon Trainer from Canada and co-host of the Wayspotters Podcast, reflects on his path through Pokémon GO, meeting trainers worldwide and transitioning into content creation. From the excitement of GO Fest to discussing the challenges of Wayfarer abuse, he sheds light on the issues affecting the community. His role at GO Hub has provided him with unique insights into how content drives the Pokémon GO experience for players.

Sources
Opening Song: "Forget You" by Alex_MakeMusic from Pixabay
Intermission Song: "Il barone rosso" by Luciano Michelini

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Your next Pokemon adventure begins here!

David Hernandez:

My name is David Hernandez, and you're listening to As the Pokeball Turns. Welcome to As the Pokeball Turns, where the stories are real and people still play this game. One of Niantic core values is exploration. It's the idea of visiting a place, whether familiar or brand new. it could be a favorite destination, which makes a community unique, or a place that tells a story through its history or experiencing a new culture. For others, it might be going to a brand new place, traveling to a place that is unfamiliar. Regardless of how one engages with exploration, the idea of stepping outside one's own inner circle is consistent and is what drives my guest to interact with both Pokemon Go and the Wayfarer system. My guest is the writer for Pokemon Go Hub and the new co host of the Wavespotters podcast. From Canada, here is his origin story into the world of Pokemon Go. This is Professor Glaw. Today, I'm joined by a writer for GoHub and the new co host for the Wayspotters podcast, Professor Glaw. Glaw, welcome to the show.

Professor Glaw:

Thank you for having me. I'm glad to be here.

David Hernandez:

Definitely. And you had some pretty big shoes to fill in for when you first started the podcast or when you joined the Wayspotters podcast.

Professor Glaw:

I did. I did. I had to take over for Lachlan, and he did a really, really good job when he was on the show with Jamal, so I was kind of nervous when I first took over. Seems to be going well.

David Hernandez:

you've done a lot since. y'all started doing video. You started doing shorts, we're six months since your first debut. Has it lived up to what maybe you expected or envisioned when you joined the show?

Professor Glaw:

I think so. we were on the precipice of kind of big, big things, right? And Lachlan and Jamal did some great things. They had some great conversations with Niantic, we started doing the video, and it's just grown the podcast so much. Started adding new topics and new sections to the show and it was crazy how many people came up to us and recognized us from watching the videos. it blew me and Jamal away.

David Hernandez:

Did they say like, Oh, you're the Wayspotters guys or something like that?

Professor Glaw:

Yeah, there was a couple, there was one time when I was, me and Jamal split up at one point. I went to go take some pictures of some stuff for my, for my daughter and someone walked up and they first noticed I was wearing a Wayfarer shirt. And they pointed out, they were like, Hey, where'd you get that shirt? And then they looked up and they were like, Hey, you're Chris from Wayspotters. I've seen you on YouTube. I literally stared at them for probably five or six seconds, not knowing what to say. It was weird.

David Hernandez:

It's a very humbling experience or very awkward cause on one hand you're a podcaster, but then the other hand, it's like, these people recognize you and especially since you guys are on video on YouTube. YouTube's where a lot of people like to consume their content, Did you sign any autographs?

Professor Glaw:

I signed a couple of autographs, I did.

David Hernandez:

Oh, wow. Dang. Famous right here.

Professor Glaw:

yeah, it was crazy. And it's, I think YouTube lends itself well to Wayspotters because Wayfarer is such a visual medium. A lot of people, they want to see what we're talking about and see the kind of things that we're putting up on the screen, while we're describing it, we try very, very hard to describe it for our audio only audience, and our audio only will never go away. So we're just trying to capture a separate audience and have a medium where we put the shorts out too, so that if you're listening to the audio version, you can go and look at the short and spend a minute and see what we were talking about. Right? So it just helps people visualize what we're talking about.

David Hernandez:

What got you into Wayfarer to begin with?

Professor Glaw:

Wayfarer, I started Wayfarer in 2019 when it dropped for Pogo. I didn't play Ingress too much, so I wasn't near enough, high enough level and when it dropped for Pogo, the area that I was living in, I was living in Plattsburgh, New York at the time. they had basically nothing, so it was kind of very selfish for me. I wanted places where I could go grind. So the first thing I did was tricked out the park, the big park that they had there and put in, I think it's got three gyms now and 15 or 16 pokestops. So it's like the spot to go for community day and for raid days So that's what kind of got me started.

David Hernandez:

What was it like for you to be able to create Pokestops for an area or community that didn't have any before?

Professor Glaw:

It was pretty cool. there wasn't a lot of people who knew what was going on, there was a lot of people in Plattsburgh that were like, Oh, we can make PokéStops now and they were just like, Ah, this is too intimidating. I don't want to. So it was me, Tristan, and Kirsten. We're like the three people who were taking over and making everything and it was really cool to hear, to see people pop up in the chat in the morning, if when something synced and popped up, like, Oh, there's a new gym over here. Oh, there's three or four new Pokestops over here. I got to sit back and watch the whole community get so excited about new places to go play. It was really, really cool, and it got me hooked. I was hooked ever since then.

David Hernandez:

Did you have a lot of people who played Pokemon Go in that area, in spite of it not having a plentiful number of stops?

Professor Glaw:

There was about a hundred people in the chat. the Facebook chat was almost always maxed out. So yeah, there was a good healthy community there. There still is.

David Hernandez:

Now, was that where you first started playing Pokemon GO or was it a different place?

Professor Glaw:

no, I first, so I've moved around a lot. I started playing Pokemon Go actually where I'm living now, in 2016 when it first came out. Like, I was day two, I was playing Pokemon Go, I had to, because I lived in Canada at the time, I had to download the APK and sideload it onto my phone, sorry Niantic, because they hadn't released it here yet, and I was like, no, I need to get it on this,

David Hernandez:

It's like they should release it sooner!

Professor Glaw:

They should have, right? And I understand they had to slow roll it out because they had massive server issues back then, but I was like, yeah, I don't care. I want to play.

David Hernandez:

So what was it like for you to play the first couple of days when it first came out?

Professor Glaw:

It was pretty cool. There was about five or six of us in the area that figured out how to download it and play it. And we were walking around and catching Pokemon and people were looking at us weird. And then it when they finally officially released it. everyone up here was playing, it was just, you couldn't walk 10 feet without bumping into somebody who was looking at their phone trying to catch something. it was nice for those first few days when it was just... A small group of us and they had a pretty healthy ingress community here back then. So there was lots of stops.

David Hernandez:

I remember those moments felt the game felt more innocent, as before we cared about Shinies or cared about IVs and all that. It's just, we were just excited for Pokemon to be around.

Professor Glaw:

Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. And it was CP was the big thing back then because we didn't know about IVs and all that, so it was just like, oh, I got a bigger 1 show it off, throw it on the Facebook chat or whatever.

David Hernandez:

Where would you and your friends go to play Pokemon Go in those days?

Professor Glaw:

we went down to the park at the lake. there's a big, very long, walkway that goes right along the beach. And it's a nice straight line, there's lots of trees, it's very shaded there. So that's the best place to play in the area. there's a spot in Ajax that has three gyms You can hit from one spot. So that was a big place to go to.

David Hernandez:

Now are those places still the places people go to for like, say a community day or for raid days and stuff like that?

Professor Glaw:

Yes, absolutely. the park here in Oshawa is Full of people playing community day every month or like a couple of times a month, it's great. I, that's where I created my first route too.

David Hernandez:

Really? So it'd be around that place?

Professor Glaw:

Yeah, it goes from one end of the walkway down to the other. So that's like the, you start at one end and then you go down and then you just go back and forth down that path. That's where I created the route because I got early access to it. That's the grind spot for everybody on community day.

David Hernandez:

Before Pokemon Go, did you have any experience with Pokemon?

Professor Glaw:

I actually started playing Pokemon when it first came out when I was a kid I had Pokemon Red for Game Boy way back when. So I've been playing Pokemon for a while. I got out of it for a few years. I think I played Gen 1, Maybe I played Gen 3 and then I didn't play anything until... Ultra Sun, Ultra Moon. So there's a big gap where I didn't play anything. But I started having kids, and they started getting big into Pokemon, and then I'd make fun of them for knowing every single Pokemon name, but not the names of their friends. And then they got Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon, and there was like the Ultra Room, so I'm like, well, this is kind of cool, so I took the DS and I started playing again, and that's when I got back into

David Hernandez:

I gotcha. And I believe Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon came around the same time as Pokemon Go as well, right?

Professor Glaw:

It was very similar timing, yes. so that's originally the reason that I wanted to play Pogo, was because I looked at it as something that I could play with my kids.

David Hernandez:

Do you and your kids still play?

Professor Glaw:

I do, my kids do not.

David Hernandez:

Oh, that's unfortunate. You get back into it.

Professor Glaw:

Yeah. I'm gonna try and get the little ones into it. Every time I catch a shiny, I let them, like a unique shiny, I let them pick the name. Some of the names they come up with are hilarious.

David Hernandez:

Can you share some of the names that you've actually named some of your Pokemon?

Professor Glaw:

Yeah. Let me pull it up. Keep in mind that they are 10.

David Hernandez:

Of course, of course. I'm not expecting any I'm not expecting a sophisticated name here. I'm just very curious. It sounds very cute.

Professor Glaw:

Let me pull it up here. they named one of my snore, my shiny Snorlax, buffet.

David Hernandez:

Okay.

Professor Glaw:

They named one of my shiny Skip Loom Skippy. My shiny Sylveon is named Sparkles. They named my shiny, Meganium Twinsies because I played that community day with my other son and he caught the exact same Pokémon as shiny.

David Hernandez:

Oh, wow. So y'all both have the same shiny?

Professor Glaw:

yeah, both have the exact same one, yeah. They named my... one of my shiny Magikarps, they named it Goldie and now it's evolved into a Gyarados, so I have a bred Gyarados named Goldie. Oh, here's a good one. my shiny Sunflora is named Kenflower

David Hernandez:

Kenflower?

Professor Glaw:

Because when my son named that one, he was playing, Street Fighter.

David Hernandez:

Oh, okay.

Professor Glaw:

he named it after his favorite character in Street Fighter, Ken.

David Hernandez:

That's awesome, man.

Professor Glaw:

my shiny red ice is Snowman Icy.

David Hernandez:

Snowman.

Professor Glaw:

my Shiny Lopunny is Love Bunny. My daughter named that one, but it's got no e so it's Love Bunny. It's love, but, so it's L o v B u N Y.

David Hernandez:

okay. Awesome.

Professor Glaw:

Love, love bunny.

David Hernandez:

Oh my gosh. I was thinking it was gonna be L U V.

Professor Glaw:

No. Oh, yeah. No, she, uh, no, she got that one, right? my shiny Scyther is named Seth for some reason.

David Hernandez:

Oh, cool, man. Thanks for sharing some of those names.

Professor Glaw:

Yeah, no worries.

David Hernandez:

So do you have a favorite Pokemon at all?

Professor Glaw:

Snorlax is my favorite Pokemon. Snorlax has been my favorite Pokemon since gen 1.

David Hernandez:

Really? Just, any particular reason why?

Professor Glaw:

he's big fat and lazy and there are, that's, I, one of my favorite things to do is just lounge around and be lazy and eat snacks, so.

David Hernandez:

I

Professor Glaw:

It really resonated with me.

David Hernandez:

as a parent, I hear sleeping's not too common,

Professor Glaw:

Yeah, my kids are older now, like my youngest are ten, so it's not so bad. My wife lets me sleep in every day because I work till midnight every day, so it's not so bad.

David Hernandez:

What do you think of the new sleep Snorlax with the hat?

Professor Glaw:

I think it's pretty cool. It's really cute. I really wanted a shiny one, but I didn't manage to get one, so...

David Hernandez:

Oh man, nobody was able to hook you up to GoFest?

Professor Glaw:

No, I couldn't find anybody that had an extra to trade away. Everybody I asked, were just like, No, I've only got the one and I want to keep it. And I'm like, I hate you! Give it to me!

David Hernandez:

So obviously Wayfarer comes out in 2019. Before that, like, how do you play Pokemon Go? what's your... Way to play?

Professor Glaw:

I'm not what you would call like a hardcore grinder. I play a couple hours every day. when I'm at home, I'll open the game once in a while and catch what's here. I'm lucky right now I have a gym that I can catch from my house. I get my coins pretty much every day. I go out once in a while, if I'm going out for a walk, I'll go out for a stroll, I'll play. I play a little bit when I'm at work and then I'll try and play every single community day, like the whole time. I'm not even level 50 yet. I don't PvP much at all. I got to level 20 once just to prove to myself that I could do it. When the Sylph Tournaments first come out. I was big into it then because we had just enough people to run the tournaments so I had to participate because I was one of the community leaders. So I was into it then I did decently, but like I was never, I never won a tournament and I never really got very good at it. So it's just one of those things that I do for the stardust when I can, but oftentimes I do, I forget to do all my battles every day.

David Hernandez:

So what was your first Niantic Live event?

Professor Glaw:

Ooh, my first Niantic five I found, I think was. GO Fest 2019 in Chicago. it was overwhelming and very exciting for the first time. I was living in Cornwall at the time, so a couple of us decided that we were going to go and we drove down. We got an Airbnb and we stayed like in Chicago. So it wasn't so bad. We took a cab out to the park. And then I just remember walking into the parks for the first time and just seeing like a thousand people ready to play Pokemon go. And I was like, this is super cool. And they have an inflatable Pokemon and whole habitats where they had stuff set up and it was really cool, super cool. And I had met so many good people that weekend that it was just amazing. And I swore to myself that I would never miss another one again, and then COVID hit.

David Hernandez:

Hey, I mean, well, you only missed one, that was Seattle. Otherwise,

Professor Glaw:

Yeah, I didn't get a chance get up to Seattle, yeah, but it was a really good experience. I still talk to people that I met from GoFest in Chicago.

David Hernandez:

would it be just random people you meet along the street or just playing the game, or was it people that you met prior to?

Professor Glaw:

no, it was just a couple people that I met in the park that we just sat and had a really good chat. I added them on, on Facebook before I parted ways.

David Hernandez:

Oh, that's awesome,

Professor Glaw:

So it's, yeah, that's the great thing about Pokemon Go is it brings people together on a global level.

David Hernandez:

And I was going to say, you probably have a good experience with that because you said you moved around a lot, right?

Professor Glaw:

I have, I've lived in five different cities in my life. It's just since Pogo was released. So I'm in a couple of discords for several different cities at this point, and I have friends all over.

David Hernandez:

That's going to say, like, you've had the perfect opportunity to experience how this game brings people together by, I'm pretty sure that's probably happened in every single city.

Professor Glaw:

Yeah, absolutely, yeah. it's a melting pot in every single city, and the communities come together in different ways, and it was really cool to see people take up the mantle of being a community leader, and to bring people together. And it's just really cool to see people Come out of the shell, when they start playing Pokemon, you know?

David Hernandez:

You see them evolve over time to people who wouldn't say a word to, now they're social people that keep going and going and going.

Professor Glaw:

Yeah, absolutely. I've met people who were like in their 60s and their late 50s who were just like, Oh, I used to sit on the couch and just watch TV and now I get out and I play Pokemon and it's changed my life because now I'm healthier because I'm going for a two, three kilometer walk every day. it's just getting people out there and getting people active and getting people involved in the community. And I met one guy who was like, I didn't talk to anybody. Now I have 50 people that I talk to every single day and it's done wonders for their mental health.

David Hernandez:

That's what I've always loved too, because, especially community days, I remember I always see families, there'll be the kids and the wife and the, husband, they're walking, it's like a game night almost, to where they're playing Pokemon Go, and they're just catching, you got the kid who's super excited, like, oh, look, daddy, I got, look, mommy, I got a shiny or whatever, and stuff like that is what keeps me playing.

Professor Glaw:

I remember we used to walk around when my kids were really, really young. we got them little tablets that they could play on. So me and my wife would walk up and on the street and we'd play and then they'd play and of course they were like super little. So they were just throwing bottles all over the place, but you could tell when they caught one because they would just get super excited and start giggling because it would, catch and they'd be like, yeah, yeah.

David Hernandez:

Yeah, they have so much excitement.

Professor Glaw:

Yeah, every once in a while, they'd start yelling and then did, cause they, they find a Pokemon that they thought was really cute and they didn't want to lose it. They're like, you can't do catch. And I was like, all right, I'll catch this one for you.

David Hernandez:

So, New York City is this past year, you got to go this time as a content creator instead of a regular person you did in Chicago. How was it different for you, in your opinion, going to New York City as a co host of Wayspotters compared to how you went in 2019 in Chicago as a regular player?

Professor Glaw:

in 2019, I just went as a player. I wasn't big into watching the YouTube or to tell you the truth. I don't even know podcast existed back then. Right? So I was just a guy walking around trying to meet people trying to be as sociable as possible and just grind and catch Pokemon. Right? This time around, it was a very surreal experience going as a content creator, especially as the on the group that we're with. So we would go and we had a couple of meetups with some of the bunch of the patreons before and we were doing little chats and stuff. When we got to the park, we got to go over and meet with this group and, we hung out with, different podcast groups and a couple of YouTubers and it was a social networking event, I think, in conjunction with playing the game. I think we grinded a lot less than I did in 2019, but Just running into people from the community and having chats with people from the community about Wayfarer and about Wayspotters And just about Pokemon in general. I think I enjoyed this experience a lot more than I did in 2019 because I was more in touch with what the community was doing what the community wanted and just saying hi to people and just being more more social and focusing more on that aspect than the playing the game. I don't think I finished the research until like late Sunday

David Hernandez:

That's right.

Professor Glaw:

But it was it was very structured to a point and I liked that. it was really cool and getting to meet like you and all the other patrons and some other Podcasters that I listened to getting to meet everybody for the first time like actually face to face was really cool experience And having people walk up to me in the park and be like, Hey, you're Chris from the Wayspotters and you're Jamal from the Wayspotters. Can I get a picture? Can you sign this, postcard? can we, and I was just like, hold on, you recognize me? This is crazy. It was very, very humbling and very overwhelming. I think a little bit at first. I don't want to say I got used to it by the end, but it was less overwhelming at the beginning. The first couple of times me and Jabal just kind of looked at each other and we're like, is this happening?

David Hernandez:

Is this for real? Yeah,

Professor Glaw:

Is this for real? Yeah. There was a couple of times. There's 1 time. that we had stopped because Jamal needed to do a special trade with someone and we just ended up literally by chance stopping besides someone who's watched the YouTube and he just turned over and was like, hey, you're the way spotters and we were just kind of like. Yes. Yes, we are. Wow. Okay. Then, it was a really good chat and we got to meet some really cool people in the community who listen and we said to everybody, if you have show ideas, let us know and, we'll use it as a topic. the more that we get our community involved in what we're doing, the better off everyone's going to be. So it was just really cool to meet some of the people. And there's a few that we missed, that I was really disappointed that we didn't get to meet, but there's always next year.

David Hernandez:

Now, one thing that's interesting is I know GoFest you in Chicago in 2019, right soon after that, you eventually started working for GoHub, but you also started like trying to do content creation. You dipped your toe into it. That's when you eventually started doing YouTube. Did you always have the desire to do content creation, after that GoFest, or what made you want to do content creation to do the writing?

Professor Glaw:

I've always wanted to give back to the community and do it in a way that was informative and fun. I'm a big writer. I like writing. I've been trying to write a novel for the longest time and I just can't ever seem to get it off the ground, so when I saw on Twitter that Go Hub was hiring writers, I was like, yeah, I'm going to give it a shot. I want to, it seems like a cool thing to do. And then we moved to Plattsburgh and I got the email saying, Hey, congratulations. You've been chosen. I was just so excited. that they had hired me and I could get to start that. The YouTube, it's a lot of work like, I don't think that I realized just how much work goes into that when I started it. that's why it's falling off a little bit. I want to get back into it, but it's a lot of work between GoHub and then the Wayspotters and then trying to do the YouTube, um, especially when with the Wayspotters doing the video as well, right? So it takes up a lot of my time, but it's totally worth it giving back to the community and just having people enjoy the content that you're putting out. It's just, it's a very rewarding experience. There's a couple of times people were just like, Hey, I read your articles on GoHub and they're really cool. And I really enjoy that all the writing that you guys do. So that's, it makes you feel good when people are like, Hey, I enjoy the things that you are putting out into the world. and it enriches their life. It's just such a rewarding experience.

David Hernandez:

What topics do you try to focus on when it comes to writing for GoHub?

Professor Glaw:

I do mostly data mining articles, and kind of stuff that speculates about the future about what certain.

David Hernandez:

and see what oh, what's gonna happen kind of thing, right?

Professor Glaw:

right. Like I did 1 on. I'm going to do 1 on, what breeding might look like. I got 1 coming up that's going to be way too early speculation on where GoFest is going to be next year, I'm gonna talk about,

David Hernandez:

let's hold on real quick. Let's speculate where we think GoFest is gonna be. So I'll let you go first and then I'll go. so right now at the time of this recording Where do you think GO Fest could be next year?

Professor Glaw:

I, my gut tells me somewhere in California. I would not be surprised if it was San Francisco, that is the number one spot that I'm picking, because they seem to be going East Coast, West Coast, because it was Chicago for a bit, and then it was Seattle, and then it was New York, so I think they're going to go back to the West Coast of U. S. think there's always going to be one in Japan, there's always going to be one in Japan, there's always going to be one in Europe, and then there's always going to be one in the U. S. So think San Francisco. what do you think?

David Hernandez:

My guess is Hawaii and I think it'll be around the same time as the PvP championship next year

Professor Glaw:

Oh, world, yeah.

David Hernandez:

Yes, I think we'll see. I think it How they did Japan this past year is going to be how they're going to want to do it for Hawaii next year. So that's my gut feeling.

Professor Glaw:

Oh, that's a good one. I'm going to add that list. I'll give you credit for that one.

David Hernandez:

That's fair. Well, either way, it looks like we're both in agreement that it's going to be on the west coast next year. Although Hawaii, I don't know if coast. It's more of an island.

Professor Glaw:

Yeah. It's off, it's off the west coast. I think

David Hernandez:

Yeah.

Professor Glaw:

enough.

David Hernandez:

Have you ever gone back to some of your old articles to see like, oh, I was completely on this or I completely missed this?

Professor Glaw:

I do. I wrote one. That was like a speculation article on when they're going to release certain Pokemon. I was way off with Kecleon, like way off. I put Kecleon, at the tour event and they released it way early.

David Hernandez:

Not that bad, I think it was like a couple weeks, right?

Professor Glaw:

Yeah, it was close. They released it right before.

David Hernandez:

they gave the Shiny at GO Tour Hoenn.

Professor Glaw:

Yes. Yes, they did. So, I wasn't too far off. There's sometimes that I'm just like, way off, and it's just funny to go back and read it and be like, yeah, I wasn't even close. Sometimes I nail it, though, and it's just, it's, sometimes people have been like, you knew. I'm like, I didn't. I actually didn't.

David Hernandez:

It's like you're either a prophet or you're a bum, it's not really anything in between.

Professor Glaw:

Yeah, exactly, yeah. It's feast or famine when you make predictions, right? So.

David Hernandez:

it's always fun to speculate.

Professor Glaw:

I love it because it gets people talking right and then people go into the comments and like, Oh, I think it's gonna be here I think they're gonna do it this way and it's fun to go back and look at people and be like, yo, You were wrong. You were wrong. Hey, you actually got it, right? So good for you it's super fun. And it's just one of those things that really gets people talking, especially when people are just like, if you think that's how they're going to do it, you're stupid and I'm just like, well, know, you're entitled to your opinion.

David Hernandez:

I mean, we're just speculating. We don't know if we're going to be right.

Professor Glaw:

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. And sometimes it's funny when you put out speculation articles for Gohob, people were just like, you're just trying to throw us off the scent because you already know what's going to happen. And Like, we don't. do you really think that Niantic plans six months in advance and lets us know? Come on.

David Hernandez:

They probably plan six months in advance, but they don't let y'all know.

Professor Glaw:

Oh, God, no. No, we're lucky if we get a couple of days in advance, knowledge of some stuff.

David Hernandez:

Well, that's actually interesting. So what is it like for you to work with Niantic from a GoHub perspective?

Professor Glaw:

It's cool. I love knowing, a day or so in advance. Just so we can get the articles prepped and stuff and get them ready to go. and it's interesting to see how the reaction that our group has to the news and sometimes we look at stuff and go, oh, batten down the hatches, because this is going to be a disaster. we have that preparation for news that's coming out and, like, when the whole raid pass thing went down, the remote raid pass thing went down, we knew a couple days in advance. There's only a small group of people who work for GoHub that have access to that. it's not everybody. so we were just like, I'm gonna go ahead and delete my Twitter now, and then open it back up in a week because this is not gonna be fun. it's funny because sometimes people will like, they'll yell at our Twitter like we're Niantic. I don't know how many times I've had the type is GoHub isn't Niantic. If you're angry at someone, you're angry at Niantic, not us.

David Hernandez:

right? It's like they take their frustration out on you, basically.

Professor Glaw:

Yeah,

David Hernandez:

they think probably you're part of the problem.

Professor Glaw:

yeah, exactly. They yell at us, like, we're the ones that made this decision, and it's just like, we're just passing on the news, dude.

David Hernandez:

that's a tricky position to be in. Do you ever have trouble trying to keep stuff to yourself at times when you find something out?

Professor Glaw:

Oh god, no. No, no. I have way too much respect for the process, and for Zero, the guy who owns GoHub, to, be a leak, or there's times when I'm just like, oh, this news is so juicy. I want everyone to know now, and it's, It's like not coming out for a week and I got to bite my tongue, so yeah, there's sometimes that there's news that I'm just like, Oh, people are going to love this so much that I don't want to get it out now. But when you're embargoed, you're embargoed and it's got to stay, it's got to stay in the chat.

David Hernandez:

You've been listening to As the Pokeball Turns. We're gonna take a quick break. We'll be right back. So eventually, we talked about at the beginning of the show, you become the new co host for the Wayspotters Podcast in February of 2023. What interested you in becoming the co-host for Wayspotters?

Professor Glaw:

So I was a guest on episode 44 when I wrote that big article for GoHub, Jamal found it and was like, Hey, I need to get this guy on the show. So he reached out to me and was like, Hey, we're from Wayspotters. We have this podcast that talks about wayspotting and wayfinding. And I hadn't heard of them before then. So I went and listened to a bunch of episodes before I was a guest. they had me on, and I just had so much fun talking to Jamal and Lachlan about my article and just Wayfarer in general. And I think that episode ended up being like an hour and a half long because they ranted so much. and it got pretty good downloads too, right? So it was a pretty popular episode. I joined their Patreon Discord shortly after that. And Jamal and I would have conversations about Wayfarer and... Kind of stuff on the side and then he dm'd me, I think a week or two before Lachlan left and was like, Hey, just a heads up. I think Lachlan might be leaving. I might need someone to guest host for a couple episodes. Would you be interested? I was like, yeah, absolutely. And then Lachlan left and he dm'd me. Funny enough, I was listening to the episode where Lachlan recorded his goodbye and me and Jamal, like, right after that, we're like, yeah, I'm gonna need you for a couple episodes. I'm like, if you need me for one or five or a hundred or just for the rest of your life, I go, I'm

David Hernandez:

Oh my God.

Professor Glaw:

He's like, yeah, yeah, we'll, we'll do a couple episodes. And then I think we did, one or two and then he introduced me to Ken and he's like, yeah, yeah, I think we're good. You know, our chemistry is pretty good. We got along pretty well. And then I had a chat with Ken and they were like, yeah, there you go. You're the new, you're the new co host. So it was pretty cool.

David Hernandez:

What were you hoping to bring when you joined the podcast? Like what goals did you initially have? Or what vision did you have?

Professor Glaw:

being an upbeat, positive attitude. I know Jamal and I had talked before I came on about doing the video. And like we mentioned earlier, it's, I have access. Or experience with the YouTube and the editing aspect of it. So I was like, I'll take care of all the YouTube stuff. You can take care of all the audio stuff and just growing the podcast getting it out to more people, being able to help people with Wayfarer because Wayfarer can be intimidating and it can be a process that's not exactly rewarding if you're not doing it correctly, and it's very easy to not do it correctly. Like Jamal's area, he waits months to get a decision on his nominations, right? I mentioned this in the podcast a couple of times, if you're putting something in, you're doing the work to go out there, take the pictures and do the descriptions, and then it gets rejected 6 months later, people are going to be so discouraged. So we just want to help people make better nominations to get quality things on the map because the more people who are in Wayfarer the better that Niantic Games are gonna be.

David Hernandez:

And that goes back to trying to educate people and try and teach them like how to nominate a stop, because it's not that straightforward. It's not something that it's easy to grasp because I remember when I went through Wayfarer, I had to go through some old, Q and A's from the Ingress side, just to find the information on how some things were eligible because it wasn't on the main website. I'm sure that's gotta be a challenge for y'all as well.

Professor Glaw:

Yeah, that's one of the things that's a big sticking point with Wayfarerers is you go, they ask you to go to the criteria page and all that and it's not really up to date with everything, and it's just really frustrating to see new Wayfarers look at stuff that's on the map and be like, Oh, that must be eligible and then they nominate it and then people get into the reviews and you're just like, yeah, that's not eligible anymore. It used to be, but it's not now. that's one of the big things that me and Jamal try and do is get that information out there. The nuance to Wayfarer that the Wayfarer team is struggling to get out there.

David Hernandez:

What's been your favorite moment on the show so far? Anything that sticks out?

Professor Glaw:

We had a lot of fun with the AMA and talking about the AMA when Niantic did theirs. I think my favorite episode that we've done so far, and this is going to be a little bit selfish, is I wrote an article for Go Hub called Ways to Improve Your Way Spot Nominations. and it got a lot of traction on Go Hub, so I put it on the forums and there was a lot of people who were like, this is really, really good. So we did a whole episode on that and that episode was really, really well received, people loved that episode. And it's funny because people on the Wayfarer form still bring it up when people are like, Hey, What's wrong with this nomination? People are just like, hey, go check out this post and listen to this episode, this'll help you because it goes through and it's really good. I think that one was my favorite so far.

David Hernandez:

And it would just be general tips on just like, how to write a description properly, avoid saying Pokemon as much as possible, stuff like that.

Professor Glaw:

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It was, it's a lot of the top mistakes that people are making that end up get their rejections and then ways to avoid it.

David Hernandez:

One thing that you've been very vocal about has been seeing wayfarer abuse sometimes, you know, is that something that you think could ever be solved or like, what's the best way you think people could approach that?

Professor Glaw:

It's yeah, we did 2 whole episodes on abuse. to the point where we had a couple people be like, why are you guys so negative now? It's like, no, we need to talk about this because it's a big problem. I think the Wayfarer team is doing a fairly good job at dealing with it, especially recently. it's just, it's a huge problem that they let slip through the cracks a little bit and it was like a virus, you know, once, If you leave it untreated for too long, it just spreads and it becomes a bigger problem than it would have been had you dealt with it in the beginning. They've created a new report for reporting abuse and they're, I reported some abuse and they dealt with it fairly quickly. I think it was like 18 days that they took action on it. They're putting strikes against Pogo accounts, which I think is huge. That will discourage people from doing the abuse if they're going to start losing all of their Pokemon. because people have had their accounts, like, permanently banned like, they've lost their accounts because of Wayfarer abuse. So, I think they're doing a decent job. I think the best way is to just remove stuff that is on the map that shouldn't be there, so that other people don't look at it and think, oh, I can do it too. I think that's the biggest thing. they need to just clean up the game board and then start dealing with the people who are abusing like they recently removed 1000 way spots from the Netherlands that were abusive. And that's just absolutely bonkers.

David Hernandez:

I guess maybe for those who are more unfamiliar with the Wayfarer system, cause me and you were kind of in the know, what are the negative consequences of having Wayfarer abuse that people may not realize?

Professor Glaw:

So one of the biggest things I think is if you're playing the game, so like let's take New York City for example, right? So you have a bunch of people in New York City who are new to the city. They don't know where anything is, and they're a tourist. So you open up Pogo, you open up Ingress, you open up a Niantic game, and you're like, I'm going to explore. And you see a Pokéstop off in the distance that's like a cool plaque or a cool mural and you want to go, Oh, I want to go look at that mural in person. And then you walk all the way over there. And it's not there. Right? So now you're discouraged. You're like, well, what am I doing? And now you're not going to pay attention and now you might not even play the game anymore because I've seen people who are just like, I'm going around and I'm using this game to, to help me explore. And I want to get out there and see things and everything is, it's not there. it's very frustrating. And I think that's the biggest thing and Niantic is using this as a method to draw in sponsorship. And if a sponsor looks at this and says, Hey, we wanna run and do things with your map, and give Niantic money so that they have money to make POGO better. They're not gonna do it if the Niantic game board isn't clean. They're gonna look at it and go, you can't even manage this. Why am I gonna work with you? You know what I mean?

David Hernandez:

Yeah, yeah, I see what you're saying. I guess maybe the counter argument would be for some Pogo players. For them, they see Pokéstop to see like, yes, I can play the game. You know, what's the harm in that? Well, my question is this though, because you're saying, I get what you're saying to where the Pokestops are used for exploration, like if you want to go check out a plaque, if you want to go see a check out a statue, it should be there, otherwise if it's missing, it ruins the whole point of having the Pokestop to begin with. in your opinion, Do you think the idea of exploration has been missed by the Pogo audience?

Professor Glaw:

Yes. Absolutely. to a certain extent, I think that the large majority of the Pogo audience it's a point of interest or it's a Pokestop. I'm just going to spin it and not even look at the photo disc and not even look at the description. Right. it's a means to an end. It's a spot where I can get items and it's a spot where I can drop a lure and attract more Pokemon and that's it. Right. and I hear, I feel that. And I, it's tough when you talk about, especially rural communities, right? Like communities that are outside of the main cities that don't necessarily have a lot of points of interest where they can create gyms and they can create pokestops to be able to grind community days and that's the nuance within the Wayfarer system that a lot of people struggle with because if you're in a rural community, Pogo's not that fun, as opposed to if you're in New York City when You could put a Pokestop in every single community or every single building and every single stop. Right? it's difficult. and I, I can see the people trying to better their community, not necessarily the way they should go about it, but I can understand why it happens.

David Hernandez:

that makes sense because, like I said, I'm with you. I like to go explore different areas. I like being able to see stuff on the map that is actually on there. it just seems like... For me, and even you, we're kind of in, we're in a different world compared to pogo players, they see pogo stops and gyms as a resource, and nothing more than that. my hope would be with the route system that might help people to be more inclined to experience the exploration side of Pogo, because routes you only need one Pokestop. So they're not tied to having a lot of Pokestops, not tied to having a lot of Gyms. They're more based on the experience and exploration that both me and you kind of identify with.

Professor Glaw:

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. And I've been excited for routes since they were first found in the code I think it was 2020 or something like that. It was like a long time ago. Yeah, 20. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. and you're right. And it's one of those things that I think will really help the rural community because you can get items out of, you can get pretty good items out of them and you only need one stop because you can do a loop one, right? I don't think necessarily they rolled it out that the way that they should have, but it's getting better and they're starting to roll it out to more people. So hopefully it helps promote the exploration aspect of Pogo. Like you said,

David Hernandez:

Now, my last question about Wayfarer. What's something that you would like to see changed in Wayfarer?

Professor Glaw:

Ooh, that is a good one. My biggest pet peeve and I can't really say much, but my biggest pet peeve with Wayfarer has been the system in which you review like the user interface for reviewing. I hated it ever since I started like It's not in line with what the Wayfarer team and what Niantic wants people putting into the game. And it needs a major overhaul, and one is coming. I can't talk about it, but one is coming and I am very excited. fingers crossed it comes soon.

David Hernandez:

Fingers crossed. Professor Glaw, that is the interview. That is an episode. Before you do go, if people want to check out your content, people want to connect with you. Where can they find you? By all means, please plug away.

Professor Glaw:

you can find me on the GoHub, so it's Glawhantojar. You can find me and Jamal on YouTube, if you search@Wayspotters. I have videos on YouTube, if you search Professor Glaw, you'll find my YouTube videos there. I'm going to start doing some more tutorial videos there. So that would be great. If you could check us all out, we would definitely appreciate it.

David Hernandez:

Cool beans. And I'll make sure to include links to everything that he said in the description of today's episode. Thank you for listening to As the Pokeball Turns. If you want to support the show, consider becoming a patron by either clicking the link in the description or going to patreon.com/asthepokeballturns. Now here's a sneak peek for the next episode of As the Pokeball Turns.

People on this episode

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David Hernandez

Host
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Dux

Co-host
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Layla

Co-host