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[00:01:00] Hey everybody, what's going on? Rob's sister Nino and I'm back to talk a little bit about
[00:01:06] the news that we got here over the weekend about the end of a survivor tradition.
[00:01:12] The SIA Award is coming to an end. Just me here today talking for a little bit.
[00:01:18] I had a few things on my mind that I wanted to talk to you about.
[00:01:22] I did this format earlier in the week. I made some predictions which were
[00:01:26] not exactly right about the survivor finale, but I've enjoyed being able to just jump on
[00:01:33] and talk a little bit by myself about my thoughts in these shorter podcasts.
[00:01:38] Please let me know if you like this kind of a format. I just wanted to come on
[00:01:43] and talk a little bit about the SIA Award and ultimately its end here coming into Survivor
[00:01:51] 46 and a little bit about where and how it started. Now the headline on Friday,
[00:01:59] we got on Jeff Probst's Instagram. He posted a long post in his story. Jeff Probst tweeted
[00:02:09] or posted, It's the end of one of the most unique eras in the history of Survivor.
[00:02:16] After 8 years, 14 seasons, 19 players and over $1 million awarded, Survivor is officially
[00:02:26] bringing the SIA prize to a triumphant end. Interesting sentence. First, triumphant end,
[00:02:35] I think probably depends who you ask because I think there's probably a couple of people from
[00:02:39] the Survivor 46 cast that say not so triumphant to end the SIA Award this week without giving
[00:02:46] away any SIA money. It was reported last night, the award is going away. I assumed that SIA wanted
[00:02:55] to stop doing it which I think is well within her right. It was kind of a wild thing to do,
[00:03:01] to be giving away so much money to your favorite reality TV show contestants. But
[00:03:06] I thought the phrasing of this was interesting that Jeff said, Survivor is officially bringing
[00:03:13] the SIA prize to a triumphant end. Now I know that SIA is a unique person. Maybe SIA didn't
[00:03:19] want to come out and say, Hey, I want to stop doing this. I don't know how to get out of it.
[00:03:25] But SIA has not given away money every single season. I mean she has done it for
[00:03:31] the last few seasons, but there have been stretches of time where she didn't give
[00:03:36] anybody the SIA Award money. I want to talk a little bit about the SIA Awards in the past,
[00:03:45] but there's been periods of a year or so where just nobody got any SIA money as recently as
[00:03:52] Survivor winners at war and then Survivor 41. Nobody got any SIA money before she came back
[00:03:59] in Survivor 42 and gave money to Dreya. I think if SIA just was not feeling this season for
[00:04:06] whatever reason, I think she could have just not given anything away and just come back
[00:04:12] and had it open. But Jeff says it's over, no more SIA Awards. He went on and talked about
[00:04:18] the history of the war, talked about how that's so grateful for everything that she's done.
[00:04:27] He says, so it's with tremendous gratitude and admiration to SIA that we bring to a close one
[00:04:32] of the most unique relationships a TV show could ever have with a pop star of SIA's global watch.
[00:04:38] Again, I don't really understand why she just didn't want to do it this season, but maybe
[00:04:45] for whatever reason, I think it's valid to ask the question, did Survivor want the SIA Award
[00:04:52] to end? It would be a departure. It seems very celebrated that SIA would give this money away.
[00:05:00] I have here in front of me one of the great Survivor collectors items. I have the official
[00:05:08] collector's edition of the Survivor 40 year anniversary written by Cynthia Wong and Steven
[00:05:16] and I collaborated a little bit and posted some of our thoughts about all the seasons.
[00:05:20] There's a whole section about the super fan, music maestro SIA views Survivor as a gift.
[00:05:27] Now she returns that love in spades and it was all about how SIA is this great super fan of
[00:05:33] Survivor. A whole section about how Cochrane really got her involved as a super fan and she
[00:05:40] found the show during Cochrane's season and then became friends with Cochrane and then
[00:05:43] Cochrane started showing her more and more seasons until ultimately she comes to one of the
[00:05:50] Survivor finales with Cochrane. It's the Survivor Co-Rong finale and SIA is in the audience
[00:06:00] and Michelle has just won and they talked to Michelle, they talked to Aubrey and they talked
[00:06:07] to the zero vote finalist Ty Trang. I believe this was in May of 2016 and I'm gonna play the
[00:06:16] clip here of what went on that night. Okay, here's Jeff talking to Ty. A call comes from the crowd
[00:06:34] watching this at home. I'm like, oh my god is there an intruder? Is somebody, is there about to be
[00:06:40] something horrible happening on stage? Jeff looks out into the audience and his eyes light up.
[00:06:48] Oh my, oh my gosh. What? Okay wait Glenn go hold, hey slow down, slow down, slow down.
[00:06:57] This is an unrun, this is not a moment. Okay but I know who this is. From over the shoulder
[00:07:03] we see now SIA, classic black and white wig, big hat and Jeff is trying to direct the cameras
[00:07:12] to pick up SIA. She is not on microphone, Jeff is trying to pick up her audio.
[00:07:20] Wait SIA, SIA come up you don't have a mic. Oh my god wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait,
[00:07:28] wait, wait just come here, come here. Okay where do you want to go Glenn? Tell me where
[00:07:32] you want to go, right here? Okay, okay this is, this really is SIA. Hi, hi, hi.
[00:07:40] We met because you're a fan of Survivor and have become friends and I know people right
[00:07:45] now are going what is this bit and I'm telling you you're about to tell me what this bit is.
[00:07:49] Yeah this seems like Jeff does not know that what is going to happen but if famous people
[00:07:55] like Survivor, Jeff is willing to go with them okay? I could not let Ty go home without saying that
[00:08:03] your like authenticity and your care for animals really inspired me and so I want to donate
[00:08:09] $50,000 to you and I want to donate $50,000 to your choice of animal charity
[00:08:18] and and I just want to say thank you for showing America how to be kind to animals.
[00:08:23] Wow, yes. My god thank you so much. Thank you guys.
[00:08:32] And Survivor history was made and was like wow okay $50,000 to Ty Trang, $50,000 to whatever
[00:08:41] charity of Ty Trang's choice. Now Ty in hindsight this is kind of a raw deal because other
[00:08:47] people are going to get $100,000 of $100,000 of to them personally they don't have to give
[00:08:53] $50,000 to a charity. I guess they could if they wanted to but that's where it was born
[00:08:58] in May of 2016 and you know that Jeff goes back and talks to Sia a little bit about why
[00:09:08] is she doing this? Wow, now Glenn get a shot of the house because we have a scanning
[00:09:14] ovation happening here. So now why is this like a fan favorite thing because part of the money
[00:09:23] you're giving actually giving money to Ty? Yes well I remember that Sprint used to give money
[00:09:29] to a fan favorite and when it didn't happen last year I remember thinking I kind of wanted
[00:09:34] to do it for Keith but then I was too chicken, pardon the pun. Okay so good joke
[00:09:41] there by Sia and she mentions that okay she wanted to do this award for Keith Nail at one
[00:09:51] point in time and she ultimately didn't. Keith Nail was kind of bummed out because he would
[00:09:59] have gladly accepted the Sia money, the late great Keith Nail, and even I believe attempted
[00:10:06] to go to one of Sia's shows to meet up with her to potentially cash in on that prize that was
[00:10:14] dangled by Sia towards Keith Nail. I think I have a clip of Keith Nail posting about this.
[00:10:22] Hey Sia, me and Big D here. Thanks for thinking about me at the finale that was real nice
[00:10:29] and we're gonna try to catch up with you and show in New Orleans. Be good.
[00:10:35] To our knowledge Sia never did end up catching up with Keith Nail but she had wanted to he
[00:10:41] was the inspiration he's part of this story and so Sia gives the money into Ty that's in
[00:10:49] season 32. Millennials versus Gen X happens nothing, Ty Trang even comes back,
[00:10:56] Survivor Game Changers no Sia, HHH Sia was not moved but Ghost Island comes along
[00:11:04] and in Survivor Ghost Island Sia fell in love with Donathan and after Survivor Ghost Island
[00:11:13] she said she was so moved by Donathan's story she gave Donathan $14,000 because that was the
[00:11:20] maximum that she could gift to Donathan without there being tax implications. I think at another
[00:11:27] point she also gifted Donathan another $14,000 at least that's what it says here in this
[00:11:33] Sia chapter of the Survivor 40th anniversary almanac that I have in front of me but then
[00:11:40] after that Sia then in Survivor David versus Goliath at some point after the season was over
[00:11:47] she really liked Davey, she emails Davey hey Davey and he's like he thought it was fake
[00:11:54] that she emailed him that okay I want to send you $14,000 he was her winner pick okay and so
[00:12:02] now Sia comes back in a big way at Survivor the Edge of Extinction she comes out she awards
[00:12:11] Rick Devins the largest prize yet $100,000 she loved Rick Devins she also for the first time
[00:12:20] gives out multiple prizes she liked Aurora's story she gave Aurora $15,000 for growing up
[00:12:28] in the foster care system and Joe Anglem had wanted to cut his hair off and she gave Joe
[00:12:33] Anglem $15,000 for charity because he cut his hair off that night so she gives away three
[00:12:40] prizes for the very first time which is going to eventually go on to be kind of the format
[00:12:46] for what Sia will do a lot of these seasons season 39 she ends up giving actually double
[00:12:54] maybe the biggest prizes yet she gives double hundred thousand dollar prizes to Elaine and
[00:13:00] Janet at the season after season 39 the highlight of the idols that was the season
[00:13:06] that she spent wanted to you know throw the most money at Elaine and Janet Jamal got $15,000
[00:13:12] but then Sia goes away again you know pandemic's hard on everybody she is off the scene for
[00:13:20] survivor winners at war is not moved by survivor 41 but there's one person that really
[00:13:28] moves Sia to come back and that's Dreya and so after survivor 42 she awards Dreya and her story
[00:13:35] $100,000 surprises Dreya with that then in survivor 43 Jesse gets real close to the
[00:13:43] end of the game she ends up giving Jesse $100,000 and then two $50,000 award winners in Owen
[00:13:54] and Ryan Medrano that she was moved by his story and then in survivor 44
[00:14:03] Sia is back and she of course loved Carolyn and this is where I come into the story
[00:14:11] because I got to be a little part of this and I was doing my exit interview with Carolyn
[00:14:19] and it was back in May of one year ago May of 2023 looks like May 25th 2023 so a year ago
[00:14:30] from the day I'm recording this and so here I am talking with Carolyn and the CBS rep says
[00:14:38] hey Rob at some point we're gonna have a special guest coming in to join you on the call and I'm
[00:14:47] thinking okay is this gonna be like is it Jam Jam is it some is it Carson is it some other
[00:14:53] relative of Carolyn's and so here I am talking to Carolyn. Makes sense. I can imagine I can
[00:15:01] imagine yes okay uh look look who's here a figure pops up onto the screen this is Rob
[00:15:08] in real time once again the person on zoom is their zoom name is Beautiful's iPhone
[00:15:19] I don't know who this person is I do not recognize this person
[00:15:24] I'm wondering is this Sia but I am not sure because I have never seen Sia without her classic
[00:15:34] trademark wigs and hats and face coverings and so I don't want to misidentify this person
[00:15:45] so I try to play it cool here's me with Carolyn
[00:15:56] yes okay yes we have a we have a we have an amazing
[00:16:00] surprise guest for you here Carolyn yes Carolyn do you know who this is?
[00:16:12] It's Sia Farler. God bless you Sia for breaking attention there because I was trying to play it
[00:16:24] cool of like okay Carolyn you know who this is right? In fairness to me she wears a disguise
[00:16:38] I don't I have not seen Sia without the wig she classically does not show her face
[00:16:46] so this is a blonde woman I think this could be Carolyn's sister I don't know
[00:16:52] Carolyn immediately knows who it is and and she's speechless but here's Sia breaking some
[00:17:00] news to Carolyn hi Sia hi how are you I'm wonderful I'm very excited to be able to
[00:17:10] offer Carolyn my greatest congratulations and tell Carolyn that I love her so much and that I
[00:17:21] really relate to the whole recovery brain and how much I relate to you know even being able
[00:17:35] to emotionally regulate really good things happening and Carolyn is just like she's like
[00:17:41] can't even have words coming out and so it was a really nice moment everybody was super
[00:17:46] excited when it happened Sia and Carolyn are really getting into it at some point
[00:17:54] I'm getting messaged in the chat like okay Rob wrap it up like uh okay I'm sorry Sia we're
[00:18:00] out of time for this uh we really need you to wrap this up but that was pretty wild a
[00:18:07] really a highlight for me and a cool way that I was somehow involved with this story Sia also
[00:18:14] popped in on exit interviews that day and gave money to Carson she gave fifteen thousand dollars
[00:18:21] to Lauren she gave fifteen thousand dollars to and then last season she ends up uh one more
[00:18:28] time she ends up after survivor 45 she gave Katora a hundred thousand dollars and then
[00:18:36] Caleb fifteen thousand dollars and Jake fifteen thousand dollars and so we came in survivor 46
[00:18:43] expecting all right this is probably going to be the format that it was the last couple of
[00:18:48] seasons kind of bad timing for the players to find out now like right if they would have
[00:18:57] known at the start of the season like hey just so you know no more Sia award I think that
[00:19:04] probably would have hit a little bit different than you know just like a tough week for Charlie I
[00:19:10] think overall to find out by the way also see there's no more Sia award Jeff said it is one
[00:19:18] of the most interesting eras in survivor history certainly is I don't know if I would
[00:19:24] necessarily classify from Korong until now as the Sia era but it is kind of weird where I don't know
[00:19:34] if it was ever affecting the game I think we used to speculate oh Big Wendy was trying to
[00:19:39] save the chickens or people were trying to be animal activists to try to get the Sia money but
[00:19:47] ultimately the the people that Sia picked there was no real through line between anything that
[00:19:54] I don't think it was possible that you could have gained the like Sia liked Ty, Keith Nail,
[00:20:03] Jesse, Lauren, Elaine like it was all over the map the kind of people that Sia wanted to
[00:20:11] award the money to so I think it wasn't necessarily something that was affecting the game
[00:20:17] Was it affecting social media? That I don't know. You know was it potentially a thing of why
[00:20:26] that they didn't want to show Liz saying that she was a millionaire but she really wasn't a
[00:20:33] millionaire like is that all tied in where they didn't want to potentially portray people
[00:20:40] a certain way or was the fact that this cast was just so all over the place on social media
[00:20:47] did they feel like that people were sort of trying to go for Sia money and Survivor or
[00:20:53] did Sia just say hey I'm out and but I don't want people to be mad at me so Survivor can you
[00:20:59] say that it was a mutual decision or your decision because I don't want people
[00:21:04] to be upset with me but again the thing that I just can't understand is like
[00:21:09] why would Sia want to say that's it never again it's over and she could just like give it out
[00:21:17] when she felt like it you know or if Survivor wanted it to end can Sia still as a private
[00:21:22] citizen give money to whoever she wants but certainly newsworthy I think it's interesting
[00:21:29] to talk about I don't want to create controversy around it I just think it's like very
[00:21:37] interesting the way that it all came together and the way that it got rolled out this week
[00:21:44] this news so that's it for the Sia award a no word on whether or not somebody will step up
[00:21:50] into the Sia spot Q said on Friday night that he would take over the role of Sia Q said sad
[00:22:01] no Sia winners this season I'm going to use my CUMIO money to award one person from each season
[00:22:06] twenty thousand dollars until it's no longer smart to do so starting with season 46 who are y'all
[00:22:13] voting to win CUMIO money award very interesting that Q is saying he's going to give money to
[00:22:20] somebody from this season of Survivor which I kind of feel like that you're not allowed to
[00:22:25] the contestants are not supposed to be giving money to each other after the season is over I
[00:22:31] feel like that there used to be rules about that but who knows what's allowed and what's not
[00:22:36] in the new era of Survivor so keep an eye out for who Q might award the CUMIO award to later
[00:22:45] on those are my thoughts about the Sia award very fun to go on a little walk down memory
[00:22:52] lane and talk a little bit about this I mean should Survivor have an award that's given out
[00:22:58] by the private citizen Sia talked about how like oh there used to be a sprint fan favorite
[00:23:03] and again I don't know if that ever was affecting the game we could do a whole
[00:23:07] thing about the sprint fan favorite award Big Brother certainly has its own fan favorite award
[00:23:13] and Survivor now does not have anything like that I think it is a good question as to
[00:23:19] whether or not we should have something like that where it does increase the fan engagement
[00:23:26] but honestly I feel like the fans are maybe too engaged maybe this is the right call
[00:23:32] of that we need to you know it'd be great if the people that are engaged are maybe too
[00:23:38] engaged and the people that aren't that engaged it's hard to get them engaged enough
[00:23:43] it's almost like that we have in the world of Survivor there are people that sort of like
[00:23:49] watch Survivor are on their phone or sort of like half paying attention and then we have
[00:23:54] the people who are like super obsessed with the show and I don't know if there's a ton
[00:24:00] of middle ground there I don't know necessarily if the award was necessarily helping or hurting
[00:24:07] it but all fun things to talk about we also have a lot going on here on Rob is a podcast I talked
[00:24:14] about yesterday on our patron feedback show we talked a bunch took a bunch of calls talked
[00:24:20] about the schedule coming up for next week I'm gonna have Chappelle back on Tuesday for Club
[00:24:25] Kondo Wednesday Mike Bloom Shannon and I are gonna be kicking off our Wednesday night Survivor
[00:24:33] Summer Series while the Survivor podcast every Wednesday night and on Thursday we're gonna do
[00:24:38] Know It Alls in our regular day where Stephen is going to come back and we'll hear what Stephen
[00:24:43] Fishback had to say about Survivor 46 No More Sia Award and everything else and then kicking
[00:24:49] off on Friday we have a brand new series that is going to be a daily series where we are
[00:24:58] going to be going through each season of Survivor looking for what returnees we'd like to see come
[00:25:05] back Mike Bloom is going to be bringing you the Survivor 50 wish list starting on Friday of this
[00:25:11] week and I'm going to join him to talk about Survivor Borneo not to mention we also had in
[00:25:15] our patron podcast feed I talked with Mike Bloom and Shannon Gus about some news and
[00:25:21] speculation about the Australia versus USA Survivor season that's up in our patron feed
[00:25:28] robinswebsite.com slash patron for all that thank you so much for listening I love to get
[00:25:32] your feedback on this type of content I really enjoy it feels like that the people that are
[00:25:38] listening to this are the people that I'm really trying to connect with in this space
[00:25:41] so thank you so much for checking this out and talk to you again soon take care have a good one bye