Sad YouTube Is Over (For Now).
I started Sad YouTube over three years ago, in the fall of 2012. I wanted somewhere to preserve all of the wonderful, heartbreaking stories that seemed to be littered throughout YouTube’s comment section, unrecognized. The project soon took over my life—or at least many, many long hours of it, usually in the hours past midnight when I needed an excuse not to go to bed, or not to do the work I was supposed to be doing. But I regard those hundreds of hours of reading YouTube comments as well-spent; there was a real thrill of discovery to them, a feeling that any randomly clicked “Related Video” link could lead to finding a hidden story from decades past.
It was gratifying to see how, over the years, the project connected with people, which added to the sense that I was on some sort of mission. I got great, thoughtful notices in media outlets like Slate, Newsweek, The Awl, and GQ, as well as (and this became a running joke) uncountable mentions in the German press. Andrew Sullivan even blogged about it! I also wrote a story of my own, for BuzzFeed, in which I first made contact with some of the commenters whose stories had inspired me to start the project in the first place.
I was lucky enough to be featured on NPR’s On the Media/TLDR, due to the good offices of PJ and Alex, now doing their thing at the great Reply All dot limo. I collaborated with Chris Trowbridge of the CBC for a Day 6 radio piece where we spoke with both commenters and one of the musicians who inspired their stories, and uncovered a murder mystery along the way. I got onstage and talked about it at IRL Club.
And I had the good fortune to work with the ridiculously talented artists Ohara Hale, Dan Buller, and Stephen Evans on the Sad YouTube Books series of ebooks, in which I collected comments by theme—time, place, or emotion—and made digital chapbooks of them, with the above-mentioned artists’ wonderful illustrations. They are 1968, California, New York, 1976 and Regrets. (And despite what you’ll read below, there may be more in the future.)
All in all, I collected upwards of 600 stories, each a shining little jewel of humanity. Some of them describe huge, life-shattering events—wars, car crashes—and others describe smaller, subtler moments, fragments of memory that would otherwise have been lost in time, I love them all.
If this all sounds valedictory, it’s because it is. I’ve had less and less time to comb through the comments section in the last few months, and I’m currently working on a few writing and filmmaking projects that will be occupying even more of my time. So instead of letting the site just taper off, I wanted to draw a line under it and make a proper farewell.
I will of course keep the site up for the indefinite, and hopefully infinite, future. There is really a (not-at-all-organized) massive archive here, and I want people to be able to access it. I never got around to building an index for the site, and I apologize for that, but if you’re a new reader I invite you to check out three posts I made collecting some of the site’s most memorable comments over the years: here, here and here. They’re a pretty good start.
And while I won’t be continuing to post comments here for the foreseeable future, if anyone wants to take my lead and start their own Sad YouTubes, nothing would make me happier. I’ve already heard of some interest in doing versions based in other languages/countries, and I think that would be wonderful. (Maybe a German Sad YouTube?)
If you want to follow me and my other projects, you can check out my sporadically updated blog at markslutsky.com or on twitter at @totallyslutsky. I’ll also still be checking my emails at [email protected].
Thank you to all my readers, to everyone who helped spread the word or sent in a submission of your own.
Remember, it’s sometimes okay—and even good for your soul!—to read the comments.
