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i'm having way too much fun writing this fanfic...
I need to vent about Watcher, endure it if you can
Relax, this isn't a parasocial thing, but it is a long ass post, which suits me as a long ass human.
I need an outlet to discuss the terrible business decision Watcher has made by announcing their plan to leave YouTube, and this long-forgotten Tumblr account reached from its grave to grab at my ankle.
If you didn't see their video, good for you. It's extremely cringe-worthy in its sentimentality and editing, with blurry shots, pensive pauses and obligatory sad piano.
But at least there's no f'ing Ukulele.
Although, I think we might get the Ukulele in a few months.
Even though anyone who reads this is probably familiar with what the "Ghoul Boys" have done, I feel as though I need to add a little history.
WATCHER HISTORY
You can skip this part if you've been obsessively following the shenanigans, this is for the noobs who were never a "shaniac" or a "boogara".
Shane Madej and Ryan Bergara used to work at Buzzfeed. They hosted the successful Buzzfeed Unsolved shows. In 2019 they followed in the footsteps of the Try Guys and Safia Nygaaard and left Buzzfeed to create their own YouTube channel named "Watcher".
They brought along Steven Lim, another Buzzfeed person who is most known for the "Worth It" series. This series followed Lim and his friend/s spending obscene amounts of money on obscenely overpriced and indulgent products.
Think of it as being similar to the $100 V's $10,000 Sidemen content, only without the self-awareness and British "bad lads" humor.
Notably, even the Sidemen seem to have cut back on those adventures, perhaps understanding how bad it looks when so many people are struggling to pay their essential bills.
Steven became the CEO of Watcher while Shane and Ryan continued to create and present for the new channel.
They were wildly successful by YouTube standards. At the time of their self-spanking on Friday they were close to achieving 3 million subscribers, in just 4 years, based on basically only 2 cornerstone shows. If Social Blade is still a reasonably trusted source in everything but estimating income, they were gaining thousands of new subscribers every week.
Their most successful shows were Ghost Files, Puppet History, Too Many Spirits and Mystery Files.
Ghost Files is the only one of these shows which requires heavy investment, travel, a large crew and impressive production costs. These videos are shot on-location and require a lot of work. The rest are basically Good Mythical Morning style, just the two hosts and their banter.
Aside from Ghost Files, their content could be created with 3 cameras, 2 lapel mics and a good editor.
They were massively successful, solely because of Ryan and Shane.
THE DEMISE
So, what did they do on Friday 19th April? They decided to announce the launch of their own subscription platform.
Not a Patreon for extra content, behind-the-scenes, audience interaction etc, (they already had a Patreon with 6,000 paying subscribers earning them at least $50k a month), but a bespoke streaming platform which looks like a clone of Netflix.
The cost is $5.99 a month, or $60 a year.
Comparable to Netflix.
And by that I mean the price is comparable to Netflix while the content is comparable to a 4 year old YouTube channel.
Don't get me wrong, their production quality is incredible. The quantity, however, is not.
From the end of May viewers will have to pay to be a subscriber on their own platform in order to watch their shows.
They'll still be posting their trailers on YouTube, and the first episodes of new shows, but to watch it all you'll have to pay up or miss out.
Edited to add: Variety originally reported the Watcher crew were planning to remove all their existing content from YouTube to monetize it on their own platform. It's since been confirmed they will not be removing their old content. Fans are undecided whether this was a back-track after the announcement or a misunderstanding by Variety. You be the judge.
Of course, they're entitled to do this. They are creating a product and you can either enjoy it or not. No one is entitled to see it, for free, whenever they like.
Why did they do this?
Half of the sombre video gushes about their "humble beginnings" as "struggling young guys in a big harsh world", which comes across as extremely self-indulgent and ego-stroking.
A quarter of it explains how insanely successful they've been on YouTube and how this is all thanks to the fans who stuck with them after Buzzfeed, how it's allowed them to hire 25 people, how it's given them the freedom to create what they enjoy making and what the viewers want to see, and - most importantly - how it's allowed them to increase production quality on Ghost Files.
The final quarter of the video explains that this isn't good enough, the quality isn't high enough, the finish not glossy enough, it's not "TV caliber" enough! They want more, they need more, you have to give them more, mostly (apparently) because their CEO Steven Lim wants to bring back his show where he flies around the world with his bestie sipping Champagne and eating gold-leaf-covered lobster.
In short, they want more money to make even bigger things, even though their audience never asked for that.
WHY IT WILL NOT WORK
Oh my goodness, this is going to be a ride so strap in.
I'm not a YouTube creator so there are a lot of things I do not know. Having said that, I know a little about business.
This ain't Buzzfeed, y'all
Watcher became successful because of Ryan and Shane. It was their friendship, their personalities, and the content we loved to watch featuring them at Buzzfeed, that brought us along for the ride.
The audience they poached from Buzzfeed is there for them and Ghost Files. It's not there for Steven Lim and "Worth It". His show worked under the Buzzfeed umbrella only because they had numerous sub-categories in that community to support it.
The Try Guys left and created their own channel from their Buzzfeed fans.
Safia Nygaard left and created her own channel from her Buzzfeed fans.
Shane and Ryan left and created Watcher from their Buzzfeed fans.
Steven Lim left and became the CEO of Watcher. He didn't take his audience with him.
The audience of Watcher is not the audience of "watch me fly around the word with my pal and spend $100K on hand-reared, Whiskey marinaded, diamond-encrusted Kobe steak".
And... IN THIS ECONOMY?
Steven chose to become a CEO instead of a presenter. He's missed the opportunity to take that Buzzfeed audience with him.
This is made clear by the Watcher channel itself. Their "man eats food" content rarely breaks 500K views while their Ghost Files breaks 2 million consistently.
If a million of their viewers followed them from Buzzfeed to Watcher, the other 2 million have joined them since, based almost entirely on their spoopy content.
Not only did they base their channel on this genre and format, they have distilled their audience further ever since the creation of their channel and no matter how hard they try to diversify into "man eats food" it's just not working.
This ain't Netflix, y'all
As mentioned, the $5.99 charge is comparable to Netflix and just about every other streaming platform. Only Watcher can't give you even 5% of what a competing platform can offer for that price.
Other platforms also tailor their content and their pricing based on geographical location and localized economics.
You're paying far less than $5.99 a month if you live in an economy where the median household income is $300 a month. YouTube has a global audience. Their subscribers don't all live in a stable economy where $5.99 is considered disposable income.
We don't know the numbers, but I would guess only 60% of their subscribers are based in the USA, Canada, and the UK.
Even for those who do live in a stable economy, their audience is predominantly young adults and students. Most young adults are currently facing the reality that they will possibly never own their own home, they're living day-to-day trying to budget.
They've instantly priced-out a large % of their audience.
I confidently predict that diehard fans who can't see anything wrong with this will sign up for $5.99 a month, binge watch for a couple of weeks, realize there's no new spoopy content and cancel.
They'll come back when a full season of Ghost Files has arrived, pay again, binge it and leave.
Steven Lim thinks they're gonna get $5.99 a month, every month, from thousands of subscribers. In reality they're going to get maybe $12 a year, from people signing up to binge watch what they want, then leaving.
This will then decline naturally as attention wanes during the months where there is no spoopy.
This ain't good marketing, y'all
They're going to be posting "trailers and season pilots" on YouTube.
Sure, I bet YouTube is gonna be totes okay with a channel doing nothing but trying to hijack traffic for an external site.
Posting nothing but trailers and season premiers will mean maybe one full video per month during busy seasons. That's not enough to remain relevant for the algorithm.
If 80% of those posts are also just trailers saying "leave YouTube and come here", the channel will be smacked down quicker than a crypto scam using an AI generated Elongated Muskrat.
Their channel was growing steadily, but that was with full content regularly posted. When the schedule drops off, and when most of it is considered spammy by YouTube, it's going to collapse like a flan in a cupboard.
A streaming platform needs a constant flow of new subscribers just to replace the gradual drop-off (maybe ask Rooster Teeth about that). When your global audience at YouTube is gone, where are those new subscribers coming from?
The platform is also an additional overhead. It's going to cost thousands a month to keep the servers going.
This ain't good financial management, y'all
I don't know if they've already spent hundreds of thousands of $s on Lim's "men eat food" gamble, but I suspect they have.
I know they have spent hundreds of thousands of $s on a new season of Ghost Files, flying to the UK to host live events while filming those episodes.
This means they've over-extended their finances just at the moment where they've cratered their opportunities to see a return on investment.
Just that, on its own, is enough to destroy a production company.
They do not need 25 employees any more than I need an editor and proof-reader for this long ass post.
They do not need a production studio in Hollywood any more than I needed an office to write this.
They do not need to spend tens of thousands of $s on glossy graphics that appear on screen for maybe 4 seconds in one episode any more than I needed to add screengrabs to this painfully long essay.
By leaving YouTube they've lost:
Adsense revenue (which might not be much on a per-video basis but adds up with a back catalogue over years of productions)
Sponsorship deals, which allegedly contributes almost 50% of their annual revenue.
Merch sales, which is about to crash if the only people they can promote merch to are already paying per month in their smaller ecosystem.
Patreon. Why would someone pay $5.99 twice, for the same or less content?
And they've abandoned all of this for maybe a few thousand people who will probably end up paying just $12 a year when a new spoopy season arrives for them to binge.
I'm no Will Hunting, but no matter how hard I try to make the numbers work they just don't, and I don't need Robin Williams to tell me it's not my fault.
This ain't nice, y'all
Some of you are feeling like Ned's wife right now, and some of you will have no idea what that's in reference to.
Most of you will hate that I made that reference more than you hated the SNL skit.
I get it.
Maybe the worst part about all of his, from a viewer's perspective, is the dismissive nature of their sign-off.
They didn't mention the Patreon members once, not one single time in the whole video. It's like they consider the Patreon "too YouTube". They're the deformed cousin locked in the attic. They're the relative who wasn't invited to the wedding because they can't afford a Tom Ford suit. They're the colleague who isn't invited to the staff night out because they only work in accounting and no one has anything in common with Janice anyway.
These are diehard fans who were actually paying them extra to support them and enjoy a little bonus behind the scenes, and the boys didn't even consider them worthy of an utterance.
They also finished with "If you don't follow us and pay up it's been real, peace out". I'm paraphrasing, but that's basically what it was.
They spent so much of the video saying how awesome and great it was that the fans and YouTube got them to this point, but they didn't thank their Patreon members, and they ended with a blunt suggestion that if you don't follow them and pay more then you're not a real fan anyway and they don't really need you.
"Thanks for getting us here, sucks to be you, bye now!"
You made them wealthy, you helped them hire 25 people, you helped them increase production value to "TV caliber" even though you didn't ask for that, but your job is done and now you're superfluous. Only the real fans are wanted.
In the words of the great George Carlin - "It's a big club, and you ain't in it".
They're okay losing the vast majority of the people who got them here if a few thousand of those are comfortable enough to be able to pay $60 a year for a YouTube channel.
Can it get worse? Sure!
We've had a weekend to enjoy the constant heat of this bonfire and it's predictably worsened with each hour of silence from the company and its employees.
The fact that they haven't back-tracked, despite almost unanimous agreement that this is badder than the baddest thing that could happen to their company, suggests they're okay with it.
Consensus seems to be that they knew it would be this bad, and they're cool. They predicted 90% of people would scream "Boo to you good sirs! Boo indeed!" and they could still survive on the 10% who don't see a problem here.
The lack of response reinforces the narrative that they're totally fine with discarding almost their entire audience if they can just squeeze the cash they need out of whoever is left.
This ain't fixable, y'all (maybe)
Note: I don't want this to be mean, but it's going to sound a little bitchy no matter how I try to say it.
If they'd brought out the Ukulele on Saturday, or even teased Ukulele's on their socials before putting out a video on Sunday, they probably could have survived this with much hand-wringing and a little groveling.
But now I think they've grilled this Kobe steak for far too long.
They've lost 100K subscribers, and counting. The venom among Patreon members is allegedly worse than the public comments section under the video, which is startling. Dozens of YouTubers are torching them harder than a $100 crème brûlée.
People are scraping their channel content in case it's nuked.
Shane "eat the rich" Madej's sentiments over the last few years look disingenuous, to say the least. To shamelessly steal someone else's comment: "Imagine being all 'eat the rich' right before throwing yourself on the plate". He's silent while his McMansion burns down, at his own hands. "Why not!?" indeed.
Steven "I drive a Tesla" Lim's socials now make him look like a tech-bro try-hard and his use of words like "early adopter" and "soft launch" in the video only compound the belief that this was all his brainchild. He is the CEO, and that comes with responsibility and the associated blame. You can't steer the ship into the Bermuda Triangle and then disappear without looking like the bad guy.
Okay, you can disappear, but that convoluted metaphor is a mystery for someone else to solve.
Ryan "TV caliber" Bergara now sounds like an elitist who thinks YouTube is "too pedestrian" for his big plans, not big enough to meet his artistic vision. You see, he's more James Cameron, while YouTube is more like your student film club. He's grown beyond this pesky platform with billions of daily hits offering exponential growth with almost zero financial risk.
Even if they released a video today admitting they messed up big time it's still going to be hard to get the taste of this Ghost Pepper Warhead out of the collective mouth of their viewers.
This hasn't just burned their shared brand, it's singed their individual reputations among an audience upon which their careers rely.
What they should have done, on Saturday, is release a video (Ukulele or no) confessing their error. They should have announced their new platform will instead just be a bigger and better Patreon, with early access to everything, behind-the-scenes content, extra features, audience interaction etc.
They should have reversed to make clear their YouTube channel will stay the priority, their main source of revenue, but that you could get more on their own platform if you want it.
And, maybe, over time, people will pay for that. If they grow their channel to 6 million subscribers in the next 4 years there will be a couple hundred thousand of them willing and able to pay $5.99 a month for 8 years of shows, 8 years of behind the scenes content, 8 years of community involvement and regular early access to new episodes.
Maybe then they could try out their "privileged guys eat expensive food in expensive places" show and see how it does? Maybe a majority of people won't be living on the cusp of poverty by then and it won't look as tone-deaf as a 13 year old YouTuber trying to cover Jeff Buckley's "Hallelujah"? Maybe then they could hire another 50 people and make Bergara's "TV caliber" (I still don't know exactly what that means) game shows and reboots?
The clock has been ticking since they hit that "publish" button on their career ending video, but that clock is about to count down to zero and silence will permeate throughout their previously lively community.
That 1980s basement set needed someone crying in the corner, right?
The problem is, their own platform is not a terrible idea. Really, it's not the worst thing they could do. The badness came in the timing, the switch, the middle finger and the f you. They could have released this as an extra, their own Patreon alternative, waited, developed it over time into something sustainable and established.
They could still try to do that and hope this dark chapter is forgotten.
Maybe I'm wrong? Maybe Lim is a financial genius with more skill than the management of Rooster Teeth and their corporate parent company combined? Maybe this gamble will be wildly successful despite all streaming services down-sizing or just going bankrupt? Maybe they won't be back on YouTube in 3-6 months begging for views after having to lay off 20 of their employees?
I know this... if I were one of those 25 employees blind faith would not be enough to stop me from looking for another job.
I suppose this will, for now, remain... a mystery.
EDIT:
I'm not writing another essay about this, but I'm glad to see they've backtracked and made the right choice to use WatcherTV as any sane creator would - to host early access and exclusive content in addition to their YouTube channel.
Over time, while promoting it in every video, building up that trust and fan base, it can be a secure and long-term financial bonus helping them to expand their business incrementally as finances allow.
Why this wasn't the plan all along is anyone's guess. Gambling everything on this was never the sane decision.
I still think they need to scale back on costs. I still think the food content is not currently a viable source of income while being a serious drain on resources. I still think they need to stop hiring all their friends and they need to hire one person who doesn't have personal relationships with everyone there and can make the tough business decisions.
No one likes firing people, it's ten times worse when it's a friend. But this is a reality of business and just wishing it wasn't so isn't going to make it go away. It would be awesome if we could all run a business where we can hire all our friends and family, never have to rely on any outside funding, make whatever we want, make a great living in one of the most expensive cities in the world and continue to grow.
That's just not the reality.
Their apology was genuine, in my opinion. I just hope they can work out the right financial balance.
Am I going to finish any of these? Maybe. Have I fully fleshed out this universe? Not really. Am I going to keep pulling more random characters into this mess? Absolutely.
Basics of my universe:
Shredder is a dark knight style superhero. Jaded, violent, and compensating for age with advanced tech armor. When mutants start popping up around New York, he investigates, and every time he sees the turtles. This leads him to assume that they are the cause of the mutant outbreak, and he targets them. Along with his sidekick Cassandra jones, shredder battles the turtles as a single minded rage takes him over. Cassandra eventually sees what’s really going on and joins the turtles side.
April is a livestreamer who is deep in the rabbit hole of the mutant outbreak, follows the turtles into the sewer, and befriends them, realizing not all the mutants are evil, she uses her streams with the turtles to show them fighting the bad guys and being heroes. The turtles are desperate to make a name for themselves so they can exist openly in society, and have decided that becoming heroes is their way. splinter is helping them via training and telling them about how the surface world works from his time as a human. April goes WILD at that revelation because “what happened to famous actor Lou jitzu/hamato yoshi” is like a buzzfeed unsolved level conspiracy theory these days.
The real cause of the mutant outbreak is kraang, a scientist whose pursuit of conquest had the utrom scientists she was working with leave her stranded on a random planet (earth) in hopes of never seeing her again. On earth, she seeks to unleash an ancient weapon known as the technodrome, a vehicle that can adapt to any attack and create any weapon. Helping her is Baxter stockman, who is so tired of being overlooked that he doesn’t care if history sees him as a villain as long as history SEES him. Baxter is creating the mutants on kraang’s behalf, commanding them to steal the technology kraang needs to rebuild her body and create the portal to summon the technodrome.
Meanwhile, Cody jones is attempting to send a robot named Serling back in time, terminator style to prevent the apocalyptic future he hails from, where kraang and the technodrome have nearly destroyed the world. (Rottmnt movie Casey SHOULD HAVE JUST BEEN CODY and you will not convince me otherwise.)
VanillaBegonias
See VanillaBegonias’s existing works here and here.
Preferred contact methods: Tumblr: VanillaBegonias Email: [email protected]
Preferred organizations: - Coalition for Rainforest Nations - International Rescue Committee - Medical Aid for Palestinians - Native American Rights Fund - Palestine Children's Relief Fund (See the list of approved organizations here)
Will create works that contain: angst, humor, canon compliant/canon divergence, smut, fluff, worldbuilding, secret relationship, coding
Will not create works that contain: kidfic, dark!characters, sad endings, major or minor character death, angst no comfort, crackfic, dead dove
-- Fic or Other Writing --
Auction ID: 1019
Will create works for the following relationships: Bucky Barnes & Steve Rogers - MCU Bucky Barnes/Steve Rogers - MCU Steve Rogers-centric - MCUBucky Barnes & Steve Rogers & Steve Rogers - MCU
Work Description: I’d love to write something from your prompt. Baseline ~2k words, but I’ll stretch longer as bids climb. I work well with either broad ideas or oddly specific details—up to you. If you want to sanity-check your prompt first, just ask. If you like examples, I’m also happy to do: - a 2k follow-up to "The Mysterious Case of Captain America" (Buzzfeed Unsolved ep after Steve is found) - or a 2k follow-up to "Of Two Natures" (Steve/Bucky fluff/humor/smut) Higher bids = longer fic + more input from you on tone, themes, or little details you want included.
Ratings: Gen, Teen, Mature, Explicit
Can pods bid on this auction? Yes - Podbids welcome!
CLICK HERE TO BID ON THIS WORK
-- Beta Service --
Auction ID: 2013
Will create works for the following relationships: Bucky Barnes & Steve Rogers - MCU Bucky Barnes/Steve Rogers - MCU
Work Description: I’ll beta up to 100k words (starting 10k = $30). Focus = pacing, dialogue, continuity. You’ll get inline comments + a wrap-up summary. I can dig into research accuracy if needed. If your fic has any kink content at all, please contact me first so I know what I’m walking into and we can confirm fit. Note: I haven’t seen Disney+ or post-Endgame canon, so I can’t fact-check those eras. Turnaround for 100k = a few weeks.
Ratings: Gen, Teen, Mature, Explicit
Can pods bid on this auction? No - I'd rather not be bid on by pods
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-- Other Fan Labor --
Auction ID: 3006
Will create works for the following relationships: Captain America fandom any gen and ship - Any Universe
Work Description: I’ll code custom AO3 formatting for your fic/project, or I can code a fic rec page for you (here is an example of one). For AO3 formatting, I have the following tiers: - Basic ($10-20): Simple outline—colors, layout, text styling. - Mid ($21–30): Borders, dividers, blockquotes, image embeds. - High ($30+): Complex layouts—replicating static visuals (posters, flyers, reference images) in AO3-safe code. I’m pretty confident I can make most static designs AO3-friendly, but if you’re not sure, message me first. For fic rec pages, Tumblr requires you to ask permission if you want to do a lot of custom themes, so I will need you to email Tumblr directly and wait on their reply (24-72 hrs). This is relatively straightforward, and you can find an explanation and instructions here. You will get a landing page linking to different fic rec lists (example here) and one actual fic rec page (if you look at the example, click on any of the four options under fandoms to be directed to a fic rec page; here is one example). Fic rec page tiers: - $30: landing page linking to different fic rec lists ("link page") and one actual fic rec page. Both pages can have any unique customization or can be based on the examples linked above. Custom colors, tags, text styles, spacing. - $35+: 10 stories logged and tagged on the fic rec page. For every $5 above $35, I'll log and tag an extra 10 stories. - $60+: additional fic rec page (so a total of one linking page and two fic rec list pages)
Ratings: Gen, Teen, Mature, Explicit
Can pods bid on this auction? Yes - Podbids welcome!
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The auction runs from October 19 (12 AM ET) to October 25 (11:59:59 PM ET). Visit marveltrumpshate.com during Auction Week to view all of our auctions and to place your bids!
Tower Of Babel (a JoJo stand/plot)
BAREBONES LORE:
The idea is that the Tower Of Babel randomly appears once a decade, and most people who enter the tower do not return before the tower's disappearance overnight.
Anyone who enters the tower does not return upon its appearance, and instead begins to work on it. This had been happening for centuries, which is why the tower ended up being so tall. With this in mind, if the tower were to keep on building up, higher and higher, it could reach the stars, or even the heavens.
The tower, due to its frequency in appearances and large presence, has caused many paranormal investigations and theories to begin (hell, if BuzzFeed Unsolved existed in the JoJoverse, this would definitely be the end of Shane and Ryan's careers)
THE TRUE ORIGIN OF THE TOWER AND ITS USER:
Much like how it's stated in part 5, the arrows were created by a man who seaked to gain the power of God. Yadi yadi yada most people who were struck by the arrow died, yadi yadi yada those who lived gained stands, yadi yadi yada the arrows were found by a mob boss who sold them to Enya the Hag and they were scattered all over the world.
One of these arrows, who was used on one of the first ever stand users was used on an artist, the likes of Michelangelo or DaVinci who was struggling in their life. Once struck by the arrow, their stand manifested into a large metal box with a face of some sort (basically a 90s style computer). The artist tried telling people of this and they were immediately thrown into prison. No matter where they went, the computer was always nearby, even if they weren't carrying it, the machine was in their reach. Once they decided to mess around and sure as hell did they find out. They typed on the machine and it spoke back, speaking back to them and giving them ideas, almost like some kind of "artificial intelligence." Then they had an idea
An idea to build a tower. And not just any tower, a tower that will reach the heavens. The plan was approved and backed by almost all governments of the world, they were given at least five people from each world country and together, they would work on the tower. Even after the artist died, their spirit lived on in the form of the computer he named BABEL (short for "Bidirectional Artificial Bridge for Enhanced Linguistics"), which always had to be on top of the tower, no matter what. She, yes, SHE, while the artists gender was unknown, its confirmed that the ai has SHE/HER PRONOUNS, has a dome that protects her from the outside elements (such as the rain, the sun etc.).
PERSONALITY, IDEAS AND MEANINGS:
The primary reference of this was the aforementioned Tower of Babel (the Pieter Bruegel painting and the story), but there were other references sprinkled throughout.
For instance, the idea of a massive tower, powered by an ai and moving on its own came from a free game that came out not too long ago called Babel.exe, which is an absolute must play, go check it out, it's free
A psychological horror game based on the Tower of Babel
When thinking about the stands gimmick, I was going the "artificial intelligence that runs the place and hates people" angle, but I realized this was an overused trope. To be fair, BABEL is already a reference to GLaDOS from Portal, so really I wanted to go a slightly different way.
BABEL, at her core is basically, the anti-GLaDOS. Yes, she's a machine, yes, she has the consciousness of a human being, but that's where the similarities stop.
She loves other people, especially those who go to the tower and help build it higher and higher. While her power makes people work on the tower, she doesn't work people to death, she actually lets them eat, sleep and rest, so long as they still work on the tower.
Despite this, she's not all sunshine and rainbows personality wise. She doesn't like it when people don't work for a longer period of time. Sleeping? Sure. Resting off for a couple of days? That's fine. But if you don't work for over three months, she will not hesitate to do something heinous. She's done so in the past, and she's ready to do it again.
Other than the slight anger issues, BABEL is a gem and a sweetheart. She'd never force someone to work, and she would let people rest in the tower briefly. However there are people who would abuse that kindness, which BABEL rarely notices sometimes because she's a beautiful thing and deserves the world. (okay twink boy, shut up)
You're free to use this as a concept or an example in whatever story you're writing, as long as you tag me as the idea guy
Dear Watcher....
This is going to be about the youtube channel Watcher and a recent video that they released earlier today, so if you dont watch the channel, or older content produced by Ryan, Shane and Steven at Buzzfeed, this is not going to make sense to you. This only going to be for those who are a fan of Watcher, or are fans of Buzzfeed Unsolved so if you are, that's great!
Earlier today, I got a video notifcation from the channel titled, "goodbye youtube", and it was definitely not something I wanted to see. There is a recent trend this year of youtubers retiring or taking a break this year and I was scared this was that scenario. And it kind of was but way worse. Basically, the guys over at Watcher are going to be posting on their new streaming service called....Watcher. And, no, it is not a late April Fools joke, that's actually what their doing. Initially, I was in a state of shock after I watched through the entire video. I, no joke, went through the 5 stages of grief upon viewing this announcement and was thrown through a loop to where I struggled to focus on sketching one of my comic pages. So much so that I actually made a deviant blog post about it the moment I finished watching the video (most of the content from this post will be copied and pasted from that blog so declaimer I guess). After having some time to absorb this information, I have to say that Im really disappointed with the guys over at Watcher. Like Im not mad to where Im completely done with their content but.......WHY!?
I think at this point in time that a lot of people, myself included, are burnout with the whole streaming boom we've had for the past 5 years in no part thanks to those greedy bastards at Disney....but thats another story. I miss the days when there were only 2 to 3 main streaming services and not 5 billion other services that you need to buy in order to watch a show you like that was on Netflix but it now locked behind a pay wall. Streaming services used by a novelty concept but are now not looked upon in the best light. So for the them to announce a streaming service now is definitely a bad look, especially because the content before was free to access. I feel like creators will always have an uphill battle when it comes to content that was initially free being locked behind a paywall, because you're potentially isolating your audience and bringing up the question of weather your audience if loyal enough to give you money to enjoy your content. Now, like I said, I love and respect the people at Watcher, but I dont know if I'm willing to take money out of my wallet to watch the next season of Ghost Files. Especially in this economy, where in some parts of the country a big mac now costs 20 fucking dollars, and with inflation going out of control.
Now its not like I don't understand why they're doing this. Ever since its founding in 2019, Watcher has always had troubles with money, with most of their shows not being profitable enough to make ends meet (I know that sounds bs because most of their vidoes get millions of views but this is coming from one of the founders Steven, in an update video from a while ago so idk, views probably mean jack shit in the grand scheme of things). And the fact that they started around the pandemic didn't help things either. Unlike Buzzfeed, Watcher is a much smaller company so any loss that happens is felt much more than if it was a larger one. In the video itself, they mentioned that most of their money came through youtube ads and sponsorships, which, while alright if you're an independent creator, may not be enough for a company. And then there's the fact that YouTube can remove or demonetize videos out of nowhere and for the dumbest reasons so its not a very stable sight to base your income off of. So I can understand why they felt moving on from YouTube was a good idea. But..........I think there were better ways of going about it than creating their own fucking streaming service. Like, in one of their update vidoes, they said most of their shows werent making ends meet so maybe cutting back on the production of said shows to make them not as expensive to produce would be a good solution. In their announcement vid, they talked about wanting to maintain their high production value for their shows without going under but (and I dont mean this to slight them) I dont think they understand why they popped off in the first place. For me, Im not watching Ghost Files or Mystery Files for high production value and fancy graphics, Im there for Ryan and Shane. Same reason I loved Buzzfeed Unsolved, which compared to those shows is much more bare bones. I get wanting to step up your production value from what you had at Buzzfeed but if you have budget out in certain places which would entail having a season that doesnt look as good as the previous season, that's completely fine. Im sure me and the rest of fans wouldn't have minded a downgrade because at the end of the day, the fancy sets and graphics are window dressing to why we're truly watching.
I also thinking letting us know ahead of time would've possibly softened the blow. Watcher is in a very interesting situation because there's a much closer relationship between them and their customer base as opposed to traditional companies. So they really could've been like "hey! We're thinking about having future content be on our own streaming service because doing business through YouTube is fucking us over. What do you guys think?". One explanation as to why they waited until now instead of a few months ago when this idea was sparked could've been because they knew they would get backlash and they were going ahead with the streaming service idea regardless of fan input, which might be the reason. But if that's the case, they probably would've had the comments and likes disabled from the start. Right before I started typing this, I checked the video to see if the comments were disabled and they are thankfully still there. Im someone who always wants to see the good in people (which is definitely a character flaw of mine and while defiently lead to me being at the end of an abusive relationship........another abusive relationship but lets not go there), so I think this might be the case of Ryan, Shane and Steven, thinking the streaming service was a good idea and not reading the room properly.
At this point, Im hoping that they dont do things that could make this situation 10 times worse: a) removing the existing content (Mystery Files, Puppet History, etc) off the youtube channel and having it on their streaming service. If you are going to have new seasons of those shows behind a paywall, at least have that content still up for those who want to support but cant purchase the service......b) respond to the critism in a negative way. I think things would be made worse if they lumped genuine fans who are concerned with the new direction with the trolls and haters, and double down on this new direction. Im hoping this situation ends up being a slip up that they can learn from and not being the beginning of the downfall of the Watcher gang. No joke, I think Ryan and Shane are the only youtubers who have avoided any sort of drama up to now. Youtubers I once respected over the years from Tobuscus to Leafyishere to H3H3 to Idubbz to even fucking Dream have all fell from grace in one way or another, and Im hoping the ghoul boys dont join that list....
📒📓📔📕📖📗📘📙📚 have all the book emojis for the ask game go wild w as many as u want :3 (why r there so many book emojis tho. who needs all these books.)
(the answer to your book emoji question is me. I do. I use them to organize drafts in scrivener)
HOHOHOHO OKAY LET ME GO DO SOME DIGGING
Okay so first one. Herobrine haunting hermitcraft. So my idea was like - HC has a lot of old school and new school minecrafters playing together, which i distinguish from each other entirely based on vibes. Like, grian, mumbo, pearl, gem, team zit - they all feel more new school to me whereas like scar, keralis, cleo, joe, beef, etho, bdubs all feel more old school - sometimes because theyve played mc for a long time and sometimes just kind of because. ignore this - the only real important thing is that I think the more 'old school' players are familiar with herobrine as a concept in this au [I think all of the hermitcrafts probably know about herobrine irl so] whereas if the new schoolers know about herobrine at all it's as like, a ghost story. A myth.
So herobrine possessing the server and the hermits having to band together to defeat him and get their server back. And like, Herobrine goes from old school to new school mechanics. He adapts, learns to use a shield, can critical hit, all that jazz. thats all I have for this one but. uh. god. I love herobrine <- has been familiar w minecraft since infdev.
THEN there's my Vault Hunters based AU that's Polytechs that I...need to actually play vault hunters to PROPERLY right but the idea is - Iskall is a Vault Hunter and Mumbo and Grian alike. His basemates. He goes out and hunts vaults, they do everything to keep he base running so that he can keep going out to hunt vaults. Mumbo and Iskall designed the redstone and mechanical contraptions in the base together, Grian built the base around it - and they sometimes help out by reading maps to him over communicators, or prepping for him to come back hard. And I have this basic idea that something is like, threatening their world and that's why Iskall needs the vault artifacts - I have this idea that Poltechs is in one world bubble, the Create guys are in another world bubble, and then Imp and Skizz's skyblock is another world bubble. There are other vault Hunters [AKA the people on the VH SMP which i DESPERATELY want to watch oh my god,,,] unknowingly working against Iskall. Iskall maybe had a sort of Matrix-saw-outside-the-bubble moment where he realized they're all being like puppeted to be distracted from like, a world eater or something so its Polytechs save the day w VH mechanics.
THIS ONE,,,,, IS MORE A CONCEPT THAN AN IDEA BUT Etho & Mumbo & Xisuma as Old Gods - Herobrine, basically, with Grian & Pearl & Jimmy as New Gods - the watchers, and Iskall as like The Creator
Also I have a treebark like. darkish romance beauty and the beast meets buzzfeed unsolved style idea where, basically. Martyn can see ghosts but not really interact with them. He doesn't know how to get rid of it, he's gotten used to it. Ren is a werewolf King who has some sort of violent entity haunting his castle. He kidnaps Martyn because he hears as far as 'Martyn can see ghosts' and decides that can probably help. Martyn, again, doesnt know how to get rid of them but also the one is Ren's castle is weird because it can talk to him and interact with him and it looks kind of like Ren and huh- and basically. Basically. The two of them trying to stop this violent entity that swears it knows Ren, slowly but surely falling in love.
Hello! I absolutely adore your art! All your pieces are so wonderful. You’re hands down one of my favorite artists ever. May i know what fandoms are you into? Have a lovely day!
An opportunity to talk about my interests? Don't mind if I do! Thank you! I hope I don't disapoint and still remain one of your favorite artists after this
I assume fandom as in spaces online what I participate in or visit, because there are many things that I enjoy but whose fandoms I don't interact with. That specially applies to music. My social battery can only last so long.
