Youtube Horror and the Proliferation of "Content"

[Chud]

The previous 'marna had a brilliant thread on movie recaps. I consider movie recaps to a constrained form of video essay; so to build back better I'd like to discuss video essays in general.

---

The Rules of Content

1. Content is (usually) meta-media. Making original work is hard. Commenting on work that already exists is much easier, and allows you to piggyback off of said work's existing audience.
   
2. Content is "chill". Strong emotions, passionate speech, daring conclusions: a good recipe for a meaningful life, not so much for engaging content. The optimal character for a "content creator" to play is that of a sage calmly imparting their wisdom.
   
3. Content is detached. You don't want the viewer to be personally affected by, or invested in, the content. That will impair their ability to detach from $CURRENT_CONTENT and re-attach to the next content in the autoplay queue. If your audience is primarily Zoomers, you don't have to put much thought into this; Zoomers are already very good at viewing things from a "detached" perspective, because they tend to think of themselves and their immediate social group as a small enclave in hostile space.
   

I apologize if this all sounds nonsensical or disjointed. It's a collection of many disparate observations that I haven't bothered to tightly reconcile with each other.

[Frank]

There is another throughline of the concept of "content" that always bothered me, one that appears in IRL streams, internet drama/"bloodsports", and lolcow shit. This meshes with the meta-media concept somewhat, as all of these are derivative of other people and their works. "It's content, bro" is their cry whenever confronted on this. Tiny nuggets of "drama" buried in hours upon hours of streams and videos and forum posts, which is promptly clipped and spread around.

IRL streaming was once a very bold idea, a new avenue of entertainment for an emerging medium. Now it's separated into two major groups: Twitch/Youtube refined IRL (lifeless, uncharismatic streamers passively experiencing a safe public space) and IP2 IRL (watching a loser's continued downward spiral). Neither has any potential for creativity. Most have retreated back into more conventional streams or given up altogether.

The concept of the "lolcow" was born from something much more interesting, true Wired Anthropology. Ulillillia is an artifact of this early scouring of the internet for weird guys' rich inner worlds pasted unceremoniously online. Nobody tried to mess with him; they just admired his weird neuroses, obsessions, life experiences, writing, and art. Christory was preceded by something that would more appropriately be called Art Christory, a study and appreciation of the Sonichu comics. Even the early trolling was something creative. Knowing that Chris would boldly and proudly step into whatever trap they set up, they sought to create the most entertaining and ironic ways for him to do so. The troll sagas felt like stage plays, with the audience clued into something that Chris was too autistic/prideful to see coming. Now it's just A-Logging all around. I've mentioned in the Acceptable Targets thread how the Kiwi Farms audience is mostly spiteful losers who seek to attack e-celebs they don't like or find someone more of a loser than them to antagonize.

Bloodsports... do I even need to explain this one? Maury without the minstrel show. Never had a downfall, it's just been parasitic shit the whole time.

---

The formation of entertainment into a refined pipeline of "content" from site to site I think plays the largest part in this. "Content" is the word applied to an ISO-standardized shipping crate of passive entertainment that makes the rounds from one website to another. You can see it happen in real time if you hang out in many disconnected social spaces online. Chris-chan did something wacky? Pack it in a crate, put it on a truck to the Port of Kiwi Farms, send it on a container ship to the Port of Twitter, then a train to Right Wing Twitter City, a truck to the Wholesome Chungus Account Distribution Warehouse, and finally to your door in a Twitter Suggested Postal Service step van. Every part of this delivery system is free of cost and technologically streamlined so you don't have to lift a finger to find anything, just open your mouth and let the pre-chewed "content" slide down your throat. Now you're based and redpilled!

Economies of scale have precluded the need for creation, much less creativity. This used to only happen at the community level when it gets too big and its users stand to gain nothing from putting time into creativity or thoughtful engagement. Chat's too fast, just post kappas. Thread's moving too fast and about to hit bump limit, just post reaction images and one word responses. Nobody will, or even can, read that wall of text you just posted. Now this phenomenon has priced out niche engagement on the internet as a whole. Why make or read a long post on Amarna when you can just have Twitter drop a steaming turd of internet drama into your mouth? Just smash the like button for more.

"Content creation" is so ubiquitous as to approach perfect competition, and thus the product becomes homogenized. If you mean to make a living through Youtube, every minute spent working on your video has diminishing returns. Why have original thoughts when you can "review" or commentate over someone else's? Thoughtful, high-effort works are artisan goods. You will likely fail to find an audience in a sea of "content" equivalent to a can of Coca-Cola or a McDonald's cheeseburger. (To be clear I don't mean to denigrate Coke or McDonald's which are legitimately impressive, just as I don't mean to disparage #Logistics which I think is humanity's most impressive creation.) As you were discussing before, the Indian has perfectly refined this system to create the most bizarre, twisted "content" imaginable where you wonder if anyone is actually watching it. It's like Chinese plastic rice scaled to industrial levels. Is this part of some large-scale scam that no regulator cares to do anything about or are people really stupid enough to eat plastic?

[Chud]

Was engaging in will-to-see perusal of Minecraft "content".





The video is alright, but I'm more fascinated by the personality behind it; specifically the complete lack thereof. This is the most unremarkable "content creator" I've ever seen. Yet he regularly mobilizes armies of people who far surpass him in merit - modders, server hosts, video editors, master builders and the like.

The most charitable reading is that Sipover acts as a sort of mediator or socialite. If that's the case: why him and not one of the five million other aspiring YouTubers? Was it luck of the draw? Did he pivot from a more "involved" brand of "content"? Or is the bar really that low?

[anthony]

The video is alright, but I'm more fascinated by the personality behind it; specifically the complete lack thereof. This is the most unremarkable "content creator" I've ever seen. Yet he regularly mobilizes armies of people who far surpass him in merit - modders, server hosts, video editors, master builders and the like.

The most charitable reading is that Sipover acts as a sort of mediator or socialite. If that's the case: why him and not one of the five million other aspiring YouTubers? Was it luck of the draw? Did he pivot from a more "involved" brand of "content"? Or is the bar really that low?

With things like his breakout video 'Who is the Best Minecraft Youtuber' I have to wonder how much buildup goes in. Was this like an already determined thing behind the scenes that everyone would boost this guy and this was just his professional debut? His online social life is probably very important.

[Mason Hall-McCullough]

Reaction videos designed to soothe the inferiority complex of the indian race are a subgenre I was previously unaware of:



"There's a lot going on here."

• A Danish family somehow figured out that this type of reaction content would be popular.
  
• The videos are indeed widely popular and the channel has >1M subscribers.
  
• The channel functions as a sort of reverse minstrel show where the family are debasing themselves with indian branding and introducing each video with an indian greeting, as if to allow the audience to feel a kinship with Whites.
  
• Each video's comment section is filled with broken English defecations praising india.
  
• The audience seem to be enjoying themselves and don't care at all that they are being cynically pandered to with fake reactions and lies. They probably can't even tell the reactions are fake because they don't interact enough with Whites.
  

It's quite bizarre that a random Danish family would be spreading misleading propaganda about the strength of the indian military.

I have difficulty fathoming the mindset of the audience without modelling them as a mass of undifferentiated subhuman creatures with no capacity for self-reflection. Maybe videos like these are important to reinforce their delusion of possessing inherent value as they live surrounded by sewage.

WNs are often derided as "ethnonarcissists", but I have never seen this level of crude and delusional pride in one's race from a single White person, let alone en masse. Notable how this type of behavior is most common among those who have the least to be proud of, something that can probably be extended to the more vulgar nationalism of less intelligent Whites (which still doesn't compare to that of the average indian/chinese).