So hey, let's talk more about Katersoneseven's new dog. Or should I start with her deleting my comment when I pointed out how much she paid for it? Yeah, that happened.
In her newest vlog, Kate linked to the website of the woman she bought the dog from, so I went and took a look. Maybe she assumed nobody would actually do that! But when I saw the $600-1000 price tags, I almost Shih Tzu'd myself. I mean, you've got to be fucking kidding me, right? You handed this lady potentially ten times or more the cost of a shelter dog? The same person who tells people how bad breeders and pet stores are, while suggesting they donate to animal causes? And this doesn't even count the probably hundreds of dollars she spent on items for the dog beforehand.
This woman breeds more than one type of dog. They might have a litter of five on average, each. Dogs can usually have pups twice a year. They're freaking four-legged dollar signs for this lady, I don't care how nice she seems. And of course she's going to be "one of the sweetest people you'll meet" to the suckers stupid enough to hand her hundreds of dollars a pop to keep her puppy factory running.
So when I made my comment regarding my shock at the cost, and that this woman was obviously in it for the money despite her personality, and that I was disappointed in Kate for not getting a shelter animal, she deleted it. Pretty quickly, too! And I could tell that mine wasn't the only one, because I have a tendency to check her vlog comments for criticism, because she has a history of deleting and banning people who say things she doesn't want to hear. There were scattered ones missing by the time I refreshed, but I can't really remember any specific content from them (maybe something about someone talking about not getting adopted and comparing it?), just that there were gaps.
At the end of the day, it's just a comment; nothing but bytes floating around out on Google's servers somewhere. But the fact that someone can't take honest and justified criticism of their actions, who makes a living putting their life on the internet for a hundred thousand people to see and judge every day, is a bit ironic. This blog isn't my first foray into writing, nor with negative comments, and I never deleted anyone's opinions. Hell, there's even some negative ones on this blog. And sure, a blog is a bit different from a daily vlog. But unless it's a blatant troll or spammer, you either reply to'em or you ignore'em. Anything other than that comes off too much as trying to protect your brand by keeping others in the dark.
Oh, and while we're talking about comments, I saw one from Cory on a vlog or two prior to this one. He was replying to someone leaving criticism about not getting from a breeder, seemingly peeved at them about it, then went on to say that Kate "did the right thing" over and over, and implied there's no need to question her about it. Sorry, buddy, but saying something often doesn't make it true. Obama's still not a Muslim, global warming still exists, 9/11 wasn't an inside job, there will never be a "Year of the Linux Desktop," and Tupac is dead. Didn't work for these things, and it's not working for you either. Kate did the right thing, for her. She didn't do the right thing, ethically. There's still a puppy sitting alone in a shelter somewhere (or already put to sleep) because she opted for the puppy factory version. Nothing he can say changes that fact.
Anyway, I just wanted to make a post while I was a bit steamed over what she paid for the damn thing, combined with the comment incident. But I've about run out of steam on the issue. Kate will be Kate, to which I can simply continue thumbing down her videos, and question whether I want to remain subscribed at this point, or simply fast forward through all her incessant hyperactive cooing over the puppy. Seriously, I had to skip the goofball stuff when she visited the animal store when her dad's car broke down. They must have thought she was nuts from that caffeine high she was on.
So yeah, that's enough about that nonsense.
Monday, December 10, 2012
Wednesday, December 5, 2012
Shit Zoo
Couple things or so I wanted to mention about recent Katers vlogs before I move on to something else.
First is the fact that Kate is in Vegas again with her dad, and I gotta admit, the vlogs have been more enjoyable to watch again. With these last few videos, I've actually clicked on them not long after seeing them pop up, as opposed to letting them sit in my notifications for possibly days before getting around to them. Part of me wants to say that it's because Cory stayed behind, and maybe Kate's more herself when she's just with her dad. But I also kinda enjoyed the ones when they were visiting Cory's family too. So maybe I'm just bored of the monotony of their apartment life, I dunno.
Second thing I wanted to mention was in the recent episode where Kate bought the hat or whatever it was for that girl she saw in the gift shop. At first, I thought that was a pretty nice thing of her to do. And I do still think that, don't get me wrong. But later on, when it crossed my mind again, I realized how my parents and I might have reacted to a stranger buying me something like that. While being generous is a good thing, I don't think my parents would have really appreciated someone buying me something without their permission, and certainly something so costly. And in the case of this girl, obviously her mother had been trying to teach her financial responsibility, which might have resulted in the situation playing out a bit differently had she asked the mother first. Instead, the girl got a rather expensive item responsibility-free. But worse than that, her mother was likely feeling embarrassed at being barely able to have bought this for her child by herself, along with from knowing a stranger was watching this and pitying them enough to buy something so costly. Some people are very prideful and refuse to take charity, some to the point of feeling insult. You never know who that's going to be, so I would be a bit wary before offering something so expensive to a young person, and most especially when having not asked permission to do so. But, it was still a nice thing to do, and I don't want to pick at her for it too much. Just, you know, take other peoples' feelings into consideration too. Sometimes not being able to afford something is a lesson young people need to learn, and helps shape them to be more responsible with money as adults.
The last thing to mention is something I just saw on Facebook. Kate is determined to have a Shih Tzu, and with quite a specific laundry list of expectations about the particular animal she wants, from shedding to barking restrictions. So she found a breeder who can supposedly give her one. That immediately set off my hypocrisy detector, because Kate has always been a strong proponent of shelters, and to avoid breeders and pet stores. Not to mention, I believe she herself was burned by a breeder giving her a sickly animal once upon a time. So Kate seems to be trying to justify her current actions by commenting that this woman is "very supportive of adopting from animal shelters when you can." Irrelevant! The women breeds animals! Give me a break. She's just being sympathetic of Kate's feelings on the matter in order to make a sale. If the woman really felt this way, she should be taking in strays or shelter animals for people to adopt, not breeding new animals into the world for people with very picky expectations of what they want in a dog, while yet another unadopted shelter dog gets put to sleep. This really kinda bugs me, to be honest. It's one thing for random strangers to give business to breeders, but for Kate to do it is just simply ridiculous. I honestly don't want to hear any more from her about donating to animal charities or getting shelter animals when she's too hypocritical to practice what she preaches. Come on.
Anyhow, enough about that. I actually was going to comment on peoples' naivety concerning the importance of money after seeing some of peoples' comments on a recent Wheezy Waiter daily vlog. Since this post is already getting a bit long, I'll just get right to the point: a lot of people are just stupid about money.
You see, some people either grow up with money in their hands and never learn how hard it is to actually earn or keep it. Other people truly think that money is a bad thing and that society should/could exist without it. You will often see both of these kinds of people, along with a few other generally naive individuals not really fitting into either category who just want to appear as if they have this profound understanding of something, who will go around insisting that money isn't important. They go on and on about how it's the root of all evil, how it doesn't buy happiness, blah blah.
But you know what money does buy? It buys food. It buys water. It pays your mortgage. It pays the taxes for the land your home even sits on. It buys gasoline. It pays your car payment. It pays your medical and pharmacy bills. It buys your entertainment. It pays for your internet which allows you to make these kinds of ludicrous comments to begin with. You can't barter for everything, and certainly not if you want to live in the 21st century. Your ISP doesn't want your chickens for six months of internet service.
Money is important, folks. Nothing is free in this world; not even water (or rain). Money does buy happiness, but not necessarily in the life-fulfilling way some people hope. Money buys you peace of mind, which has an extreme impact on your happiness. If you make $15k a year and have countless medical bills and general debt looming over your head, you're going to be a much happier person if you make $250k+ a year and can actually pay all of these on time and go to your next appointment or hospital visit without concern. And knowing you can buy your kids what they want for their birthday or Christmas, or buy your wife/husband that anniversary gift you think they deserve, gives you a strong sense of satisfaction. There's certainly a limit on what amount of money can make you happy. But the fact is, that amount is still usually more than a lot of people make. If you make minimum wage working full-time in America, you're still living below the poverty line.
So this blind cynicism that money is a bad thing is just immature. Either you have too much of it, and/or you're out of touch with its importance. Currency was created for a reason, and it's because not everyone who has something you want or need necessarily needs the goods or services you yourself can provide. While the American dollar may not necessarily translate directly to something of value anymore (as in gold), it does still represent work performed or goods sold, which is the entire point of it in modern society. A piece of paper still has value if society as a whole deems it so.
Anyway, that's enough of my rambling. Probably should have broken this up into two posts, but I doubt anybody reads most of this stuff anyway!
First is the fact that Kate is in Vegas again with her dad, and I gotta admit, the vlogs have been more enjoyable to watch again. With these last few videos, I've actually clicked on them not long after seeing them pop up, as opposed to letting them sit in my notifications for possibly days before getting around to them. Part of me wants to say that it's because Cory stayed behind, and maybe Kate's more herself when she's just with her dad. But I also kinda enjoyed the ones when they were visiting Cory's family too. So maybe I'm just bored of the monotony of their apartment life, I dunno.
Second thing I wanted to mention was in the recent episode where Kate bought the hat or whatever it was for that girl she saw in the gift shop. At first, I thought that was a pretty nice thing of her to do. And I do still think that, don't get me wrong. But later on, when it crossed my mind again, I realized how my parents and I might have reacted to a stranger buying me something like that. While being generous is a good thing, I don't think my parents would have really appreciated someone buying me something without their permission, and certainly something so costly. And in the case of this girl, obviously her mother had been trying to teach her financial responsibility, which might have resulted in the situation playing out a bit differently had she asked the mother first. Instead, the girl got a rather expensive item responsibility-free. But worse than that, her mother was likely feeling embarrassed at being barely able to have bought this for her child by herself, along with from knowing a stranger was watching this and pitying them enough to buy something so costly. Some people are very prideful and refuse to take charity, some to the point of feeling insult. You never know who that's going to be, so I would be a bit wary before offering something so expensive to a young person, and most especially when having not asked permission to do so. But, it was still a nice thing to do, and I don't want to pick at her for it too much. Just, you know, take other peoples' feelings into consideration too. Sometimes not being able to afford something is a lesson young people need to learn, and helps shape them to be more responsible with money as adults.
The last thing to mention is something I just saw on Facebook. Kate is determined to have a Shih Tzu, and with quite a specific laundry list of expectations about the particular animal she wants, from shedding to barking restrictions. So she found a breeder who can supposedly give her one. That immediately set off my hypocrisy detector, because Kate has always been a strong proponent of shelters, and to avoid breeders and pet stores. Not to mention, I believe she herself was burned by a breeder giving her a sickly animal once upon a time. So Kate seems to be trying to justify her current actions by commenting that this woman is "very supportive of adopting from animal shelters when you can." Irrelevant! The women breeds animals! Give me a break. She's just being sympathetic of Kate's feelings on the matter in order to make a sale. If the woman really felt this way, she should be taking in strays or shelter animals for people to adopt, not breeding new animals into the world for people with very picky expectations of what they want in a dog, while yet another unadopted shelter dog gets put to sleep. This really kinda bugs me, to be honest. It's one thing for random strangers to give business to breeders, but for Kate to do it is just simply ridiculous. I honestly don't want to hear any more from her about donating to animal charities or getting shelter animals when she's too hypocritical to practice what she preaches. Come on.
Anyhow, enough about that. I actually was going to comment on peoples' naivety concerning the importance of money after seeing some of peoples' comments on a recent Wheezy Waiter daily vlog. Since this post is already getting a bit long, I'll just get right to the point: a lot of people are just stupid about money.
You see, some people either grow up with money in their hands and never learn how hard it is to actually earn or keep it. Other people truly think that money is a bad thing and that society should/could exist without it. You will often see both of these kinds of people, along with a few other generally naive individuals not really fitting into either category who just want to appear as if they have this profound understanding of something, who will go around insisting that money isn't important. They go on and on about how it's the root of all evil, how it doesn't buy happiness, blah blah.
But you know what money does buy? It buys food. It buys water. It pays your mortgage. It pays the taxes for the land your home even sits on. It buys gasoline. It pays your car payment. It pays your medical and pharmacy bills. It buys your entertainment. It pays for your internet which allows you to make these kinds of ludicrous comments to begin with. You can't barter for everything, and certainly not if you want to live in the 21st century. Your ISP doesn't want your chickens for six months of internet service.
Money is important, folks. Nothing is free in this world; not even water (or rain). Money does buy happiness, but not necessarily in the life-fulfilling way some people hope. Money buys you peace of mind, which has an extreme impact on your happiness. If you make $15k a year and have countless medical bills and general debt looming over your head, you're going to be a much happier person if you make $250k+ a year and can actually pay all of these on time and go to your next appointment or hospital visit without concern. And knowing you can buy your kids what they want for their birthday or Christmas, or buy your wife/husband that anniversary gift you think they deserve, gives you a strong sense of satisfaction. There's certainly a limit on what amount of money can make you happy. But the fact is, that amount is still usually more than a lot of people make. If you make minimum wage working full-time in America, you're still living below the poverty line.
So this blind cynicism that money is a bad thing is just immature. Either you have too much of it, and/or you're out of touch with its importance. Currency was created for a reason, and it's because not everyone who has something you want or need necessarily needs the goods or services you yourself can provide. While the American dollar may not necessarily translate directly to something of value anymore (as in gold), it does still represent work performed or goods sold, which is the entire point of it in modern society. A piece of paper still has value if society as a whole deems it so.
Anyway, that's enough of my rambling. Probably should have broken this up into two posts, but I doubt anybody reads most of this stuff anyway!
Sunday, November 25, 2012
Boogie Tonight
I don't talk enough about Youtubers that I still like, so I thought I would take the time to do that while I'm not busy at the moment. Don't know how much I'll have to say, but I guess we'll find out!
Today I'll tell you about a fellow I stumbled onto by accident a while back. It was of a morbidly obese guy with a lisp, ranting and screaming about some video game, probably World of Warcraft. While part of me wanted to facepalm, another part of me thought that this was pretty funny to see him raging so animatedly like that. So, I clicked to see what other videos this "Francis" fellow had, since he seemed to have a lot, and I thought watching him scream and throw things might be mildly entertaining enough to watch a bit more of.
Turns out, this guy is not actually named Francis. He goes by the name Boogie (Boogie2988 to be exact), has no lisp after all, and his real voice more suited to doing radio. Francis is a character he plays sometimes, along with other characters like a redneck named Jessy. Boogie himself is not much like either of these characters. He's actually turned out to be one of the most insightful people I subscribe to on Youtube.
Boogie's Youtube description pretty much sums him up: "I'm fat, I make internet videos. Sometimes they're funny, sometimes they're serious. Deal with it." He's very comfortable in front of the camera, so he tackles a large array of topics, from video games and trading cards, to bullying, to politics on occasion, all the way to mental illness, depression, and suicide. He's shared details of his past with his viewers of his less-than-stellar upbringing, dealing with his mother's mental condition, and his own struggle with obesity, which led to rough points in his life. But instead of using this as a crutch for excuses or sympathy, he uses it to encourage, motivate, and educate people.
The guy just doesn't need any sympathy, and he admits it. He's engaged, he's losing weight, has a career through Youtube doing what he enjoys, and has an ever-growing following of viewers who support him in his endeavors. He seems pretty genuinely thankful of his subscribers, and often interacts with them directly in live shows. Though his growing fame still has its unfortunate side, both due to his weight being an easy target for trolls, along with all the people who stumble onto Francis videos and think he's for real. But he deals with these people fairly well, and sometimes uses it as a talking point.
I've never dealt with being overweight at any point in my life, so I can't relate to him directly in that sense. But, oppositely, I have had health issues which resulted in me combating being underweight in the past. I think a lot of people have dealt with health issues, either for themselves or a loved one, and/or have known people who have struggled with obesity, and/or known people who have had mental health issues. So I think a lot of people can find things to relate to with Boogie's ramblings on various topics. The insight he's shared on certain issues has even enlightened me a bit at times. And it indicates to me that he actually thinks about these kinds of things, where as many people simply dismiss them in favor of happier thoughts.
Now, I won't go as far as to say I watch every single one of his videos. I'm not really a big fan of the Jessy character most of the time despite my southern upbringing, and some of the trading card or video game videos I'll skip just because I don't necessarily play whatever he's talking about. But I would say that I still watch the majority of his normal videos, as well as his live streams, and always click on any of the Francis skits, all of which enough so that I can recommend people check him out if they're ever looking for somebody a little different from the average Youtube vlogger. Just look for boogie2988.
Today I'll tell you about a fellow I stumbled onto by accident a while back. It was of a morbidly obese guy with a lisp, ranting and screaming about some video game, probably World of Warcraft. While part of me wanted to facepalm, another part of me thought that this was pretty funny to see him raging so animatedly like that. So, I clicked to see what other videos this "Francis" fellow had, since he seemed to have a lot, and I thought watching him scream and throw things might be mildly entertaining enough to watch a bit more of.
Turns out, this guy is not actually named Francis. He goes by the name Boogie (Boogie2988 to be exact), has no lisp after all, and his real voice more suited to doing radio. Francis is a character he plays sometimes, along with other characters like a redneck named Jessy. Boogie himself is not much like either of these characters. He's actually turned out to be one of the most insightful people I subscribe to on Youtube.
Boogie's Youtube description pretty much sums him up: "I'm fat, I make internet videos. Sometimes they're funny, sometimes they're serious. Deal with it." He's very comfortable in front of the camera, so he tackles a large array of topics, from video games and trading cards, to bullying, to politics on occasion, all the way to mental illness, depression, and suicide. He's shared details of his past with his viewers of his less-than-stellar upbringing, dealing with his mother's mental condition, and his own struggle with obesity, which led to rough points in his life. But instead of using this as a crutch for excuses or sympathy, he uses it to encourage, motivate, and educate people.
The guy just doesn't need any sympathy, and he admits it. He's engaged, he's losing weight, has a career through Youtube doing what he enjoys, and has an ever-growing following of viewers who support him in his endeavors. He seems pretty genuinely thankful of his subscribers, and often interacts with them directly in live shows. Though his growing fame still has its unfortunate side, both due to his weight being an easy target for trolls, along with all the people who stumble onto Francis videos and think he's for real. But he deals with these people fairly well, and sometimes uses it as a talking point.
I've never dealt with being overweight at any point in my life, so I can't relate to him directly in that sense. But, oppositely, I have had health issues which resulted in me combating being underweight in the past. I think a lot of people have dealt with health issues, either for themselves or a loved one, and/or have known people who have struggled with obesity, and/or known people who have had mental health issues. So I think a lot of people can find things to relate to with Boogie's ramblings on various topics. The insight he's shared on certain issues has even enlightened me a bit at times. And it indicates to me that he actually thinks about these kinds of things, where as many people simply dismiss them in favor of happier thoughts.
Now, I won't go as far as to say I watch every single one of his videos. I'm not really a big fan of the Jessy character most of the time despite my southern upbringing, and some of the trading card or video game videos I'll skip just because I don't necessarily play whatever he's talking about. But I would say that I still watch the majority of his normal videos, as well as his live streams, and always click on any of the Francis skits, all of which enough so that I can recommend people check him out if they're ever looking for somebody a little different from the average Youtube vlogger. Just look for boogie2988.
Friday, November 16, 2012
How to Destroy Your Career
I felt this was worth writing about, so I thought I'd do it now before I forget again.
So, Cory Williams aka SMP Films announced on his Facebook that he was "done with Youtube." He listed off a myriad of other websites like Newgrounds as examples of other places which he has also been "done" with in the past. He went on about change, and how that's good and necessary. Then he said there was another place for SMP Films instead of Youtube, and to stay tuned.
The comments to this Facebook post where about what you would expect, with a mix of the typical "I'll support you no matter what" from the brown-nosers, and people expressing some degree of concern that this perhaps wasn't a smart move.
If you've read this blog for any period of time, you've probably guessed that I would fall into the latter category.
If we look back at Cory's career, he had his initial success on Newgrounds. That was in a time in the pre-Youtube days when vlogging and internet video was still very young. Lots of people still had internet that was so slow, and had to use plugins which were so crappy (RealPlayer), that streaming video wasn't exactly the most desirable media at the time. But to his credit, he still managed to get his start, with the right technology appearing on his heels, to turn his initial success at Newgrounds and Myspace into something of an actual career. Particularly so with Youtube rolling around when it did.
But that's the thing. His career now is on Youtube. It presently revolves around the partnership program that Youtube provides, based on the tens of thousands of subscribers who regularly view his videos, which allows him to buy his food and pay his rent. When you cut Youtube and his subscribers out of the equation, suddenly the career part kind of goes away with it. Your options for making money outside of that environment are not nearly as easy or advantageous, and to cut off that huge resource of user and monetary potential without at least gradually migrating to something different is pretty much how you destroy everything you built so far.
Now sure, Cory is sometimes premature in his excitement, and prone to positive and negative emotional extremes. One time he'll be so excited to tell you how good everything is going (like right now), and then suddenly a week or two later he'll be totally depressed again. I think he gets his hopes up on things which have a good chance of not working out, or he doesn't think something through, and disappoints himself. It was like with that whole stupid wrestling thing, which lasted all but a month before you never heard about it again, despite fans telling him from the start that it's a crazy idea with all of his back problems. That may be all this is, and he might be on Youtube for years to come, but his impulsive nature makes it hard to tell at this point.
If that's not the case, then his options are a bit iffy. There's Vimeo, the only other streaming video site which has had anywhere near the success of Youtube. Then there's sites like Ustream, too, but they tend to cater to live streams as opposed to uploaded media. He could have his own custom website made for serving up his videos, too. But the problem is that there's absolutely no revenue in any of these by default. I'm fairly sure that Vimeo and Ustream still lack any kind of affiliate or partnership programs. He could always use these services to host video on a custom website, but then that begs the question why not just use Youtube's player? You could put ads on a custom website of course, which makes it really the only option worth looking at, other than ads inserted into videos themselves. But then you still have the problem of viewers, making your revenue source a moot point if nobody's watching.
Let me be blunt here. Cory's success is almost entirely based around the communities of the websites he's been a part of, not by the quality of his content alone. If someone had to actually go and look on a separate website to find his stuff, his career would have likely never gone anywhere. Convenience is a huge factor in success. I subscribe to things on Youtube which I would never bother going to find elsewhere on the internet. Hell, that even applies to him and Kate, and any other vlogger I've watched over the years. I wouldn't actually seek out vlogs normally, it's just convenient for me to watch them when in my list of other subscriptions.
There's also the potential of using social media these days to promote yourself entirely, of which he already has a Facebook and Twitter presence. But he only has around twenty-two thousands likes on Facebook at the moment, which is a drop in the bucket compared to his Youtube following. And even then, you're counting on people sharing the video to ever branch out to new subscribers, because Facebook isn't designed to promote media randomly to others like a dedicated video site is. Youtube's been doing this for years, they have the "related videos" thing down pretty well now.
So basically, any other website Cory moves to means an immediate and drastic drop in views. That also means an equally drastic drop in profits, other than money he'll continue to make from stuff currently uploaded there (assuming he doesn't delete it). People don't want to leave Youtube, people don't want to check another website, and people don't like being abandoned. I've seen it before, when someone thinks they're sick of Youtube and starts posting click-through placeholder videos on Youtube linking to their actual video on Vimeo. People get pissed, they thumbs the video down, they leave a bunch of angry comments, and they never click through, out of spite and/or laziness.
And I recognize that he specifically mentioned SMP Films, which perhaps excludes Mean Kitty from being moved. And if I'm to be honest, Mean Kitty is the only one of the two channels I care much about. Though, still being honest, the Mean Kitty videos as of late have been a bit lackluster.
So I dunno, it's just all silly if you ask me. What I do know is, for a guy who has complained about money problems on more than one occasion, he sure doesn't seem to think these things out very well. While he can legitimately and proudly consider himself a trailblazer in internet video, that time is over. Crazy videos of guys doing stupid shit are a dime a dozen on the internet now, as are cat videos for that matter, and he's not going to stand out from them while doing what he's always done, regardless of what website he might take them to. There are ways to reinvent yourself without shooting yourself in the foot in the process.
So, Cory Williams aka SMP Films announced on his Facebook that he was "done with Youtube." He listed off a myriad of other websites like Newgrounds as examples of other places which he has also been "done" with in the past. He went on about change, and how that's good and necessary. Then he said there was another place for SMP Films instead of Youtube, and to stay tuned.
The comments to this Facebook post where about what you would expect, with a mix of the typical "I'll support you no matter what" from the brown-nosers, and people expressing some degree of concern that this perhaps wasn't a smart move.
If you've read this blog for any period of time, you've probably guessed that I would fall into the latter category.
If we look back at Cory's career, he had his initial success on Newgrounds. That was in a time in the pre-Youtube days when vlogging and internet video was still very young. Lots of people still had internet that was so slow, and had to use plugins which were so crappy (RealPlayer), that streaming video wasn't exactly the most desirable media at the time. But to his credit, he still managed to get his start, with the right technology appearing on his heels, to turn his initial success at Newgrounds and Myspace into something of an actual career. Particularly so with Youtube rolling around when it did.
But that's the thing. His career now is on Youtube. It presently revolves around the partnership program that Youtube provides, based on the tens of thousands of subscribers who regularly view his videos, which allows him to buy his food and pay his rent. When you cut Youtube and his subscribers out of the equation, suddenly the career part kind of goes away with it. Your options for making money outside of that environment are not nearly as easy or advantageous, and to cut off that huge resource of user and monetary potential without at least gradually migrating to something different is pretty much how you destroy everything you built so far.
Now sure, Cory is sometimes premature in his excitement, and prone to positive and negative emotional extremes. One time he'll be so excited to tell you how good everything is going (like right now), and then suddenly a week or two later he'll be totally depressed again. I think he gets his hopes up on things which have a good chance of not working out, or he doesn't think something through, and disappoints himself. It was like with that whole stupid wrestling thing, which lasted all but a month before you never heard about it again, despite fans telling him from the start that it's a crazy idea with all of his back problems. That may be all this is, and he might be on Youtube for years to come, but his impulsive nature makes it hard to tell at this point.
If that's not the case, then his options are a bit iffy. There's Vimeo, the only other streaming video site which has had anywhere near the success of Youtube. Then there's sites like Ustream, too, but they tend to cater to live streams as opposed to uploaded media. He could have his own custom website made for serving up his videos, too. But the problem is that there's absolutely no revenue in any of these by default. I'm fairly sure that Vimeo and Ustream still lack any kind of affiliate or partnership programs. He could always use these services to host video on a custom website, but then that begs the question why not just use Youtube's player? You could put ads on a custom website of course, which makes it really the only option worth looking at, other than ads inserted into videos themselves. But then you still have the problem of viewers, making your revenue source a moot point if nobody's watching.
Let me be blunt here. Cory's success is almost entirely based around the communities of the websites he's been a part of, not by the quality of his content alone. If someone had to actually go and look on a separate website to find his stuff, his career would have likely never gone anywhere. Convenience is a huge factor in success. I subscribe to things on Youtube which I would never bother going to find elsewhere on the internet. Hell, that even applies to him and Kate, and any other vlogger I've watched over the years. I wouldn't actually seek out vlogs normally, it's just convenient for me to watch them when in my list of other subscriptions.
There's also the potential of using social media these days to promote yourself entirely, of which he already has a Facebook and Twitter presence. But he only has around twenty-two thousands likes on Facebook at the moment, which is a drop in the bucket compared to his Youtube following. And even then, you're counting on people sharing the video to ever branch out to new subscribers, because Facebook isn't designed to promote media randomly to others like a dedicated video site is. Youtube's been doing this for years, they have the "related videos" thing down pretty well now.
So basically, any other website Cory moves to means an immediate and drastic drop in views. That also means an equally drastic drop in profits, other than money he'll continue to make from stuff currently uploaded there (assuming he doesn't delete it). People don't want to leave Youtube, people don't want to check another website, and people don't like being abandoned. I've seen it before, when someone thinks they're sick of Youtube and starts posting click-through placeholder videos on Youtube linking to their actual video on Vimeo. People get pissed, they thumbs the video down, they leave a bunch of angry comments, and they never click through, out of spite and/or laziness.
And I recognize that he specifically mentioned SMP Films, which perhaps excludes Mean Kitty from being moved. And if I'm to be honest, Mean Kitty is the only one of the two channels I care much about. Though, still being honest, the Mean Kitty videos as of late have been a bit lackluster.
So I dunno, it's just all silly if you ask me. What I do know is, for a guy who has complained about money problems on more than one occasion, he sure doesn't seem to think these things out very well. While he can legitimately and proudly consider himself a trailblazer in internet video, that time is over. Crazy videos of guys doing stupid shit are a dime a dozen on the internet now, as are cat videos for that matter, and he's not going to stand out from them while doing what he's always done, regardless of what website he might take them to. There are ways to reinvent yourself without shooting yourself in the foot in the process.
Tuesday, October 2, 2012
There's No Sense in Nonsense
I know that I pretty much only write about KatersOneSeven and Cory/SMPFilms these days, but I guess I'm fairly disillusioned with the entire vlogging community these days, so I don't really watch many anymore to complain about!
There's a couple of things I wanted to discuss. Primarily, Kate's new car. Let's forget the fact that it's a Nissan Juke, one of the ugliest cars presently on the market, with awful gas mileage to boot. Cory owned a Nissan, so I imagine he talked her into buying one as well out of brand loyalty rather than actually knowing anything about cars, as has been covered in this blog previously.
So it's been, what, less than six months since Kate got her Ford Focus? I imagine that she got it for around five to eight thousand bucks, which isn't bad, especially given that the Focus isn't too bad of a car. I had the same thing for a while myself, so I know what it's like. But what doesn't make sense is why Kate would be jumping up and getting another car so soon, and a NEW car at that. It wasn't a month ago that she bought a brand new computer to be able to make better videos, and then returned it because her finances weren't what she thought they were going to be. Now she's gotten herself into about eight years of payments on a car that will be lucky to last that long.
The fact of the matter is, buying a new car is unquestionably a bad decision. Unless you're very rich, there is no logical justification for doing so, other than "I want it." The moment you sign those papers and drive it off the lot, it's lost 10% of its value. It's no longer a new car. You can put a hundred miles on it and then decide you don't like it, but suddenly it's worth quite a few dollars less because it's a previously owned vehicle.
Given that the Juke starts at $20k (and who knows how many options she added, not to mention at least $2k of tax and then a bunch of dealer fees), she already lost $2k driving it off the lot. Might as well have burned that money. Which is ironic, given that that much would have bought the computer she returned.
In five years, you're looking at a mere 40% of the original value. That means she's lost $12k (not counting the tax and fees on top of the original vehicle price) before she's even paid it off.
Meanwhile, she's going to sell her Focus to Cory, which I'm quite sure she won't sell him for market value given their relationship. So he might give her $2-4k for it, depending on how generous she is, which is barely enough to pay for any serious down payment.
So basically, the lack of sense put into in buying this vehicle is apparent. And this isn't just about Kate; people make this same blunder all of the time. They get into serious debt for a vehicle they don't need with money they don't have just so that they can feel good about owning something that's never been owned. They don't consider that there could be a serious and/or annoying recall within the first few months, either, which is all the more reason to avoid a new vehicle.
Then to make matters worse, Kate was going on about credit in a way which seemed to indicate that she didn't entirely understand it, and worse yet, was practically promoting that people get into debt in order to build their credit score. But whatever, people and their spending problems is a whole other topic.
My last complaint about the car she chose is that, as someone who pinches pennies as hard as she does, I fail to understand buying something with such bad gas mileage considering how much driving she has to do, and will inevitably do in the future for her career. If I were going to blow $20k on a car, I'd at least want a little bit of return in how much fuel it guzzles.
Anyway, the other topic I wanted to mention in this post was about the UFO thing I just watched, where Kate and Cory are out in a parking lot at night and are certain they see one.. Instead of considering the options of what it could be, or asking someone what they think it might be, they just immediately jump to the most far-fetched conclusion: that it definitely has to be an alien. And Cory matter-of-factly stating this just made me facepalm, since it's certainly not the first time he's factually declared something ridiculous and been utterly wrong. I've got 99 explanations, but a UFO aint one.
So yeah, that's my facepalming session for the time being. I don't try to be too harsh or anything, but come on. If people put themselves out there for the public to view their lives, then it's fair game to criticize as well. That's the whole point in this blog! Besides, there's more than enough fanboys in the world to make up for anything I say.
There's a couple of things I wanted to discuss. Primarily, Kate's new car. Let's forget the fact that it's a Nissan Juke, one of the ugliest cars presently on the market, with awful gas mileage to boot. Cory owned a Nissan, so I imagine he talked her into buying one as well out of brand loyalty rather than actually knowing anything about cars, as has been covered in this blog previously.
So it's been, what, less than six months since Kate got her Ford Focus? I imagine that she got it for around five to eight thousand bucks, which isn't bad, especially given that the Focus isn't too bad of a car. I had the same thing for a while myself, so I know what it's like. But what doesn't make sense is why Kate would be jumping up and getting another car so soon, and a NEW car at that. It wasn't a month ago that she bought a brand new computer to be able to make better videos, and then returned it because her finances weren't what she thought they were going to be. Now she's gotten herself into about eight years of payments on a car that will be lucky to last that long.
The fact of the matter is, buying a new car is unquestionably a bad decision. Unless you're very rich, there is no logical justification for doing so, other than "I want it." The moment you sign those papers and drive it off the lot, it's lost 10% of its value. It's no longer a new car. You can put a hundred miles on it and then decide you don't like it, but suddenly it's worth quite a few dollars less because it's a previously owned vehicle.
Given that the Juke starts at $20k (and who knows how many options she added, not to mention at least $2k of tax and then a bunch of dealer fees), she already lost $2k driving it off the lot. Might as well have burned that money. Which is ironic, given that that much would have bought the computer she returned.
In five years, you're looking at a mere 40% of the original value. That means she's lost $12k (not counting the tax and fees on top of the original vehicle price) before she's even paid it off.
Meanwhile, she's going to sell her Focus to Cory, which I'm quite sure she won't sell him for market value given their relationship. So he might give her $2-4k for it, depending on how generous she is, which is barely enough to pay for any serious down payment.
So basically, the lack of sense put into in buying this vehicle is apparent. And this isn't just about Kate; people make this same blunder all of the time. They get into serious debt for a vehicle they don't need with money they don't have just so that they can feel good about owning something that's never been owned. They don't consider that there could be a serious and/or annoying recall within the first few months, either, which is all the more reason to avoid a new vehicle.
Then to make matters worse, Kate was going on about credit in a way which seemed to indicate that she didn't entirely understand it, and worse yet, was practically promoting that people get into debt in order to build their credit score. But whatever, people and their spending problems is a whole other topic.
My last complaint about the car she chose is that, as someone who pinches pennies as hard as she does, I fail to understand buying something with such bad gas mileage considering how much driving she has to do, and will inevitably do in the future for her career. If I were going to blow $20k on a car, I'd at least want a little bit of return in how much fuel it guzzles.
Anyway, the other topic I wanted to mention in this post was about the UFO thing I just watched, where Kate and Cory are out in a parking lot at night and are certain they see one.. Instead of considering the options of what it could be, or asking someone what they think it might be, they just immediately jump to the most far-fetched conclusion: that it definitely has to be an alien. And Cory matter-of-factly stating this just made me facepalm, since it's certainly not the first time he's factually declared something ridiculous and been utterly wrong. I've got 99 explanations, but a UFO aint one.
So yeah, that's my facepalming session for the time being. I don't try to be too harsh or anything, but come on. If people put themselves out there for the public to view their lives, then it's fair game to criticize as well. That's the whole point in this blog! Besides, there's more than enough fanboys in the world to make up for anything I say.
Friday, August 24, 2012
So Fix It
I've kind of gotten bored of the Katers vlogs again lately, some of which I've actually just skipped along through. As mentioned in previous posts about other vloggers, that's never a good sign! But out of boredom I've just let the recent ones play, and I heard something which irked me just enough to bother making a post about it! And it's partially because I've seen this same thing happen in other couples as well.
Okay, so, Cory seems to like to think he knows about cars. He's tried to make us think that he knows a thing or two about his dune buggy, for example. And he went with Kate to help her pick out her car. He also tried to teach her to drive stick. But, as someone who does know about cars, I can tell you that Cory pretty much does not.
Now don't get me wrong, I know it's kind of a man thing to say you're into cars. It doesn't really hurt anything most of the time, which is why it didn't bother me about Cory before, aside from the teaching Kate to drive stick part (which personally I think he couldn't have done worse). All of the trouble out of Cory's jeep was also kind of an indication that he had no idea about them. But in this particular vlog, and actually a vlog or two prior as well, Kate had been having trouble with her tire. Dangerously so, I would go as far to say, because it was affecting her steering. That's when the boyfriend who conveniently knows about cars is supposed to step in.
Now, as any man who knows anything about cars might do, he would immediately jack the car up, take the wheel off, and inspect it for defects. Running over shit in the road happens all the time. I just plugged a hole in my tire after pulling a nail out of it the day before last, as a matter of fact. So, anyone who knows even the slightest bit about cars can change a tire. Cory could have checked, patched, or even replaced the tire if necessary. All he had to do was put the spare on it temporarily (in case she needed it that day or something), throw her whole wheel in his car, and just taken it to get a new tire and balancing done to it. You don't need the whole car for that, after all.
Instead of dealing with this right away, though, Kate drove on this dangerous wheel for days. It could have simply gone flat and left her stuck with trying to change it (or more likely, calling someone to), or worse, and left her careening into another car, tree, or worse.
Well when Kate took her car in, she said she was not only going to get the tire fixed, but have a rotation, alignment, and oil change. The alignment, okay, that's fine. The equipment at the shop can do an alignment way better than your average Joe ever could. And the rotation is certainly easier to do on a lift than trying to do it yourself, but it certainly could have been done by Cory at home. But the oil change is the real kicker.
Mechanics ALMOST ALWAYS rip you off on this. Some of them don't even change it. They'll check the stick, if it looks clear, they leave it. This is partially because people want their oil changed way more often than it really needs to be, to be honest. But it's still a dishonest practice by mechanics nonetheless, because you're paying for it to be done. Even if they change the oil, though, lots of them won't bother to change the oil filter. You can find hidden camera shows a dime a dozen where they've marked the filter somehow and end up getting the same one back after the "oil change." For anyone who knows anything about cars, as Cory claims to be, this is not hard to do either.
So that's the thing. Kate is always pinching pennies. Here's a perfect opportunity to save a lot of money. But what do they do? Take it to the shop, and drive it there on the bad wheel. Some car guy!
The irony of course is that in this very same vlog, Kate's chair is broken, and Cory says "I love to fix things."
I'm sure Kate's chair is still broken as well.
Okay, so, Cory seems to like to think he knows about cars. He's tried to make us think that he knows a thing or two about his dune buggy, for example. And he went with Kate to help her pick out her car. He also tried to teach her to drive stick. But, as someone who does know about cars, I can tell you that Cory pretty much does not.
Now don't get me wrong, I know it's kind of a man thing to say you're into cars. It doesn't really hurt anything most of the time, which is why it didn't bother me about Cory before, aside from the teaching Kate to drive stick part (which personally I think he couldn't have done worse). All of the trouble out of Cory's jeep was also kind of an indication that he had no idea about them. But in this particular vlog, and actually a vlog or two prior as well, Kate had been having trouble with her tire. Dangerously so, I would go as far to say, because it was affecting her steering. That's when the boyfriend who conveniently knows about cars is supposed to step in.
Now, as any man who knows anything about cars might do, he would immediately jack the car up, take the wheel off, and inspect it for defects. Running over shit in the road happens all the time. I just plugged a hole in my tire after pulling a nail out of it the day before last, as a matter of fact. So, anyone who knows even the slightest bit about cars can change a tire. Cory could have checked, patched, or even replaced the tire if necessary. All he had to do was put the spare on it temporarily (in case she needed it that day or something), throw her whole wheel in his car, and just taken it to get a new tire and balancing done to it. You don't need the whole car for that, after all.
Instead of dealing with this right away, though, Kate drove on this dangerous wheel for days. It could have simply gone flat and left her stuck with trying to change it (or more likely, calling someone to), or worse, and left her careening into another car, tree, or worse.
Well when Kate took her car in, she said she was not only going to get the tire fixed, but have a rotation, alignment, and oil change. The alignment, okay, that's fine. The equipment at the shop can do an alignment way better than your average Joe ever could. And the rotation is certainly easier to do on a lift than trying to do it yourself, but it certainly could have been done by Cory at home. But the oil change is the real kicker.
Mechanics ALMOST ALWAYS rip you off on this. Some of them don't even change it. They'll check the stick, if it looks clear, they leave it. This is partially because people want their oil changed way more often than it really needs to be, to be honest. But it's still a dishonest practice by mechanics nonetheless, because you're paying for it to be done. Even if they change the oil, though, lots of them won't bother to change the oil filter. You can find hidden camera shows a dime a dozen where they've marked the filter somehow and end up getting the same one back after the "oil change." For anyone who knows anything about cars, as Cory claims to be, this is not hard to do either.
So that's the thing. Kate is always pinching pennies. Here's a perfect opportunity to save a lot of money. But what do they do? Take it to the shop, and drive it there on the bad wheel. Some car guy!
The irony of course is that in this very same vlog, Kate's chair is broken, and Cory says "I love to fix things."
I'm sure Kate's chair is still broken as well.
Saturday, June 9, 2012
Road Trip Troubles
I guess I'll throw a post on here!
When Katers and Cory first started their road trip, I'll admit, I was pretty bored of the vlogs. It had gotten to the point that I was just skipping along through them, which is usually a sign that an unsubscribe is in the not-so-distant future. I was busy during the time, too, which didn't help. Though I've been busy in the past, and still made time for the vlogs. But anyhow, I don't know what happened, I just started enjoying them again, for the most part. Funny stuff happened, meet-ups happened, etc. So while I don't look forward to the vlogs like I once did, I at least don't sigh to myself at the thought of watching another 20-30 minute episode as I was doing for a while there. I'd kind of expected the road trip to ruin them, much like such things always did to most other peoples' vlogs.
Here's the thing I don't get about this road trip, though. Cory hired this Josh guy to be his camera man, who I don't know if we ever even saw before that day. I asked myself why does Cory need a camera man, when that's what he already pays Kate to do? Stranger still, vlog after vlog happened, and we never really saw Josh even holding a camera. In fact, I had a "wat" moment when Josh had to ask Cory one time whether he needed to use the flash to take a picture of something while they were outside. So I just don't know what the deal is with him coming along, particularly since there's no indication that he's any kind of professional photographer. He might be filming actual SMP Films videos for him which we don't see on the vlogs, but still, again, why isn't Kate just filming them like before? She's the one who actually studied up on how to operate the cameras. But anyway, that all being said, Josh has turned out to be kind of entertaining, particularly when paired with Shaun.
There's also the thing with Kate getting all upset in that recent vlog. Obviously it had something to do with Cory, because she commented something along the lines of "that doesn't help" when showing people holding hands and stuff together. I guess the internet rumor machine immediately assumed this meant her and Cory broke up, but I don't know if I'd go that far. My brother has actually assumed that they've been broken up for a little while already, and that they were just keeping up the illusion for the fan's sake, but I would disagree. He actually got bored enough of it to unsubscribe, so his info isn't really up to date anymore.
One thing I kinda get tired of is this Keek thing. It's starting to rub me the way that things like City Story did. It just doesn't feel like something she just naturally wants her fans to check out. And Cory just made a video wanting people to jump on Keek as well, so if that's not proof enough to me that they're being sponsored by them, then I don't know what is. I mean, the Gung Ho stuff doesn't bother me, because they admitted they're a sponsor. It's when somebody tries to push something under the guise of it being something they personally like when it bugs me. It's that kind of stuff that turned me against people like Leo Laporte. He'll claim he loves just about any product that's given to him, then in a week or two he's back to using what he used to use. Anyway, I digress. I was going on Keek at first to see if Kate made any videos I'd be interested in, but apparently now you have to be logged in to even watch anything, so fuck that.
Shaun has turned out to be the entertainment of the trip. Most of the stuff he does is amusing to some degree, which is usually enhanced when Josh is involved. I had a few actual laugh-out-loud moments. Whether that gets annoying when riding in a car with him/them for hours though is another story!
I keep thinking there was something else I meant to touch on, but heck if I know what it was.
TL;DR version: Katers vlogs are still entertaining, but fuck Keek.
UPDATE: Naturally, the day after typing this, we see Josh filming an SMP Films video.
When Katers and Cory first started their road trip, I'll admit, I was pretty bored of the vlogs. It had gotten to the point that I was just skipping along through them, which is usually a sign that an unsubscribe is in the not-so-distant future. I was busy during the time, too, which didn't help. Though I've been busy in the past, and still made time for the vlogs. But anyhow, I don't know what happened, I just started enjoying them again, for the most part. Funny stuff happened, meet-ups happened, etc. So while I don't look forward to the vlogs like I once did, I at least don't sigh to myself at the thought of watching another 20-30 minute episode as I was doing for a while there. I'd kind of expected the road trip to ruin them, much like such things always did to most other peoples' vlogs.
Here's the thing I don't get about this road trip, though. Cory hired this Josh guy to be his camera man, who I don't know if we ever even saw before that day. I asked myself why does Cory need a camera man, when that's what he already pays Kate to do? Stranger still, vlog after vlog happened, and we never really saw Josh even holding a camera. In fact, I had a "wat" moment when Josh had to ask Cory one time whether he needed to use the flash to take a picture of something while they were outside. So I just don't know what the deal is with him coming along, particularly since there's no indication that he's any kind of professional photographer. He might be filming actual SMP Films videos for him which we don't see on the vlogs, but still, again, why isn't Kate just filming them like before? She's the one who actually studied up on how to operate the cameras. But anyway, that all being said, Josh has turned out to be kind of entertaining, particularly when paired with Shaun.
There's also the thing with Kate getting all upset in that recent vlog. Obviously it had something to do with Cory, because she commented something along the lines of "that doesn't help" when showing people holding hands and stuff together. I guess the internet rumor machine immediately assumed this meant her and Cory broke up, but I don't know if I'd go that far. My brother has actually assumed that they've been broken up for a little while already, and that they were just keeping up the illusion for the fan's sake, but I would disagree. He actually got bored enough of it to unsubscribe, so his info isn't really up to date anymore.
One thing I kinda get tired of is this Keek thing. It's starting to rub me the way that things like City Story did. It just doesn't feel like something she just naturally wants her fans to check out. And Cory just made a video wanting people to jump on Keek as well, so if that's not proof enough to me that they're being sponsored by them, then I don't know what is. I mean, the Gung Ho stuff doesn't bother me, because they admitted they're a sponsor. It's when somebody tries to push something under the guise of it being something they personally like when it bugs me. It's that kind of stuff that turned me against people like Leo Laporte. He'll claim he loves just about any product that's given to him, then in a week or two he's back to using what he used to use. Anyway, I digress. I was going on Keek at first to see if Kate made any videos I'd be interested in, but apparently now you have to be logged in to even watch anything, so fuck that.
Shaun has turned out to be the entertainment of the trip. Most of the stuff he does is amusing to some degree, which is usually enhanced when Josh is involved. I had a few actual laugh-out-loud moments. Whether that gets annoying when riding in a car with him/them for hours though is another story!
I keep thinking there was something else I meant to touch on, but heck if I know what it was.
TL;DR version: Katers vlogs are still entertaining, but fuck Keek.
UPDATE: Naturally, the day after typing this, we see Josh filming an SMP Films video.
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