Hey internet, can I have the money back please? I was using that for things e.g. paying for goods and services. Sorry if you didn't realise that, but let's not hold a grudge, just give the money back and everything will be fine. Are you listening to me?! Who did this?! DON'T YOU KNOW THEY JUST INCREASED THE RENT?!
Well gosh darn it. In a crazy twist, I have become the victim of racism / hate speech that almost certainly wasn't directed against my demographic. In a bid to "protect their image" (read: gain negotiating power with YouTube for superior contract terms), many advertisers have suddenly left YouTube in the wake of a semi-fabricated outrage over ads being placed on unsavory content. And that means the value of YT ads has dropped tremendously, which in turn means the value of YT channels has dropped, which in turn means I am now ranting in on the internet about the dastardly villainy of capitalism like a true edgemeister.
The story goes that certain videos containing racist or otherwise offensive were found to be displaying ads for major international companies. I say 'found' in a very broad way, because YouTube has always been like this, but it was finally reported on and, of course, memed up into a massive controversy.
Now YouTube, in general, has strict (but admittedly poorly communicated) rules about what kinds of content can be 'monetised' i.e. is allowed to have ads run on it. These rules protect large companies from issues that may arise from people mistaking their ads randomly appearing on something for an official endorsement of that thing (whether this connection actually happens in the minds of viewers, I don't know, but I seem to recall there is some evidence that it at least sometimes happens, despite the lack of rationality behind it).
But now, the story continues, the big companies have had enough of the edge-cases or missed cases where the ads still got through onto something freaky, and have just given up on the whole YouTube thing altogether. Now that's all very good for them, since they can protect their supposedly under-threat images (although I haven't heard of any problems arising from this before now) and directly harm Google, the super-company that is itself a competitor to most of the conglomerates that own these advertising companies.
BUT WHAT ABOUT POOR OLD DEVIN?!
Yes, heartlessly, these gigantic corporate monoliths forgot to consider that devaluing YouTube advertising will screw everyone who works with/for YouTube over, including this very writer. How could they? I mean, I probably bought a coke once. AND THIS IS HOW THEY REPAY ME?
Now with any luck this will all prove to just be a negotiation strategy; they will soon return with superior terms with Google thanks to the 'risk' of bad press and ads will at least become a bit more valuable.
I could here go on a rant about how hypocritical it is for these organisations to actually care about the issue at all, while their operations directly promote pseudo/actual-slavery, environmental destruction and aggressive neo-liberal globalisation across the world. But that would mean believing their claims that they care about the 'damage' to their reputation from a vanishingly small percentage chance of being alogrithmically selected to advertise on a controversial video from 3 years ago with 492 views.
I mean, a hate-speechy AND MONETISED video is such a rare thing (from what I saw, the controversy was actually over a single-figures number of cases) and there are billions of videos on YouTube... This is like if, say, Ralph Lauren, discovered that somewhere in the world there were AT LEAST 7 guys wearing their clothing while waxing lyrical on the superiority of their skin color or sexual preferences, they would be like "RIGHT THAT'S FUCKING IT MATES FROM NOW ON NO ONE IS ALLOWED TO WEAR OUR CLOTHES YOU RUINED IT MATES WE WILL NOT BE ASSOCIATED WITH BIGOTRY OR HATRED THAT DOES NOT PERTAIN TO OUR OWN SLA- I MEAN EMPLOYEES".
So, the point of all this was just to say that I don't make as much money anymore, and I didn't make all that much before. Depends how you measure it, but we're down something like 50% in monthly revenue, compared to periods of similar videos last year (and down a lot more compared to the recent Christmas boom in advertising!) But thanks to the minor-deieties that are my Patrons, my overall income is actually relatively stable against this decline in YouTube. So all is not lost, and the channel continues! Huzzargh!
Right, that'll do for now. Time to scatter a few memes throughout this post, and then I'll be on my merry way, pockets refreshingly lightened.
