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I've been watching Youtube vids for a long time (well relatively, like 10+ years) and it's one of my primary forms of entertainment. It has been very interesti

I've been watching Youtube vids for a long time (well relatively, like 10+ years) and it's one of my primary forms of entertainment. It has been very interesting to see youtubers come and go, a lot of them seem to burn out on the schedule of trying to produce content regularly, which I can understand, anyone who's edited videos would realise the time it can take to produce something of good quality. Pewdiepie is an interesting case as he's far and away the biggest "real" channel on youtube (i.e. not VEVO or one of the generic youtube channels). https://vidstatsx.com/PewDiePie/youtube-channel https://vidstatsx.com/PewDiePie/youtube-channel gives you an idea of the size, he regularly gets 5-10 million views a day! The controversy seems very click-baity to me, I read the articles and watched his response videos. It seemed to me that he made some pretty bad taste comments (if you've seen much of his content that shouldn't be a surprise) and the WSJ deliberately sliced it up to take it out of context and produce the most sensationalised headline possible. All reminded me of the quote generally attribued to cardinal Richelieu. "If you give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest of men, I will find something in them which will hang him."

pm90 10y ago
> "If you give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest of men, I will find something in them which will hang him." I really don't think what he did was "honest" i.e. not meant to be provocative. As many sibling comments have pointed out, if you're making a living as a public personality, you kinda have to accept a higher level of scrutiny simply in order to avoid media hit jobs.
- raesene6 10y ago
  Oh I wasn't suggesting that what he said wasn't meant to be provocative, the main instance they picked up was ill considered and in bad taste, but then if you watch any of his other videos this really shouldn't be a surprise. The hit job was some of the other items they'd cut together to make the "anti-semetic" charge stick. One item where he was comparing youtube policies to those of the Nazi's (i.e. casting both in a negative light) the WSJ used as "proof" he was pro-Nazi. that's what prompted my thought of the quote.
  - fixermark 10y ago
    A recurring pattern I've seen with online celebrities is that when they get popular enough for more mainstream media to notice them, they're suddenly held to the standards of mainstream sensibilities and judged in a mainstream light that can be very incompatible with their brand. And their fans then defend them with "If you've seen their other stuff, you'd know that isn't unusual," which is a pretty thin defense---a bit like defending an arsonist with "Oh sure, nobody cared when they burned down all those grocery stores, but now that the WSJ is reporting on that orphanage..."
    - norikki 10y ago
      No. The whole reason pewdiepie and other personalities on youtube have such high viewership is because mainstream media hasn't had anyone funny for decades. Anyone fresh, honest or even just equally offensive to every group has been purged from the airwaves for being politically incorrect. Even Dave Chappelle is getting in hot water for jokes that no one would have objected to 10 years ago.
      - pm90 10y ago
        I don't see how what you're saying opposes what fixermark is saying. Sure mainstream media may not be providing good material, but the way to fix this isn't to not hold people accountable for their actions.
        jdmichal 10y ago
        But that is the fix if "holding people accountable for their actions" is what kills the joke...
        fixermark 10y ago
        If holding people accountable for their actions kills a joke, the joke wasn't very good. This is one of the points slowbeef makes in the essay; part of the reason YouTube let's-players end up offending is the nature of the project doesn't leave them time to simmer jokes long enough to be good.
- Bartweiss 10y ago
  And on the other side, if you're someone who gets raised to a public personality for your liveliness and lack of filter, you're likely to step over the line eventually. One of the best points I've seen was that Youtubers have a lot in common with talk radio hosts. When Howard Stern said something offensive, it was a bit rich to act surprised. He was paid to be shocking, he did better the harder he pushed on the edge of acceptable, and so of course he eventually went too far. Everyone from PewDiePie to Penny Arcade have run into the same issue. (Under this framework, JonTron is a fundamentally different issue - he doesn't seem to have been looking for views, just melting down.)
  - fixermark 10y ago
    Howard Stern is an excellent example, particularly because you won't find him on most heavily-regulated media.
    - x0x0 10y ago
      Howard Stern is a terrible example: his advertisers knew exactly what they were getting. PDP, unless he's stupid, should have known what DISNEY wanted. And it's not anti-semitic jokes, particularly following repeated use of Nazi iconography in his videos.
      - talmand 10y ago
        PDP was popular before Disney became involved, if Howard Stern's advertisers knew what they were getting then Disney should have known as well. You provide Stern an excuse but then deny the same excuse to PDP.
        Bartweiss 10y ago
        Notably Stern's employers and advertisers seemingly didn't know what they were getting, as judged by their decision to drop him for racist comments. Maybe they should have known, maybe they knew but figured they could profit and then drop him when he screwed up, but they did hire him after his success and drop him later. You're right that it exactly mirrors PDP's situation: off-the-cuff, inflammatory content creator partners with advertisers, does something extra-inflammatory, gets dropped by same.
- fareesh 10y ago
  If public outrage can do this, public outrage at media hit jobs can fix them
  - fixermark 10y ago
    The public outrage at what you perceive to be a "media hit job" is unlikely to come. What you're witnessing is mainstream (pretty much) America rejecting something they're now aware of that's too outside the norm. PDP can keep making content, but there's not really a likely scenario where he gets paid by Disney to do it.
    - pm90 10y ago
      This. I don't understand why the people who like PDP's content should care about him not being being able to get money from mainstream agencies such as Disney. He hasn't been banned from youtube, he can pretty much continue doing what he's always been doing. But those endorsements are predicated on certain restrictions...
Frondo 10y ago
You could examine everything I have ever, ever written and you will never find me paying someone to hold up a sign reading "Death to Jews".
- baby 10y ago
  You're not a comedian.
- alva 10y ago
  No, but I could now quote you in the news saying you wrote "Death to Jews" online. And that is pretty much what all of this is about.
  - PhasmaFelis 10y ago
    Seems to me it's about someone literally paying a guy to hold up a sign that says "Death to Jews".
    - sqeaky 10y ago
      The joke was that he was asking a bunch of people to do unreasonable things for $5 and someone else actually agreed to this. He went into it knowing it was unreasonable and thats the joke. We only hear about this, because no one else did the other crazy shit he suggested.
      - watwut 10y ago
        Do we know what other crazy shit he suggested?
        quirkafleeg 10y ago
        His other crazy shit was to pay someone to say "Hitler did nothing wrong". When that guy, who was dressed as Jesus, was banned by Fiverr, Pewdiepie stated: "Isn't it ironic that Jews[1] found another way to fuck Jesus over?" Whether his quest to push the comedy envelope extends further than Nazi/Jew related material, I don't know. [1] Fiverr is based in Israel. Edit: And the predictable downvote within minutes. How funny that the fans of Pewdiepie, and his "free speech", have such a reaction to a post stating objective facts about what he said.
vanderZwan 10y ago
> It has been very interesting to see youtubers come and go, a lot of them seem to burn out on the schedule of trying to produce content regularly, which I can understand, anyone who's edited videos would realise the time it can take to produce something of good quality. This is kind of related to the part of the story that informs you that you need weekly updates to stay visible to your subscribers because YouTube is weird. I'm not sure if that is true any more, especially with options like Patreon. I support 3blue1Brown and Primitive Technologies through it, and part of the reason I do is that they both take their time to produce quality videos.
ekianjo 10y ago
> All reminded me of the quote generally attribued to cardinal Richelieu. It's worse than that. Richelieu was talking about absolute power of the State. Now the online power is made up of hordes of folks whose only reason to exist is to make their views the predominant ones and silence anyone who's diverging from them, even if that person was simply joking. There's a surprising good share of folks who are anti-Freedom of expression especially in Gen X and Y. Anyone who lived during the 80s would find the present situation intoxicating.
- geofft 10y ago
  I think that the power of hordes of folks to try to make their views the predominant one is nothing other than a cynical phrasing of democracy, right? What is political freedom, if not the ability to work with like-minded others to advocate for or against a viewpoint? Should we censor people who wish to engage in this right? And I am confused how anyone here was silenced. This person's views, and the views of everyone who objects, and the views of everyone who objects to the objection, are all public. The video is easily available. Discussion forums that have nothing to do with his usual material, like this one, are discussing it. There's rich public debate about what he said and why he said it, fueled by an independent press that is not constrained to write only what serves those in power (any sort of power), and fueled even more by social media. This seems like the epitome of freedom of expression. If I saw someone say "Hitler was right" and nobody commented on it, I would wonder where freedom of expression went! Remember that the position that Hitler was indeed right is not one that lacks for support. The third Google result for me for 'pewdiepie hitler' is from The Daily Stormer, an actual, non-joking Neo-Nazi website, and the comments are celebrating how PewDiePie's viewers are being "red pilled" into understanding that Hitler's position is defensible.
  - nailer 10y ago
    > And I am confused how anyone here was silenced. This person's views, and the views of everyone who objects, and the views of everyone who objects to the objection, are all public. The video is easily available. According to Pewdiepie, the WSJ pushed Google to suspend his Youtube account.
yeukhon 10y ago
I don't follow his channel for the impression you had about him. I like the other gamers (Van--s, H-0, etc). I think you nailed it that stress is so bad that many have lost appetite to release new videos on a regular basis, and I've seen this in many youtubers I was following for years. Some gamers I know just don't want to edit anymore and instead release most of the gameplay or switch to Twitch completely and depends on just donation. While the top youtubers can make over a million a year, it can become a no-life job in the end. There's also an impression at least from my PoV that many YouTubers are now in LA making LA their "Silicon Valley" (yes, after all LA is the SV for entertainment industry) but since the living standard there is pricey and different some YTers might be under unhealthy stress. There was a YouTuber who committed suicide last year. We don't know exactly why, but it was very unexpected for fans and friends, and while I really don't want to speculate, I just can't help but think career might contributed to the cause regardless.
- hkmurakami 10y ago
  I think one of the smartest moves Day9 did was to hire production staff.
  - yeukhon 10y ago
    Depends. I am going to name names now. Ray William Johnson was a comedian on YouTube and his channel was a big hit about 7-8 years ago. At some point he signed up with an agency and started having a production crew instead of making them off of his own room, but for me the quality had gone down dramatically. I am not sure if there's even a correlation, perhaps just timing that there weren't that many funny videos on YouTube worth reviewing or perhas is the script the crew was producing just wasn't the right fit for me. I was very displeased with the new videos he was releasing. Later he ended relationship with the agency after some dispute and ran with his own production team, but the quality has continued to suck and so I am no longer a subscriber. Sorry. WongFu Production ran from a channel of three college students making videos about Asian life in America to a production company of its own (their made shorts, movies, and even a YouTube original series recently, and also making films for others). Their production quality is amazing. My favorite gamers on YouTubes just record from their computer and have no production crew whatsoever. I think Smosh Brothers is behind a production team at this point, and their videos are pretty fun to watch. It depends, there are good and bad ones.
evilDagmar 10y ago
The WSJ may have sensationalized things, but PewDiePie legitimately made those incredibly tacky statements and "jokes" all by himself. We don't need that type of tactless behavior in online gaming. What happens on 4chan should stay on 4chan.
- philangist 10y ago
  Who are you to police what we do or don't need in online gaming? Why is your definition of tactless behavior more valid than mine? All of this just seems like recreational outrage from the outside looking in.
  - izacus 10y ago
    He is "the public" - the same kind of public that kinda sets social norms for all other types of behaviour in media and real life.
    - theseatoms 10y ago
      And he can feel free to tune out and watch other content.
  - nommm-nommm 10y ago
    People are allowed to form an opinion on things. They are even allowed to publish that opinion online. That's not "policing."
    - jknoepfler 10y ago
      Strangely, it takes time and maturity for people to realize the difference between being criticized for airing cruel or insensitive humor on an internet video venue and being locked in a cell and tortured for their political views (as in a police state).
    - nilkn 10y ago
      Your opinions have consequences. They can affect other people in real ways. In this case, the imprecise, incredibly untrustworthy outrage of thousands of people -- fueled by a sensationalist media hit job -- almost ruined someone's career. You're welcome to your opinion. But you also have to take responsibility for it.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
CommanderData 10y ago
The pewdiepie controversy seems manufactured to me. I get pewdiepies humor. I watch his videos anticipating his originality and I guess 54 million subs do for varying reasons. His ability to express himself and generate content that makes me laugh repeatedly. He's not insensitive despite what some news articles say. The anti-semitism thing is so overused today its a little meaningless. The only way to push its worth is to generate headlines and articles to emphasis its importance. He jokes broadly about every culture and only seems to have issues with one culture in particular, unsurprisingly. It's reached a point it feels he's holding back something funny to please WSJ - a huge, huge tragedy and loss to his freedom and originality.
- debt 10y ago
  Would it be illegal for Disney to encourage or indirectly fund a hit piece on PewDiePie? It's very likely the OP here is right: YouTubers are imploding. Disney probably is the first to see that(they acquired Maker Studios a year or so ago) and needed to offload a massive failing asset. The anti-semitism problem is a very specific angle to take particularly related to Disney and PewDiePie. Someone clearly combed his trove of videos and found every single Nazi reference; seem like a stretch to begin with. Idk theories.
  - crooked-v 10y ago
    Is it really that surprising that Disney thought that using "death to all Jews" in a joke, regardless of context, was inappropriate?
    - fwn 10y ago
      "regardless of context" does not even exist. Your comment featured it and I don't think it's an inappropriate comment you made here.
      - cloakandswagger 10y ago
        "Death to all jews" -crooked-v 3/27/17
ovi256 10y ago
"If you give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest of men, I will find something in them which will sell millions of pageviews." There, updated for contemporary KPIs.
cr0sh 10y ago
> "If you give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest of men, I will find something in them which will hang him." Assuming the attribution of that quote is correct, that's got to be one of the most ironic utterances ever... /Richelieu was anything but a saint, for a supposed "man of the cloth"...
draw_down 10y ago
If you give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest of men, I rather doubt those six lines would contain weird comments about Jews.

pm90 10y ago

> "If you give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest of men, I will find something in them which will hang him." I really don't think what he did was "honest" i.e. not meant to be provocative. As many sibling comments have pointed out, if you're making a living as a public personality, you kinda have to accept a higher level of scrutiny simply in order to avoid media hit jobs.

raesene6 10y ago
Oh I wasn't suggesting that what he said wasn't meant to be provocative, the main instance they picked up was ill considered and in bad taste, but then if you watch any of his other videos this really shouldn't be a surprise. The hit job was some of the other items they'd cut together to make the "anti-semetic" charge stick. One item where he was comparing youtube policies to those of the Nazi's (i.e. casting both in a negative light) the WSJ used as "proof" he was pro-Nazi. that's what prompted my thought of the quote.
- fixermark 10y ago
  A recurring pattern I've seen with online celebrities is that when they get popular enough for more mainstream media to notice them, they're suddenly held to the standards of mainstream sensibilities and judged in a mainstream light that can be very incompatible with their brand. And their fans then defend them with "If you've seen their other stuff, you'd know that isn't unusual," which is a pretty thin defense---a bit like defending an arsonist with "Oh sure, nobody cared when they burned down all those grocery stores, but now that the WSJ is reporting on that orphanage..."
  - norikki 10y ago
    No. The whole reason pewdiepie and other personalities on youtube have such high viewership is because mainstream media hasn't had anyone funny for decades. Anyone fresh, honest or even just equally offensive to every group has been purged from the airwaves for being politically incorrect. Even Dave Chappelle is getting in hot water for jokes that no one would have objected to 10 years ago.
    - pm90 10y ago
      I don't see how what you're saying opposes what fixermark is saying. Sure mainstream media may not be providing good material, but the way to fix this isn't to not hold people accountable for their actions.
      - jdmichal 10y ago
        But that is the fix if "holding people accountable for their actions" is what kills the joke...
        fixermark 10y ago
        If holding people accountable for their actions kills a joke, the joke wasn't very good. This is one of the points slowbeef makes in the essay; part of the reason YouTube let's-players end up offending is the nature of the project doesn't leave them time to simmer jokes long enough to be good.
Bartweiss 10y ago
And on the other side, if you're someone who gets raised to a public personality for your liveliness and lack of filter, you're likely to step over the line eventually. One of the best points I've seen was that Youtubers have a lot in common with talk radio hosts. When Howard Stern said something offensive, it was a bit rich to act surprised. He was paid to be shocking, he did better the harder he pushed on the edge of acceptable, and so of course he eventually went too far. Everyone from PewDiePie to Penny Arcade have run into the same issue. (Under this framework, JonTron is a fundamentally different issue - he doesn't seem to have been looking for views, just melting down.)
- fixermark 10y ago
  Howard Stern is an excellent example, particularly because you won't find him on most heavily-regulated media.
  - x0x0 10y ago
    Howard Stern is a terrible example: his advertisers knew exactly what they were getting. PDP, unless he's stupid, should have known what DISNEY wanted. And it's not anti-semitic jokes, particularly following repeated use of Nazi iconography in his videos.
    - talmand 10y ago
      PDP was popular before Disney became involved, if Howard Stern's advertisers knew what they were getting then Disney should have known as well. You provide Stern an excuse but then deny the same excuse to PDP.
      - Bartweiss 10y ago
        Notably Stern's employers and advertisers seemingly didn't know what they were getting, as judged by their decision to drop him for racist comments. Maybe they should have known, maybe they knew but figured they could profit and then drop him when he screwed up, but they did hire him after his success and drop him later. You're right that it exactly mirrors PDP's situation: off-the-cuff, inflammatory content creator partners with advertisers, does something extra-inflammatory, gets dropped by same.
fareesh 10y ago
If public outrage can do this, public outrage at media hit jobs can fix them
- fixermark 10y ago
  The public outrage at what you perceive to be a "media hit job" is unlikely to come. What you're witnessing is mainstream (pretty much) America rejecting something they're now aware of that's too outside the norm. PDP can keep making content, but there's not really a likely scenario where he gets paid by Disney to do it.
  - pm90 10y ago
    This. I don't understand why the people who like PDP's content should care about him not being being able to get money from mainstream agencies such as Disney. He hasn't been banned from youtube, he can pretty much continue doing what he's always been doing. But those endorsements are predicated on certain restrictions...

Frondo 10y ago

You could examine everything I have ever, ever written and you will never find me paying someone to hold up a sign reading "Death to Jews".

baby 10y ago
You're not a comedian.
alva 10y ago
No, but I could now quote you in the news saying you wrote "Death to Jews" online. And that is pretty much what all of this is about.
- PhasmaFelis 10y ago
  Seems to me it's about someone literally paying a guy to hold up a sign that says "Death to Jews".
  - sqeaky 10y ago
    The joke was that he was asking a bunch of people to do unreasonable things for $5 and someone else actually agreed to this. He went into it knowing it was unreasonable and thats the joke. We only hear about this, because no one else did the other crazy shit he suggested.
    - watwut 10y ago
      Do we know what other crazy shit he suggested?
      - quirkafleeg 10y ago
        His other crazy shit was to pay someone to say "Hitler did nothing wrong". When that guy, who was dressed as Jesus, was banned by Fiverr, Pewdiepie stated: "Isn't it ironic that Jews[1] found another way to fuck Jesus over?" Whether his quest to push the comedy envelope extends further than Nazi/Jew related material, I don't know. [1] Fiverr is based in Israel. Edit: And the predictable downvote within minutes. How funny that the fans of Pewdiepie, and his "free speech", have such a reaction to a post stating objective facts about what he said.

vanderZwan 10y ago

> It has been very interesting to see youtubers come and go, a lot of them seem to burn out on the schedule of trying to produce content regularly, which I can understand, anyone who's edited videos would realise the time it can take to produce something of good quality. This is kind of related to the part of the story that informs you that you need weekly updates to stay visible to your subscribers because YouTube is weird. I'm not sure if that is true any more, especially with options like Patreon. I support 3blue1Brown and Primitive Technologies through it, and part of the reason I do is that they both take their time to produce quality videos.

ekianjo 10y ago

> All reminded me of the quote generally attribued to cardinal Richelieu. It's worse than that. Richelieu was talking about absolute power of the State. Now the online power is made up of hordes of folks whose only reason to exist is to make their views the predominant ones and silence anyone who's diverging from them, even if that person was simply joking. There's a surprising good share of folks who are anti-Freedom of expression especially in Gen X and Y. Anyone who lived during the 80s would find the present situation intoxicating.

geofft 10y ago
I think that the power of hordes of folks to try to make their views the predominant one is nothing other than a cynical phrasing of democracy, right? What is political freedom, if not the ability to work with like-minded others to advocate for or against a viewpoint? Should we censor people who wish to engage in this right? And I am confused how anyone here was silenced. This person's views, and the views of everyone who objects, and the views of everyone who objects to the objection, are all public. The video is easily available. Discussion forums that have nothing to do with his usual material, like this one, are discussing it. There's rich public debate about what he said and why he said it, fueled by an independent press that is not constrained to write only what serves those in power (any sort of power), and fueled even more by social media. This seems like the epitome of freedom of expression. If I saw someone say "Hitler was right" and nobody commented on it, I would wonder where freedom of expression went! Remember that the position that Hitler was indeed right is not one that lacks for support. The third Google result for me for 'pewdiepie hitler' is from The Daily Stormer, an actual, non-joking Neo-Nazi website, and the comments are celebrating how PewDiePie's viewers are being "red pilled" into understanding that Hitler's position is defensible.
- nailer 10y ago
  > And I am confused how anyone here was silenced. This person's views, and the views of everyone who objects, and the views of everyone who objects to the objection, are all public. The video is easily available. According to Pewdiepie, the WSJ pushed Google to suspend his Youtube account.

yeukhon 10y ago

I don't follow his channel for the impression you had about him. I like the other gamers (Van--s, H-0, etc). I think you nailed it that stress is so bad that many have lost appetite to release new videos on a regular basis, and I've seen this in many youtubers I was following for years. Some gamers I know just don't want to edit anymore and instead release most of the gameplay or switch to Twitch completely and depends on just donation. While the top youtubers can make over a million a year, it can become a no-life job in the end. There's also an impression at least from my PoV that many YouTubers are now in LA making LA their "Silicon Valley" (yes, after all LA is the SV for entertainment industry) but since the living standard there is pricey and different some YTers might be under unhealthy stress. There was a YouTuber who committed suicide last year. We don't know exactly why, but it was very unexpected for fans and friends, and while I really don't want to speculate, I just can't help but think career might contributed to the cause regardless.

hkmurakami 10y ago
I think one of the smartest moves Day9 did was to hire production staff.
- yeukhon 10y ago
  Depends. I am going to name names now. Ray William Johnson was a comedian on YouTube and his channel was a big hit about 7-8 years ago. At some point he signed up with an agency and started having a production crew instead of making them off of his own room, but for me the quality had gone down dramatically. I am not sure if there's even a correlation, perhaps just timing that there weren't that many funny videos on YouTube worth reviewing or perhas is the script the crew was producing just wasn't the right fit for me. I was very displeased with the new videos he was releasing. Later he ended relationship with the agency after some dispute and ran with his own production team, but the quality has continued to suck and so I am no longer a subscriber. Sorry. WongFu Production ran from a channel of three college students making videos about Asian life in America to a production company of its own (their made shorts, movies, and even a YouTube original series recently, and also making films for others). Their production quality is amazing. My favorite gamers on YouTubes just record from their computer and have no production crew whatsoever. I think Smosh Brothers is behind a production team at this point, and their videos are pretty fun to watch. It depends, there are good and bad ones.

evilDagmar 10y ago

The WSJ may have sensationalized things, but PewDiePie legitimately made those incredibly tacky statements and "jokes" all by himself. We don't need that type of tactless behavior in online gaming. What happens on 4chan should stay on 4chan.

philangist 10y ago
Who are you to police what we do or don't need in online gaming? Why is your definition of tactless behavior more valid than mine? All of this just seems like recreational outrage from the outside looking in.
- izacus 10y ago
  He is "the public" - the same kind of public that kinda sets social norms for all other types of behaviour in media and real life.
  - theseatoms 10y ago
    And he can feel free to tune out and watch other content.
- nommm-nommm 10y ago
  People are allowed to form an opinion on things. They are even allowed to publish that opinion online. That's not "policing."
  - jknoepfler 10y ago
    Strangely, it takes time and maturity for people to realize the difference between being criticized for airing cruel or insensitive humor on an internet video venue and being locked in a cell and tortured for their political views (as in a police state).
  - nilkn 10y ago
    Your opinions have consequences. They can affect other people in real ways. In this case, the imprecise, incredibly untrustworthy outrage of thousands of people -- fueled by a sensationalist media hit job -- almost ruined someone's career. You're welcome to your opinion. But you also have to take responsibility for it.

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

CommanderData 10y ago

The pewdiepie controversy seems manufactured to me. I get pewdiepies humor. I watch his videos anticipating his originality and I guess 54 million subs do for varying reasons. His ability to express himself and generate content that makes me laugh repeatedly. He's not insensitive despite what some news articles say. The anti-semitism thing is so overused today its a little meaningless. The only way to push its worth is to generate headlines and articles to emphasis its importance. He jokes broadly about every culture and only seems to have issues with one culture in particular, unsurprisingly. It's reached a point it feels he's holding back something funny to please WSJ - a huge, huge tragedy and loss to his freedom and originality.

debt 10y ago
Would it be illegal for Disney to encourage or indirectly fund a hit piece on PewDiePie? It's very likely the OP here is right: YouTubers are imploding. Disney probably is the first to see that(they acquired Maker Studios a year or so ago) and needed to offload a massive failing asset. The anti-semitism problem is a very specific angle to take particularly related to Disney and PewDiePie. Someone clearly combed his trove of videos and found every single Nazi reference; seem like a stretch to begin with. Idk theories.
- crooked-v 10y ago
  Is it really that surprising that Disney thought that using "death to all Jews" in a joke, regardless of context, was inappropriate?
  - fwn 10y ago
    "regardless of context" does not even exist. Your comment featured it and I don't think it's an inappropriate comment you made here.
    - cloakandswagger 10y ago
      "Death to all jews" -crooked-v 3/27/17

ovi256 10y ago

"If you give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest of men, I will find something in them which will sell millions of pageviews." There, updated for contemporary KPIs.

cr0sh 10y ago

> "If you give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest of men, I will find something in them which will hang him." Assuming the attribution of that quote is correct, that's got to be one of the most ironic utterances ever... /Richelieu was anything but a saint, for a supposed "man of the cloth"...

draw_down 10y ago

If you give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest of men, I rather doubt those six lines would contain weird comments about Jews.