5 ms·

Having spent literally hundreds of hours producing video game content for youtube and twitch, I can say this: It's an incredibly sad, discouraging experience e

Having spent literally hundreds of hours producing video game content for youtube and twitch, I can say this: It's an incredibly sad, discouraging experience even if you get traction (and I got some traction). It's also utterly hollow: your entire existence is as a wrapper around the content folks actually want to see. The most successful streamers develop their own brand, but these people are the 0.5%, the Felixs and the _sips and the ZachScotts. They're the exception, and even they have specific genres and subjects that if they venture into they risk losing a massive chunk of their audience. Once I realized this, I had to stop trying to do it professionally. I'd rather go back to doing software product work. At least I feel like a real person with real impact in this field, as opposed to one of a billion interchangeable wrappers around other people's mostly interchangeable content. But you can of course go see my youtube channel and watch my old minecraft content if you want. Some of the stuff around the middle of my cycle (i.e., D&S play Minecraft, Minecraft the Hard Way, Sunless Minecraft) was pretty solid for the genre.

y2bd 8y ago
Similar boat of making Minecraft videos in the past (2011-2014). It was mostly just my friend and I playing through various Minecraft adventure/puzzle maps. We got a couple dozen to a hundred followers through luck/timing (playing new maps that later become popular) but didn't get too far. Then one day my friend on a whim did a skit that ended up doing very well (it got featured on wired.com and even posted on HN [1]). We got a lot of attention from this skit (and one or two others), but this really wasn't content we wanted to dedicate ourselves towards. It was extremely disheartening seeing the wide disparity between videos we wanted to make and videos that got views--we loved to think that people enjoyed watch us, but it was really clear that most people just wanted to see more of those two/three videos. I don't think I regret the time spent though. Doing LPs definitely strengthened my ability to explain what I'm doing as I'm doing it, a skill I use all the time as a software dev (and one I definitely see others lacking). It also gave me a ton of experience with video editing, which while not as useful professionally is a lot of fun and I think a useful skill to have in your pocket. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3543039 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3543039
- symlinkk 8y ago
  I watched your video and I think you would do a lot better if you used your real voice instead of a computer generated voice. The content is great though.
  - wpietri 8y ago
    Personally, I liked the voice. The posh accent fit the educational video component, while the synthetic, glitchy nature fit with Minecraft and the comedy of the whole thing.
flashman 8y ago
> your entire existence is as a wrapper around the content folks actually want to see Yeah, what sets popular streamers apart is that their 'wrapper' is distinctive and entertaining in its own right. Everyone is showing much the same product; what can you put around it that's different? Kind of like selling fizzy drinks, I guess.
- s-shellfish 8y ago
  Sort of. I've been making art for a long time, went to school for it. People want to see themselves in whatever you produce for them. It's that simple. They want something they identify with. Artists and content developers can have more fun playing with it because they have different meaning spaces - they see connections across content that is still self identity, it's just across a different set of things. It can be competitive and draining though, so one must use their energy wisely. Crowds can be fickle in general, so it can as well be exhausting staying plugged into them, producing just for them, without any way of receiving meaningful feedback. It's not that people are narcissists at heart, it's just that they don't want to pay attention to things to things that don't make sense to them on any level. That's pretty normal.
  - B1FF_PSUVM 8y ago
    > People want to see themselves in whatever you produce for them. It's that simple. Funny thing is comrade Tocqueville hit on that upon looking at the USA for a couple of months almost two centuries ago. Something along the lines of "democratic peoples want to hear stories about themselves" (instead of the classics), rather early on the pages of his Democracy in America, writing about theater and culture.
    - s-shellfish 8y ago
      Now that I think about it though, it really depends. If there's no stable reflection of self identity, that's what people seek out. But if there is a stable way to identify with the self, people seek out novelty, something different. I think the internet introduces both tunnel vision of self identity and complete chaos where self identity breaks down. This seems like it would be an obvious consequence of anonymity, but some things are easily forgotten. It makes sense with the Democratic process. Identities constantly swapping and merging, playing both sides while being neither fundamentally. It makes sense that communism would have a valid criticism. Stable, forced sense of identity suppresses dissent before it manifests. Until revolution, war happens, that is. Scary stuff!

y2bd 8y ago

Similar boat of making Minecraft videos in the past (2011-2014). It was mostly just my friend and I playing through various Minecraft adventure/puzzle maps. We got a couple dozen to a hundred followers through luck/timing (playing new maps that later become popular) but didn't get too far. Then one day my friend on a whim did a skit that ended up doing very well (it got featured on wired.com and even posted on HN [1]). We got a lot of attention from this skit (and one or two others), but this really wasn't content we wanted to dedicate ourselves towards. It was extremely disheartening seeing the wide disparity between videos we wanted to make and videos that got views--we loved to think that people enjoyed watch us, but it was really clear that most people just wanted to see more of those two/three videos. I don't think I regret the time spent though. Doing LPs definitely strengthened my ability to explain what I'm doing as I'm doing it, a skill I use all the time as a software dev (and one I definitely see others lacking). It also gave me a ton of experience with video editing, which while not as useful professionally is a lot of fun and I think a useful skill to have in your pocket. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3543039 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3543039

symlinkk 8y ago
I watched your video and I think you would do a lot better if you used your real voice instead of a computer generated voice. The content is great though.
- wpietri 8y ago
  Personally, I liked the voice. The posh accent fit the educational video component, while the synthetic, glitchy nature fit with Minecraft and the comedy of the whole thing.

flashman 8y ago

> your entire existence is as a wrapper around the content folks actually want to see Yeah, what sets popular streamers apart is that their 'wrapper' is distinctive and entertaining in its own right. Everyone is showing much the same product; what can you put around it that's different? Kind of like selling fizzy drinks, I guess.

s-shellfish 8y ago
Sort of. I've been making art for a long time, went to school for it. People want to see themselves in whatever you produce for them. It's that simple. They want something they identify with. Artists and content developers can have more fun playing with it because they have different meaning spaces - they see connections across content that is still self identity, it's just across a different set of things. It can be competitive and draining though, so one must use their energy wisely. Crowds can be fickle in general, so it can as well be exhausting staying plugged into them, producing just for them, without any way of receiving meaningful feedback. It's not that people are narcissists at heart, it's just that they don't want to pay attention to things to things that don't make sense to them on any level. That's pretty normal.
- B1FF_PSUVM 8y ago
  > People want to see themselves in whatever you produce for them. It's that simple. Funny thing is comrade Tocqueville hit on that upon looking at the USA for a couple of months almost two centuries ago. Something along the lines of "democratic peoples want to hear stories about themselves" (instead of the classics), rather early on the pages of his Democracy in America, writing about theater and culture.
  - s-shellfish 8y ago
    Now that I think about it though, it really depends. If there's no stable reflection of self identity, that's what people seek out. But if there is a stable way to identify with the self, people seek out novelty, something different. I think the internet introduces both tunnel vision of self identity and complete chaos where self identity breaks down. This seems like it would be an obvious consequence of anonymity, but some things are easily forgotten. It makes sense with the Democratic process. Identities constantly swapping and merging, playing both sides while being neither fundamentally. It makes sense that communism would have a valid criticism. Stable, forced sense of identity suppresses dissent before it manifests. Until revolution, war happens, that is. Scary stuff!