Game Theory: The End of an Era

hello Internet welcome to Game Theory where today I'm once again ripping down the facade that this is a gaming channel and talking about the real world the real world of digital video the box that I exist perpetually in we are well over halfway through 2021 now I am currently petitioning hard to become a Jeopardy guest host and be an ignored hard by Sony Pictures Entertainment so if you haven't signed that link down below please do that I need every signature that I can get nothing's gonna come of it but you know what it makes me feel good that you all care and regardless if anything were to come of it don't worry I'm not leaving YouTube anytime soon in other corners of online video anyone who's ever touched the dream SMP is now dominating the charts over on Twitch and on YouTube Mr Beast continues his domination of literally everything gaming reactions shorts philanthropy and we are also desperate for a hug at this point that a short pick-me-up video of Steve from Blue's Clues literally broke Twitter I guess I just wanted to say that after all these years I never forgot you and I'm super glad we're still friends I'm glad that we're friends too Steve dark Lore of Blues Clues Theory I don't know about you but 2021 feels like this never-ending inflection point to this constant flip-flopping of the world is opening up again oh no no no never mind never mind oh our masks are off up no no put those puppies back on movies are in theaters now uh they're they're back on streaming all wait people like shangshi we're back in theaters only baby it's like that feeling when you're at an airport you know actually you probably don't know does anyone even remember what it's like to be in an airport anymore it's that uncomfortable feeling when you're antsy and eager to move on to your next destination but you aren't quite there yet well that is 2021 in a nutshell it is this year-long inflection point and it's not just an inflection point in real life but also in the world of digital content now I've talked in the past about the four generations of YouTube there was gen 1 the era of viral videos and then Gen 2 was the rise of the YouTuber gen 3 was watch time strikes back and then Gen 4 was the Viner Invasion if you want a refresher on all of that well that video is linked right here using that I icon in the upper right hand corner of the screen that YouTube thought was important enough to include on their product offering but literally no one uses but I've suspected for a while now that we're in the middle of a new generation gen 5. now if this was a video game it would be what Pokemon Black and White which I gotta say is ironic because this generation is anything but black and white literally nine months ago I started writing down all the things that have been trending over the last year and a half things like engineering DIY The Tick Tock influence YouTube shorts a push for greater Creator accountability the dream SMP hermitcraft YouTuber boxing Mr Beast Paving the way for massive giveaways of money the return of Creator burnout vtubers brand safety Kappa YouTuber investing hype houses the sun setting of top tier channels I mean the list just goes on and on and on and I couldn't wrap at my head around it all it felt really scattered so unfocused you know what what did all of these Trends mean well based on the fact that I'm sitting down on the couch finally making this video that you can tell I figured it out just smacked me right in the face like Floyd Mayweather smacking Logan Paul which uh by the way not to toot my own horn but to totally toot my own horn called that one absolutely rigged anyway I'm excited to sit here on the couch and talk to you about it today because honestly it's gonna affect you and the content that you consume the people that you choose to follow which platforms live and die and who lives to tell their story here we are ladies and gentlemen documenting the evolution of yet another era of entertainment consider this the YouTube State of the Union Address except you know I'm not the president of YouTube yet yet you watch yourself Susan wojiski once I'm done with that Jeopardy petition the make matpat CEO of YouTube petition is coming up next first let's talk about some of those trends that I just rattled off some of them are fun like dog robots that pee beer take the cup put the cup under the robot dog's crotch but a lot of them are also serious so let's talk about those first and I'll save the more fun ones for later now 2020 was the Watershed year for audiences demanding that the creators and platforms they support be unproblematic with the black lives matter movement followed immediately by pride month followed later by hate violence against the Asian Community all of it wrapped in financial insecurities due to the pandemic and topped with a bow of an emotionally charged presidential election yeah I would say that it was a year where accountability was on the top of everyone's Minds social responsibility became this key factor in who audiences decided were and were not allowed to continue being relevant moving forward suddenly it was as though there was this audit of your entire online history with the internet shoving videos ideas and creators overboard to see if they managed to stay afloat or if the collective anchor of their past online actions pulled them under for good and yeah while there are both permanent casualties from this audit process as well as some shorter term casualties the community that seems to have felt it the most is beauty ironically enough where the actions of many of the top channels weren't able to survive the scrutiny causing this massive decentralization of viewership the collapse of this vertical also wasn't helped by the fact that 2020 just saw a massive decline in makeup sales at retailers like Sephora and morphe go figure you don't need a lot of makeup where you're not seeing people in real life meaning that the internet's team Beauty was likely getting hit where it actually hurt and actually matters their pocketbook and it's worth noting that this call for accountability wasn't just something for individual creators we're still seeing the Fallout of it now with streamers currently protesting hate raids over on Twitch showing that platforms themselves are being held accountable for the communities that they've fostered well The Purge by audience has been happening on one side The Purge by platform has been happening on the other it's no secret at this point that brand safety has been like the buzzword on this platform for the last four years or so but now it really does feel like it's reached its final form at this point there's restrictions on violence profanity suggestive content content aimed at kids content involving kids quote unquote dangerous situations whatever that means extreme political speech the mention of hot button news words remember YouTube banned the word pandemic and videos around this time last year there's even rules and regulations around excessive bare skin including wearing a bathing suit in situations where bathing suits are inappropriate true story we were actually dinged by that one we were covering a Rick and Morty episode and one of the animated characters was wearing a swimsuit in the background on a yacht and apparently it did not pass muster so sorry amaranth I don't think that YouTube is going to be trying to steal you away from twitch anytime soon and don't get me wrong I'm not trying to imply that most of these changes are bad or anything it's just another form of accountability as the platform has bit by bit learned what it takes to be a safe and positive and also profitable space for most of their audience but as you can expect these changes do tend to trickle down into the content on the platform and into the creators and how they run their businesses creators at this point have realized that it's time to leave anything that might even remotely defend an audience or a platform at the door if they have any hope of being a trusted partner and continuing to pay their bills in the future this double-sided pressure has created a narrow safe little canyon of content on the platform that still involves most of your favorite stuff but now just a little more puritanized you still have gaming but you certainly can't have violent games blocky blood-free Minecraft is the order of the day for me sure you can try playing Call of Duty or Mortal Kombat but the perceived risk to creators of demonetization is just too high even if the platform wouldn't end up demonetizing you these games exist in too gray of an area so no thanks I'm just gonna stick with my nice safe Among Us the angel Trope of reacting is back and it's been back for a couple of years and whoa whoa they are shocked you have never seen shocking content like this it is so surprising how ice cream is made or whoa that's a really weird food never seen anything like that before and also what are those tick tackers up to again oh they are so wacky over there there brand safety also extends to the huge surge in Millennial grown-up content from the stylings of Mr Kate and literal DIY of everything to making dumplings with the try guys and talking about having kids with the ballingers adding the spice to this brand safe content soup is YouTube's criticism vertical but that criticism ends up being mild at best we are a long distance away from the keemstars of the world creators like Drew good and Curtis Connor Danny Gonzalez love these guys they're delivering the sickest burns on Undercover Boss Disney Channel original movies boom roasted Anthony Padilla he's become the Oprah of YouTube between his empathy and those dimples for the god Sarah Zed is spilling tea on Old tumbler fandoms and the H3 podcast was definitely spicy and one of the most popular things on the platform until of course it spun itself into its own net of criticism they're all hilarious insightful fun to watch but also one key word safe and I want to make it clear that I'm not knocking or passing judgment on any of these Trends or any of these creators I'm in this content Canyon with you riding along until it's time to adapt to the next cultural shift of the internet but I think it says a lot when I feel like I'm one of the edgiest content creators on the platform here in 2021 because I'm a guy who still talks about fictional child murder on a not too infrequent basis I guess I'm super spicy now look at me Orson Welles once said the enemy of art is the absence of limitations meaning that some of the best art is made when there are constraints in place on the artist but I would argue that at this point the pressure from the trifecta of audiences and critics and platforms are having some real unintended consequences on what actually gets produced so let's start talking about those unintended consequences shall we the first is that YouTubers are becoming increasingly corporatized manufactured 90s boy band style to be the next Justin Timberlake or to use a more modern in reference that people would probably understand the next Kim taeyong that's a v from BTS by the way which I hope I'm pronouncing His official name right but if I'm not please don't kill me I like bts's music but I'm not a super fan enough to know their official pronunciations of their actual names also young cook is my favorite that probably is going to put me on a lot of hate lists anyway we talked a couple years ago about Investors funding and owning the careers of YouTubers that's how Jake Paul used his pop star maker model alongside garyvee who was one of his main and backers but now if Crews and houses aren't directly controlled or backed by an outside corporate investor they are now corporatized on the inside and we've gotten a peek into that with groups like FaZe Clan the parade of these mini corporate houses is just incredible to believe it makes your eyes water there's hype house Alpha House collab crib Glam house I swear I'm not making these up bite Squad just a house the house nobody asked for the point of all of this is that it's been a very long time since these Carefree happy-go-lucky groups of friends haven't had to Ink they're happy go luckyness into contracts dictating the business structure around everything that they do and this is happening more and more and faster and faster as these groups continue to jump into the YouTube ecosystem especially when the brand safe Shenanigans are making bang which leads us to another Trend that I initially was having trouble fitting into all of this YouTuber investing back in 2016 my partner Steph and I were asked to take a brief Consulting meeting with a guy from one of the top Silicon Valley venture capital firms now if you don't know what venture capital is it's basically people wanting to invest in small companies that they think have potential in order to own a portion of that business as they grow and also to Foster their growth anyway this guy said that he wanted to start buying and selling YouTube channels kind of like you would a stock portfolio and he asked us for advice on how to do it unfortunately for him he was a little too far on the bleeding edge at the time but now five years later and this guy's dream is finally starting to become a reality admittedly it's still early days and I haven't seen anyone quite with the perfect code for buying and sell and investing in YouTube channels yet but it's coming at the beginning of 2021 Steph and I were approached by three different YouTube Financial platforms and apps all looking for us to help them do this exact same thing and now quite honestly is the appropriate time to do it you see historically the biggest problem was that there was no perfect way to compare one YouTuber to another because every YouTuber is so different in their own special flower right well wrong and the success of the content creator house model has proven that years ago we talked about how the Hub and spoke model of YouTube is the key to algorithmic growth and success you have one Central Hub one main Creator supporting and giving rise to a bunch of other popular in their own right creators they collab with each other everyone wins they all grow together well that model has now been honed and perfected by groups like The collab houses Minecraft SMP servers content Crews a few collabs here and there and you got yourself the next trending influencer who's headed to the Met Gala one well coordinated hashtag launch across five of your friends and you're suddenly a top trender on Twitter Jen 4 of YouTube was the first wave of creators who had grown up watching online videos knowing the importance of words like algorithm and SEO they were Savvy creators Gen 5 they're not just Savvy creators they're Savvy business people now are you starting to see why this whole thing was so difficult to shove together like how do you connect the brand safety dot over here with the YouTube corporations and investing dot over here while also looping together this push toward greater accountability does the simultaneous rise in criticism channels alongside YouTuber bread baking tutorials actually intersect and the answer is yeah they do and they all connect through one word adulting that's right hang with me here for a second because I'm going to explain it all because we are here ladies and gentlemen in generation 5 of YouTube YouTube became the adult in the room every social video platform that we've seen since like the 20 knots has had some sort of flow to it right Facebook started as the hit new thing a website site that in order to get an account you had to have a college email address which made it super cool and super exclusive let me poke you and then I'm gonna post it on your wall nowadays not so much caters more to the Boomers and gen xers and the people who insist on injecting themselves with horse urine in order to stay strong if you're under 40 and you're personally using Facebook unironically well to The Wider populace you're not really considered to be internet literate YouTube fortunately has maintained youth oriented Supremacy both on the internet and in media at large for over a decade now an incredible feat but Gen 5 has been marked by the moment that it finally had to get a haircut take that babysitting job off the resume and clock in for a real career regarding some of the trends that we were talking about from the last year in light of being a Bonafide grown-up a lot of what's been happening on YouTube suddenly makes a lot of sense when you're young and dumb and irresponsible well you can go around and get away with saying things that you might regret tomorrow burning couches and throwing them into local swimming pools not treating people the way you should is it acceptable no definitely not never ever but then again you were a dumb kid an idiot teenager a counter-cultural mover and Shaker so p people are going to be more forgiving of your behavior but that doesn't last and now if YouTubers want to continue paying their bills and also be taken seriously in The Wider media landscape and not be stoned to death in the court of public opinion it's time that they grow up they clean up their act they apologize and you see that's exactly what they're doing what we are doing both of our own volition and because the platform now dictates it grown-ups are responsible for setting the tone of fairness and equality in the world and YouTube is now very clearly wearing the big boy pants in the family when it comes to social responsibility it also extends to all those content trends that we were talking about before who designs their own homes adults who cooks with or without a recipe adults who has babies adults the hopefully engineering speed chess this amazing Scottish farrier Channel who fixes hooves for a living that's awesome I love that Channel all adults this is the sort of content that you use to be able to see on the Discover Channel or TLC back in the day heck who watches news and criticism the YouTube criticism vertical is as much as I hate to say it modern political punditry Millennials might not be all that into cable news but they were sure as heck into Frenemies and hey nothing motivates people more than money which is something that adults have to know a lot about at this point we are so many years past the point where people do YouTube for fun when I tell people that I didn't monetize this channel until I had a million subscribers and didn't quit my job to do it full time until 3 million which is completely True by the way it is Unthinkable for them that idea just does not compute when I got my first brand deal back in the day people called me a sellout when we started hiring on other creators to join the team to fuel each other's creativity people said that we had gone corporate but now look at what a difference a generation or two makes nowadays I've known dozens of creators who quit their jobs at ten thousand subscribers when a Creator partners with a major brand their Community celebrates because their recognized and legitimized they celebrate by saying get that bag and as far as going corporate goes we already talked about how investors are just creating YouTubers and Petri dishes putting Vlog cameras in their hand and sending them on their way don't know what your video partner is going to do well better get that contract in place want some Financial stability take on those corporate investors Insurance Studios paid time off Severance packages sound like Corporate America it is and it's been YouTube for a while now the transformation of YouTube into a business platform started in Earnest the moment Harley from Epic Meal Time ripped the veil off this industry back during the 2014 streamies here's the deal any YouTuber that touched this microphone tonight is a millionaire maybe it was cute in 2011 but it's 2014. everyone is Rich on YouTube and it's finally reach what it was always destined to be television oh sure you can still be a 15 year old uploading videos from your basement and still be super successful here but it's actually going to be much harder now sorry actually 15 might be too young cop it might come for you uh remind oh sure you can still be legal of age 18 years old and uploading your videos but you're gonna have to operate like an adult you're gonna have to uphold the moral standards employment standards and content standards of people twice your age and more easier stuff polished enough that YouTube isn't going to be embarrassed of it to show it across the platform is it differentiated enough in a crowded Market is it long enough to fulfill those watch time metrics and are you producing it frequently enough to keep your audience interested or is the algorithm just going to wash you away have you considered your analytics your thumbnail design your click-through rates your content calendars your production schedule and the collabs to help it all grow in Gen 5 of YouTube YouTube is now an adult workplace which you know becomes the natural order of things when you're the successor to television and one of the downsides to that is that the barrier to entry is really high for any new Talent that's looking to come in enter Tick Tock and now I think you can see how this is all coming together younger people used to think of this platform of YouTube as the land of opportunity now it's tick tock videos can be shorter videos can be unpolished you don't need a 30-man production crew just to film one Vlog the rules there don't feel as strict with fears about copyright claiming or demonetization and as a result you have formats that are able to thrive there that have long been dead here over on YouTube short form scripted comedies pretty much anything related to music which oh wait once you know it we're the same formats that were the lifeblood of YouTube in its earliest days it is truly the first Global platform because it's the one that's allowed in China and being mobile first means that countries like India which we've talked a lot about recently as the big Market that everyone's looking to capture can be involved without making a big percentage of the population needing to own laptops and editing equipment and obviously I'm not the first one to notice this in March of this year YouTube launched YouTube shorts it's big Tick Tock competitor which to the Casual audience might seem like just another product launch but I'm telling you it is so much bigger than that they are losing using one of the most important demographics in the world 13 to 18 year olds which we actually know are closer to 8 to 18 year olds and they're losing them to the first video platform that's truly Global easy to access easy to produce on and that wouldn't you know is also backed by bite dance a Chinese conglomerate that's grossed 37 billion dollars in 2020 versus YouTube's 19 billion meaning that it has pockets deep enough to go head to head with the biggest platform in the world oh sure a lot of other platforms have tried to take down YouTube but Tick Tock is the first to actually pose a real threat and already the data shows it as early numbers show Tick Tock surpassing YouTube and that all important metric of watch time clicking on a 50-minute review of banned games that is a commitment I am in that for the Long Haul but scrolling through 60 funny one minute comedy videos or dance videos or whatever else is on here it doesn't really matter because they're all one minute wow wow where did that last hour go sure not all of them are great but there were enough interesting ones in there to keep shooting my brain with that dopamine so I keep scrolling longer and longer and longer also I should probably mention that Kid Icarus video the 50 minutes of Band games awesome totally worth the 50 minutes at one and a half speed which is how I have to watch everything on YouTube these days because go figure everything on YouTube is so darn long they're all like the length of movies now does this mean that we all have to pack up our proverbial YouTube bags and go head for the hills start flossing and do an Addison Ray style dances not so fast there friendos here's the twist YouTube has something that no other platform has ever had The Bravery or maybe the stupidity to give to the creators it's so unbelievably obvious but seems to elude every single platform that I come across and I can't tell if it's a financial issue or if it's greed or whatever the heck it is it's just not that hard to figure out it's do a revenue share with us unless you're a very casual viewer of YouTube which let's face it you are not a casual viewer of YouTube you're watching this video and you are this far in you are in it deep my friends and as a result you know that YouTube shares the profits of every ad run on the platform with its creators at a split of 55.45 in favor of the Creator why does that matter well on every other platform you're not just focused on making content you're focused on making content and asking for donations making content and chilling for Merch making content and Hawking those Amazon affiliate links YouTube is the only place that just does the money stuff for you you are a Creator first and foremost and they treat you like a Creator when ads run on your videos you just get a check in the mail and you can continue doing what you do best creating I don't know why no one understands the incredible importance of this it's like practically magic but no other platform has truly figured out that this is the secret sauce it's not the recommended page it is not the trending tab it is the ability to make money without ever thinking about having to make money you get more views whoa shock of all shocks you make more money right now Tick Tock has all the monetization stuff that let's face it is not the secret sauce affiliate links uh yeah Instagram asking for fan donations awesome say hello to Twitch taking sponsorships uh Vine was good at that you can sell your merch whoa you're blowing my mind right now now when people want to turn what they're doing on Tick Tock into a full at scale by that irresponsible Lambo business it's likely that they'll have to move over to YouTube at least for the foreseeable future here with all of us grown-ups with our car seats in the back of our responsible crossover Vehicles sorry to break it to you but that is why YouTube had to adult so that advertisers felt comfortable enough to move their dollars here and that's just how it is so if you made it to the end of this very long video about a lot of different things that are happening on YouTube and a lot of the trends that are changing the face of online video right now here's the tldr YouTube is now a grown-up no more weird voice cracks no more offensive jokes and with growing up that means it's no longer the coolest kid in class and that's not a bad thing I think YouTubers for all their issues are some of the most open-minded and adaptable people out there I'm excited how we all ride this wave together then again if Tick Tock does start offering passive Revenue splits on ads that run on the content Beyond just their creator fund hmm I might have to start warming up those dance moves here a musical theater Pat returns to action at least not yet anyway thank you guys so much for watching and as always remember it's all just a theory a YouTube Theory glad to be back on the couch doing these things again I'll see you in the next video

Channel: The Game Theorists

Views: 4,291,827

Keywords: tiktok, tik tok, twitch, india, vine, state of the union, tiktok mashup, end of an era, future of youtube, youtube shorts, tiktok competition, charli d'amelio, addison rae, dream, mrbeast, mrbeast shorts, dream smp, game theory, game theorists, matpat, game theory end of an era, game theory 10 year anniversary

Id: vlxghmlGNoI

Length: 25min 11sec (1511 seconds)

Published: Sun Sep 26 2021