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A Look at the Dark Side of the Lives of Some Prominent YouTubers, Who Are Increasingly Saying They're Stressed, Depressed, Lonely, and Exhausted (theguardian.com)
Many YouTubers are finding themselves stressed, lonely and exhausted. The Guardian: For years, YouTubers have believed that they are loved most by their audience when they project a chirpy, grateful image. But what happens when the mask slips? This year there has been a wave of videos by prominent YouTubers talking about their burnout, chronic fatigue and depression. "This is all I ever wanted," said Elle Mills, a 20-year-old Filipino-Canadian YouTuber in a (monetised) video entitled Burnt Out At 19, posted in May. "And why the fuck am I so unfucking unhappy? It doesn't make any sense. You know what I mean? Because, like, this is literally my fucking dream. And I'm fucking so un-fucking-happy."
[...] The anxieties are tied up with the relentless nature of their work. Tyler Blevins, AKA Ninja, makes an estimated $500,000 every month via live broadcasts of him playing the video game Fortnite on Twitch, a service for livestreaming video games that is owned by Amazon. Most of Blevins' revenue comes from Twitch subscribers or viewers who provide one-off donations (often in the hope that he will thank them by name "on air"). Blevins recently took to Twitter to complain that he didn't feel he could stop streaming. "Wanna know the struggles of streaming over other jobs?" he wrote, perhaps ill-advisedly for someone with such a stratospheric income. "I left for less than 48 hours and lost 40,000 subscribers on Twitch. I'll be back today... grinding again." There was little sympathy on Twitter for the millionaire. But the pressure he described is felt at every level of success, from the titans of the content landscape all the way down to the people with channels with just a few thousand subscribers, all of whom feel they must be constantly creating, always available and responding to their fans.
"Constant releases build audience loyalty," says Austin Hourigan, who runs ShoddyCast, a YouTube channel with 1.2 million subscribers. "The more loyalty you build, the more likely your viewers are to come back, which gives you the closest thing to a financial safety net in what is otherwise a capricious space." When a YouTuber passes the 1 million subscribers mark, they are presented with a gold plaque to mark the event. Many of these plaques can be seen on shelves and walls in the background of presenters' rooms. In this way, the size of viewership and quantity of uploads become the main markers of value.
[...] The anxieties are tied up with the relentless nature of their work. Tyler Blevins, AKA Ninja, makes an estimated $500,000 every month via live broadcasts of him playing the video game Fortnite on Twitch, a service for livestreaming video games that is owned by Amazon. Most of Blevins' revenue comes from Twitch subscribers or viewers who provide one-off donations (often in the hope that he will thank them by name "on air"). Blevins recently took to Twitter to complain that he didn't feel he could stop streaming. "Wanna know the struggles of streaming over other jobs?" he wrote, perhaps ill-advisedly for someone with such a stratospheric income. "I left for less than 48 hours and lost 40,000 subscribers on Twitch. I'll be back today... grinding again." There was little sympathy on Twitter for the millionaire. But the pressure he described is felt at every level of success, from the titans of the content landscape all the way down to the people with channels with just a few thousand subscribers, all of whom feel they must be constantly creating, always available and responding to their fans.
"Constant releases build audience loyalty," says Austin Hourigan, who runs ShoddyCast, a YouTube channel with 1.2 million subscribers. "The more loyalty you build, the more likely your viewers are to come back, which gives you the closest thing to a financial safety net in what is otherwise a capricious space." When a YouTuber passes the 1 million subscribers mark, they are presented with a gold plaque to mark the event. Many of these plaques can be seen on shelves and walls in the background of presenters' rooms. In this way, the size of viewership and quantity of uploads become the main markers of value.
I tell you what, they had better be saving that money! Cause you can only be king-ding-a-ling in the gamer community for so long. Once someone else's shit sparkles more than yours, the herd is off to munch on new grass.
Now, if you'll excuse me, I have backups to corrupt.
And after thinking about it for a little while, if you are truly some kind of Youtube star making $50k per month, that's $600k per year, and people earning far lower salaries have assistants. So 4.) Hire workers to take the burden off of you. Hire that video editor for $15k per month = $360k per year = nothing to sneeze at even in California. You'll probably be a lot less burnt-out if you have the other stuff handled by someone else. Would it be nice to keep all the money for yourself? Sure. But it you don't get burnt-out and you can keep your dream job for longer, while still making a ton of money, it could be a nice balance for you.
If you earn in a month 6 times more than what professionals in other industries earn in a year, how about just quit after a few months? Learn some financial managment (ie, don't spend more than you have) and be set for life.
So.... you think he can work for two months, disappear for ten months and pick up where he left off? He took a weekend off and lost more subscribers than most people will ever have in total. For celebrities followers are their career, they accumulate them slowly and lose them quickly. And the money is always in the future, a million subscribers is not money in the bank it's the potential to make more money tomorrow. I can talk to my boss and take an unpaid day off with little problem, no work and no pay but I'll be back earning the same the day after. He takes a weekend off and on a $500k income then if 4% of his fan base permanently leaves that is $20k/year lost. And maybe you can say boo hoo you'll only have $480k/year, but I can understand how that seems like a helluva expensive break.
Maybe a useful comparison is an athlete, your body is your accumulated capital - you train and train to make it fit, if you say fuck it today I'll be a couch potato, eat junk food and go on a bender you're not just taking a day off - you're seriously damaging your chances to win any gold medals. It doesn't matter if you have a bad day and isn't very motivated right now, you have to remind yourself how hard you've worked to get here, the goal you're reaching for and kick yourself behind. Even if you're a very successful athlete and you make lots of money and whatever... god, I'd go nuts from the grind. And that's celebrities too, unless you want to commit career suicide you got to stay in the spotlight. You have to please the fans. Even on the days you'd like to just get away from everyone and everything.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings