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Watchergate: 4/19-4/22

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can i be cynical. yeah i dont think theyre gonna come back from this unfortunately

i think a good majority of watcher fans will accept the apology and still continue to watch them but.. man i think it’s too late for some people (and thats perfectly understandable)

i know it was a weekend when they first announced watchertv (bad choice kinda 😭) so they couldn’t just record an update that fast but ive already seen people talk about unsubscribing so. like. what now.

i dont know if they’ll be able to enter the publics good graces again, at least not for a while. glad for the update! but i dont think its gonna fix everything

watcher fans … how we feeling?

#posting this separately but . yeah that’s just my read so far

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watcher fans … how we feeling?

#im so fucking exhausted dude 😭😭😭 i need a watcher break maybe #tagging because i want to know your guys opinions teehee:) #watcher #ryan bergara #shane madej #steven lim

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The Couch Sequel We've Been Waiting For All Weekend

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i am not here for negativity in any way do NOT bring that here.

if you want a FREE watcher.tv subscription, fill out this google form!

your email will then be put in a random generator as collected to be given to someone looking to gift a subscription. several fans have offered to do this for other fans, and this is an (unofficial) way to do this!

if you would LIKE TO DONATE A SUBSCRIPTION, either reblog this (for traction) with a reply, reply here, or DM me directly! you will receive a random email from me to gift someone. use the watcher.tv "gift a subscription" option to do so! would appreciate proof as well.

note-- your gift is at your donor's discretion. it could be one month, it could be a year, but we want to show support AND get more people the opportunity to jump in on this.

hooray kindness NO NEGATIVITY DO NOT EVEN TRY IT

#boosting this :) even during these weird times watcher fandom has each others backs

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Here are my thoughts about the watcher situation:

1) my PERSONAL issue is not the fact that the content is being paywalled. I understand and believe that an artist should be able to charge what they think their work is worth. I have paid for patreons and memberships before when I had a bit of extra money so I fully support creators getting adequate compensation. HOWEVER, the way this was rolled out was almost comically bad. The video felt tone deaf at times and it felt like this decision was only halfway thought through. There were many steps they could have taken to try to mitigate production costs before jumping ship.

2) Why did people suddenly decide that everything had to have been Steven’s fault? I’m not even a Steven fan, but this is ridiculous. Even if it was Steven’s idea, Ryan and Shane still sat and filmed the video. They are still the co-founders and have repeatedly supported Steven’s choices as CEO. Where did this narrative that Steven is an evil, corrupt, greedy, leader and poor Ryan and Shane are forced against their will to do these things come from? I’ve followed Ryan and Shane since Buzzfeed Unsolved like many of us here, but we can’t let them escape criticism because the idea of them doing something bad hurts.

3) As someone currently going to school for stuff like this, I would LOVE to see the research they used to come to this decision. That’s not even me trying to be shady. I genuinely want to know. The community response has been so overwhelmingly negative that I have to assume that they either 1) did not have enough data, or 2) did not collect any data themselves and relied on outside sources that didn’t fully understand the landscape of watcher’s viewership. Either way I want to know.

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#day 3 and im still cycling through this #most of the time? 😞 but reading tweets? i giggle a bit

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Watcher google drive

i think the title is pretty self explanitory

Only ghost files on it atm but Mystery Files and Puppet History are next. Watcher has back pedalled on deleteing all their free content to lock it behind a pay wall but y'know what? maybe I just dont want to give them ad revenue anymore, which is evil but screw them. Also they may still back pedal on their back pedalling, which is to many pedals anyways.

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i’ll gladly pay $6 for someone to film the audience reaction at ghost files live on thursday

#whos ready for the chaos

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I've thought about this a little bit, and it feels like a cop out, but truly I can see both sides.

On one hand, it's a fledgling company who wants to make art in a way they feel proud of. It's all well and good for us to say "we were here when the text was blue and yellow and we don't care about production value", but as someone who in her own right creates - whether its gifs or writing or silly little scrapbook pages - it's about creating something you believe is of the highest quality you can create.

Not only that, it's also about being a company that can support its employees and pay them a more-than living wage. It's potentially about being able to fulfill promises to people who had invested in Watcher in the beginning, though I know less about that.

To say that 'they make bank' with patreon and sponsorships and merch when they support a staff of over 20 people is potentially untrue. What seems like corporate greed can have several layers.

On the other hand, it's not an overreaction for fans to feel abandoned and disregarded - especially those in non-Western countries, as well as younger fans.

Fans feeling bitter at being told that USD5.99 is an amount 'anybody and everybody can afford' isn't unreasonable. It's a large amount for many fans who live in countries where several USD is a quarter of what they earn in a month, or even for people who are at stages in their life where everything they earn has to go into keeping themselves fed and housed.

Imagine a life where you struggle so much to meet your own needs, where some of your only comforts is sitting down at the end of the day and watching people talk about conspiracies or shout at air in abandoned buildings, only to see that was being taken away from you (and by the very system that's been holding you hostage and making you miserable)? I can see why people would lash out. Why it would seem like these people who joked about eating the rich and understanding privilege have been lying all along.

To me, both of these things - creatives turning away from a highly controlled space like YouTube with its low financial returns, and fans hating that content that used to be free now has to cost them money and reading that as capitalist predatory behaviour, all stem from the same issue, which is that money and art are intertwined. Whether this is terrible and insidious or just a fact of life is another point of mixed feelings, for me.

The point is: I understand why Watcher is doing this. I understand why people don't want Watcher to do this.

Do I think it's a good thing? I'm not sure. How much will their content change? Their reasoning is feeling that they're having to make content for both their fans and advertisers, so that creates an expectation that making this decision will change what they put out in a positive way. That's added pressure. Another thing is that there is a narrative they're pushing of doing this for their audience, while of course making it inaccessible to a potentially large chunk of them. How will that bridge be crossed? These questions definitely need answering, but they need time to be answered. I'm withholding judgement until these get answered for me, and I'm ready to be patient.

Do I think it was the smart thing for them to do in the long run? I have no idea. I want it to be, because I don't want them to fail and decide to give up. It's not a nice feeling to see artists give up on making their art be their livelihood.

#this is really well said and is basically my opinion on the whole watcher situation #youtube just isn’t the best platform for creatives anymore and in the past few years- #-channels have been expanding through patreon and their own site #what watcher is doing is extreme and i fully understand why people are pissed! i agree! as a longtime fan it sucks! #people who are hurt by this absolutely have a right to be. that being said inevitably we’ll see a rise of youtubers doing this #i do hope watcher responds to feedback and hopefully make some adjustments to solely uploading on their site. #i hope those fans who feel betrayed aren’t just left in the dark after this announcement.

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this fandom is low-key one of the most racist ones i have ever been in and i have been in here one and off since 2020!! like no ur soft uwu white boy bean was not kidnapped by gun-point by theeee evil ceo to make this decision and no he is not ur leftist anti-capitalist paragon who just so happens to buy hundreds of dollars worth of products at whole foods and no! ur not slick calling men of color robotic and greedy and soulless and worthless and claiming that they're responsible for everything you don't like about the company while obviously your white boy fave secretly agrees with you because you can tell by the twitch of his eyes! and don't get me started on people calling ryan dumb or gullible or that steven must have manipulated him into it or that shane is the only one smart enough to idk... see through the evil overlord??? like do y'all hear yourselves? are you not a little ashamed? do you have no self reflection or do you think that because you slobber over someone who says "eat the rich" in one occasional video that it makes you immune from being racist. tale as old as watcher's founding too!

Just gonna post this because it's true in a lot of ways. The narrative surrounding Steven has always gotten right out of hand and a racist under-developed brain can't even put together how detrimental it would have been to the company and Shane, of all people, if Steven hadn't been there for them.

All they care about is monopolising spaces to talk over people of colour for a retweet or two.

I am at zero tolerance for that this time round guys.

#heavy agree with op #acting like steven is sole person in charge is just dumb! shane AND ryan also have a say in the direction of the company fun fact! #if you dont like steven that’s fine but do not do shit like this.

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BREAKING: Andrew Ilnyckyj and Adam Bianchi join Watcher! The trio will produce and star in a brand new food show. “We picked up where we left off with Worth It, but we’re also making something completely new,” Andrew shared.

More info to come this Friday with other major announcements.

#unfollow me now this is gonna be the only thing i talk about

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my favorite part about watcher collabs with new people is seeing them find out in real time just how insane shane is

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???

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AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

#courtney miller #shayne topp #i fear its real… every hour im like Ok Yeah this isnt a joke… #so happy for them though omg