Starting a New-ish Chapter (More Like Ripping Out An Old One But We Still In The Same Book) (Patreon)

Let me preface this by saying this is not REALLY that deep a thing like im not deleting my channel or even changing directions lmao. The title of this post is kinda dramatic but it is a notable THING and as people who have pledged money to me I want to be transparent with yall (within reason) when it comes to the content i make/have made and my direction with my channel.

The THING

So let me start by saying I privated MOST of the videos on my youtube channel today. There are a list of reasons as for why which I will outline below but the main overarching reason why i did so is because I feel as a content creator i currently need a "soft" reset in my mind for my approach to my content going forward. I've been cultivating this youtube channel technically since 2014 and in 2018 (as Ive mentioned many times before) I truly started the journey of "KrisPNatz The Anime Youtuber" and that journey up until March of this year has been an exhausting one and Ive honestly been in a state of fight or flight for most of it. (Spoiler Alert: even after this obnoxiously long introspective soliloquy im still going to be KrisPNatz The Anime Youtuber lmao).

Building This Channel (The Flashback Filler Arc)

Feel free to skip this section but I want to give yall context. So when I started the anime-specific journey of this channel at literally the start of 2018, I had been hunting for a full time job for about 3 years, had been unemployed for about a year and a half and overall feeling trapped in my career prospects in addition to being broke as fuck. It was at this point that I decided I was going to attempt to seriously build my YouTube channel from the ground up with no other option than for it to succeed not only because being a content creator was a "dream job" for me (#iDontDreamOfLaborLMFAOOO) but because as someone who was trying to build a career i enjoyed and a sustainable income it felt like my last option. 

I knew I wanted to have some help and guidance when it came to approaching taking youtube more seriously so at the end of 2017 I signed up for a content creator online course and made a GoFundMe that i slapped across all my social media (at the time) and videos and begged friends and strangers to donate to me so I could pay the tuition for said course which I eventually did manage to pay for thanks in part to what I was able to accumulate on the GoFundMe, as well as paying for the rest by selling my video game collection and consoles. I took the course - twice - absorbed everything it offered all while religiously following the top content strategists on YouTube to get any extra advice, info and tips to make my youtube channel a sustainable platform. (Maybe one day Ill do an in depth How To guide podcast for anyone interested in starting a youtube channel sharing my experience and what ive learned but i digress). 

So I started 2018 going full speed, planning out months of content at a time, trying anything and everything under the niche of "anime content" to see what worked and what didnt, using everything I had learned at this point from the variety of educational resources I had accumulated. I worked 7 days a week from when I woke up to when I went to bed and made video after video after video ranging from once a week to several times a week (i believe the second season of 3 Episode Ruling i may have done 5 in a row) with what low quality, limited tools I had (an ancient canon camera, natural lighting, NO MIC if I was on camera and iphone headphone mic for voice over). 

This was a work schedule I maintained through the entirety of 2018 up until i took my first vacation in almost 10 years in the fall of 2019 out of sheer necessity (ive always been a workoholic), after which I downsized to strictly one video a week to give myself a "break" but still worked 7 days a week putting videos together. Add this to the fact that in my overambition (as Ive outlined in posts here on patreon before), I had developed a backlog of requests to get through which I would watch and read in what little free time I had. It wasnt until mid-2020 that I managed to add a day off in my work week and it wasnt until May of this year that i finally scheduled in 2 days off a week which was only possible because i downsized to 1 new video every 10 days. Also as yall know i finally managed to finish catching up on all patreon requests after having most of my videos for the past 2 years be requests because they continually piled up due to my mismanagement.

The Effect On My Content And On Me (Self Destruction Arc)

So I share my not so secret backstory because as i said at the beginning of this post - during the 3ish years of making content non stop until earlier this year I was doing so in fight or flight. I was pumping out video after video and not taking the time to make MAKING such content sustainable for me going forward to allow series to continue to be not only successful but also enjoyable for me to make. Not to mention I wasnt taking care of myself but dont call the ambulance mom, im fine now lmao. 

Reviewing Yaoi which later was rebranded to Boy Loves Boys Love was the very first anime related content I made and arguably the first popular series on my channel, but after having to review so many BL series because I was paid to and even tho making that series is arguably the easiest next to making podcasts - it ended up feeling like a chore to do. Thus my ambition to make it evolve into something enjoyable to create again dwindled despite my continued enjoyment of the BL genre. 

3 Episode Ruling which was the actual concrete beginning of me making "anime-only" content on my channel and which was a series that for years fueled my creativity, was unfortunately built on a production schedule that required me to be physically and mentally worked past the point of exhaustion every 3 months because i timed releases after third episodes of airing anime. Over time it became this dreaded task in spite of my enjoyment of it, because I had to plan to kill myself 4 times a year just to match release dates to make sure the content i discussed was relevant - "cant release it by the 4th episode, the info will be outdated", etc. Those subscribed long enough know I changed the format at least 3 times from: everything i was watching after the third episode, to only a few series after the third episode to a compare and contrast 2 series format, then reviewing a different anime every 3 episodes and NOW the podcast (which itself has already changed lmfao).

What's In An OTP grew to be a monster of a series at first when I never expected it to be because its name was a joke, forcing me to desire to change its name (because of obvious connections to a series by a bigger anituber the name was based on) but never finding a name that i truly liked thus killing my motivation to do the series. Then when I did make new installments - i was rarely fully happy with the form it would take most of the time to the point where I just stopped doing the series altogether even tho i continue to ship characters as much as i always have and have a desire to make ship/otp content to this day (especially in this DUMBASS proship/antiship social media climate - ive never looked back from deleting my twitter >.>).

Of course other series have come and gone as well for similar and different reasons but bottom line my past work schedule never allowed me to breathe and truly take time to make my content the best it could be before publishing it, or mull over how to approach making videos going forward, and my content, creativity, physical and mental health has suffered for it in addition to my views (which i'll discuss later, views arent everything).

Why I Privated Videos (Not Very Dark Secrets Arc)

There are actually a LOT of reasons why I've decided to private most of my backlog of content, yall know by now Im not someone who just does something for a singular reason i need a LIST before i make any decisive moves:

1. Production Quality: regardless of how many views a bunch of my older content has, the production is absolutely horrendous. It cant be helped cause I made what i made with what i had at the time but from a managerial perspective its not a good look for someones first video of yours to be dark as fuck in an uninspiring, messy, white walled room (shoutout my kleenex box faux wallpaper tho) with mad echos in the audio and the sun setting so you cant see shit from an already LQ camera. Id rather the production on my videos be SOMEWHAT consistent with my current technical setup. 

2. Entertainment Quality: this Ive insinuated from the fact i was in fight or flight for most of my channel's history but a lot of my older videos i honestly (and i hate the overuse of this fuckin word) cringe at. There are times im saying shit like its supposed to be funny and the joke just isnt that funny AND CURRENT ME THINKS IM HILARIOUS so i dont want poor reflections of my opinions of myself existing LMFAO~. In all seriousness theres just what almost feels like desperate execution in a lot of my older videos where i try to overcompensate the joke not being that funny with like a dancehall horn or sound effect or video clip or crop to the face in a jarring/excessive way and going forward id rather stick with videos on my channel that i genuinely feel are worthwhile, if not by view count/audience opinion than by my current subjective opinion. Of course my brand of "comedy" is mostly based in my personal thoughts, like im never trying to be funny i just write down my thoughts in real time and put them together in a script, but not all thoughts are as funny when said aloud or when you first think them - nowadays i have a better judgement of what should and shouldnt be included whereas before i was just putting out everything (theres a lot of shit that was excess fluff and coulda been cut out of older videos - a lot of them are unnecessarily long tangents just listing everything i thought of at the time).

3. Cohesive Branding: Even with a more fujoshi/mlm centric catalogue of videos overall, the branding for my content has always been all over the place. BLBL looks different from 3ER which looks different from OTP which all have had several aesthetic evolutions and its just a MESS. Going forward I would like for thumbnails and content to be a little closer in terms of loose connectivity. Its not like ima go all BL or all Ships or whatever but shit was just all over the place with different aesthetics so going forward Id like it to be more cohesive.

4. Reflecting My Interests: piggybacking off the previous point, id much prefer my channel reflect my interests going forward. Id rather it be a collection of videos on anime/manga/etc I personally love instead of splotches of my interests and then a list of others just for views or because it was requested. Im absolutely grateful to anyone and everyone whos ever pledged and made a video request, i enjoy consuming media regardless of how i felt about each individual series by the end and yall's contributions fund my continued existence so i will always be grateful. But as ive outlined in my past post about getting rid of Requests, I'm just at a point where I want to be the head control of what content i make and id like my catalogue to reflect that. 

5. Changed Stances: upon watching a bunch of my older videos, Ive come to realize my stance on things in relation to the media i consume has drastically changed in a short amount of time especially when it comes to BL, queer representation, shipping discourse and overall consumption of anime as a fan. I wouldnt say its so dramatic to say that Im appalled but 2018 me and 2021 me wouldnt be friends LMFAO. As a content creator, learning more about the things i consume/make content on as well as my various interactions with all kinds of fans on all kinds of platforms have greatly shaped and evolved my personal consumption habits and attitudes. Add that to how polarizing (TL: annoying and dramatic) fandom can be and the fact that Im a public figure within fandom spaces - I feel i have a responsibility to make sure my content reflects my beliefs in the most up to date way so theres no room for confusion or for my words to get misconstrued. Additionally ive come across videos where i make jokes i find to be tasteless and Id much rather remove those statements. Its not like i was out here saying racist/homophobic/etc shit but for example: ive made a joke about mr. hands which is pretty fucked up given that situation - im a much more empathetic and ~mature~ person now if i do say so myself LMAOLMAO #KrisPNatzIsOverParty. 

6. Anxiety and Dread: this is a much more personal reason for doing so but bottom line when it comes to a lot of my older content - i can SEE the despair in my execution and even just from thumbnails and titles let alone watching the videos and it makes me uneasy. The tedious process, long nights and creative dehydration I outlined before is something that haunts me when I see some of these videos and affects me mentally so Id much rather leave them in the past regardless how the audience feels or the fact some of them make me "a lot" of money or have brought me a lot of subscribers. Its nothing thats majorly triggering but it does cause me discomfort because of the memories of the work ive done and affects me creatively in another way I'll discuss later. I honestly dont know how i ever did multiple videos a week.

Add all this to the fact that I feel like ive been stuck in the past with my content making intentions for a while and striving to please an audience that frankly does not watch my content anymore. For those unaware, my sub count is currently at 131K but on average 100K of that audience does NOT show up to videos (technically even more than that but let me not depress myself by diving into those analytics). Taking that into account, going forward I want to have a mindset that Im making content for people who DO show up and appreciate my range of video topics - not ALL but at LEAST more than a single ship video lmfao. HONESTLY this decision has very little to do with views - id be lying if i said the drop in viewership didnt affect me - but it really has more to do with my mental view of what I want to do going forward. While attention and views is the currency of youtube, its not why i do this shit at all - the attention of youtube is honestly the worst part of the job for me, im totally fine never hitting 1 million or even 200k subs, just let me hit 200k DOLLAR$$$ lmaolmao - no seriously going viral is my worst nightmare. HOWEVER i would like at least a more consistent viewership on videos and to do so I need to focus on the present and see what works NOW instead of focusing on what worked in the past and being haunted by the success of old videos that have not sustained me, my creativity or my mental health. Privating those videos helps me prevent new subscribers who are looking for something that no longer exists and overall prevents both me and new subs time from being wasted.

Nothing Really Changes Except My Mindset (Rehab Arc)

I want to be clear that the reasoning i did all this is NOT because of a content shift or because im selling out to be more mainstream/straight male friendly LMAO. Ima still be making content objectifying AniMen, still gunna bring a Bi/mlm perspective to discussing anime, still gunna talk about BL, still gunna talk about anime no one but me and 4 others like, still gunna ship cancellable ships LMAO - BUT the videos which I make about those things will likely be different (as they have been so far this year, so nothing outside of the current norm). As i said i need a refresh in my life when it comes to making content and if it werent for the fact that: 1. i dont have the emotional bandwidth to start a new channel from scratch and 2. it would be financially irresponsible to private almost ALL my youtube videos - I would gladly start over just to feel FREE - but for now the limited catalogue does take weight off my shoulders and was a necessary loss for my mental (and probably a substantial financial one but ill figure it out). 

Lost Videos Are Not Gone Forever (This Is The Remix Arc)

All that being said - there are some videos that cover topics that i still enjoy to this day so going forward and in no particular order or release schedule Ive decided Im going to definitely remake some of my older videos. I have the scripts for all of my videos so I could easily tweak some of them and re-release an updated version with production Im happy with and executed in a way I feel best represents the current me with my current stances. If not a full blown remake some will definitely be getting updated versions with fresh scripts but the same concepts, and some that were about topics and series i absolutely adore i will gladly make new content about. A lot of the older videos will remain "dead" but some will be revived in exciting, modern ways and Im looking forward to revisiting and remastering some of them. 

Im Feeling More Positive Now (Beach Episode)

Honestly since April I feel like ive rediscovered my passion and ive achieved my creative peak. Some of my favorite videos of all time ive made in the past few months and i look forward to making more and exceeding my own expectations going forward. Ive hit a bit of a slump recently but thats in part to outside issues including my sleep schedule being out of whack BUT ILL FIGURE IT OUT and culling videos that have shackled the remaining parts of the creative part of my brain just feels like the last little push i needed to truly be the best content creator i can be in this moment - add that to the massive plans i have for the Free! Season videos and im just EXCITED to see what ill make for yall going forward. 

"Burnout" is a term that has become a meaningless buzzword among content creators but i think its safe to say for a while i may have been in denial about suffering from it. Its not so simple to assume in the past i was just physically tired or lazy or overworked but reflecting on my youtube "career" so far in retrospect leading up to now, Im pretty sure thats what Ive been dealing with for quite some time. The second half of this year really has felt like a second breath for my channel and i hope to continue to make content yall enjoy thats even better than whatever video brought you here in the first place.

+now a moment for the deceased videos+

(oh yea Bleach One Shot podcast review coming wednesday for $10+ patrons)