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"Channel Not So Awesome" - Ex-contributors of Channel Awesome detail a history of abuse (READ OP)
- Thread starter The Bear
- Start date
This is like This American Life for assholes. Better yet- a very well produced Encyclopedia Dramatica article.
This is so strangely unsympathetic. I don't doubt the guy mishandled a lot but we are going to be hearing a shitload of these kinds of stories in the coming decade- guys who somehow hit it big online and just could not handle it/leverage it and burned bridges along the way. Doesn't seem fair to basically destroy any of them in a one-sided way.
It's like a casual fan observer with a decent reading voice got a bunch of production knowledge and made a very well-produced shitpost destroying this guy in documentary format.
Reading posts and adding his own inflections to make it seem like everything is in kind of a malicious tone? fuckin amateur hour. and these readings took up so much time too. And like 5 minutes of that obvious anger-issue case LordKat guy ranting (which apparently goes completely overboard to telling him to kill himself afterwards.)
as for the topic, I am not too surprised. so many of these creators are dogs who caught trucks and just can't hold it together. basically any guy/group you can think of who hit it big and fizzled is gonna be a shitshow of a story of someone who got a bit lucky and had no idea what to do next.
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Read the document and saw the Channel Awesome twitter "apology." I'm not surprised that was their response to this, especially after reading the document.
Please bring your "separing art from artist" argument when the artist might actually be worth a shit. David Bowie was an incredibly talented musician that raped a 15 year old, Alfred Hitchcock was a gifted director that did incredibly awful things, but if you separate Doug Walker from everthing that is currently exploding, the only thing left is a mediocre video creator that hasnt evolved much since the 2000s aside from the...harshly disliked skits.
Seeing this whole thing play out is fascinating in a sad way. When I was younger, I wanted to do videos just like Walker and other "angry Youtube ranters" but as the years passed I realized that these videos were never good.
I had the same thought. Doug never took over as the boss because he wanted everyone to think of him as a nice guy. The problem is that his ego very clearly grew and grew over the years, so while Michaud ran rampant, he just sat idly by, convinced of his own "genius".
Also, there's a fan document out as well. But, who knows if some of the things in it are true.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1zimWJELr8RM2HuvK5rjgjwEYRz90iQSe1q3COc58cOQ/edit
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1zimWJELr8RM2HuvK5rjgjwEYRz90iQSe1q3COc58cOQ/edit
"""""Apology"""" from Channel Awesome's Twitter:
Unsurprisingly, folks on Twitter are tearing it to pieces
That has to be one the laziest "apologies" I've ever seen... even Fox News has done better. Fuck these guys.
It's amazing how everything shitty on the internet ties back to GamerGate.
It's really weird to see this aspect of it because I had no idea Olsen was with CA when this happened. Like I remember him making that video and GG being complete garbage about it, because it was a particularly horrifying thing he was reporting on and their reaction was vile.
Yeah, the way he reads Spoony's comments is bizarre, particularly as it's obscured by the lack of his own commentary around those bits so it's not really clear what his point is beyond his tone? And the end he's reading fans' comments, most of which are pretty entitled and bitter, as if they're good and correct in comparison.
You'd think with such a personality driven website, they'd treat their personalities better.
Regardless of the quality of the content, if Channel Awesome actually had their shit together, they would legitimately be still in the big leagues for content creation alongside Rooster Teeth and such.
Regardless of the quality of the content, if Channel Awesome actually had their shit together, they would legitimately be still in the big leagues for content creation alongside Rooster Teeth and such.
CA's apology is a lot of words that say nothing. I read through most of the article and they sound terrible to work with. I'm just a casual viewer but I'm 100% done with that site now.
Is this going to be another one bites the dust or do you think CA can survive this?
Is this going to be another one bites the dust or do you think CA can survive this?
It depends really. i do wish Brad leaves but he's too friendly with them to leave.
As we've seen with Pewdiepie, Jontron and many others...it'll hurt them, but not kill them. Too many viewers will simply not care enough to drop them, and Doug will keep making videos until he inevitably gets bored of it again.
Yeah, I see him around town a lot, and he always seems happy when I say hi. I met him when I worked at the theater they do the Midnight Screenings at. I met Allison a couple times too. Good people. A shame they got wrapped up in some of this stuff.
This is the biggest off-key shit about the kind of this video down the rabbit hole did, the masses aren't always correct. A lot of whiney assholes just don't care about mental problems and will not care at all if those are real,because assholes just don't care,being insensitive and uncaring for someone's mental state should never be excused or downplayed.
I'll note as well that CA and NC are simultaneously one in the same and distinct from each other. "CA: the partnership of various content creators" can easily die while still leaving behind "CA: the official website and studio of Doug Walker".
I would argue that "Channel Awesome" as a collective died the moment Linkara left. Joe is the biggest non-Doug "face" left on the site now, and only barely - he's pretty much 100% solo Youtuber now.
Very true. And yeah, Joe might as well not be affiliated, not that he needs them anymore anyway.
One could technically argue that there's Brad Jones as well, but 1) he ain't nearly as big as Joe and 2) he might as well also be independent.
You know, I very regularly forget Brad actually posts his stuff there. I always thought of him as a satellite producer who was good friends with Spoony and the Lupa crowd, so he'd cross over with them when they asked. He was around the internet way before a lot of them.
But overall, the "top tier" of producers on CA was always Doug, then Spoony, Linkara and Joe in terms of overall importance. Now that all the heavy-hitters are gone, it's just sort of back to the way it was at the very beginning. Doug's videos and a couple of random people. Only Doug's shtick is worn out and the angry critic bubble burst years ago.
I agree with a lot of the sentiment that Michaud in no way holds all the power over the Nostalgia Critic as an IP. Doug IS the NC so it's not like Michaud could take the brand and create an entirely new NC without there being backlash and it inevitably tanking. Doug is just someone who doesn't want to deal with conflict and that's why this has gone on for so long, and as long as he's still getting good Youtube numbers, he will probably not want to do anything to rock the boat. He is complicit and he will not do anything about it unless his bottom line is hurt.
Honestly? If he had to lose the NC moniker to get rid of Michaud, I think it would probably be for the best. When I think about it, some of his best videos over the last few years have been the stuff he's made outside of his NC personality and the meh skits. I think he's best when he just talks as himself and giving a genuine opinion on something without needing to play up his angry reviewer personality. If he was to focus on video reviews, editorials and the like just as himself, I think he would do fine for himself. It would certainly be one small way to slowly work on redeeming himself after all the garbage he let fester behind his back for years. Well, either way, I will not be watching anything of his ever again unless he actually makes an effort to changes things at Channel Awesome and that tweet doesn't inspire confidence.
Honestly? If he had to lose the NC moniker to get rid of Michaud, I think it would probably be for the best. When I think about it, some of his best videos over the last few years have been the stuff he's made outside of his NC personality and the meh skits. I think he's best when he just talks as himself and giving a genuine opinion on something without needing to play up his angry reviewer personality. If he was to focus on video reviews, editorials and the like just as himself, I think he would do fine for himself. It would certainly be one small way to slowly work on redeeming himself after all the garbage he let fester behind his back for years. Well, either way, I will not be watching anything of his ever again unless he actually makes an effort to changes things at Channel Awesome and that tweet doesn't inspire confidence.
I hope the Brad Jones thing isn't true. But with how everything seems to crumble apart at the seems now-a-days, I wouldn't even be shocked.
I'm not going to lie, some of those accounts come off as cringey. :P
Honestly it comes across as a "I heard a guy tell a guy once" so it's hard to tell. I find the normal doc from the contributors more than enough to get the picture as those are people who we know and are pretty much testifying and corroborating each other, Brad not really being brought up at all. A lot of the fan stuff seems like it needs a lot of grain of salt.
It's still up. It's probably just still being read a lot and Google Docs isn't equipped to deal with one file getting a shitload of attention all at once.
Reading through it fully now, the upper CA people just strike me as incredibly greedy, like why would you skimp on any Work Health and Safety stuff to save a buck, the (monetary) consequences for not following any such rules are alot more than making sure your crew is fed and hydrated.
I legitimately think Doug straight-up didn't know that craft services was a thing. Michaud definitely didn't give a shit, but I fully buy Doug being so ignorant that the idea didn't even occur to him until people called him out about it.
The galling thing is Lindsey taking the time to explain it and being brushed off and then they have to have a second opinion from Spoony.
She was being treated like a sidekick. Like her character.
I can understand if you're an amateur, not knowing about craft services and food but fucking water not being readily available? I got free water for literally every random job and volunteering I've ever done. Though this might just be an Australian thing but I honestly can't believe they didn't think about getting water, is it normal to work without water in the US?
And of course being an amateur isn't an excuse for not knowing basic shit about film sets, like the golden rule of people need to be alive and healthy to film your movie.
To be clear, I'm not making excuses for him, I'm illustrating that I think Doug is just that clueless and had no business trying to manage projects of that scale. I imagine Kickassia was even worse because they shot it in the goddamn desert.
As someone who used to watch pretty much everything from ThatGuyWithTheGlasses pretty much up until Spoony left, seeing Linkara leave really hits just how big this is. He always kinda felt like he'd be there forever.
I honestly would be, considering that Jones for the most part comes off as a pretty straight arrow. He never really generates a lot of "drama", and the little he does is more on those he associates with than him himself.
It really is kind of appalling how little they thought of her, how they only ever regarded her as "NC but for girls". It's a testament to her love of the craft and her skill that she has been so effective at rebranding herself.
Oh yeah I'm definitely not arguing with you or anything, just perplexed as hell at this level of incompetence for any organisation.
But what is the "character"? How is he legally different from Doug just being over dramatic while reviewing stupid 80s/90s shit?
As of last year I rediscovered her and now, starved for content, I've dipped into her Reuploaded CA stuff. It's still miles ahead of the other contributors stuff but the jokes just hurt her presentation and the references to other people on the platform never worked for me. Skits are never funny.
Also her friend, Nella seems like she'd be a half decent content maker herself if it wasn't for the lame persona shes has crafted for herself. I understand she is basically a silent partner in Lindsey's content but when she turns up and "nerds" on camera, I instantly get irritated and lose interest.
How funny that when talking as herself (like in the Booze your own adventure vlogs) she's actually engaging.
Her turning up at the end of the recent Hobbit video reeked of the old school Skits, that I had hoped they had moved beyond.
It was even worse than that. It was a spirit bomb of plot holes thrown out by the critics they didn't think were important enough to be in the movie in person.
If I recall, there was a certain "end of an era" vibe to TBF around that time, if I remember correctly, SOPA was a thing.
I remember that, and now I can't help but think of South Park's SoDoSoPa.
No, this is very much true. After his success in his Patreon, he did little to jackshit.
He was also suffering from bipolar disorder along with other health issues, a break up, addiction to social media, as well as the general anxieties and stresses of being an online persona with a demanding (and toxic) fan base. It sucks he didn't end up doing anything for the fans, but it was honestly the best thing for him to drop off given his condition.
Yeah, that's really where the point of contention comes in. It would be one thing if he just kind of faded away. Honestly, people would be sad that he's no longer making videos, but that would be about it. Instead, he made a ton of money on Patreon without delivering much of anything. People tend to not react kindly when they feel like they've been scammed. Combine that with Spoony's audience already being pretty toxic, and it's a recipe for disaster.
But this thread isn't exactly a thread about Spoony stuff. He seemed to just get passing mention in the article.