I am curious about what Watcher’s response is going to be (if they respond at all) since I really don’t think they anticipated the level of backlash that they’ve been getting for their streaming service

Okay look. Yall are being dumb about this. Steven food shows aren't what's expensive in watcher.

One of the easiest ways to go under as a business is not managing your cash flow. And that's exactly what's happened here. Buzzfeed has a number of pans on the fire, if they need to shift budget around that's something they can do. A single studio on the other hand, cannot.

But guys come on. Let's not be dumb here. It's not Steven's show that's costing them too much money. Like, i'm not a fan of Steven, I don't watch his content so I can't speak on its quality. And the optics of the golf leaf tesla caviar situation aren't good. But I'm imploring yall to consider this from a more realistic perspective.

They've made some really poor financial decisions for ghost files and they're pretty plain as day to recognize. Firstly, the studio. A fixed cost. Every month they have to pay rent for a place that by their estimate is expensive. This is an expense that adds ... very little? To the viewing experience if we compare it to the buzzfeed set up. Hence, no new revenue from this investment.

Second of all. 25. People.

25 people =25 people's salaries. And not just anyone, these are producers and sound people and graphics animators and all that jazz, thats not chump change. You have to pay salaries every month whether youre making money or not. Once again, fixed cost with very little direct impact on revenue. No one is watching the show that wasn't watching it before based on its production value.

Plus, a bunch of upfront costs. Booking the venue for ghost files, the transport, lunging your whole crew with accommodation to who knows where.

Consistent cost every month + massive irregular costs for your main revenue source + a long production period = cash flow shortages . These videos are definitely filmed way before they're released, meaning you have to pay these costs before you can actually start making any money.

They make a ton of money, enough for teslas and caviar and all this jazz.... just not consistently. Some videos do better than others, they push their podcasts and low cost shows to try to fill the gap between high income series but like I said, fixed costs. You still have to pay rent this month even if you're planning to make a million dollar next month.

This is 100% about getting a more predictable and more stable source of revenue to fill the holes in their poor cost management. I promise you the expensive food isn't what's making the $100 000 dollar hole in their pocket.

This is why they didn't do a transition or try alternative forms of revenue or whatever, they looked at their costs, they looked at the revenue problem and they looked at the costs of doing this internationally and they said huh this would be alot easier if revenue was consitent and didn't think further than that. Steven's show was mentioned because on YouTube the costs wouldn't justify the additional expense, but if you've got consistent revenue to play around with you get better utilization of your staff, particularly for editing back to back shows instead of one block of production with majority of your staff idling the rest of the time.

This was a terrible financial decision because they didn't do enough market research and aren't controlling thier expansion. It is not because Steven Lyn wants to eat caviar or whatever. Yall are being Dicks.

150k + dislikes in one day is crazy they literally blew it

BREAKING NEWS:

Goatman’s bridge will now cost 6 dollars to walk on

“well, maybe shane was outvoted” “this is steven’s fault” “i think ryan-” these are all grown men with dick and balls

“I hope you follow us one more time.”

Bestie this isn’t Lord of the Rings, you are not the fair and wise Aragorn. You are three YouTubers asking me to fund your trips to Europe and gold flaked meals.

My nuanced opinion is this: they're not the most evilest greediest capitalist pig dogs to ever exist let's get out the guillotine etc etc, HOWEVER Watcher TV is still the dumbest fucking decision they could have possibly made

Do I feel bad about how mean some of the Watcher comments are? Ah, sort of.

But mainly when I see people posting things like 'I no longer have to pretend that anything they did on Watcher was as good as Unsolved' I'm struck by how it just shows that people followed them, and stuck with them, out of love, loyalty and respect. So when the illusion of those feelings being mutual was shattered well, this is basically post-divorce honesty hour. It's the parasocial relationship break up equivalent of 'I never really liked your apple pie.'

steven lim: we actually need more money for higher production value so that you guys have the best! and we're bringing back a super expensive show! for you guys, the fans!

the fans:

OMFG THIS COMMENT. GUISE. THAT LAST SENTENCE IS SO FUCKING RAW

My favorite funny moment that came out of the Watcher streaming announcement was people asking Miles (from the Try Guys) about the Watcher streaming service while he was live on YouTube and as he was about to speak a whiteboard fell directly onto his face and he took it as a sign from the universe not to speak

the irony of this meme after the announcement today

I don’t think the Watcher TV move is being made out of greed. They have high production costs, and artists do deserve to be paid for their work. I do, however, think it is a monumentally stupid decision.

First of all, who in their right minds thinks the best way to announce a paywall is a hyped up countdown to a “big surprise”? They literally set themselves up with that.

Second, this is not sustainable. People have been comparing it to other creator-run streaming services like Dropout or Nebula, but those services have bigger audiences, bigger casts, and way more frequent uploads. In Dropout’s case, its more than three times the content (at least) for the same price.

I’m not gonna argue about how it sucks for people who can’t afford it. Unfortunately “artists deserve to be paid” and “everyone deserves art to bring them joy” are both contradictory but true. I will however point out that the majority of Watchers’ audience is young or lower-income. Pricing has to be decided with your target audience in mind.

This didn’t happen because Watcher got insanely evil and greedy, and its true that artists deserve to be paid.

But this was an objectively bad decision no matter where you stand. If Watcher doesn’t change course I will not be surprised to hear them declare bankruptcy in a year or two.

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.

Well...guess my comfort straight men have finally disappointed me....