I'm pretty sure Zizek specifically addressed this problem when it came to Squid Game, which was an intelligent show essentially about capitalist exploitation and class consciousness. Almost immediately, people missed the point. It became just another fun show to binge watch. They renewed it for a second season and now they're doing a real-life spin-off reality TV show based on it. It's one of the clearest examples I've seen lately of the idea that capitalism will ultimately subsume any and all critiques of capitalism and recycle it into mainstream culture.
Well, I see what you are going for, but if Squid Game's point was to be about capitalist exploitation and class consciousness then it would have done that in a way that wouldn't be so easily mistaken for a carbon copy of all the media it more than just drew inspiration from. It is, doesn't matter what you or even it's creators may think it ought to be, just another fun show to binge watch. The general and main point of your comment is quite spot on, though, critiques of capitalism sell pretty well.
Actually there is another piece that addressed this far more specifically and that is far more famous: Wall-E. About what could happen if humanity becomes completely complacent and submissive to the system.
@@MrMarinus18 Not really, that's just the popular imagination about waste and such. It's not realistic. Read "An Illustrated Guide to Plastic Straws" for perspective. Even 'lazy people being morbidly obese' is basically obsolete, given we already figured out GLP-1. Obesity is solved, it's just that solution didn't get deployed at scale yet. Give it a few years and % of population with obesity will start dropping, fast. If these are supposed to be good critiques of capitalism... but no, there are better ones actually. Examples: "THE NON-LIBERTARIAN FAQ", "Meditations on Moloch", both by Scott Alexander. Second one isn't precisely about capitalism, but close enough.
do y'all feel like Gen Z has no interest in being passionate about anything? everything has some amount of irony attached to it with them. It concerns this elderly 28 year old.
My buddy and I were just talking about the word “content”. I hate how many marketing terms we’ve adopted. I don’t want to “consume content”. I want to “watch TV” or “play video game”. Content is such a joyless word
It didn't kill culture but it shoved it to a corner. Art resisted all the threats to it's existence so far and will continue to do so, I believe. It's up to us to support it where we find it
technically art and culture has actually always been about money, it is an expression of whatever you want it to be yes but it is dependant on a certain level of economic freedom and general freedom which makes it also a political issue. I don't know the situation in roman times in relationship to art but medieval art or "Christian art" was paid for by the church and they hated humanity which is why humans look so flat and uninspiring in those pieces, they would refuse payment or even destroy pieces that went against their negative values. The modern era started when kings were buying and selling pieces to show off their honor etc and the power of the church had dwindled when everyone understood their nature during the black plague when they basically jumped into the life rafts of their monasteries shouting "monks and nuns first!" so now even when they paid for a piece they couldn't usually destroy artwork that didn't fit their ideas and in some cases had to accept whatever. Still pieces were gear towards what kings wanted and what people would buy because supplies were expensive and due to constraints of the times some paintings took years to produce. This situation continued until modern times with the price to get into art slowly plummeting as science was allowed to repair the damage the Catholic church had on the world but even before streaming and AI art, the world of culture was mostly just a racket. The price for famous pieces of art has zero to do with technique or execution since that would make perfect copies not forgeries but instead valued as recreations that will bring the original authors vision further into the future. Instead the value of art pieces are attributed to names and previously what they were sold at. This has made most culture just a means for money laundering and pretending to be something most of the rich really aren't, actual gentlemen and ladies.
@@liamnehren1054 I don't think they had money when they were painting on the walls of caves my guy. Art has always been involved with money because people like to create art so it gets involved with a lot of stuff including crimes that normally don't make money like graffiti. Humans have always created art it will never stop even when we don't have money since we will be bored and try to solve that by making art like most artists they just draw because they want to and they like it lmao.
@@liamnehren1054 Typical capitalist. Pretty sure Van Gough didn't make jack all on his art. Nor did Mozart. They did it from passion. Artists create for commission because it is a skill they have that can help them live... but most of Mozarts favorite pieces were created without monetary motivation.
@@manicpepsicola3431 you are wrong, even in the cave times there is an economical element due to the low level of tools causing most human endeavor to be limited to simple survival, art would have been limited to stormy seasons or winter months which pushed people into staying mostly in sheltered areas. Even then most of their time would have been towards crafts such as weaving, trapping since it requires less time outside etc. So only a tribe that was working very efficiently had the resources for someone to do something inherently none functional. Carving would have been more productive and yet still leave room open to self expression so the grand majority of stone age era artwork was undoubtedly made in the form of tools or clothing and has long since rotted away. As for street art are you sure no one has ever made money from it? or that is has no connection to money? there have in fact been artists who found their beginning in it back when you couldn't directly make money from it, so you could compare it to having an art class where the last generation of street artists are the teachers and the younger ones the students honing their craft until the day they have enough money through jobs etc to get into other forms of painting, since spray painting only requires the spray cans so it is inherently cheaper in some areas of the world. Now let's get into the actual industry behind it and the modern way street art directly produces monetary gain. Where do you think the paint comes for street art? does the heavens drop it from the sky? you have to buy it so you already have money if you don't have a job, so either your disposable income is going towards your hobby or your family has too much money and not enough sense and have let you run around doing something that is a crime in most countries, also no, a company produces it and hence probably the paint industry as a whole lobbies against it being banned. even though spray cans have an alternative in the form of a compressor with a range of add-ons that go from wide range spraying to very intricate penmanship (I have one) Otherwise why do they still exist when street art is almost universally seen as a terrible thing destroying the paint jobs of hard working people? On top of that comes the cleaning products and a constant battle of chemists trying to make their paint stick to anything and resist removal while the others make cleaning products to remove them. When I was in Germany in 2001 they had a solution that wiped it right off of the plastic walls of the subways but since that solution has been made useless and new attempts actually melt the plastic of the walls for example. Now for the modern way people make money off graffiti: social media and patron (and similar) Have you seen that viral video of the guy painting a hand holding a tree? or the dozens of other ones that became incredibly popular? they make bank. The point that I was trying to make is that there is ALWAYS a monetary component to art even when it is for arts sake. Embellishments on a sword hilt to paintings, it's either to sell something or because you have money/time (and we all know the saying) to waste burning a hole in your pocket and the later one is closer to art for art's sake but usually quite soulless. Art is grand when it has real emotion, talent and practice behind it and someone who never has to sell their art due to having everything they need has probably never had the full range of experience needed and seen in the life of the greats. Famous examples: -Da Vinci was an engineer who sold art to pay for his pet projects. he made seriously high payments from the church that today would probably rival how much his paintings are being sold at today! -Van Gogh was eternally poor and committed suicide due to depression almost definitely due to a lack of money making him a burden on his family, especially since he had fairly recently moved away from his brother's house but was most likely about to have to go back.... -Raphael (Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino) had a shitty early life becoming a young orphan giving him the full range of life experience in the terrible aspects but his uncle and step mother didn't exact abandon him as give him a myriad of opportunities and he was not only well off to begin with but was handed the path to being a church artist and hence was set for life, when he died it was supposedly probably from an STD and he lived in a palace. So once again he had time/money to burn and nothing to do. (plus he was raised specifically into it and paid to do it) I could go on but I won't.
I extremely hate that title "content creator" because it feels like such a bullshit word. Everything can be catagorized as content(service) but it starts shifting from people that made videos on youtube wanting to have a fancy job title, to other industries as well. God forbid in the future you'll see people saying im a hospital content creator, fuck you, you're a nurse, just as youtube content creators are just some dudes making videos on the internet
as it should, I remember a story of a popular musician in Canada who could play half a dozen instruments and was well known for beautiful pieces whose producer wanted him to switch to rap because it was popular, so he gave up selling on a large scale until self publication became a thing. This was around the year 2000, my mother was close to most of the big artists in one of the towns known for artists in Canada.
It's similar on instagram an youtube as well. I am a visual artist but these social media platforms see us as "content-creators" and if we want to be seen we have to play along their rules and algorithm. But if we do that, we stray away from our art in its purest form (our personal vision) and it becomes self destructive. Everything starts looking the same and is getting boring in the end, trending art is watercolor art ghibli style or pretty young girls. That might appeal to the yonger audience, but it becomes quickly dissatisfying for anyone expecting something more. So I don't know how long this system can continue.
stephanie, pretty thin white girls have always been "trendy", now where have you been. each generation just get to decide what the accountrement ought to be. the thing is you are older like me , thus no longer the demo market. and IG was never built around burdened elder millenials and gen z . we are all guests in a world where being 20 is prized and we've been there .
You made a great point about binge watching being a part time job, it does feel like a chore sometimes because you simply ‘have’ to know what happens next even though it’s not enjoyable anymore.
Cédric, son, the way you worded it is very much giving "first world" problem .You sound depressed. Now why aren't you curating and whittling down shows to absolute essentials instead of overindulging on fluff. Your eyeballs must be itchy and dry.
That's exactly how I feel watching She Hulk. I'm not a hater but I'm not enjoying the show. The actress is charming but the show actually sucks. And yet I'm probably going to finish the series but haven't been enjoying the process. Watching this video opened my eyes to alot.
Exactly! That "well . . . I already started this so I guess I gotta finish it" feeling is very real. And often leads us to finishing some shows that we end up feeling embarrassed about in the long run.
I felt this when I watched Netflix series 'Dark'. I hated the series from 1st episode but I HAD to watch the whole series just because I don't want to be left out. It was so stupid and boring, that I had fever the next day of forcing myself to binge watch the last season.
It's pretty telling that "content" doesn't mean art, or entertainment, or anything that meaningful. It just means "stuff." It doesn't even have to be particularly interesting or well made stuff. All it has to do is... be I mean, the most popular streamers aren't even that creative. They're just nice sounding, clean looking people who say "bruh" and "sus" a lot. And we pay them, directly out of pocket, just for effortlessly being themselves
Its still art, diluted and recycled art but still art. The most popular streamers are still artist, but their target audiences are kids, so you can't really expect them to make "high" art, but nevertheles still art.
It isn't effortless, but I generally agree with your point. That said, I've never donated to content creators outside of charity events because the fact is, there's always something else, so if this specific creator goes under, why care? Capitalism makes everyone the asshole.
@@winzyl9546 I think it stops being art when it stops making you think, even at it’s lowest it makes you think. Twitch streamers and that like make me feel like I am being numbed, like it feels like nothing and makes me actively not think at at all. Even in comedy where there is a reaction you think about the joke and the punchline hits, I can’t see Twitch as art, it is just a product, nothing else.
See this should sound encouraging like "HEY if you just be really authentic you'll get a following and not have to have your soul crushed for years just to keep eating!" ...but the reality is that it just becomes a luck game.
Culture isn't dead, it, like it always does, is just moving to a different place. Who knows? Perhaps in the next 10 years we'll be seeing a larger rise in local art and local music. One thing is for certain, a lot of us need more boredom in our lives. For boredom is a crucial element to creativity.
@@ooievaar6756 Louis CK talked about it on Conan once! The importance of boredom! And that bit I think also shows up in Louie too. The power of boredom!
The media industry has always been about churning out safe, repetitive, generic content. After twenty years we recognize and remember the best ones and declare that "the golden age of ..."
hell that's even the case for saviors! XD there were many "sons of god" around Jesus' time but we only hear about the one that made the biggest splash.
Truth. Streaming has turned out many great shows and movies, we are just in it right now so we focus on all the crap swimming around the good stuff, most of which will be forgotten in 10 years. There was crap on Radio programs, crap on network TV, crap on Cable, but now we just remember the stuff that stood the test of time. We can also turn out more crap faster. That’s just technology. It use to take awhile to film something, put it together, and get it in front of the public. Now most consumers can get their hands on a decent quality camera and thanks to digital media have a piece of content up on a public platform within days (heck, a good cinematographer could prob visually compete with a DSLR with a high end smartphone). I can freaking edit video on my phone now, pretty easily. I hate editing on a small screen, but it’s still insane to me that I can do it. in college, which is less than 10 years ago, i had to go to the computer lab at school to use the ‘nice mac’ to edit my student films in Final Cut Pro. I certainly couldn’t have done it on my cellphone!
Yea, this episode kinda sucked. Seinfeld banked off of.... Seinfeld. TMNT was a toy line first and a TV show second. And the less said about Transformers (TV or Movie) the better. Mass Media has always been 100% only about cash. And don't tell me that Bojack / Inside Job is soul-less while Battleship went to theaters.
Yeah, I don't think he realizes the most profitable subscribers are the ones who own a subscription and watch very little of the service. Every time you stream something from Netflix it cuts into the profit margin, that is the reason why that button pops up to ask if you are still watching, it is to cut the stream if you're not there anymore. The button is not there to tell you to keep watching haha
@@xaverager A vast vast amount of old hollywood movies are lost cause no one cared to remember it. they were made to sell tickets an then be discarded when no longer relevant. In fact one of the largest catches of old movies was finding a ton of them that had been buried in the permafrost of a some Canadian town that didn't see a need to store them. Besides even if it is generic trash I don't see the problem with it. Sometimes I just want to watch a generic action slock to kill two hours and enjoy myself. Not every movie has to be a deep introspection of the human condition. As long as those movies exist they will be enjoyed as well and remember long after everyone has forgotten the cliches of modern movies.
damn the idea of watching shows being like a 2nd job and watching a show while also being on my phone hit me hard as I'm very guilty of both of those things. Time to rethink some parts of my life.
Season passes are the worst thing ever. They feel like work that has to be done without a fulfilling end. And the streaming services are gonna be the impending doom of the industry. Microsoft has forced to onto the industry and now other are feeling the need to go into that route. I once saw a video calle "Elden Ring feels like the end" And it actually feels like that. It makes me think that after this year things are just gonna get worse. And for real, I adore a single player expierence with tons of thought put into it and that it makes use my brain to go through it and understand the story that is presented before my eyes. That's why I live the Soulsborne saga, that's why I love hollow knight, and that's why I live Nier automata
The thing I just don't get is that they can't seem to understand why they're hemorrhaging subscribers--it's because they cancel every show they make! Netflix used to be the savior to canceled TV shows like Longmire and produced genuinely great media that still no one has ever heard of, like Bloodline. Now they just churn and churn and churn, and I'm more inclined to just buy the media I want to watch, or at the very least just rent it on Amazon instead.
People forget Netflix is in over 100 countries with about 220.67 million subscribers globally as of Aug 2022 73.28 in the US as of July 2022 with 11,000 employees after the 300 they laid off. So it doesn't matter how good a show is it's how many viewing hours it gets globally. Stranger Things S4 pt 1 racked up over a billion viewing hours in less than a week justifying its huge budget. now Squid Games same viewing hours, probably for a smaller budget. And what we see in the US is a fraction of what Netflix has which is why I'm thinking of getting a VPN for it and youtube etc.
Amazon has turned me away too after that terrible adaptation of the wheel of time... they gutted it completely and then claimed success.... but yeah totally agree Netflix keeps cancelling things for no reason and pulled some of the bad anime company "tricks" where they give a series a false ending because they don't want to continue producing it.
I find I can't trust taking a chance on a new show that isn't within a pre-existing franchise anymore because I am too scared it'll be canceled after the first season. I usually just wait until other people hype it up enough to guarantee that more will come, which is completely counter-intuitive to what streaming services want (as they seem to want a show's views to explode extremely early after its release to justify a renewal, which is often impossible for many niche shows considering how they often seem to be dropped onto streaming services with very little marketing fanfare). With broadcast TV, a new show would be airing for weeks, allowing it to slowly and naturally accumulate a fanbase (and encouraging people who watch other shows on the same channel to give that show a chance, hence programming blocks), but it seems like companies now expect huge fandoms to appear out of nowhere or else a show can’t be given a chance to grow.
"consuming content is another job" oh that one hit me bc i barely watch any shows or movies or anime or play video games anymore... Up to 12 hours of my day is RUclips videos. Wisecrack reruns are a part of that
Technically, RUclips is culturally healthier than any of the things you mentioned! Since the things being made are from real people, not giant mega-corporations.
@@logicalfallacy234 Also, depending on who you watch. A lot more thought and effort is put into the "content". Just watch a normal documentary created by a streaming service and then watch one on the same subject by a RUclipsr, every minute feels like you're getting a new piece of info. Streaming services know they can put less effort into something and still get views, but a RUclipsr has to put effort, otherwise why come back to the channel?
Finally! I've been waiting to see this questioned for awhile now. The idea that people "consume content" is such a bizarre transition from "watching tv."
@@Warriorcats64 Except the word "consume" is used. As though it's worth taking in in order to just get by. Adds more weight to the importance people put on content. Entertainment just has such a higher value than it used to, it's fascinating since listening & watching are far more passive verbs in comparison, know what I mean? Not to mention the massive boom in ease of access when it comes to content creation and the plethora of things to actually watch. It's more or less become a culture in and of itself compared to the old days.
Streaming services started to become a content producer instead of a platform for other content producer(s) to publish their own work, essentially making the whole platform feel boring due to lack of creative differences.
I think the problem is people don’t really absorb or desire culture. It’s not about diversity or genuine passion; it feels like synthetic, mainstream consumerism. It’s not about what the content gives you or how it makes you feel, it’s just about how much content you can get or where you can get it. So many different media projects don’t even feel like passion projects anymore; just cash-grabs.
I always felt like 90 day fiancé was a tour of the worst ideas about love and romance as they exist in the modern world... also, like a lot of reality TV shows it seems to be about presenting you with conflicts so that you could choose which side was justified. Basically shows for judging, which is quite a bizarre thing to sit and watch now that I think about it
yeah just from a neural chemical standpoint after starting a serious relationship, you are almost lobotomised levels of illogical towards that person for the first 1.1 years due to brain chemistry. At the 2 year point you will have finally obtained an objective understanding of the other person and whether or not you can really stand each other for the long run. Then comes real world issues like where to live etc that will rip a relationship apart unless a compromise can be found or one is entirely dominant over the other so 3 years is a logical relationship period before marriage. 90 days....
I believe we are entering and age where we see the rebirth of the hobby, bowling leagues and game nights with friends. People are going to start creating their own stimulus as the quality of entertainment being served is so often flavorless.
Probably not. It's more likely that people will instead fill their free time with streamers. I think that streaming will become much bigger when it becomes common to watch a streamer watch episodes of Marvel and Netflix shows. Watching RUclips is the most common category on Twitch (Just Chatting, technically, but you can see those streams getting millions of views when uploaded to RUclips), so, it would make sense that watching Netflix would be lucrative if they allowed that. To put it another way, I think that binge-watching Marvel will become a hobby with a community that fulfills social needs if it becomes common to be able to experience watching Marvel tv shows with a community, like with Twitch chat.
@@empresssk Torrenting is distributed, no one party needs to store it all. Also the current system of trackers makes it relatively easy to figure out who is storing which files. Ever pirated movies? This is how it already works. I find lost gems all the time. Also the acceleration of computing power and cheap storage space means it will be easier than ever to host huge archives of lost content.
It's no longer about making something worthwhile, or even something that you like. It's about making something that can be marketed well enough to get an audience to see it once, watch some tiktoks and hot takes that surround it for 2 weeks, and then move on to the next thing. I have friends who will call me cynical for avoiding things like the live action Disney remakes, and then as long as it's at least a 5/10 they say "See! I told you it would be fun!" And then they never mention them again. As good as streaming services and content creators are at running this machine, we keep going to see what it produces. This is our fault. They are giving us exactly what we have asked for and, as with most things in life, changing ourselves and our neighbors is the best way to start making things better.
"then they never mention them again." This is the one that gets me - this type of content has such a short cultural tail. If you don't binge the content immediately, it's like arriving at a party that everyone else left ages ago. I'm catching up on Stranger Things, and even though it's one of Netflix's biggest shows of all time, the last season has almost completely left the pop culture save for a few memes full of spoilers. I'm enjoying myself reading about the show on reddit threads, but they're all 4 month old discussions at this point. If you're not fast enough, it feels like you're watching the content all by yourself in a void.
Content is all about cycles of hype and nostalgia. It's like saying "if you weren't their to experience something the first time then don't worry because we'll be rebooting, remastering, or sequalling it again within the next 5 to 10 years or so anyway! Make sure to binge it then!"
i finally understand why watching stuff on streaming stopped being fun and started feeling like a chore!! i basically only watch youtube and play video games and thought i was missing out lowkey :v
@@Armaan8014 RUclips videos are filtered through God Empereror Google's algorythms. The videos being presented to you are the ones with the highest calculated probabilty for you to click on and consume. Every successful content creator is aware of this and most forge their content in that regard. There are off course amazing content creators who despite this makes valuable quality stuff though, like Wisecrack... sometimes. RUclips is still amazing place for education and art if you stay away from the traps, which is hard
This is easily one of the highest quality channels on RUclips. I find myself consistently agreeing with your analysis of things I have not considered before.
I'm at the point where I have so many things I just can't keep up with. I want to watch shows, I want to play games, I want to watch RUclips, I want to be active and then I have responsibilities. I can't fit it all in. And of course whenever I have free time my brain says "there isn't anything interesting to do"
I never cared for any media service that could just pull my shows whenever. Cable, Netflix, HBO, RUclips, radio etc etc can just say "done" and my favorite stories or art is gone. Same goes with documentaries and music. Books and magazines. I will, for that very reason, have and always will prefer hard copies. VHS, dvds, blurays, CDs, vinyls, cassettes, books, etc. I've been around since the cable and radio days, and was always frustrated by the disposable mindset of those institutions and their successors. So much of what I love is gone, pulled from cable TV decades ago and never seen a release in hard formats. All that work, art, memories...destroyed. And digital services are doing the same. If a piece of media is of particular sentimental value to you, I highly encourage even younger people in getting physical copies somehow. Keep some old-school players/devices. These services don't care about you as an individual, only the collective. They don't care about art, only the bottom line. You don’t have to be a cinemaphile or hard collector, just keep a few things for yourself on a shelf to dust off and remind yourself of fonder times every now and then. Remind yourself you're in control of your consumption. These are just the ramblings of a dinosaur some could argue. I won't disagree. But if you love it, preserve it somehow. Seriously.
I'm beginning to feel the same, this amazing show Infinity Train seems to be doomed to oblivion as it never received physical media and just like you said, the owner of the streaming underwent Corporative Changes™and just pulled the show from existence altoegether... But I don't like the word "Consumption", sounds a tad too materialistic for the works of art they are, perhaps we could begin to use a word like "Interaction" to exemplify what the work of hundreds, if not thousands of people means to us rather than give the corporatives reason in their mentality for "Content = Consumption"?
Recently I had been wondering why I had been losing interest in new TV shows and movies. This perfectly exemplifies my loss of desire to watch the latest watercooler shows. Everything just seems soulless, and overly artificial. Spot on wisecrack.
binge watching being another job hits bc something I had to enforce for myself for my own good was like not owing a show completion- cus otherwise it really is just another thing you have to do. its like we're encouraged to exist for the content and not the other way around
I've thought about the points made in this video for a while, and while I do believe that it is true in the context of what streaming and productions companies at the top need to create for their bottom line, it's created a huge possibility, if not a huge necessity, for the up and coming filmmakers and producers at the bottom to choose to create works of art and oppose the standards that this industry sets. I know that it sounds idealistic, because no one wants to be a starving artist, but it's imperative in order to continue to keep pushing the landscape forward. One of the greatest catalysts of innovation is the refusal to accept the status quo. We are currently in one of those times where the status quo of this industry is being undercut by where we are technologically. Therefore, something has to change, and you can't say it's tech that need to change, because it's going to change anyways. How is the other side going to keep up? Because the current business models aren't going to keep these companies viable in the next 10, or even 5 years. It's time for us to determine how we're going to do things differently.
@@WisecrackEDU This was Scorsese's advice to young filmmakers! "Make your own film industry". And is also the undercurrent behind his legendary Marvel comments.
The strange bit is, especially now, there is a cornucopia of high quality media that is available ostensibly for free just by digging through the public domain, and yet people will take reality shows (or what ever) over that, and pay for it. It's a corollary to parasocial relationships, where there needs to be a constant stream of updates and factoids to maintain the illusion of a relationship; content needs to be omnipresent because no one in their right mind would seek-out reality shows excepts as soma.
This went from a video about low effort content....to some leftist brain rot about how watching netflix is capitalism oppressing us...instead of our poor behavior being simply a reflection of our own inner sloth.
9:19 "water, water, everywhere, nor a drop to drink!" In an age with endless "content" almost none of it has any meaning, and therefore, no reason to be watched.
This is the first Wisecrack video I've seen on my feed in what feels like months. What did the YT algorithm do to this channel? So glad to see you all pop up again because my brain was hungry for something to sink its teeth into.
This was so well said and researched! You perfectly articulated the half baked thoughts I've been having about this for a while. I'd love a follow up video on content in the realm of platforms such as youtube, instagram, and tik-tok etc. While I do find great videos like this on RUclips I am also still very much addicted to youtbe and do find myself watching it mindlessly more than I'd like.
Great video! I think the other reason people are abandoning streaming platforms is that people are getting fed up with shows just disappearing whenever the service feels like pulling them. When you buy a DVD, you can watch that film or television show as much as you want, whenever you want. But if a streaming service decides to hide one the seasons of your favourite series, you just have to accept that. You pay every month, but you only have the access they decide you should have. Whatever that may be.
If the algorithm offers me one more thumbnail of some gormless RUclipsr looking like a stunned goldfish whilst pointing to a fake "shocked" headline, I'm going to scream.
I enjoyed this episode a lot, had me laughing a number of times. Also found the ideas very interesting - started opening up some webpages and downloading books on Adorno and Horkheimer's ideas... thanks!
We hope you enjoy those books! We talk about Adorno and Horkheimer's ideas in quite a few videos, and we will surely be talking about them more in the future.
In answer to the query at the end about why streaming started off doing "prestige shows" and "Indie films", it needed these to viewers who are more selective in what they watch. Basically, the same idea as what HBO is (or was?). The issue Netflix is having now is that they seem weirdly incapable of finding new prestige shows to make and when they do find something with promise, they bugger it up or cancel it before it gets a proper chance, ironically making people less likely to watch their new content because they can't trust that the story will get finished, even if it's good.
Netflix and to a much lesser extent, Hulu, are the only cashflow positive streaming platforms. Apple and Amazon don't share itemized revenues for their platforms. For all the corporate propaganda against Netflix for 2 decades now, the company is still the largest, most successful platform of its kind. It makes twice as much as Disney per sub AFTER costs, which makes the hyperbolic emphasis on their spending really silly and clearly out of context to create a certain narrative. And losing a million subs for Netflix, when contextualized properly, is less than half a percent of its customers, as opposed to 3-5% of Hulu or Apple TV+. Pro-Disney journalists even tried to pretend that Disney has surpassed Netflix's subscribed count "in just a few years" but they don't tell you they are adding ESPN and Hulu (much older services) subs to that, AND counting bundle subscribers as 3 separate subscribers to pad the numbers.
I recorded a rap song in 2014 called "consumer divorce" about this lol I think it's still on iTunes, released 2016 with my debut novel. Needless to say streaming services haven't shown much love for either 😜
I've heard it said that in the old TV days the shows were just seen as the stuff you use to fill time between the ad-blocks. I.e. literal "content". Entertainment has been content for a long time. Possibly forever since most of what we would now consider to be high art was "what a rich guy wants to hang on his wall" or "what a rich guy wants to barely hear in the background of his fancy lad party", literal filler, wall paper, content! Not saying that's good, it's not, but I question whether streaming is the problem here.
My fear is that content just didn't kill culture, its that content is becoming a culture. that everyone is being socially engineered to accept to a point years later its the normal.
Thanks for the vote of confidence Michael, but us gamers have it only marginally better. Yes, while a few of us may have our minds tweaked out trying to optimize the fashion of our builds in Elden Ring and trying to sus out all the philosophically charged lore of Miyazaki and Kojima, A LOT more are mindlessly proliferating the US war machine in CoD, are braindead on idle games, or are chasing novelty-based dopamine on the genre-mash ups like the latest open-world roguelite stealth action survival game with crafting and rpg elements. There is so much chaff content churned out and so many people who specifically opt for the path of least resistance, easy modes, meaningless content, and ways to optimize the fun out games. E.g. When I first played mmo's (Vanilla WoW back in the day) there was such a huge social element, but over time, it has seemed that the social element has been relegated to a bonus as mmo's are being designed to be played solo now. Similarly, Diablo 1 (and 2) had huge elements of horror baked into its very being. It was a scary disempowering experience. But now the series (and the genre it created) is almost exclusively reduced to chasing bigger numbers and amassing loot; what once was a means to an end (getting the gear to defeat the big bad and survive) has now become a end in and of itself (you grind loot to grind different loot). The industry as a whole has embraced pretty much the exact same model discussed in the video. Even if we are required to press a few buttons, many (and I'd argue most) people are doing their damnedest to eliminate even that behind and in front of the screen.
So true. Visual progression is so vital to the gamer experience, especially in RPGs. Even if you're aiming for single player experience, even customizable options once included for free or after besting a boss or level, are now monetized and less enjoyable. Especially when they make it hard not to buy (ie, boosts your item stats by 800% for 85 cents)
I remember when Survivor first hit the air waves. I was so excited for this new "reality show" content which was unheard of at the time. Shortly into that first season, I was disappointed that the entire point of the show was drama with incredibly poor editing and had nothing to do with surviving on an island. I have refused to watch reality shows ever since. The whole manufactured drama, written by very bad writers and acted out by horrible actors that makes up every single reality show is truly a scourge on society.
I dislike binge releases for shows bc there is no hype for the show at all and it dies after a week. I have seen this happen to two of my most anticipated shows, Edgerunners and JoJo, and no one talks about them. What's the point of asking high quality shows if it only has a week in the spot light
I miss it too... I liked anticipating a whole week what was to come. And I understand that if you don't binge watch now, the shows don't seem interesting to the public by the streaming services and are at risk of being canceled, no matter how good they are. Not all people can or want to binge watch, is not a fair metric of the success of a show
To be fair, Edgerunners has only been out for 6 days and my feed is filled with it. That said, yes, I hate dumping an entire season in one go. I miss hype build-up and water-cooler conjecture. Yet it amazes me how many I talk to who say they can't stand waiting for new episodes and will simply wait until an the entire show is up so they can blitz through it.
It seems Netflix is hesitating on giving The Sandman a second season because The Sandman is too good. After an episode of The Sandman, the viewer will stop and think about what they watched; instead of binge-watching it. I watched The Sandman three times, but never all at once.
I love wisecrack and I know you guys have to edit in a way to keep this no attention spam tiktok generation paying attention, but some parts of this video I had to watch twice because of how fast the transitions and cuts were
Agree. I can't connect the dots and understand this essay. Maybe I'm just not wise enough. lol. (Joke aside. I can understand videos from channel like Veritasium just fine.)
Great video. Made me think a lot about I’m engaging with content. I feel like streaming content may be the reason it is harder for me to consume entertainment that requires more effort like reading and playing video games.
I am cursed with proposition of finding what hits the spot every morning day and night. As we are getting into our own bubbles, Its increasingly harder to find content (ironically) that doesn't feel iike a paint by numbers scheme. Everything everywhere, all at once being a breathe of fresh air. Even then, its a movie that is still obscure to most people.
I feel like the same thing has been happening with music as well. I was introduced to the concept of muzak through vaporwave about a decade ago and I feel like the line between muzak and music has never been as blurry as it is now. So much of the popular music today is so generic and predictable and feels like it was made to play in the background rather than the foreground of your mind that I can't help but think of muzak.
I'm not sure streaming created the assembly line of endless content idea, I ascribe that more to cable. 24 hour programming, over a hundred channels, where programmers had to come up with SOMETHING to fill that 2 PM on a Tuesday slot, so we started getting garbage reality TV shows out the wazoo. Cable was the first time you could sit in front of your TV and consume endlessly. Streaming is just performing the same dance, in my opinion.
You're not wrong, we are very aware of the ironic cycle of creating content critiquing the ideology of content production while producing content in that same ecosystem. But hey, at least we're self aware.
@@WisecrackEDU I thoroughly enjoyed the moment when you asked what we'd do if we weren't binging and everything tinted 'conspiracy red', so it's not all lost. Was just cracking a joke at you guys crack jokes at how everything's become trivialised and automated, so we can have pretend principles in shows while we can only crack jokes in reality. :D Also, I have never seen those fucboy shows, hah!
So does this mean that producing content that actually contains content and whose purpose is to showcase content, is now a form of rebellion against this current system?
I have a lot of issues with this video essay. I agree with the idea that “content” is made to generate profit, but thats always been the case. The distinction between entertainment and content is arbitrary IMO. If anything streaming is a reflection of what happens when markets go global and audiences are easier to reach. Today we have much wider audiences than before because of interconnected markets. This means that there is a huge demand for “content” to be made, which means established companies are pumping out junk, because now there is an audience for it. But conversely what this also means is that there is a higher audience for ALL content makers, including yourself which likely wouldn’t have a platform in old media. Basically today’s landscape means a fall of gate keepers and a huge increase in audiences. It doesn’t mean the demise of entertainment as we know it, but rather a recalibration. If you want a counterpoint to this entire video look at the quantity and funding amount to independent films that are being released today. We saw an explosion of demand and investment at all levels of creation, and this is awesome. I’m going to stay away from the discussion on Marcuse because thats beyond the scope of what streaming is doing.
Yeah I don’t really buy the premise of the video but I don’t watch reality tv so maybe I don’t know. Americans have been watching 6 hours of tv since the 90s, people passively watching “content” isn’t anything new. It just seems like “content” is being used as a buzzword to describe media/entertainment. Like you said, it’s a recalibratation. I do get that we all spend a lot, if not most of our day having some sort of media in the background whether it is RUclips or podcasts. But that’s more on the fact that we all have these phones on us 24/7.
Thankfully there's a billion books out there. I'm already starting to read more now than ever because not only is the content on screen trash but people themselves are just walking social media pages.
I do miss the early days of Netflix streaming when you could find small indie films and international foreign films. I tried searching those small films from back then that are no longer available and you pretty much gotta pirate them now. Cause yeah they aren't profitable so no streaming service is gonna pick them up.
The modern entertainment industry has been a thing for almost 150 years now. The goal has always been the same since day one: make money. Everything else has always been secondary to that fact. The only thing that's changed since radio plays and nickel movies is the medium in which it is sold. You could even argue further back to plays and pulp novels that have gone back even further, tbh.
It's absurd to give content agency at all. People create content. People are the acting agents behind all content. Content is the manifestation of people's experiences and expressions. It lacks agency. It's the reason why you can make the argument that guns don't kill people, it's the people with guns that are killing people; although that gets corrupted by people with bad intentions or by people acting disingenuously. The greediness and self-interested profiteering of people are what's "killing" (actually, corrupting and stunting our expressions of) culture. Yes, you get more access to expressions (such as media "content"); the problem is you also get it more and more devoid of meaning, and you get an increasingly more corrupted & devalued version of it every time due to the greed, profiteering, and self-interested machinations of those people who have, covet, or are adjacent to the power to control and manipulate your production, access to, and use of content.
I wonder if Twitch follows the same narrative. It seems like it might but I'm not sure we're at the same point that Netflix is in. Especially because it can involve participatory culture ie gaming.
I am literally having stress dreams about the length of the list I am keeping of TV shows I need to watch. I feel like TV shows aren't supposed to do that to us.
Exactly, this video for me lacked introspective. Referencing Eichorn and Adorno is a useful repetition, but where the realization that wisecrack is the same piece of content industry that uses reductionist practices ?
This is what Scorsese meant by his Marvel comments! His solution? "Make your own film industry." Basically, make films yourself, don't pay attention to what's selling. Novels and theatre also are a great way to get out of the hole we're in culturally! Look into the classics of Western canon, look into the Pulitzer Prize winners and Nobel Laureates in Literature. Look into the films that do well at Sundance and Cannes. Check out your local film festivals and theatre's and literary magazines. There's a lot of amazing work from great artists out there! Just gotta know where to look.
Most of the criticism - everything being just meh, rehashing the same stuff, profit over quality - applies as much to Hollywood as to Netflix. Great movies are the exception, not the rule.
This went from a video about low effort content....to some leftist brain rot about how watching netflix is capitalism oppressing us...instead of our poor behavior being simply a reflection of our own inner sloth.
Yeah I was thinking this... but could it be that media by the ruling class has always had the conformist/profit bias which makes it boring and unadventurous, and the rise of "Content" is really just us noticing how this has evolved? It seems kind of obvious to say
for example I found it interesting in particular in the episode the explanation of how Netflix uses an AI to target the most lucrative potential spaces in the market. Not trying new things and just extracting wealth out of what already exists isn't new, but it's interesting to see how these saddos have evolved their techniques. I mean, imagine prioritising extracting as much wealth as possible without being very concerned about what it creates in the world... what a mess
@@TheCalmack Watch artistic content then, it exists. People watch low effort shows because thats what they enjoy. Just let people enjoy things. Horny young basic women watch F*ck boy reality shows...thats who they're made for. And that is fine.
The RUclips algorithm was good in identifying me as a viewer for this content. I had never seen this channel before. But I have a tendency to prefer movies over TV shows or series. My one exception is RUclips! I use it for quick little informational type videos multiple times a day. Mainly as something to look at while I eat. I'm definitely a walking contradiction here because the two media things I consume most are 15 minute RUclips videos OR 2+ hour long movies. But this video definitely succinctly summarized why I wasn't missing Netflix for months after not having it: it is all just endless, mindless fluff. Designed to be ignored while I'm on my phone. But keep it on in the background.
Art has always fought with ALSO being a business. And there are these brief periods where the latest format (radio, TV, whatever) is willing to take some risk. Netflix had a good wave where they could save cancelled shows and take big risk on projects currently rejected in other arenas. Netflix has always turned out more crap then gold, but they were also taking risk at one point because they had the money to do so when they became content producers and not just content distributors. And in those risk were some gold nuggets amongst the crap. Now they have less money to take risk on that weird show that was pitched and if something is released that doesn’t produce stranger things numbers, it could end up on the chopping block. But Netflix always had the money makers of the past in their back pocket as well when they were the primary and biggest source for movies and TV shows on the internet for one all-in fairly cheap price. But then Disney and HBO Max and others came to collect their content and drag it back to their own streaming service libraries. Now the mom with 4 kids has cancelled Netflix because Disney Plus exist and she feels that has more content to occupy the kids while she cleans the house. And Rick heard HBO max has a better library, so he made the switch. People also still want their old content, there favorite shows. And while ‘new content’ might surge a brief internet buzz, services like Paramount Plus seduced me over because that’s the best source to get my OLD Star Trek and watch it as much and as frequently as I want. Cable TV stole so many people from Network TV with the availability of past things people love as much as new things only available on Cable.
@@empresssk lol, I had the paramount add on to prime for a bit then I realized there were a few things I couldn’t get and folded and got the paramount plus app cause it was all there. Also, Art as a bussiness has always been bankrupt. Netflix has NEVER cared about art….artist care about art and always have. There are just these brief windows where art gets a surge because the art is also ‘popular’ art and can make producers happy because it’s also making $$$$. Waves of art funded by companies or patrons of the arts…be it independent funding, NBC, or Netflix or whoever comes next is mostly circumstance and random ‘right time, right place’ tbh.
Video games are inherently more interactive, but they're not free from the same problems. The top publishers of videos games are pulling the exact same moves we see from content streaming services like Netflix. Case and point Activision Blizzard.
I think the important takeaway is that gamers are more active in the their consumerism. The game shown was elden ring, a $60 game bought by over 15mil gamers. Spending that kind of money and investing that kind of time is not passive.
I don’t think streaming platforms making safer content is anything new. Most media in general tends to be safe, but we tend to forget about those because they are generic and only remember the really great and risky stuff. I think that even though media tends to create safer entertainment, there will always people willing to do more innovative shows/movies
I know there are time limits, but it would be great if you could compare things like Netflix, Disney+, and RUclips. YT is the original streaming service because it got You to make content for it. By doing so, it addresses some of your concerns about marginalized opinions. It's not perfect, but you can find people who agree with you on RUclips. This isn't always a good thing though.
@@SlapstickGenius23 that is an aspect of late stage capitalism. When there is no more actual demand, supply has to incentivize new demand because more demand means more profit, creating an unsustainable cycle based on artificial demand. There stops being a stabilizing point because satisfying wants and needs stops being the driving force.
The funny thing is there's not much here in streaming that's different than cable TV. Cable TV pushes out subversive content, but only for it to create an assembly line for countless other shows (i.e. The Walking Dead leading to endless spinoffs, FOX continually mulling bringing 24 back, NBC continually making The Office clones, etc.)
i was looking through my amazon prime tv the other day, i had a flash back to vhs rental stores circa 1984/85. you havent heard a single thing about any of the choice's, and when you do make your pick and watch, you realise that its utter garbage. conan the barbarian, anyone ?
You could make this comment about every wisecrack video that has come out in the last like 3 years. It’s so well done and so interesting but goddamn does it always leave me depressed about the world.
This went from a video about low effort content....to some leftist brain rot about how watching netflix is capitalism oppressing us...instead of our poor behavior being simply a reflection of our own inner sloth.
Great art is always being made. I actually think that the obssession for make so much content also gives voice to many different creators, as the companies want as much content as possible. The less restrictive nature of streaming, in comparison with TV, makes it a tailored way for some shows to get greenlit in a way that in the past it wouldn't be possible. Of course, streaming is far from utopia. But I think it's better than the pre-streaming era.
I would like to point out the irony that some of the Best Shows released on Streaming services in the last few years in my opinion all only released 1-2 episodes a week. Arcane and Obi-Wan chief among them
I'm pretty sure Zizek specifically addressed this problem when it came to Squid Game, which was an intelligent show essentially about capitalist exploitation and class consciousness. Almost immediately, people missed the point. It became just another fun show to binge watch. They renewed it for a second season and now they're doing a real-life spin-off reality TV show based on it. It's one of the clearest examples I've seen lately of the idea that capitalism will ultimately subsume any and all critiques of capitalism and recycle it into mainstream culture.
Well, I see what you are going for, but if Squid Game's point was to be about capitalist exploitation and class consciousness then it would have done that in a way that wouldn't be so easily mistaken for a carbon copy of all the media it more than just drew inspiration from. It is, doesn't matter what you or even it's creators may think it ought to be, just another fun show to binge watch. The general and main point of your comment is quite spot on, though, critiques of capitalism sell pretty well.
Ahh yes, but as you know-..*sniffles*-.. and so forth and so on.
Actually there is another piece that addressed this far more specifically and that is far more famous: Wall-E.
About what could happen if humanity becomes completely complacent and submissive to the system.
I can even hear Zizek himself saying this
I can even hear the saliva rattling around the sides of his tongue
@@MrMarinus18 Not really, that's just the popular imagination about waste and such. It's not realistic. Read "An Illustrated Guide to Plastic Straws" for perspective.
Even 'lazy people being morbidly obese' is basically obsolete, given we already figured out GLP-1. Obesity is solved, it's just that solution didn't get deployed at scale yet. Give it a few years and % of population with obesity will start dropping, fast.
If these are supposed to be good critiques of capitalism... but no, there are better ones actually. Examples: "THE NON-LIBERTARIAN FAQ", "Meditations on Moloch", both by Scott Alexander. Second one isn't precisely about capitalism, but close enough.
"An age without passion possesses no assets; everything becomes, as it were, transactions in paper money." - Søren Kierkegaard
You will own nothing and you will be happy
You know the way to our hearts. (It's Kierkegaard quotes, in case that wasn't clear.)
Based and Soren-pilled.
do y'all feel like Gen Z has no interest in being passionate about anything? everything has some amount of irony attached to it with them. It concerns this elderly 28 year old.
@@G8tr1522 whoa whoa whoa slow down on the sweeping generalization.
My buddy and I were just talking about the word “content”. I hate how many marketing terms we’ve adopted. I don’t want to “consume content”. I want to “watch TV” or “play video game”. Content is such a joyless word
“Joyless” is the perfect way to put it.
don't ask questions, just consume product and then get excited for next product
@@yanstein8464 And Obey! Ala They Live.
Content makes us discontent. 😂
In the end that's still consuming and waste of time.
It didn't kill culture but it shoved it to a corner. Art resisted all the threats to it's existence so far and will continue to do so, I believe. It's up to us to support it where we find it
technically art and culture has actually always been about money, it is an expression of whatever you want it to be yes but it is dependant on a certain level of economic freedom and general freedom which makes it also a political issue.
I don't know the situation in roman times in relationship to art but medieval art or "Christian art" was paid for by the church and they hated humanity which is why humans look so flat and uninspiring in those pieces, they would refuse payment or even destroy pieces that went against their negative values.
The modern era started when kings were buying and selling pieces to show off their honor etc and the power of the church had dwindled when everyone understood their nature during the black plague when they basically jumped into the life rafts of their monasteries shouting "monks and nuns first!" so now even when they paid for a piece they couldn't usually destroy artwork that didn't fit their ideas and in some cases had to accept whatever. Still pieces were gear towards what kings wanted and what people would buy because supplies were expensive and due to constraints of the times some paintings took years to produce.
This situation continued until modern times with the price to get into art slowly plummeting as science was allowed to repair the damage the Catholic church had on the world but even before streaming and AI art, the world of culture was mostly just a racket. The price for famous pieces of art has zero to do with technique or execution since that would make perfect copies not forgeries but instead valued as recreations that will bring the original authors vision further into the future. Instead the value of art pieces are attributed to names and previously what they were sold at. This has made most culture just a means for money laundering and pretending to be something most of the rich really aren't, actual gentlemen and ladies.
@@liamnehren1054 I don't think they had money when they were painting on the walls of caves my guy. Art has always been involved with money because people like to create art so it gets involved with a lot of stuff including crimes that normally don't make money like graffiti. Humans have always created art it will never stop even when we don't have money since we will be bored and try to solve that by making art like most artists they just draw because they want to and they like it lmao.
@@liamnehren1054 Typical capitalist. Pretty sure Van Gough didn't make jack all on his art. Nor did Mozart. They did it from passion. Artists create for commission because it is a skill they have that can help them live... but most of Mozarts favorite pieces were created without monetary motivation.
@@manicpepsicola3431 you are wrong, even in the cave times there is an economical element due to the low level of tools causing most human endeavor to be limited to simple survival, art would have been limited to stormy seasons or winter months which pushed people into staying mostly in sheltered areas. Even then most of their time would have been towards crafts such as weaving, trapping since it requires less time outside etc. So only a tribe that was working very efficiently had the resources for someone to do something inherently none functional. Carving would have been more productive and yet still leave room open to self expression so the grand majority of stone age era artwork was undoubtedly made in the form of tools or clothing and has long since rotted away.
As for street art are you sure no one has ever made money from it? or that is has no connection to money? there have in fact been artists who found their beginning in it back when you couldn't directly make money from it, so you could compare it to having an art class where the last generation of street artists are the teachers and the younger ones the students honing their craft until the day they have enough money through jobs etc to get into other forms of painting, since spray painting only requires the spray cans so it is inherently cheaper in some areas of the world.
Now let's get into the actual industry behind it and the modern way street art directly produces monetary gain. Where do you think the paint comes for street art? does the heavens drop it from the sky? you have to buy it so you already have money if you don't have a job, so either your disposable income is going towards your hobby or your family has too much money and not enough sense and have let you run around doing something that is a crime in most countries, also no, a company produces it and hence probably the paint industry as a whole lobbies against it being banned. even though spray cans have an alternative in the form of a compressor with a range of add-ons that go from wide range spraying to very intricate penmanship (I have one) Otherwise why do they still exist when street art is almost universally seen as a terrible thing destroying the paint jobs of hard working people? On top of that comes the cleaning products and a constant battle of chemists trying to make their paint stick to anything and resist removal while the others make cleaning products to remove them. When I was in Germany in 2001 they had a solution that wiped it right off of the plastic walls of the subways but since that solution has been made useless and new attempts actually melt the plastic of the walls for example.
Now for the modern way people make money off graffiti: social media and patron (and similar) Have you seen that viral video of the guy painting a hand holding a tree? or the dozens of other ones that became incredibly popular? they make bank.
The point that I was trying to make is that there is ALWAYS a monetary component to art even when it is for arts sake. Embellishments on a sword hilt to paintings, it's either to sell something or because you have money/time (and we all know the saying) to waste burning a hole in your pocket and the later one is closer to art for art's sake but usually quite soulless. Art is grand when it has real emotion, talent and practice behind it and someone who never has to sell their art due to having everything they need has probably never had the full range of experience needed and seen in the life of the greats.
Famous examples:
-Da Vinci was an engineer who sold art to pay for his pet projects. he made seriously high payments from the church that today would probably rival how much his paintings are being sold at today!
-Van Gogh was eternally poor and committed suicide due to depression almost definitely due to a lack of money making him a burden on his family, especially since he had fairly recently moved away from his brother's house but was most likely about to have to go back....
-Raphael (Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino) had a shitty early life becoming a young orphan giving him the full range of life experience in the terrible aspects but his uncle and step mother didn't exact abandon him as give him a myriad of opportunities and he was not only well off to begin with but was handed the path to being a church artist and hence was set for life, when he died it was supposedly probably from an STD and he lived in a palace. So once again he had time/money to burn and nothing to do. (plus he was raised specifically into it and paid to do it)
I could go on but I won't.
This is a smart comment.
As a musician, nothing makes me sadder about my career than hearing people call me a "content creator."
As music lovers, at least know we would never dare call you or any other musicians, "content creators."
I extremely hate that title "content creator" because it feels like such a bullshit word. Everything can be catagorized as content(service) but it starts shifting from people that made videos on youtube wanting to have a fancy job title, to other industries as well. God forbid in the future you'll see people saying im a hospital content creator, fuck you, you're a nurse, just as youtube content creators are just some dudes making videos on the internet
@@Donerbrt I agree. Call me a musician or an artist. “Content creator” is an insulting term.
@@WisecrackEDU thank you! Calling a musician a “content creator” is even more insulting than calling an executive chef a cook.
as it should, I remember a story of a popular musician in Canada who could play half a dozen instruments and was well known for beautiful pieces whose producer wanted him to switch to rap because it was popular, so he gave up selling on a large scale until self publication became a thing. This was around the year 2000, my mother was close to most of the big artists in one of the towns known for artists in Canada.
It's similar on instagram an youtube as well.
I am a visual artist but these social media platforms see us as "content-creators" and if we want to be seen we have to play along their rules and algorithm.
But if we do that, we stray away from our art in its purest form (our personal vision) and it becomes self destructive.
Everything starts looking the same and is getting boring in the end, trending art is watercolor art ghibli style or pretty young girls. That might appeal to the yonger audience, but it becomes quickly dissatisfying for anyone expecting something more. So I don't know how long this system can continue.
stephanie, pretty thin white girls have always been "trendy", now where have you been. each generation just get to decide what the accountrement ought to be.
the thing is you are older like me , thus no longer the demo market. and IG was never built around burdened elder millenials and gen z . we are all guests in a world where being 20 is prized and we've been there .
You made a great point about binge watching being a part time job, it does feel like a chore sometimes because you simply ‘have’ to know what happens next even though it’s not enjoyable anymore.
Cédric, son, the way you worded it is very much giving "first world" problem .You sound depressed. Now why aren't you curating and whittling down shows to absolute essentials instead of overindulging on fluff. Your eyeballs must be itchy and dry.
@@PHlophe a lot of assuming from your part. Thx for ‘worrying’ but my eyes and state of mind are well
That's exactly how I feel watching She Hulk. I'm not a hater but I'm not enjoying the show. The actress is charming but the show actually sucks. And yet I'm probably going to finish the series but haven't been enjoying the process. Watching this video opened my eyes to alot.
Exactly! That "well . . . I already started this so I guess I gotta finish it" feeling is very real. And often leads us to finishing some shows that we end up feeling embarrassed about in the long run.
I felt this when I watched Netflix series 'Dark'. I hated the series from 1st episode but I HAD to watch the whole series just because I don't want to be left out. It was so stupid and boring, that I had fever the next day of forcing myself to binge watch the last season.
It's pretty telling that "content" doesn't mean art, or entertainment, or anything that meaningful. It just means "stuff." It doesn't even have to be particularly interesting or well made stuff. All it has to do is... be
I mean, the most popular streamers aren't even that creative. They're just nice sounding, clean looking people who say "bruh" and "sus" a lot. And we pay them, directly out of pocket, just for effortlessly being themselves
Its still art, diluted and recycled art but still art. The most popular streamers are still artist, but their target audiences are kids, so you can't really expect them to make "high" art, but nevertheles still art.
@@winzyl9546 sus
It isn't effortless, but I generally agree with your point. That said, I've never donated to content creators outside of charity events because the fact is, there's always something else, so if this specific creator goes under, why care?
Capitalism makes everyone the asshole.
@@winzyl9546 I think it stops being art when it stops making you think, even at it’s lowest it makes you think. Twitch streamers and that like make me feel like I am being numbed, like it feels like nothing and makes me actively not think at at all. Even in comedy where there is a reaction you think about the joke and the punchline hits, I can’t see Twitch as art, it is just a product, nothing else.
See this should sound encouraging like "HEY if you just be really authentic you'll get a following and not have to have your soul crushed for years just to keep eating!"
...but the reality is that it just becomes a luck game.
Culture isn't dead, it, like it always does, is just moving to a different place. Who knows? Perhaps in the next 10 years we'll be seeing a larger rise in local art and local music.
One thing is for certain, a lot of us need more boredom in our lives. For boredom is a crucial element to creativity.
That's the hope! On both fronts! Boredom and local art and music.
No we'll just make an AI that calculates how to make the good brain chemicals because that's cheaper or whatever.
@@texivani that's the big fear!
@@ooievaar6756 Louis CK talked about it on Conan once! The importance of boredom! And that bit I think also shows up in Louie too. The power of boredom!
The media industry has always been about churning out safe, repetitive, generic content. After twenty years we recognize and remember the best ones and declare that "the golden age of ..."
hell that's even the case for saviors! XD there were many "sons of god" around Jesus' time but we only hear about the one that made the biggest splash.
Truth. Streaming has turned out many great shows and movies, we are just in it right now so we focus on all the crap swimming around the good stuff, most of which will be forgotten in 10 years. There was crap on Radio programs, crap on network TV, crap on Cable, but now we just remember the stuff that stood the test of time. We can also turn out more crap faster. That’s just technology. It use to take awhile to film something, put it together, and get it in front of the public. Now most consumers can get their hands on a decent quality camera and thanks to digital media have a piece of content up on a public platform within days (heck, a good cinematographer could prob visually compete with a DSLR with a high end smartphone). I can freaking edit video on my phone now, pretty easily. I hate editing on a small screen, but it’s still insane to me that I can do it. in college, which is less than 10 years ago, i had to go to the computer lab at school to use the ‘nice mac’ to edit my student films in Final Cut Pro. I certainly couldn’t have done it on my cellphone!
Yea, this episode kinda sucked.
Seinfeld banked off of.... Seinfeld. TMNT was a toy line first and a TV show second. And the less said about Transformers (TV or Movie) the better.
Mass Media has always been 100% only about cash.
And don't tell me that Bojack / Inside Job is soul-less while Battleship went to theaters.
Yeah, I don't think he realizes the most profitable subscribers are the ones who own a subscription and watch very little of the service. Every time you stream something from Netflix it cuts into the profit margin, that is the reason why that button pops up to ask if you are still watching, it is to cut the stream if you're not there anymore. The button is not there to tell you to keep watching haha
@@xaverager A vast vast amount of old hollywood movies are lost cause no one cared to remember it. they were made to sell tickets an then be discarded when no longer relevant. In fact one of the largest catches of old movies was finding a ton of them that had been buried in the permafrost of a some Canadian town that didn't see a need to store them.
Besides even if it is generic trash I don't see the problem with it. Sometimes I just want to watch a generic action slock to kill two hours and enjoy myself. Not every movie has to be a deep introspection of the human condition. As long as those movies exist they will be enjoyed as well and remember long after everyone has forgotten the cliches of modern movies.
damn the idea of watching shows being like a 2nd job and watching a show while also being on my phone hit me hard as I'm very guilty of both of those things. Time to rethink some parts of my life.
"...I don't want to sell you death sticks."
"...I want to go home and rethink my life."
We're right there with you.
Seriously... that one made me a little sick.
Going with the gaming analogy, we are pining for fulfilling single player experiences while all they are giving us now is endless mindless MMOs
God of war ragnarok drops in less than 2 months. But true there is a lot of crap in games too.
Don’t forget Microsoft trying to brute force it too… 🫠
Another industry in which we should pay more attention to the indies.
Ahh yes, when Fallout 76 was announced
Season passes are the worst thing ever. They feel like work that has to be done without a fulfilling end. And the streaming services are gonna be the impending doom of the industry. Microsoft has forced to onto the industry and now other are feeling the need to go into that route. I once saw a video calle "Elden Ring feels like the end" And it actually feels like that. It makes me think that after this year things are just gonna get worse. And for real, I adore a single player expierence with tons of thought put into it and that it makes use my brain to go through it and understand the story that is presented before my eyes. That's why I live the Soulsborne saga, that's why I love hollow knight, and that's why I live Nier automata
The thing I just don't get is that they can't seem to understand why they're hemorrhaging subscribers--it's because they cancel every show they make! Netflix used to be the savior to canceled TV shows like Longmire and produced genuinely great media that still no one has ever heard of, like Bloodline. Now they just churn and churn and churn, and I'm more inclined to just buy the media I want to watch, or at the very least just rent it on Amazon instead.
People forget Netflix is in over 100 countries with about 220.67 million subscribers globally as of Aug 2022 73.28 in the US as of July 2022 with 11,000 employees after the 300 they laid off. So it doesn't matter how good a show is it's how many viewing hours it gets globally. Stranger Things S4 pt 1 racked up over a billion viewing hours in less than a week justifying its huge budget. now Squid Games same viewing hours, probably for a smaller budget. And what we see in the US is a fraction of what Netflix has which is why I'm thinking of getting a VPN for it and youtube etc.
Shows get canceled because people don’t watch , you may think a show is popular but it could just be a small circle that likes it
To be fair, I droped my Netflix sub when "outside" became available again. As did many.
Amazon has turned me away too after that terrible adaptation of the wheel of time... they gutted it completely and then claimed success.... but yeah totally agree Netflix keeps cancelling things for no reason and pulled some of the bad anime company "tricks" where they give a series a false ending because they don't want to continue producing it.
I find I can't trust taking a chance on a new show that isn't within a pre-existing franchise anymore because I am too scared it'll be canceled after the first season. I usually just wait until other people hype it up enough to guarantee that more will come, which is completely counter-intuitive to what streaming services want (as they seem to want a show's views to explode extremely early after its release to justify a renewal, which is often impossible for many niche shows considering how they often seem to be dropped onto streaming services with very little marketing fanfare).
With broadcast TV, a new show would be airing for weeks, allowing it to slowly and naturally accumulate a fanbase (and encouraging people who watch other shows on the same channel to give that show a chance, hence programming blocks), but it seems like companies now expect huge fandoms to appear out of nowhere or else a show can’t be given a chance to grow.
"consuming content is another job" oh that one hit me bc i barely watch any shows or movies or anime or play video games anymore... Up to 12 hours of my day is RUclips videos. Wisecrack reruns are a part of that
Technically, RUclips is culturally healthier than any of the things you mentioned! Since the things being made are from real people, not giant mega-corporations.
@@logicalfallacy234
Also, depending on who you watch. A lot more thought and effort is put into the "content". Just watch a normal documentary created by a streaming service and then watch one on the same subject by a RUclipsr, every minute feels like you're getting a new piece of info. Streaming services know they can put less effort into something and still get views, but a RUclipsr has to put effort, otherwise why come back to the channel?
@@bbrbbr-on2gd Yup! Agreed on all counts!
Yup same and when I do try to sit down and focus on a movie, it's difficult for me to fully immerse myself in it and enjoy movies the way I used to.
@@chai_lattes Try focusing on something for 25 minutes! That's how long most people's attention span is naturally, so. That's been helping me!
Finally! I've been waiting to see this questioned for awhile now. The idea that people "consume content" is such a bizarre transition from "watching tv."
Not that bizarre, not in the least. No more than Watching TV replaced "Sit by Radio".
@@Warriorcats64 Except the word "consume" is used. As though it's worth taking in in order to just get by. Adds more weight to the importance people put on content. Entertainment just has such a higher value than it used to, it's fascinating since listening & watching are far more passive verbs in comparison, know what I mean?
Not to mention the massive boom in ease of access when it comes to content creation and the plethora of things to actually watch. It's more or less become a culture in and of itself compared to the old days.
Streaming services started to become a content producer instead of a platform for other content producer(s) to publish their own work, essentially making the whole platform feel boring due to lack of creative differences.
I think the problem is people don’t really absorb or desire culture. It’s not about diversity or genuine passion; it feels like synthetic, mainstream consumerism. It’s not about what the content gives you or how it makes you feel, it’s just about how much content you can get or where you can get it. So many different media projects don’t even feel like passion projects anymore; just cash-grabs.
Put down the remote and touch grass, Jesus.
People are now oppressed by HAVING TOO MANY ENTERTAINMENT CHOICES AND FREE TIME
@@arkology_city Thanks, I get what they are saying, but damn.
@@arkology_city So, is touching grass culture? or just another form of consumerism?
@@qchtohere8636 it's just a vapid meme
@@arkology_city not oppressed, just wasting your life watching fast food TV when there's a world full of amazing art outside of sub services.
I always felt like 90 day fiancé was a tour of the worst ideas about love and romance as they exist in the modern world... also, like a lot of reality TV shows it seems to be about presenting you with conflicts so that you could choose which side was justified. Basically shows for judging, which is quite a bizarre thing to sit and watch now that I think about it
yeah just from a neural chemical standpoint after starting a serious relationship, you are almost lobotomised levels of illogical towards that person for the first 1.1 years due to brain chemistry.
At the 2 year point you will have finally obtained an objective understanding of the other person and whether or not you can really stand each other for the long run. Then comes real world issues like where to live etc that will rip a relationship apart unless a compromise can be found or one is entirely dominant over the other so 3 years is a logical relationship period before marriage.
90 days....
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I already got that premise without even watching a single minute of that show.
I believe we are entering and age where we see the rebirth of the hobby, bowling leagues and game nights with friends. People are going to start creating their own stimulus as the quality of entertainment being served is so often flavorless.
Probably not. It's more likely that people will instead fill their free time with streamers.
I think that streaming will become much bigger when it becomes common to watch a streamer watch episodes of Marvel and Netflix shows. Watching RUclips is the most common category on Twitch (Just Chatting, technically, but you can see those streams getting millions of views when uploaded to RUclips), so, it would make sense that watching Netflix would be lucrative if they allowed that.
To put it another way, I think that binge-watching Marvel will become a hobby with a community that fulfills social needs if it becomes common to be able to experience watching Marvel tv shows with a community, like with Twitch chat.
When streaming collapses, torrents will be the only way to pick up the pieces of all the permanently shelved movies 😂
@@empresssk Torrenting is distributed, no one party needs to store it all. Also the current system of trackers makes it relatively easy to figure out who is storing which files. Ever pirated movies? This is how it already works. I find lost gems all the time.
Also the acceleration of computing power and cheap storage space means it will be easier than ever to host huge archives of lost content.
It's no longer about making something worthwhile, or even something that you like. It's about making something that can be marketed well enough to get an audience to see it once, watch some tiktoks and hot takes that surround it for 2 weeks, and then move on to the next thing.
I have friends who will call me cynical for avoiding things like the live action Disney remakes, and then as long as it's at least a 5/10 they say "See! I told you it would be fun!" And then they never mention them again.
As good as streaming services and content creators are at running this machine, we keep going to see what it produces. This is our fault. They are giving us exactly what we have asked for and, as with most things in life, changing ourselves and our neighbors is the best way to start making things better.
"then they never mention them again." This is the one that gets me - this type of content has such a short cultural tail. If you don't binge the content immediately, it's like arriving at a party that everyone else left ages ago. I'm catching up on Stranger Things, and even though it's one of Netflix's biggest shows of all time, the last season has almost completely left the pop culture save for a few memes full of spoilers. I'm enjoying myself reading about the show on reddit threads, but they're all 4 month old discussions at this point. If you're not fast enough, it feels like you're watching the content all by yourself in a void.
This is the way
Yes that is what pays the bills…. but I guess liberal arts students never have to pay bills
Content is all about cycles of hype and nostalgia.
It's like saying "if you weren't their to experience something the first time then don't worry because we'll be rebooting, remastering, or sequalling it again within the next 5 to 10 years or so anyway! Make sure to binge it then!"
i finally understand why watching stuff on streaming stopped being fun and started feeling like a chore!! i basically only watch youtube and play video games and thought i was missing out lowkey :v
Hate to break it to you... but RUclips is part of the same content machine.
@@robotoboy30 youtube is much worse actually. The youtube algorithm is more invasive and creepy than netflixes can ever be.
For me, watching RUclips videos became a chore 😔
@@robotoboy30 No - RUclips videos are made by human beings (not talking about the most popular ones)
@@Armaan8014 RUclips videos are filtered through God Empereror Google's algorythms. The videos being presented to you are the ones with the highest calculated probabilty for you to click on and consume. Every successful content creator is aware of this and most forge their content in that regard. There are off course amazing content creators who despite this makes valuable quality stuff though, like Wisecrack... sometimes. RUclips is still amazing place for education and art if you stay away from the traps, which is hard
This is easily one of the highest quality channels on RUclips. I find myself consistently agreeing with your analysis of things I have not considered before.
I'm at the point where I have so many things I just can't keep up with.
I want to watch shows, I want to play games, I want to watch RUclips, I want to be active and then I have responsibilities.
I can't fit it all in.
And of course whenever I have free time my brain says "there isn't anything interesting to do"
I never cared for any media service that could just pull my shows whenever. Cable, Netflix, HBO, RUclips, radio etc etc can just say "done" and my favorite stories or art is gone. Same goes with documentaries and music. Books and magazines.
I will, for that very reason, have and always will prefer hard copies. VHS, dvds, blurays, CDs, vinyls, cassettes, books, etc. I've been around since the cable and radio days, and was always frustrated by the disposable mindset of those institutions and their successors. So much of what I love is gone, pulled from cable TV decades ago and never seen a release in hard formats. All that work, art, memories...destroyed. And digital services are doing the same.
If a piece of media is of particular sentimental value to you, I highly encourage even younger people in getting physical copies somehow. Keep some old-school players/devices. These services don't care about you as an individual, only the collective. They don't care about art, only the bottom line. You don’t have to be a cinemaphile or hard collector, just keep a few things for yourself on a shelf to dust off and remind yourself of fonder times every now and then. Remind yourself you're in control of your consumption.
These are just the ramblings of a dinosaur some could argue. I won't disagree. But if you love it, preserve it somehow. Seriously.
No rambling at all, you’re 100% spot on
I'm beginning to feel the same, this amazing show Infinity Train seems to be doomed to oblivion as it never received physical media and just like you said, the owner of the streaming underwent Corporative Changes™and just pulled the show from existence altoegether...
But I don't like the word "Consumption", sounds a tad too materialistic for the works of art they are, perhaps we could begin to use a word like "Interaction" to exemplify what the work of hundreds, if not thousands of people means to us rather than give the corporatives reason in their mentality for "Content = Consumption"?
I love owning secondhand books. They’re a reminder that decent old physical content can still be important for preservation.
Recently I had been wondering why I had been losing interest in new TV shows and movies. This perfectly exemplifies my loss of desire to watch the latest watercooler shows. Everything just seems soulless, and overly artificial. Spot on wisecrack.
binge watching being another job hits bc something I had to enforce for myself for my own good was like not owing a show completion- cus otherwise it really is just another thing you have to do. its like we're encouraged to exist for the content and not the other way around
I've thought about the points made in this video for a while, and while I do believe that it is true in the context of what streaming and productions companies at the top need to create for their bottom line, it's created a huge possibility, if not a huge necessity, for the up and coming filmmakers and producers at the bottom to choose to create works of art and oppose the standards that this industry sets. I know that it sounds idealistic, because no one wants to be a starving artist, but it's imperative in order to continue to keep pushing the landscape forward. One of the greatest catalysts of innovation is the refusal to accept the status quo. We are currently in one of those times where the status quo of this industry is being undercut by where we are technologically. Therefore, something has to change, and you can't say it's tech that need to change, because it's going to change anyways. How is the other side going to keep up? Because the current business models aren't going to keep these companies viable in the next 10, or even 5 years. It's time for us to determine how we're going to do things differently.
We love the artistic idealism! Hopefully others are down to follow your lead.
@@WisecrackEDU This was Scorsese's advice to young filmmakers! "Make your own film industry". And is also the undercurrent behind his legendary Marvel comments.
It's crazy how sometimes after working I am too burnt out to play video games (which I love) and will spend time watching shows instead.
Get yourself a Nintendo Switch or Steam Deck so you can play laying down on the couch or in bed, makes it easier.
Yes it did. Now content IS our culture.
The strange bit is, especially now, there is a cornucopia of high quality media that is available ostensibly for free just by digging through the public domain, and yet people will take reality shows (or what ever) over that, and pay for it.
It's a corollary to parasocial relationships, where there needs to be a constant stream of updates and factoids to maintain the illusion of a relationship; content needs to be omnipresent because no one in their right mind would seek-out reality shows excepts as soma.
This went from a video about low effort content....to some leftist brain rot about how watching netflix is capitalism oppressing us...instead of our poor behavior being simply a reflection of our own inner sloth.
@@quintessenceSL Very interesting.
Plot twist: culture was always (meta)content.
Always had been for many years.
The fact that i believed all your Fboy spin-offs were really drives the point home 😅
9:19 "water, water, everywhere, nor a drop to drink!" In an age with endless "content" almost none of it has any meaning, and therefore, no reason to be watched.
This is the first Wisecrack video I've seen on my feed in what feels like months. What did the YT algorithm do to this channel? So glad to see you all pop up again because my brain was hungry for something to sink its teeth into.
We are glad that the mysterious YT algorithm let us back on your feed! Hopefully it happens again soon.
This was so well said and researched! You perfectly articulated the half baked thoughts I've been having about this for a while. I'd love a follow up video on content in the realm of platforms such as youtube, instagram, and tik-tok etc. While I do find great videos like this on RUclips I am also still very much addicted to youtbe and do find myself watching it mindlessly more than I'd like.
I miss the times when I used to want to watch something more than once.
Great video! I think the other reason people are abandoning streaming platforms is that people are getting fed up with shows just disappearing whenever the service feels like pulling them. When you buy a DVD, you can watch that film or television show as much as you want, whenever you want. But if a streaming service decides to hide one the seasons of your favourite series, you just have to accept that. You pay every month, but you only have the access they decide you should have. Whatever that may be.
Which is why it is important to still buy physical media. Another is not every movie gets on a streaming services.
you can illegally stream any movie you like. You dont have to conform to whatever netflix wants you to watch
These videos are really helping me understand my sociology classes, though they require that I watch them more than once
If the algorithm offers me one more thumbnail of some gormless RUclipsr looking like a stunned goldfish whilst pointing to a fake "shocked" headline, I'm going to scream.
10/10. Yes. Culturally, everything went to hell around 2015.
BANGER handful of videos lately you guys! Holy shit, you've been killing it! Great job everyone!
Thank you so much! Hopefully we can keep the trend going with some of the things we're currently working on . . .
hope this helps the algorithm so you guys can make more content.
Same : /
Can't wait until that 'Ow My Balls' series gets greenlit.
This video is everything to me 😂 it just made SO MUCH I’ve been experiencing over the last 5+ years make so much sense. Mind BLOWN
How ironic. A content creator offering commentary on the state of content creation. I must be stuck in a loop in the matrix.
I enjoyed this episode a lot, had me laughing a number of times. Also found the ideas very interesting - started opening up some webpages and downloading books on Adorno and Horkheimer's ideas... thanks!
That’s a sarcastic comment about us not being able to focus on one thing anymore, and having a second screen mentality, right? 😉
We hope you enjoy those books! We talk about Adorno and Horkheimer's ideas in quite a few videos, and we will surely be talking about them more in the future.
@@WisecrackEDU any books you'd recommend? I've previously found Adorno to be hard reading.
@@jarrahfitzgerald2752 Minima Moralia by Adorno is great, but still hard reading so something you'd want to spend some time with.
I can’t wait for when the next thing that disrupts streaming, we’re all like “remember how amazing the golden era of streaming was?”
In answer to the query at the end about why streaming started off doing "prestige shows" and "Indie films", it needed these to viewers who are more selective in what they watch. Basically, the same idea as what HBO is (or was?). The issue Netflix is having now is that they seem weirdly incapable of finding new prestige shows to make and when they do find something with promise, they bugger it up or cancel it before it gets a proper chance, ironically making people less likely to watch their new content because they can't trust that the story will get finished, even if it's good.
Same.
Netflix and to a much lesser extent, Hulu, are the only cashflow positive streaming platforms. Apple and Amazon don't share itemized revenues for their platforms.
For all the corporate propaganda against Netflix for 2 decades now, the company is still the largest, most successful platform of its kind. It makes twice as much as Disney per sub AFTER costs, which makes the hyperbolic emphasis on their spending really silly and clearly out of context to create a certain narrative. And losing a million subs for Netflix, when contextualized properly, is less than half a percent of its customers, as opposed to 3-5% of Hulu or Apple TV+.
Pro-Disney journalists even tried to pretend that Disney has surpassed Netflix's subscribed count "in just a few years" but they don't tell you they are adding ESPN and Hulu (much older services) subs to that, AND counting bundle subscribers as 3 separate subscribers to pad the numbers.
Wait, wait, wait. Are you telling me people are manipulating statistics to prove a narrative?!?!
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I recorded a rap song in 2014 called "consumer divorce" about this lol I think it's still on iTunes, released 2016 with my debut novel. Needless to say streaming services haven't shown much love for either 😜
I've heard it said that in the old TV days the shows were just seen as the stuff you use to fill time between the ad-blocks. I.e. literal "content". Entertainment has been content for a long time. Possibly forever since most of what we would now consider to be high art was "what a rich guy wants to hang on his wall" or "what a rich guy wants to barely hear in the background of his fancy lad party", literal filler, wall paper, content!
Not saying that's good, it's not, but I question whether streaming is the problem here.
My fear is that content just didn't kill culture, its that content is becoming a culture. that everyone is being socially engineered to accept to a point years later its the normal.
Sad but accurate.
Thanks for the vote of confidence Michael, but us gamers have it only marginally better. Yes, while a few of us may have our minds tweaked out trying to optimize the fashion of our builds in Elden Ring and trying to sus out all the philosophically charged lore of Miyazaki and Kojima, A LOT more are mindlessly proliferating the US war machine in CoD, are braindead on idle games, or are chasing novelty-based dopamine on the genre-mash ups like the latest open-world roguelite stealth action survival game with crafting and rpg elements. There is so much chaff content churned out and so many people who specifically opt for the path of least resistance, easy modes, meaningless content, and ways to optimize the fun out games.
E.g. When I first played mmo's (Vanilla WoW back in the day) there was such a huge social element, but over time, it has seemed that the social element has been relegated to a bonus as mmo's are being designed to be played solo now. Similarly, Diablo 1 (and 2) had huge elements of horror baked into its very being. It was a scary disempowering experience. But now the series (and the genre it created) is almost exclusively reduced to chasing bigger numbers and amassing loot; what once was a means to an end (getting the gear to defeat the big bad and survive) has now become a end in and of itself (you grind loot to grind different loot). The industry as a whole has embraced pretty much the exact same model discussed in the video. Even if we are required to press a few buttons, many (and I'd argue most) people are doing their damnedest to eliminate even that behind and in front of the screen.
So true. Visual progression is so vital to the gamer experience, especially in RPGs. Even if you're aiming for single player experience, even customizable options once included for free or after besting a boss or level, are now monetized and less enjoyable. Especially when they make it hard not to buy (ie, boosts your item stats by 800% for 85 cents)
And, sadly, there are things that really trigger "real" gamers like the idea of having a playable character be a woman or PoC.
I remember when Survivor first hit the air waves. I was so excited for this new "reality show" content which was unheard of at the time. Shortly into that first season, I was disappointed that the entire point of the show was drama with incredibly poor editing and had nothing to do with surviving on an island. I have refused to watch reality shows ever since. The whole manufactured drama, written by very bad writers and acted out by horrible actors that makes up every single reality show is truly a scourge on society.
I liked your self awareness when you mentioned "not us, we have it sussed"
I dislike binge releases for shows bc there is no hype for the show at all and it dies after a week. I have seen this happen to two of my most anticipated shows, Edgerunners and JoJo, and no one talks about them. What's the point of asking high quality shows if it only has a week in the spot light
No one talks about JoJo? One of the most memed anime? Unless you mean the new season.
I miss it too... I liked anticipating a whole week what was to come. And I understand that if you don't binge watch now, the shows don't seem interesting to the public by the streaming services and are at risk of being canceled, no matter how good they are. Not all people can or want to binge watch, is not a fair metric of the success of a show
Never heard of either of those shows.
To be fair, Edgerunners has only been out for 6 days and my feed is filled with it.
That said, yes, I hate dumping an entire season in one go. I miss hype build-up and water-cooler conjecture. Yet it amazes me how many I talk to who say they can't stand waiting for new episodes and will simply wait until an the entire show is up so they can blitz through it.
@@zenmindgamer lmao, bro wants people to constantly talk about his favorite TV show 😂
It seems Netflix is hesitating on giving The Sandman a second season because The Sandman is too good. After an episode of The Sandman, the viewer will stop and think about what they watched; instead of binge-watching it. I watched The Sandman three times, but never all at once.
I love wisecrack and I know you guys have to edit in a way to keep this no attention spam tiktok generation paying attention, but some parts of this video I had to watch twice because of how fast the transitions and cuts were
Agree. I can't connect the dots and understand this essay. Maybe I'm just not wise enough. lol. (Joke aside. I can understand videos from channel like Veritasium just fine.)
Great video. Made me think a lot about I’m engaging with content. I feel like streaming content may be the reason it is harder for me to consume entertainment that requires more effort like reading and playing video games.
I am cursed with proposition of finding what hits the spot every morning day and night. As we are getting into our own bubbles, Its increasingly harder to find content (ironically) that doesn't feel iike a paint by numbers scheme. Everything everywhere, all at once being a breathe of fresh air. Even then, its a movie that is still obscure to most people.
Incomprehensible, have a great day
I feel like the same thing has been happening with music as well. I was introduced to the concept of muzak through vaporwave about a decade ago and I feel like the line between muzak and music has never been as blurry as it is now. So much of the popular music today is so generic and predictable and feels like it was made to play in the background rather than the foreground of your mind that I can't help but think of muzak.
I'm not sure streaming created the assembly line of endless content idea, I ascribe that more to cable. 24 hour programming, over a hundred channels, where programmers had to come up with SOMETHING to fill that 2 PM on a Tuesday slot, so we started getting garbage reality TV shows out the wazoo. Cable was the first time you could sit in front of your TV and consume endlessly. Streaming is just performing the same dance, in my opinion.
Wow this was one of the best videos you've made! Thanks for this!!
It's ironic that Wisecrack of all things should make this point. :D
You're not wrong, we are very aware of the ironic cycle of creating content critiquing the ideology of content production while producing content in that same ecosystem. But hey, at least we're self aware.
@@WisecrackEDU I thoroughly enjoyed the moment when you asked what we'd do if we weren't binging and everything tinted 'conspiracy red', so it's not all lost. Was just cracking a joke at you guys crack jokes at how everything's become trivialised and automated, so we can have pretend principles in shows while we can only crack jokes in reality. :D
Also, I have never seen those fucboy shows, hah!
@@Xandercorp We're with you! And we liked the joke, a lot. Thanks for watching!
So does this mean that producing content that actually contains content and whose purpose is to showcase content, is now a form of rebellion against this current system?
I have a lot of issues with this video essay. I agree with the idea that “content” is made to generate profit, but thats always been the case. The distinction between entertainment and content is arbitrary IMO. If anything streaming is a reflection of what happens when markets go global and audiences are easier to reach. Today we have much wider audiences than before because of interconnected markets.
This means that there is a huge demand for “content” to be made, which means established companies are pumping out junk, because now there is an audience for it. But conversely what this also means is that there is a higher audience for ALL content makers, including yourself which likely wouldn’t have a platform in old media.
Basically today’s landscape means a fall of gate keepers and a huge increase in audiences. It doesn’t mean the demise of entertainment as we know it, but rather a recalibration. If you want a counterpoint to this entire video look at the quantity and funding amount to independent films that are being released today. We saw an explosion of demand and investment at all levels of creation, and this is awesome.
I’m going to stay away from the discussion on Marcuse because thats beyond the scope of what streaming is doing.
Yeah I don’t really buy the premise of the video but I don’t watch reality tv so maybe I don’t know. Americans have been watching 6 hours of tv since the 90s, people passively watching “content” isn’t anything new. It just seems like “content” is being used as a buzzword to describe media/entertainment. Like you said, it’s a recalibratation. I do get that we all spend a lot, if not most of our day having some sort of media in the background whether it is RUclips or podcasts. But that’s more on the fact that we all have these phones on us 24/7.
It seems clear to me that many creators have lost they’re passion in the ongoing push for “content”
I like to try and have a constant stream of content. Constant Content…I call it….Con-Tent
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You look like you’re constantly trying not to smile/laugh and I’m here for it 😊
Thankfully there's a billion books out there. I'm already starting to read more now than ever because not only is the content on screen trash but people themselves are just walking social media pages.
Well, I wouldn't say a show like Arcane is trash...
Content on screen isn’t trash. You just have to look past the Netflix trending page to find the good stuff.
I do miss the early days of Netflix streaming when you could find small indie films and international foreign films. I tried searching those small films from back then that are no longer available and you pretty much gotta pirate them now. Cause yeah they aren't profitable so no streaming service is gonna pick them up.
Next: Did Culture kill Content?
Victory is so close that I can smell it
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Content is consistently defined and synonymously associated with social media/yt
This is not what I thought you were going to talk about
So in super hero movie terms:
- We live in the best time line possible! Neat! Can't wait for the next Wisecrack video.
lol
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Wow. I’m perplexed!
The modern entertainment industry has been a thing for almost 150 years now. The goal has always been the same since day one: make money. Everything else has always been secondary to that fact. The only thing that's changed since radio plays and nickel movies is the medium in which it is sold. You could even argue further back to plays and pulp novels that have gone back even further, tbh.
That is pretty cool. Can you make a video about Fahrenheit 451 and brave new world. Keep up the great work !
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This hit home cause watching videos and content has become something I feel like I need to do in order to get through my work day on the computer.
Ay, Marcos Qué Triste. ja ja ja ja
It's absurd to give content agency at all. People create content. People are the acting agents behind all content.
Content is the manifestation of people's experiences and expressions. It lacks agency. It's the reason why you can make the argument that guns don't kill people, it's the people with guns that are killing people; although that gets corrupted by people with bad intentions or by people acting disingenuously.
The greediness and self-interested profiteering of people are what's "killing" (actually, corrupting and stunting our expressions of) culture. Yes, you get more access to expressions (such as media "content"); the problem is you also get it more and more devoid of meaning, and you get an increasingly more corrupted & devalued version of it every time due to the greed, profiteering, and self-interested machinations of those people who have, covet, or are adjacent to the power to control and manipulate your production, access to, and use of content.
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Thoughtful breakdown, thanks guys
I wonder if Twitch follows the same narrative. It seems like it might but I'm not sure we're at the same point that Netflix is in. Especially because it can involve participatory culture ie gaming.
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I am literally having stress dreams about the length of the list I am keeping of TV shows I need to watch. I feel like TV shows aren't supposed to do that to us.
Thank you for this content. My brain didn’t really get anything out of it but it helped for the repetition that was needed
Exactly, this video for me lacked introspective. Referencing Eichorn and Adorno is a useful repetition, but where the realization that wisecrack is the same piece of content industry that uses reductionist practices ?
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This is what Scorsese meant by his Marvel comments! His solution?
"Make your own film industry."
Basically, make films yourself, don't pay attention to what's selling. Novels and theatre also are a great way to get out of the hole we're in culturally!
Look into the classics of Western canon, look into the Pulitzer Prize winners and Nobel Laureates in Literature. Look into the films that do well at Sundance and Cannes. Check out your local film festivals and theatre's and literary magazines. There's a lot of amazing work from great artists out there! Just gotta know where to look.
Most of the criticism - everything being just meh, rehashing the same stuff, profit over quality - applies as much to Hollywood as to Netflix. Great movies are the exception, not the rule.
This went from a video about low effort content....to some leftist brain rot about how watching netflix is capitalism oppressing us...instead of our poor behavior being simply a reflection of our own inner sloth.
Yeah I was thinking this... but could it be that media by the ruling class has always had the conformist/profit bias which makes it boring and unadventurous, and the rise of "Content" is really just us noticing how this has evolved? It seems kind of obvious to say
for example I found it interesting in particular in the episode the explanation of how Netflix uses an AI to target the most lucrative potential spaces in the market. Not trying new things and just extracting wealth out of what already exists isn't new, but it's interesting to see how these saddos have evolved their techniques. I mean, imagine prioritising extracting as much wealth as possible without being very concerned about what it creates in the world... what a mess
@@TheCalmack Watch artistic content then, it exists.
People watch low effort shows because thats what they enjoy. Just let people enjoy things.
Horny young basic women watch F*ck boy reality shows...thats who they're made for. And that is fine.
The RUclips algorithm was good in identifying me as a viewer for this content. I had never seen this channel before. But I have a tendency to prefer movies over TV shows or series. My one exception is RUclips! I use it for quick little informational type videos multiple times a day. Mainly as something to look at while I eat.
I'm definitely a walking contradiction here because the two media things I consume most are 15 minute RUclips videos OR 2+ hour long movies. But this video definitely succinctly summarized why I wasn't missing Netflix for months after not having it: it is all just endless, mindless fluff. Designed to be ignored while I'm on my phone. But keep it on in the background.
Art has always fought with ALSO being a business. And there are these brief periods where the latest format (radio, TV, whatever) is willing to take some risk. Netflix had a good wave where they could save cancelled shows and take big risk on projects currently rejected in other arenas. Netflix has always turned out more crap then gold, but they were also taking risk at one point because they had the money to do so when they became content producers and not just content distributors. And in those risk were some gold nuggets amongst the crap. Now they have less money to take risk on that weird show that was pitched and if something is released that doesn’t produce stranger things numbers, it could end up on the chopping block. But Netflix always had the money makers of the past in their back pocket as well when they were the primary and biggest source for movies and TV shows on the internet for one all-in fairly cheap price. But then Disney and HBO Max and others came to collect their content and drag it back to their own streaming service libraries. Now the mom with 4 kids has cancelled Netflix because Disney Plus exist and she feels that has more content to occupy the kids while she cleans the house. And Rick heard HBO max has a better library, so he made the switch. People also still want their old content, there favorite shows. And while ‘new content’ might surge a brief internet buzz, services like Paramount Plus seduced me over because that’s the best source to get my OLD Star Trek and watch it as much and as frequently as I want. Cable TV stole so many people from Network TV with the availability of past things people love as much as new things only available on Cable.
@@empresssk lol, I had the paramount add on to prime for a bit then I realized there were a few things I couldn’t get and folded and got the paramount plus app cause it was all there.
Also, Art as a bussiness has always been bankrupt. Netflix has NEVER cared about art….artist care about art and always have. There are just these brief windows where art gets a surge because the art is also ‘popular’ art and can make producers happy because it’s also making $$$$. Waves of art funded by companies or patrons of the arts…be it independent funding, NBC, or Netflix or whoever comes next is mostly circumstance and random ‘right time, right place’ tbh.
The content is pretty bad these days. I think most people are finding other forms of entertainment.
Video games are inherently more interactive, but they're not free from the same problems. The top publishers of videos games are pulling the exact same moves we see from content streaming services like Netflix. Case and point Activision Blizzard.
I think the important takeaway is that gamers are more active in the their consumerism. The game shown was elden ring, a $60 game bought by over 15mil gamers. Spending that kind of money and investing that kind of time is not passive.
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I don’t think streaming platforms making safer content is anything new. Most media in general tends to be safe, but we tend to forget about those because they are generic and only remember the really great and risky stuff. I think that even though media tends to create safer entertainment, there will always people willing to do more innovative shows/movies
Enough said, robot.
I know there are time limits, but it would be great if you could compare things like Netflix, Disney+, and RUclips. YT is the original streaming service because it got You to make content for it. By doing so, it addresses some of your concerns about marginalized opinions. It's not perfect, but you can find people who agree with you on RUclips. This isn't always a good thing though.
i wish you knew alot about music because i swear this phenomenon is going on in other art forms then just cinema.
Ultimately it comes down to Capitalism forcing value to be profit-based rather than derived on wants and desires of both the public and creators.
More like Hyper Consumerism.
@@SlapstickGenius23 that is an aspect of late stage capitalism. When there is no more actual demand, supply has to incentivize new demand because more demand means more profit, creating an unsustainable cycle based on artificial demand.
There stops being a stabilizing point because satisfying wants and needs stops being the driving force.
The funny thing is there's not much here in streaming that's different than cable TV. Cable TV pushes out subversive content, but only for it to create an assembly line for countless other shows (i.e. The Walking Dead leading to endless spinoffs, FOX continually mulling bringing 24 back, NBC continually making The Office clones, etc.)
Fair enough. The jungle books by Rudyard Kipling have led to a lot of Mowgli Expies appearing in works as early as John Eyton’s Jungle Born.
i was looking through my amazon prime tv the other day, i had a flash back to vhs rental stores circa 1984/85. you havent heard a single thing about any of the choice's, and when you do make your pick and watch, you realise that its utter garbage. conan the barbarian, anyone ?
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so what you are saying: "Streaming in the end will become embody what broadcast TV is. Mindless watching :) full circle!
I feel like this video was a depressing indictment of our times
You could make this comment about every wisecrack video that has come out in the last like 3 years. It’s so well done and so interesting but goddamn does it always leave me depressed about the world.
This went from a video about low effort content....to some leftist brain rot about how watching netflix is capitalism oppressing us...instead of our poor behavior being simply a reflection of our own inner sloth.
@@arkology_city huh?
@@PeterZeeke Do you know what sloth is? The 7 deadly sins?
@@arkology_city yeah but your post that has disappeared, made no sense
bruh wtf Kumars Salehi was my instructor for a university writing class -- crazy to see him here. glad he's doing recognizable work!
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Great art is always being made. I actually think that the obssession for make so much content also gives voice to many different creators, as the companies want as much content as possible. The less restrictive nature of streaming, in comparison with TV, makes it a tailored way for some shows to get greenlit in a way that in the past it wouldn't be possible.
Of course, streaming is far from utopia. But I think it's better than the pre-streaming era.
I would like to point out the irony that some of the Best Shows released on Streaming services in the last few years in my opinion all only released 1-2 episodes a week. Arcane and Obi-Wan chief among them
Content is based on culture writers arent writing stuff in a vacuum absent of the society they live in.
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true to form on this one, wisecrack back in black, good job team
Thanks Ryan!