Steam Powered Giraffe: Honeybee And Other Songs

I am always looking for new music and interesting content on Youtube all the time and I think this video called Honeybee by the group Steam Powered Giraffe certainly foots the bill. This particular video was uploaded by SpineRaptor, which is the Youtube channel for "Spine", the guitarist for the group. When I found this song the channel had only 950 subscribers (a travesty!) but in the week since I first heard it his subs have grown to over 1,300. I wouldn't be the least surprised to see his subscribers increase to 5K, 10K or beyond. You really should give this song in particular a listen.

Your first reaction might be "What is going on with the makeup and robot moves?" Well, first LISTEN to the song - great harmonies. The band is called Steam Powered Giraffe and the 3 guys are supposed to be robots (automatons actually) that were "built in the 1890s" by a Colonel Walter. They are known as "The Spine" (or just Spine), "Rabbit" (the main singer in the above video) and "The Jon". There once was a female member of the group called "Upgrade" but she left in 2011 when the remaining members decided to focus more on the music.

From what I have been able to tell, they honed their skills doing a little busking at the San Diego Zoo and there are dozens of Youtube videos showing them interacting as well as performing songs and skits. Also there are several videos showing the troupe performing before larger groups that you might want to check out. The song Honeybee is available on itunes as is their first alum called Album One.Also here are a couple more of the group's songs (also available on itunes) called Brass Goggles and Me And My Baby.

The group is made up of twin brothers Chris (Rabbit) and David Michael Bennett (Spine) and Jon Sprague (The Jon). Also there is their trusty humans, Michael Phillip Reed (on a variety of instruments), Sam Luke and Steve Negrete. The group has a website that you can find out more information called steampoweredgiraffe.com which has a lot more info about the band and tour dates. And they will be in Dearborn, Michigan towards the end of May 2012 in support of the new album called The 2¢ Show.

Wall Street Journal Claims Ray William Johnson Makes "Over A Million Dollars A Year"

Recently, the Wall Street Journal published an article (by Emily Glazer) called Who Is RayWJ? YouTube's Top Star. In the article, RWJ is described as "a foul-mouthed performer working on his own to carve out a very lucrative business". Ray? Foul mouthed? The article goes on to say that he makes about a million dollars a year from various Youtube channels, selling t-shirts and all the other stuff he has available.

According to the what Ray said to the WSJ in an exchange of emails (because he refuses to do in-person interviews) is that Youtube is "a hobby". Well Ray, we all have hobbies, but not to many that pay a cool $1,000,000 per year. Now I obviously don't have access to what Ray William Johnson makes just from Youtube but there are websites that are kind of accurate in projecting what those who are making money actually make. Personally, I don't care what Ray makes and I don't think it really is my business, but there are others who are deeply interested. Maybe I should make a video saying "How Much Does Ray William Johnson Make A Year Off Youtube?" or one of the other top youtubers. There are some already on the website, but I wouldn't bother watching them.

Obviously, I would suggest you read the Wall Street Journal article and watch the two videos below and make up your own mind about it. The link to the article is above and below will be Ray's response on his Equals 3 channel and the video showing Glazer discussing him with Gwendolyn Bounds (which Ray includes in his video below). Ray's video starts off like most of his others but about half way through he starts talking about the Wall Street Journal story.

You'll notice Ray sort of dismisses the whole "he makes one million dollars" part and says he has all these other people he has to pay and in the article he talks about animation costs for his MyFavoriteMartian channel and other associated costs. There's really no way of telling exactly what Ray makes each year, unless you're his accountant, but even Ray probably can't give you an exact figure because it likely fluctuates all the time. But - I think he is probably very comfortable as far as money is concerned.

Next is the interview Glazer had with Gwendolyn Bounds which I thought was interesting. Both seem to have an outsider's view of what goes on with Youtube partners and calling Ray William Johnson a "recent phenomenon" when his main channel became the most subscribed on the website mid-2011 as well as all the success he has received leading up to that moment seems a little short-sighted. It's like both were discussing "those crazy kids and the Youtube" which is kind played out.

One thing I noticed was that they said that if content creators had two or three million views, they received anywhere from $2,000 to $9,000. That is a point they should have clarified a bit more because there is a misconception that Youtube Partners are paid according to the number of views their videos receive. Like all in the Adsense program, getting money depends on the clicks on advertising and very little on the simple display of those ads.

New Youtube Partnership With Only 17 Subs, Wait, What?!

Just found out that this brand new Youtube channel named Jackinum has been accepted into the Youtube Partnership Program. The channel currently has a grand total of 17 subscribers and 2 videos posted onto the channel.

I took a look at the videos posted and it looks like so far he has posted just a couple, one of which is a gaming video and the first is him telling everyone that the channel is now in the Partnership Program. I've never seen another channel that had been accepted so quickly with next to no videos and such a low number of subscribers. Jack mentions he had applied for partnership on a different channel but had been declined but this one had been accepted fairly quickly. He says he had adsense enabled on his other account. Also, there's an annotation on the video about some troll site telling their visitors to thumbs down the video. I don't know what site he's talking about, but it's not Bradshaw's Blog. No nefarious activity here. I'm just surprised to see a channel get partnered so quickly within meeting the usual reasons for consideration for Youtube partnership.

Sxephil DeFranco In The News Again

"Sexy Phil, he's not sexy, sexy Phil he's S-X-E..." How many of you remember that little tune from back when Philip DeFranco was known as "Sxephil"?

His channel was one of the first that I subscribed to and I still check out his latest videos almost as soon as they shown up in my inbox on Youtube. Well, Phil was just featured in yet another newspaper article titled: YouTube’s Phil DeFranco building an empire in the San Francisco Chronicle (that link will take you to the online article) and they discuss DeFranco's latest venture on Youtube called SourceFed as well as his beginnings on the website. They also cover how he sees this latest venture progressing and what may be in store for him and his various channels in the future.

SourceFed now has 244,820 subscribers and will probably break the 250K mark by the time you are reading this. So far, most of SourceFed's videos have featured three main hosts, Joe, Lee and Elliott (along with Phil of course) and a Saturday show called Curb Cash with Kevin Brueck. In the article Phil mentions that in the next month or so they will be working a few more people into the mix which should be interesting to see, although I like what I've seen so far from Elliott, Joe and Lee. They usually have two of them on each video discussing a current event and each seems to bring different strengths and perspectives to what is being discussed.

One of their most recent videos is shown below where Elliott and Joe talk about the contest being run by Maxim magazine called Maxim's 2012 Hot 100 List (that's a link where you can vote for your favorite beautiful woman) and they talk about some of the past winners and who is in the running this year.

What I liked about this video is that the guys are pushing SourceFed's Lee Newton's name for inclusion in the contest as a "write-in" candidate because there were so many comments saying that Lee should have been included in two other lists mentioned in videos posted on the channel about the Top 99 Most DESIRABLE WOMEN of 2012 (over 300K views) and The 99 Hottest FICTIONAL WOMEN of 2012 (about 250K views). So they mentioned that, hey, if you guys think Lee is hot you might want to go to the website (at the link above) and cast a vote for Lee Newton. And the website crashed because of too much traffic. That is awesome. Obviously it is impossible to say it was because of the sudden influx of SourceFed viewers but that is possible. A new Youtube channel creating so much traffic it crashed a website for a huge magazine? That's publicity you can't buy and shows why more and more old school media types are taking notice of what's going on with Youtube and other Internet stuff.

Like I said. I've been following DeFranco for some time, and writing a little about him and others in the Youtube world on Bradshaw's Blog for a while now and I'm impressed with what he has been able to cobble together after starting out with just a camera, a Youtube channel and his own slant on the news and what interests himself and those who subscribed to him. You may not agree with everything that comes out of his mouth but you have to agree he is someone to watch.

The Hillywood Show's Breaking Dawn Parody

I've just seen this video uploaded by JckSparrow, which is the channel for "The Hillywood Show" created by Hilly and Hannah Hindi. Take a quick look and let me know what you think about their parody of the storyline from Twilight.

Personally, I avoid all things "Twilight-related" but I had to watch this because I liked what they did in their Harry Potter Friday Parody. Still, I'm not going to watch the Twilight films and oddly I still know the basic plotlines and characters in those movies so the New Moon parody does make sense to me and many fans of the vampire franchise will love it. Have to give a thumbs up to Hilly Hindi who looked pretty convincing as Bella. The video has already had over 522K views in the 3 days it has been available and it will no doubt hit the one million views mark fairly soon. Hopefully they will also release behind the scenes and "the making of" type videos of the Harry Potter video which were interesting to watch.

Swiftkaratechop And thegr8stever Discuss Swifty's Youtuber Video

I spotted these videos making the rounds and thought it would be a good idea to share it with those of you who might have read the Bradshaw's Blog post I wrote called Swiftkaratechop And The Youtuber Interaction Downgrade about Swifty's video. For better context, you might want to take a look at his video to fully understand what both guys are talking about in their videos.

So, after watching swiftkaratechop's video called "Youtuber", another youtuber decided he needed to respond to what he felt were the criticisms raised by Swifty. His name is thegr8stever and I haven't been following him although he is now on my radar. He has 33,411 subscribers which is, according to him, "a small youtuber" especially when compared to Swifty's much larger following on the website. Actually, let's let thegr8stever speak for himself. He posted the following video and then Swifty responded with one of his own and then another from thegr8stever. Just make sure you open your ears to what he is saying because he does have a good message.

According to thegr8stever, Swifty seems to think that Youtube has indeed changed and drifted away from its strong roots as a social networking website and embraced the business module with a slackening of the interaction of individual youtubers as most of the larger channels are pursuing the almighty dollar at the expense of those who got them into the position they are now enjoying. He also mentions the fact that Youtube has allowed him to meet tons of new people, unlike other so-called social networking sites such as Facebook, in a meaningful way. That is actually a good point. I would have to agree that Youtube does offer a glimpse into the lives of people I would otherwise never have the chance to interact with if not for the website's social aspect. He also mentions those who "just comment" and do not post videos which strikes home with myself because although I have been active on Youtube for several years, I have limited myself to simply posting comments and not posting actual videos of myself and I am sure that describes the vast majority of people who actually use the site.

There are many, many people who do Youtube videos because they WANT to. I really enjoyed this part of the video because it is actually a very optimistic view of what being a youtuber is and I think this is the view that was held by many several years ago. There is a whole group of youtubers who heap lots of criticism on many who post videos that they describe as "only for the money" and for trying to "game the system" in order to get further ahead and they do raise valid concerns. There are some who will do almost ANYTHING in order to garner a slice of Youtube fame and those who do blatantly try to cheat the system should be called out for the practice. There are of course many others who don't follow these practices and hopefully you can be counted on to be in that group.

Next is Swifty's response. He also raises many interesting points and praises Youtube as an avenue for potentially "making a living" and enjoying a degree of popularity as well as expressing oneself.

One point he mentioned was that he thought people should "make videos to make videos" and use the platform to actually talk to other people. Nothing wrong with that in the slightest. Youtube is a great way to become aware of other like-minded people and hear the views of others that you may disagree with and that encourages you own personal growth. What Swifty has a problem with is that in his opinion, Youtube is moving away from the old model, where they would promote those individuals who simply speak to others in a vlog format about stuff that matters to them that they discuss with their viewers and the opportunity to be paid to upload their opinions is disappearing.

One thing he mentions is that there is no way to "discover" an unknown person with a huge Youtube star (such as Ray William Johnson) giving them a shout out. But I "discovered" an "unknown youtuber" (at least to myself) named thegr8stever who I thought "Hey, this guy has some interesting ideas". Maybe I wouldn't have noticed him if he hadn't posted a video response to Swifty's original video and maybe YOU wouldn't have noticed him if you hadn't stumbled across this post on my blog, so maybe there actually is some remnant of the old Youtube still alive. I for one certainly hope so.

Another thing he talks about is that he feels Youtube is sort of pushing away those who vlog or post using old school cameras etc and to me, maybe that opens the door to another website more dedicated to promoting this type of content. There is a lot of room on the Interwebs and if that type of content is not what finds its audience on the website it will find its audience elsewhere. Maybe not under the banner of Youtube, but if Youtube is moving away from its roots, maybe another market will emerge.

Or there will be those like me, who blog about those outside the Top 100 Most Subscribed Youtube Channels. There are already lots of others who seem preoccupied with who is in or around the Top 100 (like TheWillofDC for example) while I for one do not believe simple popularity or total number of subscribers a person or channel has should be the sole prerequisite for being considered a quality content provider.

But enough of me blathering on, let's take a look at thegr8stever's response to Swifty's most recent video.

I liked thegr8stever's latest salvo about this and I think he is highly optimistic about the future going forward with Youtube. It may be because he is relatively much newer than Swifty to the Youtube partnership program and is seeing his subscriber base climbing. He is in his words "a small youtuber" which only 33K subscribers. Looking at my own Youtube channel with my 37 subscribers, I'm tiny just in comparison to thegr8stever, let alone Swifty, but then again I haven't posted any videos of my own - not that I won't ever. Perhaps it's because my subscriber base is so small that it seems that the sky's the limit that contributes to my optimism, but I am by nature a highly optimistic person.

Do I think I have what it takes to reach the heights of thegr8stever's sub total or even Swifty's? I have no idea. I should try, and as far as you're concerned you should try as well. Don't you think you owe it to yourself to at least try and succeed or fail?

Noir Clone And The Craig With A Wig Trilogy

Just in case you haven't seen all three of the Wheezy Waiter videos explaining the mysterious case of the missing Craig With A Wig from Wheezy's kitchen, here is the trilogy which also introduces "Noir Clone", an intrepid flatfoot or maybe a detective version of himself, prowling the gritty black and white streets of Chicago. In case you don't know about Wheezy Waiter and his clones, the story is partially explained in the first video called:

The Wigged Man

This video introduces the newest clone, who I dubbed "Noir Clone" in the comments section of the video although others named him that too. And he starts off as a regular clone but becomes suspicious of the absence of Craig With A Wig. In case you don't know who HE is, that was another character inhabiting the Wheezy apartment who glumly sat at the kitchen table and spouted off about everything he hated - then turned to the camera with a pained smile while you heard "He's Craigity-Craig! Craig with a wig!" This character (I always thought he was a clone experiment that had gone horribly wrong) was shown almost from the beginning of the Wheezy Waiter videos. But now the game is afoot. Where did Craig with a wig disappear to and why did he leave behind his wig? Watch parts 2 and 3 of the videos and all will be explained, well maybe not everything...

Tick Tock

Bingo! Our suspicions were correct! Craig with a wig was a downcast Craig all along and it took Noir Clone to bring this to light. My thoughts revolved around Craig having a hot new girlfriend it turned out it was just the clock that triggered Craig to turn into Craig with a wig.

The Wig Sleep

Then it turned out that it wasn't just the clock, but his new chair (by the way that's an awesome new couch) which "beckoned slumber like booze to Snooki". Then it looks like Noir Clone is going to leap into the alligator pit to meet his maker (actually I guess if Craig cloned him he already has "met his maker", but I digress) when he notices the wig sitting forlornly on the table and puts it on. After Wheezy retrieves his missing alarm clock we see Noir Clone sitting at the table in his own personal hell. Forever relegated to impersonating Craig with a wig.

Will this be the end for Noir Clone? Or will we only see him periodically as Craig with a wig? Only time will tell. All I know is that I enjoyed this bit of film making from Craig and hope to see more.

TYT Armwrestling: Cenk Uygur Vs Lucas "The Hammer" Lilieholm

I usually watch the Youtube channel Cenk Uygur and The Young Turks because of their different slant on the news and politics in general but I do occasionally watch their sports sub-channel called tytsports because like most guys I'm a sports guy. Here is something a little unexpected. Cenk takes on Lucas Lilieholm, a producer for the show in an epic arm wrestling match. Who do you think will win?

Obviously the smart money would be on Cenk in this matchup but Lucas does pretty good. It looks like Jayar (you see him in the background after the bout) is likely to be the overall favorite and eventual grand champion, but I see a dark horse in this race. I don't know about you but Ana "Mighty Mite" Kasparian just could be the spoiler. It looks like there will be more of these posted on the tytsports channel along with other sports-related news so you might want to see who eventually comes out on top.

Swiftkaratechop And The Youtuber Interaction Downgrade

This video by swiftkaratechop (aka Matthew Brown) is a little surprising. Swifty's channel is not one I am usually subbed to, so it wouldn't ordinarily come to my attention so quickly unless someone emailed it to me or mentioned it on Twitter or elsewhere but one of the people I am subbed to (the lovely LenaDanya a talented artist who does fun videos on YT by the way) liked and commented on Swifty's video so it showed up in my own Youtube stream. I thought I would check it out and thought you should do the same.

Swifty raises some interesting points about how the old Youtube community has begun to drift away and that there seems to a more pronounced culture that is more focused on uploading videos simply to make more and more money on the website with less interaction with those who are viewing the stuff being posted. This I wholeheartedly agree with and decided to share his video with those who happen to stumble across this blog.

I happen to be one of the wretched unwashed on Youtube, one of those who has been a longtime viewer and commentator across hundreds of videos who has never taken the time to upload anything personally. Why? I didn't think I had anything to really add, visually to the website even though I think what I have to say might be interesting to some. Yes, I'm not one of the pretty people on the website (not that I was born absolutely fugly and then hit in the face with a scoop shovel for good measure), but I think I have more of a radio-friendly (or blog-friendly) mug. What I am saying is that I do intend to begin uploading videos of myself shortly because I want to experience that aspect of the website and maybe this video by Swifty will be one of those kicks in the pants I need to actually add some content on Youtube. But enough about me - what about this video?

I have been aware of the swiftkaratechop channel on Youtube, but dismissed it quite a while ago, along with others that I found to be a little too juvenile, and painful to watch. Let's face it, I thought I was just not the demographic that Swifty was posting videos for. That shouldn't be read as some kind of a slight towards Swifty in any way because his channel does have a substantial number of subs and viewers - his main channel currently has 457K-plus subscribers and his videos have had over 43 million views so there is definitely a group who likes his stuff. But, this video was not expected. I do share his opinion that the Youtube community has changed quite a bit although there are still some youtubers who do actually interact with their viewers in a meaningful way. He mentions several that I am subscribed to in the description box of the video that I do notice actually talk to their viewers.
One glaring exception is of course Ray William Johnson who is currently the most subscribed channel on Youtube. Ray does talk to his "forum" or viewership during each video but beyond that he doesn't seem to interact at all with his audience. Actually after a while he closes the comment section on each video which makes commenting on his videos essentially pointless because all the comments are deleted. Now I don't have any insight into Ray William Johnson's personal or business finances, although I have read that he claimed to make a million dollars a year from his activities related to the website. But good for him and hopefully he does "give back" to the world in some way. Personally I have drifted away from watching every "Equals 3" video that gets posted because I just don't find it very funny anymore and like many, I also have a bit of a problem with his practice of using the videos of others and making a ton of cash without the original poster getting any real credit or views. Some might say that's the same thing I'm doing here, except that when someone watches a video on Bradshaw's Blog, the original uploader (like Swifty in this case) does get the views AND gets any advertising revenue, which is as it should be. I can sleep well at night.

But what is your opinion about Swifty's video? Do you agree with the points he raises? Lately I have been mulling over taking a more active role in the Youtube community and this video is food for thought from an unexpected direction and if he continues posting thought-provoking videos I may have to rethink subbing to him. There are some (tons actually) of channels that I avoid because they are painful to watch because they pander to a very low denominator of viewer and some of them are in the top 100 or 200 most subscribed channels but it is my opinion that simply because a channel or anything else in this world is "popular" does not necessarily mean that what they post can be described as "good" or of high quality. This particular video is very good and raises questions about where Youtube is headed and where it came from.

So... What Do You Think About SourceFed?

Like many, I've been watching SourceFed and so far I like what I have been seeing. The channel features Elliott (on Twitter as @elliottcmorgan), Lee (@leenewtonsays), and Joe (@joebereta) as well as Kevin (but he's not in this video). Also, some guy named Phil something... Here is their first video since the channel really kicked off replying to comments from viewers. Hopefully this will continue.

First, Philip DeFranco does steal the show with his cameo, but I did laugh at Lee's "real voice" where she sounds oddly like the girls' gym teacher from my old high school (but that's another story for another time). I liked that they answered real comments left by viewers - both good and bad. There are lots of comments about Lee being pretty, hot etc., and yes, she is easy on the eyes, but more importantly, she is also funny. The other two, Joe & Elliott have their moments too and I think this will be a successful channel if they can keep up the pace. I like the currently top rated comment: "Can u wear a bikini next time thanks", which received the following reply: "Absolutely - Elliott".

Just in case you haven't seen any of their other videos from "20 Minutes Or Less" where they upload a short video about what news stories have caught their attention that day, here's one with Lee & Joe discussing "Movie speech stolen by Politician".

These are of course, just a few of the videos uploaded to SourceFed, and there is a humorous video where Lee drops in on iJustine called One on One: iJustine and Lee Sittin in a Tree and IJ seems a little ill at ease with Lee and her suspected "girl crush" on her. Still it is interesting to watch.

The SourceFed channel continues getting lots of new subscribers and since the channel launched January 23rd it has gone from having 103K subscribers to the current total of 221,745 so I guess that would be a fairly successful first week. It will probably continue accumulating even more subs as more youtubers stumble across the channel and we will see if they can continue putting out interesting stuff.

The Return Of Ferris Beuller?

Does this the mean the return of Ferris Beuller is in the air for 2012?

Actor Matthew Broderick brought the colorful Beuller to life why back in 1986 with Ferris Beuller's Day Off and fans of the movie have been clamoring for Broderick to bring him back once more and maybe, just maybe, there is something happening. The date at the end of this short clip is 2.5.12 which is February 5, 2012 - the same day that the New England Patriots meet up with the New York Giants for Super Bowl 46. Will Abe Froman, the Sausage King of Chicago, put in another appearance? And what about poor old Ed Rooney, Ferris' vice-principal? If they are planning on having Rooney's character try to thwart Beuller's plans on attending the Super Bowl they have to have Rooney try to stop him.

The Vlogbrothers Get A Small Hotel Room Upgrade

Like many who are subscribed to the vlogbrothers, Hank and John Green, I like seeing their videos when they are both in them but also individually. This one I found particularly appealing and funny as John starts out describing their loss of a hotel room...

This video is a bit shorter than most of their other Youtube videos but I was smiling all the way through. I'm pretty sure I would have the same reaction as John and Hank upon discovering that they had somehow been lodged in such stellar quarters. Just an amazing room. I loved the part where Hank is holding the Picasso print and John mentions that he is probably the first person to hold both a Picasso as well as a can of Pringles chips and Hank immediately exclaims "First!"

Just in case you don't know why the brothers are on the road for their "Tour De Nerdfighters" which is currently crossing the U.S. (with stops in Canada) in support of John Green's latest bestselling book called The Fault in Our Stars that you can grab off Amazon. Many fans of the vlogbrothers have already bought the book and are raving about it and it did hit numero uno on the bestseller list. I'd also like to point out that the song playing in the video is called "A Song about Anglerfish" and is one of Hank Green's songs which are available at their website dftba.com. If you don't know what "DFTBA" stands for is "Don't Forget To Be Awesome" but if you are already a fan of them you know that.

One thing I would like to state is that I think that Hank Green should be given the nickname "The Green Panther" if he does plan on embarking on a career as an art thief.

Hank Green aka The Green Panther declares "FIRST!".

Also, John Green did a video called "John Green's Message to Canadians" that was posted around the same time where he discusses a previous visit to Windsor in Ontario Canada and his latest book, that you might have missed. He also mentions that nerdfighters in Canada are, naturally, awesome. I would say that many Canadian fans would love to have both John and Hank stop by and eventually I'm sure they will.

Wil Wheaton Talks About SOPA, PIPA With The Young Turks

Recently the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) was stopped in it's tracks by a general outpouring of distaste for the legislation from the people and companies across the Internet who felt that the act was too far reaching and draconian in its scope. Many voiced the concern that it was a naked attempt by the entertainment industry to flex it's muscles and could be used to cripple or stifle perceived competition for the more traditional distributors of information, entertainment and content. Actor Wil Wheaton was interviewed by Cenk Uygur on The Young Turks and Wheaton discusses the problems he sees with the legislation.

Wheaton is of course familiar to many from several movies and his role on the television series Star Trek: The Next Generation as well as more recently as "evil Wil Wheaton" on The Big Bang Theory but he is also a very good blogger in his own right at wilwheaton.tumblr.com.

I was interested in the points he made when talking with Uygur from his personal point of view concerning being one who does create his own work and wanting to protect that work which of course makes perfect sense. He makes a great point when discussing how one writer seemed to couch the debate as "you are either for artists' intellectual property rights, or you are against SOPA/PIPA" when the problems run much deeper than that. Personally I see (and definitely agree) that the work of people and companies that create this work must be protected but not by allowing a small group a vested interest in protecting themselves by being able to snuff out the work of others that is seen as encroaching on their turf. The problem with SOPA was that it potentially would allow one or more of the largest media companies to simply remove their much smaller competition if they felt that was in their best interest by dismissing them from the Internet without real due process.

More importantly, what do you think about SOPA and Wheaton's remarks? I've been following him for quite a while on Twitter (he can be found at @wilw) and except for a misguided allegiance to the Los Angeles Kings he does always tweet interesting stuff and has almost 2 million followers. You can also find him on Youtube at wilwheaton.

Philip DeFranco Gets New Office Digs And Launching Sourcefed Jan 23rd

First, here's a little SourceFed which is a new channel that Philip DeFranco started a while back but now it looks like it will be coming online in about a week (January 23rd to be exact). That link will take you to it on Youtube where 103K others, including me, have already subbed, There were 77K subbed the day before the video below came out.

Do you think this new channel will go anywhere? This new channel along with other stuff, necessitated a move to a larger studio and Phil takes us on a quick tour.

New Home For The Philip DeFranco Show

That's quite the office you have there Mr DeFranco! Good to see that you have Matty roped off from the general public and staff. Maybe get his door so it locks from the outside and leave him in there with just his computer and a motion sensor that yells "Get Back To Work!!" whenever he walks to the door. Hmmm, the secret Sourcefed set? Would have liked a peek in there.

But Phil, about that spare room - I'm callin' dibs. I see that as my own little office and... no? Okay. Like just about anyone else I would say ballpit or something similar. You could always make it like a room that other youtubers could use to film their own stuff, almost like a tiny recording studio (not music because that would be too loud). Maybe they could rent it out for a day or two here and there, maybe another small source of moola for the company and you and your crew might find "the next Youtube Star!" from a group of several out-of-town vloggers. Don't know if that's a good idea or not but it's an idea nonetheless. And the next video is Phil getting ready for the move.

Big Changes In Store

This is actually Phil's last video from his home office although I wouldn't be suprised to see a video or three shot there sometime in the future. When DeFranco and company left he old studio he moved everyone into his house and you see his editor Matty hard at work. Phil also mentions another of his projects called SourceFed which will be up January 23, 2012. The tag line for the channel is "Your only source for news" and there is one short video up so far but expect a lot of content by the time the 23rd rolls around. What kind of content? Hard to say. I don't think it will be stuff about Lyndsay "I'll Be Buried Me In A Y-Shaped Coffin" Lohan or just other celebs but I'll definitely be keeping an eye on the channel.

Along with this move to a much larger studio and the unveiling of Sourcefed Philip DeFranco has been pretty busy for the last few months. He has been posting videos to both of his larger channels like The Vloggity and his main channel The Philip DeFranco Show (which recently topped 2,000,000 subscribers). If you aren't following him on Youtube, last October Phil and his girlfriend Linz did a tour of Europe and posted videos from different countries with a big bash in Ireland where he met lots of subscribers and then posted an hour and twelve minute video of the gathering.

Anyway, looking at the first video it seems Phil and his minions have tons of space to fill but I'm predicting that in a year or so he'll been looking for an even larger workspace to house his people and all the projects they are working on. And remember, he started all this with just himself in front of a camera not too long ago.

Subscriber Losses For Top Ten Youtubers

I just checked Youtube stats to see how the Top Ten Youtubers have fared with the potential loss of subscribers given the recent announcement that Youtube would be removing inactive and closed accounts from the total number of subscribers each channel has and it's not pretty.

The totals shown courtesy of Top 100 on VidStatsX, which if you go to their website you will find out how many subscribers the top 100 lost - although VidStatsX's numbers update daily.

Taking a quick look at the stats it looks like the channel that was hardest hit was machinima who lost close to 150,000 subscribers followed by RayWilliamJohnson who was hit with a loss of 138,629 as well as nigahiga who lost 125,169 subs. If you look at the Top 100 list everyone on it lost a portion of their subscriber base. I obviously don't know if your own channel has suffered a loss or not but the website does track the Top 2000 Youtube channel fairly accurately with the lowest listed having 63,500 subscribers. It does look like a LOT of Youtube channels have lost either a lot or a small fraction of their subscribers so you might want to take a look if your own subs are over 63K.

CammehYaBams Vs ThatsoJack: Tempest In A Teapot

I just saw a number of videos that I have to shake my head about. One is from CammehYaBams called How Not To Rant With ThatsoJack And My Final Thoughts On That Vapid Community where he criticizes ThatsoJack content using logic (as well as some strong language). Apparently Jack somehow heard via Twitter that CammehYaBams was going to upload the following video and sent him a message saying to forget about it or he would be sorry.

This was followed by Jack's own reply and I would guess that Jack will probably remove the following video from Youtube shortly but below the video are some of his comments about the video. He obviously took offense to what CammehYaBams said in his video but rather than addressing them himself he simply instructed his almost 70,000 subscribers to go and dislike, flag and work to get CammehYaBams banned from Youtube.

Actually I just read that thatsojack made the video private, meaning that now it cannot be seen on Youtube but what he said in the video to his followers is reflected below.

LOL Hater

"...and I found there was this video about from this guy that alot of you probably know. He made this video about TCProductionsX and he is the biggest...um, I'm not even going to go into detail. Basically all I'm asking you guys to do is to go to the link below (he provides a link to the CammehYaBams' video about him) and dislike it, give it a thumbs down, and flag it for bullying, promoting hatred, any of the things that would be relevant." Um, a better idea would be to ask them to go to the video and WATCH it first before forming their own opinion about the content rather than just automatically hitting the dislike button and flooding the comments with negative comments.

He continues: "If you have multiple accounts do it on all of your accounts. He says really mean things... All I'm asking you guys to do is help me get this guy off the Internet... hope this guy knows he's in for a little "treat", so you guys can go and dislike and flag that and don't worry cause he messed with the wrong person."

As far as "cyber-bullying" goes, doesn't putting out a request for around 70K fans to use "all of your accounts" in order to "help me get this guy off the Internet" sound a little like cyber-bullying?

What followed was tons of negative comments with little logic, attacking CammehYaBams' looks, etc claiming he was bullying Jack by posting a video criticizing his content. Also, suddenly there are hundreds of dislikes on the video and a bunch of comments crowing "FLAGGED!" but little in the way of intelligent comments about what CammehYaBams had tried to point out about ThatSoJack's content.

One Youtuber posted the following video in defense of CammehYaBams' right to express his opinion. His name is Undertakerfreak1127 who is one of the youtubers who also criticizes what is poor Youtube content and those who try to game the system for financial gain. There is some strong language in this video but the points he makes are relevant.

Thatsojack2 Sends His Fanboys to Attack CammehYaBams After Calling HIM a Bully

If you watch the video from CammehYaBams, be sure to watch the video responses to it (including Jack's call to action) because there are lots of insightful comments in the responses made about this entire tempest in a teacup basically mentioning freedom of speech and opinion and advising Jack to grow up a bit and learn to take criticism rather than trying to turn any perceived slight into an Internet war.

My thoughts are that rather than try to call on all of his followers to attack the video and work to get someone banned for not liking whatever he posts onto a public website like Youtube maybe he would post a rebuttal addressing the criticisms in a truly mature manner.