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The Golden Age of Vlogbrothers

2020-10-07 (said on 2020-10-06 — implied: date said in the video; uploaded 1 day later) · letter vlog · John · 4:00 · watch on YouTube

Topic: Nerdfighteria (also: Internet & YouTube) · mode: Personal essay · tags: calendar ritual, community lore, self promotion

Recalling that 200 people put stuff on their heads for him in 2007, John explains why the brothers stopped chasing views: trending success brought vile comments and a shrinking sense of community; today's groups, collaborations and charity work make the present, for him, the golden age of Vlogbrothers.

What is said

The parts of the video and what is said in each (★ — how much it matters to the video).

00:00:00 — 2007 eye infection and the stuff-on-heads response: videos with an audience; Hank's recent video on not maximizing views

  • ★★ John recalls that 13 and a half years ago (March 2007) he was hospitalized for about a week with orbital cellulitis, a staph infection behind his eye. — 00:00:00
  • ★★★ To cheer John up, Hank asked viewers of their new YouTube videos to send pictures of themselves with something silly on their heads, before smartphones made that easy. — 00:00:00 · Hank Green, Stuff on Heads, YouTube
  • ★★ John says that at the time their videos got around 300 views, and about 200 people sent in pictures or videos of themselves with stuff on their heads. — 00:00:00 · Vlogbrothers

  • ★★★ John says he then realized they weren't making videos for an audience but with an audience. — 00:00:29 · Nerdfighteria, Vlogbrothers

    “We weren't making videos for an audience. We were making videos with an audience.”

  • ★★★ John notes Hank's recent video alluded to their decision a couple of years ago to stop maximizing views, which informed five months of titles from a 'not very good' 19-year-old pop song. — 00:00:29 · Hank Green, Vlogbrothers, YouTube

00:00:58 — Years on the trending page: growth metrics versus vile comments and a shrinking community

  • ★★ John says that for several years almost every Vlogbrothers video ended up on the trending page, introducing many new people to the channel and their other work. — 00:00:58 · Vlogbrothers, YouTube
  • ★★ John says seeing subscribers, views and other metrics rise is exciting, but as the internet shows again and again, what is easy to measure is not always what is important. — 00:00:58
  • ★★★ John says he always liked and was grateful to the audience, but a constant influx of vile comments made the comments less pleasant and, for him, decreased the sense of community. — 00:01:27
  • ★★★ John says it started to feel like their viewership was growing really fast while their community was actually shrinking. — 00:01:27

00:01:56 — What John loves now: Tuesday videos, nerdfighter groups, circles, clues, the PIH project, kindness

  • ★★ John says Nerdfighteria did lots of cool things between 2014 and 2017, but honestly he enjoys it more these days. — 00:01:56 · Nerdfighteria
  • ★★ John loves making a video every Tuesday and seeing nerdfighter groups flourish from Facebook to Reddit to Discord. — 00:01:56 · Facebook, Reddit, Nerdfighteria
  • ★★ John loves seeing people draw circles in response to his circle drawings; a Pizzamas t-shirt is such a drawing, made by a nerdfighter named Kimmy. — 00:01:56 · Pizzamas
  • ★★ John loves nerdfighter collaborations such as programming a singamajig to sing All Star for Hank's birthday. — 00:02:26 · Hank Green
  • ★★ John also loves the solving of the little clues he comes up with each week that lead to a secret live show. — 00:02:26
  • ★★★ John says they are in one of their most ambitious projects yet: supporting PIH and Sierra Leone's Ministry of Health to staff, supply and build a maternal care center, a NICU and a new pediatric ward at Koidu Government Hospital. — 00:02:26 · Partners In Health, Koidu Government Hospital
  • ★★★ John says they raised more money for charity in the last 12 months than in any year of Nerdfighteria's history, by over a million dollars. — 00:02:55 · Nerdfighteria
  • ★★ John is encouraged by non-monetary efforts too, from people planning days of service together to kindness to strangers in comments in difficult times. — 00:02:55
  • ★★ John asks when the golden age was: March 2007, when over half their viewers joined the first community project, or May 2014, when the channel was perilously close to US pop culture. — 00:02:55 · Vlogbrothers

00:03:24 — For John the golden age is now; thanks; sign-off

  • ★★★ John says different viewers would name different golden ages, but for him it's now; he has needed this space in 2020 more than ever. — 00:03:24 · Vlogbrothers
  • ★★ John thanks viewers for being here and for working together to make community spaces from Reddit to the comments kind and generous. — 00:03:24 · Reddit
  • ★ Signing off, John says he almost said he'd see Hank on Friday, but he will see himself on Friday. (playful) — 00:03:53

In the description and comments

  • ★★ The description says the video contains a clue leading to an unlisted livestream, easier to solve with others in comments, the nerdfighters subreddit or Tuataria. — video description · Reddit
  • ★ Asked in comments where the mustache went, John says he shaved it because he couldn't go on like that. (playful) — creator comment

Threads in this video

Where the stories that moved here went next

Mentioned

Projects: Pizzamas · Stuff on Heads

Works: All Star

Organizations: Discord · Facebook · Koidu Government Hospital · Ministry of Health and Sanitation (Sierra Leone) · Partners In Health · Reddit · YouTube

Concepts: McNamara fallacy · neonatal intensive care unit · orbital cellulitis · sense of community

Products: Singamajigs · YouTube comments

Only in the description or credits: Kimmy (person, mentioned from 2020) · Tuataria

Replies to

Later videos replying to this one

  • 2020-10-09 · The Rax Guy (John) — continues — “immediately after I made a video about why we're not trying to maximize views on Vlogbrothers anymore” (00:00:29)

Part of an exchange of 5 videos, 2020-10-02 – 2020-10-09.