#hwyd

[overtymesimms]

Doing what I love thanks for the amazing interview #HowWasYourday #HWYD #eudaimoniatv (at Texas Medical Center) https://www.instagram.com/p/CoUCoy3uxif/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[ostensiblynone]

Watcher is getting into the podcast game with 2 pods Podcasts Info

source: [Ryan] posted Oct 7, 2023

[littlekingbergara]

Sometimes I feel like people put Shane & Ryan on a teensy tiny bit too much of a pedestal as their unproblematic “comfort” YTers and I fear if they ever do have a big mess up, there’s gonna be nuclear fallout - particularly on here 😭

yeah i agree i guess. they are held up pretty high but i also think they've earned that for the most part? they're always trying to make things right with us and i think part of that comes from us not being afraid to criticize them. but im sure if they do slip up in a bigger way some people will suddenly forget that nuance exists and that real people can't be perfect all the time.

but also people are allowed to see something they don't like and decide not to support anymore and they're allowed to talk about it even if they do it in an annoying way. and that's why the block button is my best friend and i think everyone should use it more.

[xyzmp3]

I am happy to say that after about a month I have watched every video on the Watcher channel

I feel like I am a true fan now

[mysterywheeze]

what a weekend, huh

I've refrained from using this blog to share my thoughts on the [gestures vaguely] situation for- well, for a few reasons. For one, I haven't been directly involved in the fandom for a while for personal reasons (I will reiterate that I am Mostly Fine). For two, until today we didn't have an official update on the matter. And for three, there's been A LOT of vitriol within the fanbase, so saying anything felt like stepping into a minefield.

Point three still stands. But what the hell? I've thrown my thoughts into worse rings.

My opinions on the whole fiasco can be summed up in four points.

ONE: Their initial plan was bad, and the way they announced it was even worse.

I don't think I have to explain why cutting off a large number of low-income and international fans is a shitty thing to do. That the initial treatment of Patreon fans was poor is, I think, similarly self-evident. And not just because we weren't initially given free access to the streaming platform; the abrupt cancellation of WW+ and early access screwed a lot of annual-membership patrons over.

We now have confirmation that Watcher needed a new revenue stream to stay operational, and that the team viewed this change as essentially a last resort to avoid layoffs or worse. We did not get this information in the "Goodbye YouTube" video. The Watcher team could have been upfront from the beginning, but they decided not to be. Instead they hyped up the announcement, even had a countdown, leading us to think that this was a sign of something good, when in reality it was a sign of something dire.

I hope we can all agree that more initial transparency would have significantly improved the audience reaction to the announcement.

TWO: The update/apology video was a good one.

They addressed why they made their decision, admitted to their fuck-up, and changed their plan. That's Owning Up To Your Mistakes 101. What we got was a compromise; they aren't scrapping the streaming service altogether, but they aren't abandoning fans who can't afford it altogether, either. And of course, they've told us that the streaming service is necessary for the survival of the company. Better late than never.

There's still a lot that they need to do before they can fully gain my trust. And I say gain, not regain, because this isn't the first time they've had a business fumble (NOTE: this is not about the HWYD incident). From Patreon rewards coming months late to factual errors in their educational shows, to what I strongly suspect is mismanagement of funds leading to their current financial troubles, they've always had flaws that ought to be addressed.

But it's a start. A good start at that.

THREE: Some fans reacted to the announcement (and to a lesser extent, to the update) in deeply inappropriate ways.

Look, I don't think you have to ~deeply adore~ Steven Lim to be a Watcher fan. I'll admit that, as a diehard Unsolved fan since 2017 who rarely watched Worth It before 2020, Steven's shows appealed to me less than Ryan and Shane's content did. The average viewcounts of Steven's shows compared to Ryan-n-Shane's shows indicates that my preferences are pretty common.

That being said, as someone who isn't particularly enthused about Steven content, I can appreciate the things he's done for Watcher and as a human being. He's always been the guy pushing hardest for Asian-American representation, as Grocery Run, Hidden Narratives, and especially his response to the 2021 tragedy in Atlanta, made very clear.

From years ago to just last week, he's said some poorly-worded and even insensitive things. He's a human. We're prone to doing that.

If you think that it's okay to insult him on a personal level over this weekend's fiasco, to drag up an old mistake he already publicly apologized for, or to make unfounded accusations about his moral character, you are solely mistaken and have some serious maturing to do. If you actually partook in any of those activities, I sincerely hope that you regret your actions and avoid repeating them. And if you're one of those people STILL trying to pin all the blame on Steven, or even calling for his resignation(?!?)... I don't know what to tell you. I really hope you become a kinder person soon.

This also goes for people who started getting personal with the other members of Team Watcher, or with their friends or loved ones outside the company. So what if Sara had an imperfect take? She's not responsible for Watcher's bad decision, and we shouldn't be dragging her into the discourse just because she's married to a guy who did a fuck-up.

And yeah, Shane did a fuck-up. It ain't cute to act like he's an innocent anti-capitalist baby being dragged into this mess by Steven. Same goes for people saying Ryan didn't play a part in this, but over the past few days I've seen way more support for Shane among conspiratorial fans than for Ryan. I'm not going to act like racial bias is the only factor at play here, clearly it's more complex than that, but making up conspiracies to protect your white fave while scapegoating the outspoken-against-racism Asian guy... it's not a good look. You have to realize that and evaluate your biases.

FOUR: The backlash to the backlash has become excessive and unhelpful.

I get it. When people are being dicks online, it's natural to speak out against it. And boy howdy, were some people being dicks this weekend. Emphasis on the some.

Yes, there's been a lot of mean-spirited, unconstructive hate sent Watcher's way over the past few days. There's also been an incredibly large volume of constructive criticism from all corners of the fandom. Some of it's been discussed between fans, some of it's been shared directly with Team Watcher. It doesn't stick in your mind as strongly as blatant hate does, but I can assure you, it's there.

And in the effort to defend Watcher against that hate, a lot of you have made it really hard for good-faith criticism to be heard.

Seriously, every time I see someone on the Wiscord politely criticize one of Watcher's decisions, they're immediately shut down by a fellow fan. Same thing happened to me in an unofficial fan server earlier today. My good-faith critique wasn't as important as the fact that some asshole could hypothetically make a similar argument in bad faith. Any attempt at a calm, reasoned discussion of Watcher's issues as a company gets drowned out with blind positivity.

Let me make my stance crystal clear: people are allowed to be upset about things that they aren't being forced at gunpoint to pay for. That's like, the the basis of media criticism. "You don't HAVE to pay for it so you shouldn't complain about it" is not an argument that should be taken seriously here on Al Gore's internet.

There's also been a lot of disingenuous use of the "don't you believe artists should get paid?" argument, because yes I do, and yes they have been getting paid. By thousands of people at once - far more supporters than most working artists receive in a lifetime. I personally have been supporting them financially since January of 2020, literally since day one. Watcher's situation evidently isn't ideal, but as far as independent creators go they're pretty darn privileged to have the following they have.

And if you think that Team Watcher has actually totally been doing the right thing all along, then you're wrong. The guys at Watcher themselves admitted that. If they really are the bastions of honesty you're convinced they are, you'll accept that. Above all, the changes they announced today are not proof that "the bullies won". If the bullies won, there would be no streaming service. What happened was a compromise, and the assholes in this fandom didn't want a compromise.

Look, I know you guys. I remember the old days, when we weren't afraid to provide feedback to Watcher when they fucked up, and over much smaller fumbles than this recent one. I know we've all put a lot of money and time into this company and the people behind it. The sunk-cost fallacy is a very powerful thing. But please don't let your hatred for bullies and love for the boys completely blind you to valid criticism. You can't entirely shield them from growing pains if what you want for them is real growth.

FIVE: This isn't a real point in the list I just had to separate my closing thoughts from the rest of the essay I accidentally wrote. Whoops.

The other day, I saw somebody (can't recall their handle, sorry) describe some fan reactions to Friday's announcement as "post-divorce honesty". It's far from the only comparison to a breakup I've seen. That phrase has been ringing in my head for a while now. Because this situation has made a lot of people reevaluate what they like about Watcher, why they became a fan in the first place, and if it's worth sticking around.

Watcher made a mistake. One that they could walk back but can't undo. Their reputation is never going to be the same as it was before. Likewise, a lot of fans said things that can't be taken back, and now that's tied to their reputation in our community. I can't blame anyone for feeling uneasy right now.

Hm. When I started writing this, I had an actual ending in mind. I don't know where that went.

Maybe that's the note I end this massive ramble on? Watcher's future is uncertain, the community's future is uncertain, so I'm uncertain about the last part of this post...? Agh. There's a reason why I'm more of a fiction writer than an essayist. It's getting late, I've got stuff to do tomorrow, and my browser's beginning to slow down from the sheer weight of my draft being open for so long.

Just... try to take it easy on each other, okay? It's been a hell of a week, and we haven't even finished Monday yet.

[cantofworms]

sanappa rubbing georges levg hwyd he dodthat

[franciswhetsel]

Obligatory Spotify Wrapped post. Also i'm willing to bet I listened to all of saddest pod, i know i listened to the first four episodes of mobbed up, and i probably listened to maybe 20 minutes of HWYD, and that is the entirety of my podcast listening lmao

[quintessential-candles]

HWYD IT TURN OFF MY SUBTITLES IMGONNAKMS

UHH SUMMON THE SUBTITLES BACK

[jihyoruri]

I JUST CAMS BACK FROMM MY FIRENDS BKSUE AND MY FRIEND SAID I GAVE MY OTHER FRIEND THE NASTIEST LOOK WBEN SHE SAID "ya" (she stole that fron me and jts not js the word its the way she said jt) AND THEN AFYER THAT INSTEAS KF SAYING YA I JS STARYED SAYING YEEHAW INSTEAD AND THEN THWY JS SAID "hwyd u become a cowboy" then i was like "RIDING ON MY HORSE" but i wqs singing it also my friends youmger sister was like constantly shouting and daying "play with meeeee" "lets play hairdresserrrr" and when we were actually gna plsy hairdresswr w her she js siddenly didnt want to and then my driwnf sais "you do not want to have sinlings teust me" like girl you dont know what i want if my sibli g was shouting at mr to llay with them i wld play woth them befor ethey even start shouting also my friene said that me and my other friend r do dtraighrorward woth children(the 'children' being her sister cus instwad of sayung 'no thank youuu!' or smth lilr that we js said 'no' (dw we were stoll nicd to her)) also when we ate we js kept soing mukbangs and then my friends younger sister asked me to dk a mukbang witb cucumbers and then i did and then i told my friend i was gna tell her a secret with thr cucumber still in my mputh then sje leaned in so i cld yrll her then i js bit the cucumber to do asmr then she alughed and then did it to my otehr ffienf and honestly yhis was more fun then my cousins house (alao my cousin called me a betrayer for going to my friends hosue like stfu i go to ur house every single thursday i can hsng out w other friends plus i js come most of the timr for my other cousin and she called me someone who makes plans then cancels last minute its one word in my lamguage but idk if theres a word for it in english and what that word is and i never even promised id come today i js said 'another day')

-🥊

THIS IS UR LONGEST ONE YET LMAOOOOOO

[vengefulatmosphere]

hwyd oes nobody fuckijng care

[420technoblazeit]

hwyd u give him a dumpy wtf. caked up. bubble butt fr

IS THAT CAS GOIGN TO SUPERHELL. FUCKED UP OF YOU

6/10 im a karkat expert he doestn look angry enough he hsould b frothing at the mouth here

alright fuckasses u know hte drill drawing. box time

[ostensiblynone]

Ryan: Okay, I'm gonna play a little game here, ‘cause I'm curious. Because I already know Steven’s — quick to jump the gun here. Steven: [laughs] Ryan: But, Shane, I'm gonna list out some times, and you tell me: acceptable or not acceptable to say, ‘I love you.’ Shane: Okay. Ryan: One day. Shane: No! Ryan: One week. Shane: No. Ryan: Two weeks. Shane: Absolutely not. Ryan: Three weeks? Shane: no Ryan: A month. Shane: [pause] No. Ryan: [wheezes] Steven: [softly] Wow. Ryan: A month and a half. Shane: Maybe. No. Ryan: Two months. Shane: Gettin’ there. Ryan: It's getting warmer. You see, this is — where it’s starting to get warmer for me, as well. Shane: Yeah. Ryan: Two and a half months. Shane: Maybe? No, no. Ryan: Three months? Shane: [nods] That feels like a good cut-off, yeah. Ryan: That feels good for me, too. Shane: That's — that's when we're — when we're starting to — to. Before that, you got — you're sittin’ on the side of the pool with your —with your toes in it. Um, and you're like ‘hmmm, maybe I'll go for a swim.’

Knowing When To Say I Love You • Here's What You Do Episode 6 May 25, 2020

[&] [&] [&]

[raindrop-drops]

"The secret to confidence is knowing that no one cares about you, at all. And if they do, then they probably like you and they don't care how confident you are. Life is just a big parade of embarrassments, so just keep on moving."

- Shane Madej, Here's What You Do (Flirting and Recognizing Signals, 4 May 20)

[cauldronofmorning]

currently feeling very soft for Shane saying he was far more quiet and reserved and a bit of a doormat at work before BFU happened, and he was able to be more himself and yell things like “fuck you goatman!”

[autistichalfblood]

👁 The Watcher Boys 👁

     ↳ Steven Lim

     ↳ Ryan Bergara

     ↳ Shane Madej