#someone making their own post where they upload my stuff. and it's always the floral self portraits so let's say it's a post with all those

[sergle]

I'm thinking abt that pretty fall leaves embroidery pattern post and about how like... it is categorically a repost, it's a reupload. right? a thing that is generally disliked. but because it's credited, it's genuinely boosting the artist in question. and it could ALWAYS be like this. reposting content could ALWAYS be a symbiotic relationship, but because sourcing back to the original creator of something is so uncommon, it's just easier to ask people not to repost it at all. and people still don't understand the difference. or they'll go to the effort of cropping out usernames/signatures to repost something, which is More Effort than literally crediting the creator of something you liked enough to want to repost. Like. I literally don't actually care if my own shit gets reposted, you have to understand. I just don't want it STOLEN. But "do not repost" is easier to write on my art than "you can repost this, but don't alter the image/remove my signature, don't you dare write 'credit goes to the artist' because that is not credit, please link back to my original post or someplace that you can actually find me. please use an actual link/url instead of writing a non-clickable link of my username, because making it text instead of a clickable link cuts the number of people who will go to the effort of visiting my own page in Half." All those aggregate themed accounts, those fuckin annoying as hell instagrams and facebook groups that are like "body positive art we love wamen 💕 hashtag feminism" and then MASS-STEAL plus sized art created by women, if pages like these that always go and steal my older self-portraits and other works... If they just put a link to my prints of those pieces in the text of those posts, or, fuck, my commission info page? I would literally be living on the moon right now. I would have a house on the moon

[crimsonrosee]

Hey Emma!! I hope you’ve been well, I love that new coloring of yours :3 your style is quite unique and glittery sparkles I love it haha ^^ I am just checking up because I saw some concerning/worrysome things happening. First, though me saying sorry won’t fix someone else’s mistakes, I’m so sorry to hear what’s been going on with the hate anon. When there are people like that it’s quite hard not to fall into a loop of overthinking and starting to wonder if maybe they are right about everything. But in the end it’s amazing to see you stand strong against them because they are truly wasting their time here on earth judging and not even giving good criticism! Second is about the note situation and how it’s definitely discouraging especially during the time that is the like to reblog ratio on tumblr right now. Times are definitely changing with an influx of users that don’t know how tumblr works but at this point one has to be grateful for whatever they can get right? Lmao. You are so talented and have such great ideas that I only wish the note problem wouldn’t get to you as much. Sure following has a role to play in this and since you started off a little over a year ago I’m sure you have a nice small community (no bad intentions behind saying that I’m just guessing since your blog is still fairly new and you’re still getting used to tumblr)

What I’m trying to get across is this. I’ve been here for 10 years and even to this day I have such a bad habit of eyeing my activity and sometimes it does get to me “why doesn’t this post that I worked super hard on have hardly any attraction? Why doesn’t anyone love it as much as I do?” I suggest not to worry much about how much notes a posts gets and to just love and admire your piece and say to yourself that you did a good job. That you worked hard on that and it’s okay. Whatever you make, never compare to others because that’s where bad habits start to form as well which can possibly lead to trying to steal the style of whoever is successful and just do what they do. Always be unique, and start trying to rid yourself of that habit and I’m positive that it would shift your way of thinking and using the site.

I mean no ill intent with this message And only mean good. Trust me I know how hard it can be to get rid of a bad habit but if you just start, 1% is better than 0%. I believe in your bright and fruitful future doing and making work carefree of the eyes of others. And Ill always wish you nothing but the best Emma. Do what you want, when you want, however you want. And as always if you ever need help or more advice my door will always be open 🤍🤍🤍 oh and it doesn’t matter if you respond to this privately or not, your choice! ^^

AWWWW ALYSSA BESTIE MY EYES ARE FILLED WITH TEARS! THANK YOU SWEETHEART! MWAH ଘ(੭´꒳`)°* ੈ‧₊˚

i know ive been feeling gloomy whenever i use this app. Since i have only 1 year experience of using tumblr, it saddens me how my creations are not being recognised. Last year, when i uploaded my works, with no self reblog id end up having 1k notes. This year i thought my creations improved way better but I can't attest that ;(

I stress a lot creating stuff but when i see my creations are being ignored by many ppl it hurts me deep core. And yes i will always work with my own floral styles! Since i love using flowers & sparkles everywhere! 🌺✨ Even if it's girlish but its my vibe. I wish i created tumblr years ago so i wouldn't have to feel ignored this way ˚‧º·(˚ ˃̣̣̥᷄⌓˂̣̣̥᷅ )‧º·˚

Thank you for ur kind & sweet words alyssa! You didn't have to type long message for me but im ecstatic you care abt my feelings! I LOVE YOU SM! have a fantastic day! ♡︎♡︎

[a-bit-too-much-of-a-zelda-fan]

LinkedUniverse Fanfiction Ch. 15: Painting the Town

Stop! You’ve Violated the Law!

So, you’ve stumbled upon this original post for my Linked Universe fanfiction. That’s okay, it happens to everyone. As of March 2021, I’ve uploaded the entirety of this fanfic to my Archive of Our Own page. Along with finally giving the story a name–Oops! All Links: A Linked Universe Story–I made substantial edits to some of the chapters. These range from minor stylistic revisions to fixing a gaping plot hole that kinda completely broke the character conflict in the earlier chapters. I also renamed and renumbered (but not reordered) the chapters. Specifically, this is now Chapter 17: To Sell a Butterfly (Pendant).

The AO3 iterations of these chapters are the definitive versions. So, if you would like to read this fanfiction, please do so on AO3, right here. With this embedded link. Hehe. Geddit? Link?

Note: My screen name on AO3 is FrancisDuFresne. Yes, that is me. I am not plagiarizing myself.

Anyway, for posterity’s sake, the rest of the original post is below the cut.

It’s finally here! Wow! ... If you thought the long wait would end with a chapter the scale of “Fire,” you’ll be sorely disappointed. Sorry, folks. Still, now we finally get to see more of Selggog and the Links’ quest. When we’re talking my fan narrative, what can beat the hijinx of the Heroes of Wind and Twilight? Word Count: 1576

“So why’d you come with me, instead?” Wind asked.

Twilight looked down to his friend and shrugged. “I didn’t want to sit around waiting for Wild to find weapons he liked. Potion shopping beats that, at least.”

Wind glanced upward at passing shop signs as they walked down one of Selggog’s many busy streets. The others sent them to resupply on potions. Hyrule had finished the last of their stock following their skirmish with the Hinox. The two of them had been searching for an apothecary for the past half hour.

The elder of them sighed. “We should ask someone.”

“Where’s the fun in that, though?” Wind countered. He was jovially bouncing about on the balls of his feet with each step. “Having absolutely no idea where you’re going makes it a little adventure!”

“Aren’t we already on an adventure?”

Wind frowned. He clasped his hands behind his head and looked up. White, fluffy clouds dotted the otherwise clear sky. “Yeah, I guess,” he said somewhat dejectedly. Then, more chipper than before, “Well, it can be a side quest. How about that?”

“’Side quest?’ Kind of a silly name for it.”

“Yeah? Well… I like it.”

Twilight let out a bark of laughter. “Maybe it’ll stick.”

Some passersby knocked shoulders with the Links as the streets became busier. “Ack!” Wind grunted. “You know,” he called out to someone ahead who had rammed into him, “wouldn’t kill you to say sorry!”

“Shhh,” Twilight hushed sharply. “We don’t want—“ he was cut off by someone bashing his shoulder—"unneeded attention.”

Wind rubbed his shoulder and looked up to his friend. “You think they’re always this in a rush?”

“Dunno. I’m not used to city life.”

“Yeah,” Wind said. He thought back to Windfall Island, which he used to think of as a metropolis. “Gotta say this place is a bit bigger than I’m used to.”

Twilight patted his pockets. Satisfied everything was where it should be, he glanced at his partner. “Just make sure no one filches anything. You have your wallet, right?”

With a pffft, Wind checked his own pockets over. “Of course I d—”

A pause. “Wind?” Twilight asked. He stopped walking.

The youngest hero looked up at his friend with a sheepish smile. He raised his arms in a guilty sort of half-shrug. “Wind,” Twilight said slowly, “Don’t tell me you—”

“Yep.”

“By Ordona…” he cursed, smacking his forehead. He thought that over. Why did I just hurt myself? I didn’t do anything wrong. He promptly smacked Wind on the back of the head.

“Ow! What the heck?”

“What did we tell you?!”

“To watch out for pickpockets…” Wind admitted with his head hung, kicking at a pebble on the road.

“And did you?!”

Wind looked up.  His wide eyes seemed to burn with anger Twilight had never seen. “No, Twi!” he shouted back. “I didn’t! So can you stop yelling at me and making me feel like crap so we can go find it?!”

Twilight was about to fire back, then paused. For all Wind had been through, he was still just a kid. He sighed and looked around. Some people had stopped and were staring at them. “Well?” he called out to them.

They shrugged and went back to bustling down the street on their errands. When Twilight turned back to his friend, he found him breathing deeply with his eyes closed. “Hey,” he began, “I didn’t mean t—”

“Stop,” Wind interrupted. He opened his eyes and met Twilight’s gaze. “Just because I’m cheery most of the time,” he whispered. Twilight could barely hear him. “That doesn’t mean I don’t have feelings like everybody else.”

“I—”

“Just remember that.”

Twilight had never seen the youngest Link upset enough to yell. He really had struck a nerve. “Okay,” he said. “I will.”

Wind’s expression softened. “Thank you. Now let’s find my wallet. What’re we gonna do?”

“I would suggest we ask Sky to borrow the Master Sword for its dowsing ability.” He considered this. “But even if it was willing to help, there are so many wallets in this town that it probably couldn’t pick yours out of the crowd.”

A thought struck Wind. “What about your wolf sense?”

Twilight looked around. The streets were packed with people going about their business. He remembered how the residents of Castle Town reacted to seeing his beastly form. “No. I don’t want to scare all these people.”

“Fair,” Wind replied. “But what else can we do?”

“Uh…” he muttered, wracking his brains. “I… I don’t know.”

Wind’s jolted to attention as if shocked by a yellow ChuChu. The sudden movement made his partner flinch. “What if I just earn back all the money that was stolen?” Wind suggested, thrusting his arms down, palms up, as if pointing out something totally obvious.

Twilight’s brow furrowed. “That might actually work…” he admitted pensively. “How much was in there?”

Silence. Well, at least between the two heroes. The townspeople were loud and rowdy as ever. “Um…” Wind said, clearly stalling. “Not too much.”

“Don’t dick around with me. How much?”

“About two-fifty?”

“That’s a lot of smashed pots,” Twilight joked, raising an eyebrow and crossing his arms. “How do you plan on earning that much?”

The young seafarer dug in his pouch and pulled out a necklace. “I’ve got some treasures I can sell. How many people here would buy a chintzy necklace with a butterfly pendant?”

“With this many people, hopefully at least a couple.”

“How much should we charge?”

“How many do you have?”

“Seven.”

Twilight nodded. “Anything else?”

Wind shook his head. “Some trinkets, feathers, a lot of junk.”

“Right. Well, let’s get started.”

“Hoi!” Wind called out to the crowd. “Beautiful butterfly necklaces here! Twenty-five rupees apiece!”

No one walked over to them. The crowds just kept moving by. Undeterred, Wind repeated his sales call even louder. This turned some heads, but nobody came. He tried once more. The second-floor shutters of a nearby building slammed open. A disheveled old man in a sleeping cap poked his head out. “Quit yer yapping!” he shouted down to the Links. “People are trying to sleep!”

The two heroes glanced at each other, paused a moment, then shrugged in unison. Wind hooked his thumbs on his belt and shifted his weight to one leg. “Guess that’s out the window,” he said.

Twilight let out a frustrated sigh. If he had just been more careful, we’d have potions by now, he thought bitterly. No, stay focused. We need to figure this o—

“Oh!” Wind exclaimed, again startling his friend. “Let’s find a shop that will buy some of my stuff!”

“Uh, I’m pretty sure most shops won’t buy off strangers. They’re trying to sell their junk, not buy yours. Think how fast they’d go bankrupt.”

Wind shook his head. “No no no, I mean a treasure teller! Someone who deals in treasures. There was one on one of the islands I sailed to. I’m sure there’s one around here.”

“Alright,” Twilight said, “how are we gonna find one? Search every street? That didn’t quite work for the apothecary.”

“Look for a sign with a rupee on it,” Wind replied, scanning the street for such a sign. “There’s gotta be one aro—OH! Look!”

Wind pointed out to the building directly across the street from them. Sure enough, the storefront had a multitude of rupees painted all over it. Twilight sighed in relief. “That was easier than expected.”

“I wouldn’t get too excited. We have no idea what they’ll offer for my stuff. These guys can be fickle.”

“Right.”

The two heroes crossed the street and entered the store. The walls were covered in a bizarre wallpaper filled with celestial bodies and distorted floral patterns. The shelves immediately drew their eyes. Treasures and spoils lined the perimeter of the store. Everything from golden statuettes to fine china to jewelry to precious stones rested upon the shelves. A beaded curtain hung in the doorway between the store and some back room.

While Wind marveled over the treasures, Twilight strode to the ornately-decorated counter. It was adorned with an equally beautiful silver bell. He gently tapped its button. A soft, pleasing ding rang out. No one came after a few seconds, so he rang it again, a little harder this time. He strained to hear any movement in the back room but was left wanting.

By now, Wind had refocused and walked up beside his friend. They glanced at each other. A look of confusion and mild annoyance passed between their eyes. Wind shrugged. “Hello?” he called slightly louder than the second bell ring. Nothing.

“Oh, come on,” he grumbled with a huff. He hooked his thumbs in his belt again. “Maybe no one is here?”

Twilight shook his head. “With this kind of merchandise, the door would have been locked tight.”

“So why the heck is no one coming?”

“Your guess is as good as mine.”

“Alright, here goes,” Wind said with resignation lacing his voice. He cupped his hands over his mouth. “Hoi!” he yelled. “Is anybody here?!”

Nothing. The hairs on the back of Twilight’s neck stood on end. His eyes narrowed. Honing his wolf senses had carried over somewhat to his Hylian form. Something didn’t sit right with him. “Quiet down. This doesn’t feel right.”

Just then, a drawling whisper came from directly behind the young heroes. “No need to be afraid, dearies…”

[shawn-does-stuff]

Shawn Mendes: ‘I’m 20. I want to have fun’

by Michael Cragg

Shawn Mendes is the red-hot poster boy of pop. His videos have been viewed 6bn times and he has more than 42m followers on Instagram. But don’t worry if you haven’t heard of him… just ask a teenager

Shawn Mendes is standing in his underpants in a suite on the fifth floor of a London hotel as a 200-strong crowd of screaming teenage girls gathers outside. “Everyone who doesn’t need to be in the room, leave the room,” he says politely but firmly, in a soft Canadian drawl. Pop’s current poster boy should be used to causing a stir. His #MyCalvins campaign (following in the footsteps of Justin Bieber in 2016) broke the internet earlier this year, inching the 20-year-old teen phenomenon – three US chart-topping albums, 30m monthly listeners on Spotify, more than 6bn video views – closer to tabloid supremacy and global domination.

At the Brit Awards that night, Mendes will cringe as presenter Jack Whitehall ribs him about “suspicious packages”, so it’s curious to hear him describe the Calvin Klein opportunity – and the subsequent results pored over by his 42m Instagram followers – as “a goal of mine at the top of 2018. As much as it’s a stepping stone for me to play a stadium, it’s a huge moment for me to step in front of a camera and take my shirt off. I don’t see one being less meaningful than the other.”

The air is thick with earnestness as we sit down for lunch in the hotel restaurant. I blurt out a question about whether he had to wear extra padding. “No,” he says, eyebrow raised. “They’re really good underwear.” Did they send you some free ones? “Yeah, I have boxes of them at home.” He lifts up the bottom edge of his T-shirt and pulls at the waistband of his underwear before quickly pulling his shirt back down. You’re not wearing them today are you? “Not right now,” he says sheepishly. “I should be.”

Mendes’s boy-next-door appeal and laser-guided ambition feels rather wholesome, with his sensitive, heart-on-sleeve pop-rock bops such as 2015’s UK chart-topper Stitches, positioning him as perfect boyfriend material in pop’s all important fantasy world. If Bieber is the unknowable loose cannon, then Mendes is pop’s picture-perfect head boy. But it’s clear that exposing himself so literally has its downside. “The last 48 hours have been so consuming, just reading what people are saying about me [on social media],” he sighs. Do you have to read it? “No, but there’s something about being human that makes you. I’m scared of social media and how much it affects me,” he continues. “It’s literally become infused with who I am.”

Last October he apologised to his 21m Twitter followers, claiming he was worried that what he was posting wasn’t meaningful enough. “For the first time I realised how many people are listening,” he says. He now monitors how often he goes online and tries to take regular breaks, using meditation to relax. “I don’t think of myself as conceited, but I definitely spend a lot of time reading about myself,” he says.

Mendes famously has three daily rules – going to the gym, two vocal lessons and never saying no to a selfie with a fan. He’s managed the first two so far and “took about 200 selfies yesterday”. Despite this, his rise has chimed with a shift in the upper echelons of pop – its recent exponents being anti-pop stars Adele, Ed Sheeran and (with her goofy dancing style and eternal quest for relatability) Taylor Swift, who’s now a friend. Even One Direction – whose blend of teen-orientated, guitar-led pop paved the way for Mendes – always felt like they were trying to play down the pop star element.

“The more open the world is getting, the more people are craving real,” he says. “I don’t think people want to see a made-up person. [In the past] there’s been a lot of dressing up, and I still think that stuff is amazing – like I’ll wear a sleeveless top – but at the end of it, when it comes down to you, I think it’s about being authentic.” For all this talk of authenticity and being like everyone else, I tell him, you’re also a pop star begging people to look at you. Do you have to believe your own hype? “Of course,” he says, his eyes darting over my shoulder to the mirrored wall behind. “You have to. If you wake up every day and say, ‘I’m OK,’ you’re going to just be that. If you wake up everyday and look at yourself in the mirror and say, ‘I’m great, let’s go sell out that stadium,’ then you will.”

You could say he’s been in motivational training for a while now, having started out as a 14-year-old YouTube star, uploading acoustic covers of songs (Bieber, among others), before switching to the now defunct social media platform Vine. He taught himself to play the guitar via YouTube tutorials at home in the small town of Pickering, Ontario, while one of his first public performances was in a plaza in Portugal where his family – mum Karen, a British estate agent, dad Manny, a Portuguese businessman, and younger sister Aaliyah – were holidaying. While his parents were shopping, Mendes hopped up next to a statue and belted out a Bruno Mars song. “I was sweating and I thought, ‘Dude, if you want to be a singer, you’ve got to at least be able to stand on this statue and sing,’” he says of that moment.

Where was that pressure coming from? “It was from myself, which is pretty much a big statement on my personality at 14 years old.”

While he says he loved school, his early fame – after signing to Island Records his debut single, Life of the Party, was released when he was just 15 – meant he was bullied. “People were cruel at first,” he says, clearing his throat and fiddling with the rim of a cup of green tea. “They just thought it was so stupid.” He’d skip school every Friday to attend influencer events in which social media stars met fans who already assumed they were friends. “I was taking 1,500 selfies a night,” he laughs. “You quickly learn that what you love to do is a job, but I don’t resent what I do. I don’t hate taking selfies.”

Success was rapid, with his third single Stitches breaking the US top five and peaking at number one in the UK. That same year he supported Swift on her 1989 stadium tour. How did he cope? “This life is more real to me than anything,” he says. “If I were to walk down the street and no one recognised me, I’d feel something was wrong. When I was really young [fame] morphed who I was. If it was to become normal, it would feel un-normal to me.”

From the outside, I say, the other recent pop artists who can relate to that are Britney Spears or Bieber, people who have had issues with growing up in the spotlight. “A couple of times I’ve worried about that, too, but outside of all this I live a really normal life,” he says slowly. “You have to make an effort to carry your own bags, drive your own car and not be afraid of the public. I don’t blame people at all who stay inside. I understand how it could be terrifying to go to a restaurant and eat because you’re scared someone’s going to take a photo of you.”

Is that more intrusive than a selfie? “I’ve been so lucky that fans have been taking photos of me eating since I was 15, so I’m a little bit numb to it,” he says, his tone rarely deviating from preternaturally calm. There’s probably an Instagram account called Shawn Mendes Eating, I joke (I check later and while there’s no account, there is a hashtag to follow). Can it feel as if he’s being watched? “I’m inherently [aware of] that all the time.” If it ever gets too much, he leaves rather than making a scene. Are you a people-pleaser, I ask? “Yeah, is that bad?” he smiles. “It can lead to failure, but if I fail trying to please everyone, then that’s OK.”

Mendes spends a lot of time contemplating people’s perceptions of him. Last year he publicly criticised a Rolling Stone cover story, expressing his regret that “the positive side of a story doesn’t always get fully told”. I assume it’s because the piece mentioned his penchant for smoking weed, a detail that had upset some fans. “That didn’t bother me,” he smiles. “Actually, I was happy about that because maybe it’s OK for them to understand that weed’s not a big deal.” He says he hasn’t smoked in three months.

Another part of the story focused on rumours about his sexuality. “For me it’s hurtful,” he says. “I get mad when people assume things about me because I imagine the people who don’t have the support system I have and how that must affect them.” (In late 2017 he posted an emotional Snapchat story: “First of all, I’m not gay. Second of all, it shouldn’t make a difference if I was or wasn’t.”) He sighs and says: “That was why I was so angry, and you can see I still get riled up, because I don’t think people understand that when you come at me about something that’s stupid you hurt so many other people. They might not be speaking, but they’re listening.”

He says the reason he criticised the article was over a small detail in which he mentioned Dua Lipa and her boyfriend, and how amazing it looked to be in love. “It made me seem so creepy,” he says. “If anything, the article made me realise your career isn’t over if people think you’re not perfect.” You could see how the creepy singleton tag might irk him, and also why it might stick – a lot of Mendes’s biggest singles play on the idea of him as the emotionally needy bloke who gets messed around and comes back for more.

Are you bored of being The Nice Guy? He splutters, clears his throat and sits bolt upright. “Yeah, I am! It sounds so stupid – to be a nice person is the best thing in the world – but, yeah, I’m 20 and I just want to have fun. What I don’t want to do is live the rest of my life thinking, ‘I wouldn’t do that because I’m known as Prince Charming.’ The second that someone corners you into a personality, you don’t want to be that person any more.”

Two weeks later, Mendes is onstage in Amsterdam. In keeping with the floral artwork for his recent self-titled album, a 50ft rose snakes up to the ceiling from the so-called B-stage where he’ll later serenade the throngs of teenage fans and nodding dads with a handful of ballads. Replica light-up roses (€20 a pop at the merch stand) bob about in the dark as Mendes runs through a hugely entertaining, PG-13 simulacrum of a rock show to ear-bleeding screams (“God I’m so old,” a woman sitting behind me yells as she surveys the crowd).

Keen to further align himself with the pantheon of rock’s smiliest exponents, tonight Mendes segues from a cover of Coldplay’s big-hearted anthem Fix You into his own, the Kings of Leon-esque In My Blood, a song that surprised fans by touching on depression. Tonight it’s transformed – with the help of a ticker tape explosion – into something close to catharsis.

“There’s nothing like being on stage – you feel like Superman!” he’d said earlier, claiming it to be better than sex or any high. “My goal now is to enjoy what I do more and more because otherwise it doesn’t fucking matter. I used to think it was all about the crowd, but I have to be happy within myself.” As he takes his millionth selfie, his face radiating pure elation, you believe he might be.

Shawn Mendes plays London O2 on 16, 17 and 19 April

Fashion editor Helen Seamons; grooming by Anna Thompson using Bobbi Brown and Monat; lighting by Michael Furlonger and Tilly Pearson; digital operator John Munro; fashion assistant Penny Chan; shot at 12th Knot, seacontainerslondon.com

[shirlleycoyle]

What It’s Like When Your Tiny YouTube Channel Suddenly Goes Viral

Trying to go viral on YouTube is a bit like closing your eyes and throwing a basketball at the hoop – except the hoop is three miles away and there’s a 60mph wind. It’s not impossible, it’s just not very likely. Many are happy with a couple of views, while others stop uploading when they fail to "make it." So, what happens when your channel suddenly blows up years later and you find yourself in the spotlight?

Ian Nicholls, 58, from London is a YouTube veteran but you probably haven’t heard of him. He started his channel IDMproductionsteam back in 2007 and spent four years making comedy sketches, editing himself into popular British shows like The Bill or Coronation Street for a laugh.

His nephews liked the videos which were doing well online and he became a bit of a name down the local pub, but he stopped uploading in 2011 when life got in the way. Then in 2018, something strange started happening. 

“It just seemed to shoot up overnight with the views,” Nicholls said. “I can't really say how it started to get popular.” 

With his YouTube days long behind him, Nicholls was unware a video he’d made over a decade ago had just been shared on r/deepintoyoutube. The subreddit, which now has 1.5 million followers, highlights videos from the past 15 years which may have been underappreciated. “My nephew says to me, ‘Oh god there's lots of people watching now’,” Nicholls said. “It was lovely to see.” 

This belated fame found its way into Nicholls’s offline life; he’d walk into a room and spot people watching his videos or hear them quoting one of his sketch lines. “I can be somewhere, someone's house or a pub, and somebody is actually watching me, which can be a bit strange,” he said. “You don't expect it, to walk into a pub and there's me on the big TV.”

Excited by the new wave of attention, Nicholls hopes to make his return to YouTube. “It's nice feeling immortal and ever popular,” he said. “I'm still there, ain't I? At the end of the day, I'll always be there.”

James from Scotland has spent the last seven years uploading thousands of beer reviews to YouTube—or “BeerTube” as he calls it—a niche pocket of the internet where he sips from a pint and talks about things like “floral hops” for 20 minutes. With no fancy editing and no desire for fame, James has slowly built his channel RampantLionReviews for a very specific community, so he was baffled when his comment section erupted in May this year.

“I was on my day off, and then I just got like, boom, boom, boom, lots of comments saying 'reddit, reddit, reddit' and I was like, what?” he said. “I honestly don't know why it got so many likes. I mean, I'm basically just an idiot who talks about beer.”

James reacted to the situation as any Beertuber would, by drinking more beer and continuing his regular uploads. He said he was never really into posting videos for the views but will use the spotlight to keep his glass full. James hopes to build “a beer mule network” and pay his new subscribers from around the world to send him some of their regional beer.

“One of the really cool things about craft beer is that it’s so local, but at the same time for somebody like me who likes trying stuff from all over the place it’s a pain in the arse because you can’t get things,” he said. 

Malcolm Ramos, 24, from Seattle had very different plans for his channel Maximum Malcolm. He wanted attention, but from one individual specifically. In March 2017 he told the internet he would, “…make a video of myself doing a Tim Allen grunt every day until Tim Allen recognizes me and does a grunt of his own.” 

He kept this up for over a year but heard nothing from Tim. Then, in 2018, Malcolm’s video took off on Reddit. “I was excited,” he said. “That was one of the first places it got any attention.”

Uploading the grunts and reading the comments from his new following became one of the highlights of his day, and Malcolm said the attention was a huge help in getting him closer to glory. “Some subscribers who followed me because of that continued to check in all the way until the end,” he said.

After 1,000 uploads his efforts were validated when Tim Allen appeared on ‘Jimmy Kimmel Live’ and addressed Malcolm with his signature grunt. Malcolm says he’s now done with the daily uploads and wants to make things whenever inspiration strikes. 

Despite his recent success he remains realistic about the longevity of internet acclaim. “I think it’s just really hard to get popular on YouTube these days; the market seems pretty locked down,” he says. “I can see that being a bummer for a lot of people.”

But you never know, your upload today could be the next big thing in a decade. 

What It’s Like When Your Tiny YouTube Channel Suddenly Goes Viral syndicated from https://triviaqaweb.wordpress.com/feed/