It seems that, if I want to get the big traffic, I’m following the wrong tack completely. At least, that’s the lesson I’m taking away from from encounters with various YouTube channels that keep turning up on my YouTube homepage. As I’ve noted before, YouTube’s algorithm has some curious ideas as to what I want to see, as all manner of stuff apparently unrelated to what I’ve actually been watching turns up: animal videos, ‘fashion’/suspected softcore porn, boating and legal videos, to name but a few. Sometimes I end up clicking on the ‘Do Not Recommend This Channel in Future’ Option – most specifically when it started inserting Arsenal FC videos into my feed, (very offensive). Recently, I’ve noticed that some of the channels it persists with but that I simply ignore because they seem basically harmless, had started drifting away from their ostensible subject matter into the world of crackpot conspiracies. Now, as it is my policy not to give crackpots any publicity, I never name or link directly to their sites and social media. Which makes discussing this issue slightly difficult but I’ll give a brief description of two of the most prominent of these channels tending toward crackpottery.
The first belongs to a retired UK health professional whose channel originally simply provided professional guidance and health related information for those still practicing health care. He came to prominence during the pandemic, providing, at first, at least factual information on the Covid virus and how to deal with it. So, in some ways, the shift to conspiracy land isn’t quite as illogical as it might seem. After all, it really isn’t that big a jump to go from, providing health information to disseminating Covid conspiracy theories and Anti-Vaxxer misinformation. Because, having built an audience during the pandemic, how best to retain it when the crisis subsides than to try and tap into the online crazies demographic? Especially if you want not just to retain those new viewers but also ramp up the fan base further, which for a monetised site, of course, means a potential boost in revenues. It also gets you noticed by the rest of the Covid conspiracy nutters ‘community’ on YouTube and guest appearances in places like Russell Brand’s channel, (a Mecca for crackpots). This, in turn, drives yet more traffic. More than enough, in fact, to replace all the original, non-crazy, followers who will have been put off by the slide into conspiracy fantasies.
The second channel is very well known and involves a bloke who wanders around the UK, highlighting some of its lesser known sights and byways, with an emphasis on surviving examples of archaic architecture, infrastructure and the like. All pretty harmless – a bit like a twenty first century digital equivalent to Jack Hargreaves and Out of Town. But, of late he seems to have been making videos where he interviews ‘luminaries’ of such lunatic fringe groups as the ‘Freemen of the Land’ and their ilk. Now, the shift from making videos about exploring the lesser known bits of Britain and their history to endorsing the lunatic ‘Freemen of the Land’ movement might, on the face of it, seem a little radical. But, when you think about it, it is a logical extension of a form of conservatism that seeks to reject the modern world and its rules and regulations. Plus, the cynic in me can’t help but suspect, which other conspiracy demographic would be suitable to court as a potential new mass audience for this sort of channel? These are the sort of people who figuratively shake their fists at the modern world while declaring that it is all ‘political correctness gone mad’ and crying for a return to the ‘old ways’. The perfect audience, really, for a channel celebrating the rural, the forgotten and the archaic.
The fact is that while the conspiracy crackpots might be, in terms of the real world, be a pretty small demographic, online they’ve found a home – they can amplify their voices disproportionately through platforms like Twitter, Facebook and YouTube, creating a reach and awareness of their lunacies impossible in the pre-internet days. It isn’t so much that that they have been able to gain masses of new recruits, but rather that they are now aware of each others existence and can organise more easily. It also makes them a huge potential audience for those online creators hungry for clicks. Hence the number of these YouTubers now pandering to the conspiracists, even if that wasn’t their original audience. The way, of course, was paved by the likes of the aforementioned Brand, whose career as a stand up and actor seems to have stalled badly – when was the last time he was on mainstream TV, for instance – leaving him with his YouTube channel as his main outlet. How best to build his audience there – just extend his trademark ranty style into hardcore conspiracy crackpottery and get all those crackpot hits on his videos.
The sad fact is that there is a big potential audience out there for the sort of moronic gibberish these people put out, regardless of whether they are sincere about it or just cynical grifters – the crackpots can’t seem to differentiate the two. (Not that it makes any difference as to their motivation – it is all still dangerous disinformation). So, maybe I should stop taking the piss out of conspiracy fantasies (they aren’t ‘theories’ in any proper sense of the word) and start embracing them instead? After all, it isn’t as if I haven’t come up with a few myself, for satirical effect, here on The Sleaze. (Although, no matter how crazy I try to make them, I always end up finding something similar, but even more insane, already in circulation). Thankfully, though, I gave up chasing the easy clicks long ago – I’d rather put out stuff I actually believe in for an audience that shares my interest, even if they are small in number.
Doc Sleaze
