This is a issue I eventually wish to make a YouTube video on, but for now, I’ll just use it as an opportunity to post on my website. I have always had issues with what I perceived as internet panhandling, or e-begging. I have had issues with it ever since I started seeing the phenomenon online (so, from around 2006 onward). In a nutshell, my perception of e-begging has gone from pushing back, to ambivalence, to peering over the fence, and now back to pushing back (just not as hostile).
1: In the Beg-inning
Way back when, it was usually perpetrated by shady people who weren’t looking for ongoing money, but were more fishing for X dollars for Y reason. You know: “I need money to pay off a bill”, or “I need money to get this thing which will help me get work/make better videos”. I remember multiple “scams” being perpetrated on YouTube – a rigged laptop competition here, a “pay my rent” there. I took a very dim view of this behaviour & I made sure to leave my 2 cents whenever it reared its head. Yeah, I sure showed ’em, amirite?! Pfft.
Slowly, as the years rolled by & the issue wasn’t so widely vilified, an argument (for donating) that began gaining acceptance was that “artists” (which I guess video makers fall under) require “compensation for their work”. This is an argument that I understand, but ultimately disagree with. I think the main cut & thrust of the argument is: if people want to see a jump in quality, it requires more time/effort/materials, and the creator’s “paying occupation” would have to be reduced (or quit) – so pay up, or this can’t happen.
The thing is – and I hope you follow my logic here – this is a choice that the individual has made. I might decide to become a musician, overnight & without any prior training. It’s my life, and I can make that decision. A person can decide to do any number of things – it’s the beauty of having free will. Is this decision necessarily the right one for me to make? Is it feasible? Can I do it on my own? It might turn out somewhat feasible, but I would almost certainly need free money to fall into my lap in order to cover essentials, like food & shelter.
2: I has dreams – plz gib munays
I would basically be asking people this: “I have decided to do something, but I require your money, from now until I decide to stop putting my hand out, to do it”. Under any reasonable examination, this is e-begging. I have big dreams too, but I do not wish to burden people (who also have big dreams, I imagine) with financing them. Especially minors in the 8-18 age range, who should be saving their money for their *own* dreams, rather than giving it to strangers on the internet. And so, when I see internet personalities using their popularity/visibility to beg their young audience for $$$, it heats me up like a kettle. I consider it degenerate.
3: Appeals to emotion
“I can’t do maintain this level of <content> without your financial support”
“I have to make a choice – do what I love, which is making <content> for you guys, or continue working my day job & do this just as a hobby“
“I understand that you like this <content>, but it’s not worth it for me, without a financial incentive”
So, this all said, in recent years the practice of tipping on Twitch & the advent of Patreon meant that more & more “creators” were putting the hand out. In some instances, I saw amazing success & jumps in content quality. But not everyone was like this. For every dedicated streamer/Patreon user making great things happen, there were others that simply took money and ran. An example of this is Noah Antwiler (aka Spoony, TheSpoonyOne), who continues to receive hundreds of Patreon dollars every month, despite not increasing (or even maintaining) content creation on the internet.
4: From “I CBF”, to becoming a Twitch donator
People were familiar with the arguments for/against donating by this point (~2014). Giving money to strangers online was now ingrained in online culture. And so, I simply chose to ignore it. I know it happens, I have an opinion on it, nobody cares, so why bother decrying it any more? That all said, I eventually became interested in Twitch streaming. The YouTube Adpocalypse was in full swing & YouTube (for a short time) had tried to stop people linking to their Patreon pages (~2016?). Twitch seemed more viable to many, with far less ambiguity over whether or not their money was going to be messed with.
I was not interested in getting money; I was far more interested in the differences between live streaming & video making. I saw how “out-of-touch” with the issue I had become, and I was keen to learn the New Ways. But how? By becoming that which I had mocked? Couldn’t hurt; better to be a hypocrite than a permanent shrimp head. During the tail-end of 2016 & up until the middle of 2017, I supported several streamers and YouTubers (via Patreon). The reason I decided to do this was to figure out why people do this (and in increasingly large numbers).
5: Transactional interaction
Looking at Twitch alone, there is an immediacy to donating. I guess it was like the supposed “dopamine” hits one gets when receiving praise from others online (usually in the form of “likes” and reposts of personal content). I definitely understood, after a time, why people donate to streamers. You donate money, a message pops up on stream & you might even have the streamer talk about the donation/say your name/talk to you. Almost like a non-sexual phone sex hotline – transactional interaction. Most streamers are fundamentally decent & do not actively shake down their audience for money. Which is good, because the “product” (i.e. the stream) has little value outside of being a live participant. However, there were more than a few streamers who constantly hinted at ending streams early due to lack of donations.
As an aside, I often deride streaming for what it is: lazy content. Sure, there are ways to improve the overall quality, but in terms of replayability & longevity? Stand-alone video content will always beat out a stream, or a VOD (Video On Demand) of a past stream. As it should. You can turn on OBS, link it up with a Twitch channel, play a game, talk a little … and that’s basically it. Lazy!
6: Stop waffling!
I’m getting a little off topic, so let’s return to the theme. I subscribed to several Twitch channels & Patreon accounts, and after a while I noticed just how expensive this was turning out to be. Imagine you are a “typical” stream viewer – you are fiercely loyal to 2-3 streamers, and you like a few YouTubers (who have Patreon accounts). So you’ll sub to 3 Twitch channels ($5.99US per month), and give a tip here and there for other channels. On Patreon, you might pay at the lowest tiers (typically 1-2 dollars US). You add that up & it might not see like a lot of money as an adult, but to a young kid? Recall that the overwhelming viewer demographic on Twitch/YouTube are minors. Overwhelmingly. I’m not even counting stream donations, btw.
7: Somebody thinka the chillen!
So, you add up the above: $17.97 Twitch + ~$4 Patreon = ~$22US/mth. $22×12 = $264US/yr
This is not an insignificant amount of money for minors, especially if they come from a low socioeconomic background/country. What if they don’t work, but are using their pocket money? I very sincerely wish that donations were restricted to people over the age of 18. If you’re 18, you’re an adult who has the mental capacity to decide if supporting an online personality is something you’re comfortable doing. I don’t want kids to donate money that they should be spending on themselves, or within their IRL social circle.
Eventually, after almost a year of donating money to strangers (and getting fed up with one… and in general, I suppose), I did the math and decided that I prefer to keep my money. I made one permanent exception (because I consider this person a role model & friend), but I’ve severely curtained donating to online personalities. Fortunately I was never out of pocket. I’ll tell the story of that briefly.
8: Dem CS:GO skins, boi!
That’s right – I played CS:GO. I still do, occasionally (I only solo queue, though).
I had amassed a number of skins/cases over years of playing, and I felt that the time was right to cash out. Over the course of about 2 months, I sold 95% of my inventory, which ended up totaling a little under $2000US. Who knew buying Cobblestone souvenir cases would be a good investment 😛 The money that I used for this experiment was the profit from this little venture. It appears that I got out at the optimal time as well. The game hasn’t had a new operation for a long time, and Valve also changed rules regarding trading. This crippled the skin gambling economy and basically tanked the overall monetary value of CS:GO skins.
I actually still have a few interesting skins, but it felt kinda awesome getting my money back (& then some) just before Gaben’s sweedy hand crushed the value of CS:GO skins. So tl;dr I was playing with profit for over a year for this “experiment”.
9: Quid pro quo? Not really…
Upon reflection, I simply realised that I didn’t care much for the streams or other online content provided – rather, I enjoyed making a connection to the people I was donating to. “You’re just lonely, then”. No, I wasn’t. I do think I’m onto something; donators feel like they are helping out & feel valued. There is little doubt they are, too. At the end of the day, the end result is that your wallet is lighter, and theirs is heavier. Why? Because you gave your money willingly. Separate your feelings from the act & you will realise how insidious it all is, good intentions notwithstanding.
10: Donate to charity? No. Donate to streamer? Yes! (…huh?)
Think of this: many charities solicit people for donations; some small amount of money per month. Often, people will balk at the idea. Indeed, you feel some guilt saying “No,”/”Sorry,” and walking on. Especially when pension-aged people ask for donations for cancer, or disaster donations – you groan internally, thinking about how you’re a shitty person for not donating, and/or how it’s shitty for these people to ask for money when you’re not exactly flush with money. GAH!
That said, wouldn’t it be better for people to donate their Twitch/Patreon money to a charity, instead? Make a difference to those less fortunate? No. Most people won’t see it this way. They will justify it, don’t worry about that. Ultimately, it’s what it always has been – a personal choice.
11: A Personal Choice
And so, I end this long-winded post with that sentiment. I view online donations as e-begging, and that giving to online personalities is a personal choice. I feel comfortable with donating to one person (and no more), and while I don’t necessarily regret donating (a lot of) money for almost a year, I’ll never do it again. This was a path I needed to understand; I couldn’t simply be told. Now that I more intimately understand the phenomenon of online donations, I feel justified in my criticism of the act.
How does this all relate to me, personally? It costs money to keep a website up; to buy hosting. It costs my time & effort to create content. But I do it as an outlet. Personal expression, uncensored. I do not need donations from other people to continue doing something I genuinely enjoy. I will never ask for donations, not only because I have my pride as a man, but because I already get paid, working a job. I would never, ever want to do this as a full-time endeavour, not only because I would end up hating the things I like to dabble in, but because these are largely useless skills that are unlikely to secure me gainful employment if/when it turns to crap and I have to get an IRL job again, like a normie.
12: Soulful rant
Let’s be honest. For every PewDiePie, there’s millions of people that never had a shot of being anywhere near as popular online. For every senior newspaper journalist, there’s hundreds of unemployed “freelance” journalists. For every Steven Spielberg, there’s hundreds of failed film auteurs. I’m not telling you to throw your dreams in the trash can – I’m simply stating facts, and I do have a point to saying all this.
Why should anyone pay you anything, just for the privilege of “helping you” make content? How good are you at a particular thing to warrant asking for even a single dollar? In case you haven’t figured it out, people are unemployed, underemployed, debt-ridden, disabled, sick – you name it. Again, I ask sincerely: why are you asking strangers to finance your product/service? People eating out of garbage bins out here, man! Fuck you mean “$100 monthly Patreon tier”, man? What separates you from your peers? Give me a compelling argument – hell, be able to convince yourself, at the least.
13: Dreams
Me? I’ve never needed to beg for money (knock on wood). I’ve never given up on my dreams. Importantly, I’ve never needed other people to pay for my dreams. I work hard on my dreams. They form from my hopes, their shapes twist & change with circumstance. They always turn out different to what I imagined them to be. But that’s alright, because they are mine. I don’t need to beg for money to make them real – I make them real. Like I said before, it’s a personal choice whether or not to accept money from strangers. I understand why people do it. This website is an example of a dream I’ve had since I was first introduced to the Internet in 1999. I thought it was too difficult. Turns out it’s not half as hard as I thought. I had a dream to return to Japan; it has taken a long time, but I will be back before October. Do you need money from people to start working on your dreams?
tl;dr brap brap, see you next week, eatin’ the puddin’.
