Framing is often key to escaping a hairy situation, chiefly if the person at the center of it is accused of a despicable act. Public relations exists to combat perception, and the moves are always changing. Maybe it’s a company taking out a full-page ad in The New York Times’ Sunday paper, or a billboard overlooking the 405 in Los Angeles. And sometimes those PR moves are high-profile documentaries that reframe an entire event using a medium known for dealing in “nonfiction.” In his latest vlog, controversial YouTube personality Logan Paul announced that he was working on a documentary about his mindset around the time that he entered the Aokighara forest in Japan and filmed the body of a man who had committed suicide. Public outcry over the incident prompted Paul’s team taking down the Aokigahara forest video hours after posting, and led to the video creator losing his premium partnership with YouTube, his YouTube Red series, and a wave of demonetized … [Read more...] about Logan Paul is the latest YouTube creator to use documentary for apology
T shirt creator
YouTube partners with Teespring to help creators sell official merchandise
Merchandise isn’t a new concept for YouTube creators, but the company is partnering with Teespring to help creators design and sell merchandise straight through YouTube. Creators with at least 10,000 subscribers can use the new service that YouTube is rolling out today. Essentially, if creators want to design a t-shirt that their fans can purchase, a shelf appears just below their videos with a variety of items that fans can choose to purchase. This means that instead of watching a vlogger plug their merchandise with a link every few seconds in their videos, the merchandise will appear directly on the page. This is part of YouTube’s new alternative monetization plan. Creators have sold a variety of merch for years, but this marks one of YouTube’s first foray’s into partnering with creators to help sell items. YouTube is a business, though, and that means the company will take a cut of the merchandise sold, much like Teespring. Rohit Dhawan, senior director of … [Read more...] about YouTube partners with Teespring to help creators sell official merchandise
Rick and Morty co-creator promises no more big gaps between seasons
Any Rick and Morty fan will tell you that the worst part of being a Rick and Morty fan is the long waiting period between seasons. The hiatus between Rick and Morty’s second and third season, for example, was more than 18 months. It’s a long time, and it can leave people feeling antsy over when the new episodes will hit Adult Swim. But that gap will shrink in size going forward, one of Rick and Morty’s co-creators, Justin Roiland, told Polygon, following a demo of his new PSVR game, Trover Saves the Universe. Part of that has to do with Adult Swim ordering 70 more Rick and Morty episodes, giving Roiland and his co-creator Dan Harmon a little more security to flesh out episodes and move production along. “We‘re super excited that, for the first time ever, we’re locked in, we know what the future is, we have job security,” Roiland said. ”Harmon is in great spirits, we have a great writer’s room. We want the episodes to stay good, … [Read more...] about Rick and Morty co-creator promises no more big gaps between seasons
Holy shirt, if you’ve finished watching The Good Place, we’ve got a lot to talk about
The problem with Netflix / NBC’s absurdly-addictive The Good Place is that you want to tell everyone to watch The Good Place – like, seriously, now – but can’t explain why. For the benefit of doubt: if you haven’t watched creator Mike Schur’s (of Parks and Recreation fame) sitcom: watch it now. All two seasons of it. Honestly, you won’t have much choice, and The Good Place is best watched – inhaled, even – with all the story in place. One GR+ team member watched all 13 shows of season one in an *evening*. Done that? All 26 episodes? Good. We’ve amassed all the best reads, philosophical nuggets, easter eggs, videos and secrets on ‘The best show you’re not watching’ (according to Collider) in one (very good) place below, and you can thank us this side of the afterlife. ***To be clear, there are some forking unbelievable spoilers below, so don’t be an ash-hole and ruin it for yourself. We’re … [Read more...] about Holy shirt, if you’ve finished watching The Good Place, we’ve got a lot to talk about
Apogee: Where Wolfenstein got its start
[This story originally ran on on Feb. 27, 2013. We’re republishing it today to provide background on the Wolfenstein franchise prior to the release of Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus .] In the late 1980s, a Texan twenty-something named Scott Miller created a business model that would change the way people bought and sold products across the world. Miller called his masterpiece the Apogee model. Everyone else called it shareware. It made digital sales on the internet stupendously profitable and Miller a millionaire. The model and the man would revolutionize how we use the internet — before most of the world knew what the internet was. Full-time nerds Young Scott Miller was sort of a loaf. In high school in the early 1980s, the nerdy teenager would escape the Texas sun by programming lengthy text adventures in the campus computer lab. Here he met fellow budding designer George Broussard, a teenage boy with a penchant for wearing shorts. The two boys bonded over a mutual … [Read more...] about Apogee: Where Wolfenstein got its start