MONDAY BLOG: BLEHH... and SAVE THE DATE

Barring a weird couple of days last month where I had a fever that disappeared as abruptly as it arrived, I’ve not been ill much this year. I was even thinking about this last week, which would seem to have been a matter of tempting fate, because I now have Covid.

Were it not for needing to keep my mum safe – not to mention the rest of her nursing home – I wouldn’t bother testing anymore. Plus, it’s just curiosity; this is clearly not a cold, and having a positive test also allows me to be believed when I say I feel wretched! You know: because men exaggerate apparently. Man flu and all that. We have a reputation.

I don’t actually know if this is my third or fourth bout. I know Sanja’s had it at least one time when I somehow didn’t get it. And I know that my first bout was absolute hell – right back in the early days of the pandemic – and that my second bout was pretty nothing. Just felt a tad under the weather that time. So, maybe this is only the third time.

Doesn’t really matter.

This one is somewhere between the others. It’s way worse than a cold, but not as bad as the utter ghastliness of original recipe Covid. Sore throat, snotty, sneezing, cough, no energy, brain fog, and – up until yesterday evening – someone was smashing bricks together inside my brain. That last part at least has passed today, and I’m back to feeling somewhat clear-headed.

Oh! And I had a chicken kiev for dinner last night and couldn’t taste it. ‘Tis a cruel virus.

Is there anyone left who hasn’t had it? I was listening to a podcast the other day, and they mentioned how we’re still in the pandemic. It hasn’t stopped or gone anywhere, we just all collectively decided to try and get back to normal.

I’m guessing I either picked it up when we were in Lincoln last weekend, or in Peterborough services - which is always too hot and too crowded. Or I got it from Sanja - who’s been under the weather for a week or so – but in a sort of nondescript kind of way.

TALKING SHOP

Talking of Lincoln… the last few videos haven’t done great in terms of views, compared to the 10k+ we had been getting. Ever since the channel got flagged by that unpleasant sort, we’ve struggled.

However, the sense we got from their reception was that both Lincoln and Doggerland were really well received by those who watched them. Lots of lovely comments. And ultimately, that’s kind of enough. It should be anyway.

But…

That said, we’ve been talking a lot about all this. We’ve mentioned before that we’ve been tossing around the possibility of putting the newer videos on a new channel, where only people who want to watch them can go. We’re thinking about it more seriously now.

Every video we get comments saying “do the old videos again”, and it’s not about wanting to grow a new audience so much as it is wanting to insulate ourselves from those kind of comments. What with everything, I’ve been feeling a bit down, lost and irrelevant the last few months, like I don’t matter, and I’d be lying if I said those kinds of comments hadn’t factored into it.

That’s not to say we don’t understand how people feel. We know we’ve disappointed the old audience because we pivoted, but it honestly was never a plan – it happened by accident, by sort of following the flow of energy. For us, it felt organic, but I understand how it might’ve seemed abrupt to others.

So one option – the most likely - is to move Digi Level 2 over to the main Digi Channel, put Drong up on there when it’s ready, and make all the old videos public again. Have all that side of Digi in one place.

And then migrate some of the more recent videos over to a new place - Digitiser Adventures, or something - to give them a second chomp of the cherry.

The knock-back of that is that we know we’ve had a lot of main channel subscribers in the past couple of years who ARE there for the new videos… and a new channel will be starting from scratch effectively. But looking at the analytics, the Lincoln video was mostly pushed out – once again – to Cheapshow. Yet only one Cheapshow viewer even clicked on it. That’s kind of killing us, view-wise, and completely stifling any hope of growth.

Doing this would also leave the main channel there for anything we fancied doing – the odd episode of Found Footage, for instance, or a Digi Deluxe or Golden Bean. A place to experiment. It’s quite an appealing idea.

We’re scared though. That’s what’s stopping us at the minute. It’s a big leap.

We know YouTube is a brutal place now. Anyone coming into it new is going to struggle to gain a foothold. Anyone who doesn’t just do cookie-cutter content is going to struggle.

However, I sort of feel now that we have found a niche we want to stick with,t we have a better chance than ever of actually succeeding. And we know the videos are good. They’re just struggling to find their audience.

Anyway. Sorry. Big brain dump. Just me thinking out loud. I’m not well.

Today’s Bubblegun – due to the fact I wasn’t well enough to record on Friday – will be the ‘slaters’ ep that we put up on Bubblegun Extra.

The ‘vid it might slow us down a tad. I’d wanted to film this week, and I wanted to do a Biffo’s Brain, but can’t guarantee either will happen. I’ll keep you posted! The Upper Tiers should be getting some Lincoln outtakes either today or tomorrow though. Some good ones in there.

SAVE THEM DATES

Lastly... 3rd and 4th October. Don't book anything yet, but there might be a chance to meet Sanja and I and have a little get together that weekend, down at Harrow Arts. Won't be a full Digi Live, but pencil it in. More news when I have it.