So, Kiwifarms has been down for a while from my POV. I spent a lot of time during this downtime just working on myself, my career and my goals. Going offline at least from drama farming was a huge help with productivity... but while I was offline, a thought entered my mind:
How come like 99% of these people who get big complaining about other people on the internet eventually go off the deep end? And the answer I inevitably arrived to was "they don't create, they only subvert and corrupt." Not just these guys either, big faces of yesteryear like Maddox, Dick, Nostalgia Critic, Team Four Star, The Skeptosphere, the list goes on. These people are creatively Bankrupt so the only content they can farm is negative.
I would also happen to bunch Eric into that category - BUT Eric was smart. he said "Fuck this" and built something, then he hired creative people to cover for what he lacked. Still, I've always found Eric to be faaaaaar too caustic and confrontational for his own good. As the head of a multi-million dollar business, shut the fuck up, stop farming animosity and make your moves, big-man. Like you said, you're responsible for people's livelihoods. Then stop cranking on internet drama and get to work making cool shit.
Eric is now too big to attach his identity to the culture wars. Eventually he will have to consider that normies don't like the way he behaves, eventually he will have been in the game long enough to not be considered an underdog upstart, and eventually he will learn the immediate hard lesson of business - They don't expand endlessly because they "Want to" rather because they HAVE TO. Eventually his business will have to reach out across the aisle and start making more sanitized, less niche content. And he's going to need the good graces of people - this doesn't mean to lose himself or his principles, It doesn't mean to tell shitty stories for profit, It just means to leave the loud drama of the internet behind.
Eric has an amazing thing going. Those of us with businesses or ex business owners can look to him as a bastion of hope. I can also tell you kiwis with confidence from personal interactions with them that people who go around pretending he's a pariah publicly love him in private - or they're admirably jealous. He's become a legend on that alone (history will give him his dues) And I'd hate to see it ruined because he pulls a Vivzie and starts going schitzo at all his detractors on the internet. The direction he's headed in now will lead him there. Even if we agree with him here, he will ego-dive into something really stupid and the same shit that's happening to Nick, that's happened to Doug Walker, that's happened to H3H3, or Just Some Guy, or The Act Man will inevitably happen to him.
SPEAKING OF NICK:
Nick built something amazing as well. If anything, he and his audience (and you Kiwis) are probably a huge chunk of the reason Kyle Rittenhouse gets to walk free for his adult life. He built himself as an offensive, fun, but well-meaning persona with decent life advice. Nick and his kids will probably never struggle financially again so long as his wife doesn't try to ruin him. Still, Nick, much like Eric, is a caustic asshole. Unfortunately, Nick does not have the wherewithal to cover for his shortcomings, so we're witnessing a beautiful downward spiral. It's half spectacularly funny, and another half tragically sad.
When Nick came back from his unannounced hiatus, he made it seem like he lived life for a second. He sounded like took the same "log off" break I'm advocating. Unfortunately, It's become more clear - to me anyway - that Nick seems to have done it thanks to sheer laziness and cockiness. It is a piece of shit move to leave people who pay for your content hanging without an attempt at an explanation - he didn't even have proxies explain to his fans what happened. You couldn't call any lawtubers to have them explain the hiatus? You couldn't find any spot with wifi and draft a google doc explaining yourself? Nick has/had an audience of people who worship him and feed his ego. So even when his streams have devolved into the equivalent of a plastered Irish stepdad embarrassing himself at Thanksgiving, people give him a pass... "it's just a character after all"...
Its not a character. I think Nick has also started to seriously believe "it's just a character," then fused with it to cope. He's fallen off and can feel it. Instead of stepping away from the alcohol for a bit, he's an addict who's doubling & spiraling down as a result. Part of the spiral is forming a disgusting co-dependency on toxic individuals who egg you on. Everyone else seems to have stopped encouraging Nick except for one seriously fucked-up puppy, a person NOBODY should have to come to rely on for any reason - DICK.
The second Dick told Nick his reasons for going after July's business he should have cut that off then and there. Nick should and does know better. But lo and behold, Nick right now is still online seething at it. This doesn't end well for anybody, but the socially lubricated, ego-centric downward spiral doesn't care anymore about consequences. Nick is at the worst precipice any person can be on and if he doesn't stop and apologize immediately, he's going to find himself with no audience, no friends, and a real life community who hates him because his online bullshit will make its way into their ears.
Nick fed the Beast of Internet Drama. The Beast of Internet Drama must be sated or it will consume you. Your own ego, cantankerous behavior, and endless appeals to negative content will farm in individuals also obsessed with those things, generally speaking, they don't tend to be a happy or healthy sort. There is a reason we call many of them "Terminally Online."
Taking me back to the beginning: Be a creator, not a destroyer including to yourself. Create a stronger, more resilient, ultimately more productive and happier self. Be a happy you who can't be destroyed by jealous, whack-ass detractors. You work on these, and media will be a better place than the cesspool it is now.