Do you think Streaming/Being a Youtber is a real job?

[LemiaOfThunder]

Yes

No

[EmyyWolf]

HELL NO.

Because the moment someone digs up something you said or did in the past. Either online or offline. Something that is questionable or controversial?

you're DONE!!
The owners of YouTube will literally cancel you and any other channels you would have made. You’re Done!! Fired!!! No longer monetized. If you were making $10,000 a month. That shT is over! Hopefully you saved all of that. 😬😬

Hopefully you invested in stocks or did crypto or you bought properties or you rented out apartments to people. Cause that ShT is over. Hopefully you have a degree in something. Or a title or something.

Cause it would be right back to McDonald’s for you. 🫵

Also, nowadays, YouTube and many other platforms aren’t even letting you use foul language anymore. They don’t let you cuss or speak whatever way you’d like. So that’s another problem to navigate around. You’d have to edit repeatedly just to cut out the bad words, or censor them. You can’t mention certain controversial topics like gender theory, you can’t mention the 🌈 community, you can’t mention certain conspiracy theories like Flat Earth, or the Reptilians. Also, you can’t add any sort of music because it’ll be copyrighted immediately and you’ll loose money yet again.

So there you go. Good luck with that BS! 🍀🍀 YouTube is ruined. Maybe it was good in 2014-2015. Not anymore.

[provokeesmokee]

It can be.

Some content creators outearn me and deserve to. They hawk merch and keep ridiculous schedules to keep their income rolling in while they can.

[GoodManDave]

If you don't ever get paid for it, then after a while, it would not be a job that sustains you. Being an "instagram model/influencer" is kind of cheesy, and it's harder to define from someone just posting swimsuit pics all the time and who puts in little to no extra effort, except getting a perfect shot.

But doing a good Youtube video can be a lot of work. You have to make it interesting, you have to constantly think about fans, and you have to really get a lot of them before YouTube (or someone else) will pay you to sell merchandise. You also probably SHOULD have an understanding of metrics and analytics. Unless you're a natural speaker, you probably need to learn some acting, etc (just like any decent public speaker). It should probably be something "useful" (as well as entertaining)...

When you first start, you will probably need to do a lot more of it yourself, unless you have a lot of money saved up and you can hire people. You might be able to "barter" (trade) services at least; meaning if you're an excellent graphic designer, you offer that to another page that is good at analytics (they would probably be co managers of your youtube page, so they can see your dashboard, so get someone you can trust to do that if you don't have a close friend in real life that knows how to do it.

And yes, be prepared for older people to laugh at what you do. Maybe even friends. Be prepared to deal with people crapping on your work, etc. And remember that anything posted online should be treated as possibly public work that can always come back to you, so don't do something illegal or too embarrassing.

If it's a blog, you might get rude clapbacks. I personally have things set up so I can approve comments before they go out. And it may take a long time to earn anything. Ever those with thousands of fans can earn very little one month, and a few hundred the next, and a few thousand the next month. So if you DO make something that goes viral and gets a lot of views, if you earn anything from it, save for a rainy day if you can.

Modeling can be a job. Blogger can be a job. Cartoonists, comic book designers, web designers, entertainers, public speakers, DJ's and other musicians or nannies can be great jobs - if you love it, and have the skills to do it well (and are prepared to do a lot of work), sure it's a job. More people used to insult people who were creative or didn't fit the 9 to 5 suit and briefcase / cubicle life. Many still do. I know that I commonly get "Really? Do you actually make any money off that?" "Yes." But now, more people do realize that you CAN be a writer or Blogger, or comic book artist or YouTube personality or something else considered "not traditional" - and you have a lot of work outside of what they see. So you have to work at it, and then all you can do outside of making that money is believe in yourself when no one else seems to. Don't be embarrassed by your YouTube work, if it's honest.

[Lynx122]

It depends on the kind of content you make I guess. There's youtubers I respect a lot and there's ones that are just sad disgusting pathetic desperate and there's no value or principle they won't shit on for some attention. But usually the first kind can have a long term career and the second kind can't. I think it is a job but there's just a wide variety of quality and types of content and they all have their own rules and the type of people they attract and who will be successful.

I'd like to make content myself about mental health and just entertainment but I think I need to improve my speaking before I can do it. I know I have a lot to offer to people from my experience of dealing with my own disabilities and how I manage to protect myself take care of myself and live a happy life :) But if it's not presented well then you might aswell not do it at all because that's just the time we live in.

[rigmarole]

It's all in what you make of it. All you are doing is driving traffic to a website to monetize views on a cost per mille basis. It's an advertising job. Through Google adwords the average per mille price is like $3.12. Video ads are generally a little more costly, thus YouTubers often report something like $6 or $7 per mille. So if you are getting an average of 25-50K views per video and you put out videos daily then I suppose you could consider it a real job so long as you don't get demonetized. If you push merchandise for another business in the process that you own, then you can probably make a pretty reasonable living.

[bingbongbangbung]

That's why people rely on donations, sponsorships, and merchandise

[rigmarole]

@bingbongbangbung Yep. It's targeted marketing. So turn over should be roughly 5%. If you manage to get 5% of viewers to make a $20 purchase once a year on a sticker pack, a shirt, or something like that then with 25K-50K loyal viewers you could pull in an additional $25K-$50K in revenue a year on top of your $55K-$110K in ad revenue. Depending on your production costs you might do OK. That said producing new content daily is a lot of work for that amount of money. Often I see channels with 5 or 6 million subscribers with many of their videos in that 25K-50K view range after about a month. While other channels with 5 or 6 million subscribers might get 1 million views per video after about a month. The channels with the lower views tend to put out content daily and the ones with the higher views tend to put out videos weekly. At the end of the day, your viewers only have a small amount of time to watch your content maybe once a week.

[Drewtate]

Only if you make money doing it otherwise its a hobby or failed business enterprise. Much like onlyfans. Most youtubers, Instagramers, tik tokers, onlyfans and the rest make no money at it and making content can be a 18 hour a day 7 days a week job.

[dragoblack]

If one thinks that being a streamer is just "record and upload" you don't have any idea of how it really is. If you stream as a job, you have gotten to the point where you get enough views, donations, and regular visitors to make it worth it. To maintain being a streamer as a job you have to work the algorithm, be doing your own video editing, while making sure you follow the ever changing guidelines for the platform you stream on, you end up needing a gimmick, and you have to make sure your videos are entertaining... it's literally the entertainment business... with that said, you have to manage your registration as a business, make sure your location is anonymous, weed through emails of scam sponsors, manage working with companies to have sponsorship... its honestly a lot and stressfull... especially when the comment section can get you in trouble.

[JDavid25]

I've seen what people do in "real jobs" which is go to a lot of unnecessary meetings, sit around and talk, and take hour long lunches.. I believe even mildly successful YouTubers and Streamers just as much or sometimes harder, so yeah I would say so..

[Skull_Anon]

Hell no

I personally respect only jobs that make a difference

So I hate to see some of these guys earn more in weeks than what I can make in years with my job (Firefighting)

Well money was not a big priority for me and I am proud that absence of firefighters would cause a massive impact unlike these guys

[HitsyHonesty]

It is. There are youtubers who really put their heart and soul into their content and make sure it's just top nodge!
I really appreciate those content creators. The ones who are authentic, help me, know how to keep me entertained. Algorithm is brutal and youtube removes videos for seemingly random reasons. Keep doing your thing!

[molonski2]

Oh , I think it certainly can be a real job ( not the way I do it ) but for those who build up a following and really create a good channel , its extremely entrepreneurial , a couple of these stations I follow are incredibly professional , sets , editing , its a serious job , these guys / girls would be the absolute cream and are a tiny percentage.

I dont think its a Yes/ No answer because it all depends on the above.

[Honest-Matt]

Yes it is. It may seem like it's easy work to make millions by making videos or streaming for a living but it's not. It's a grind and it takes a lot of work socializing in the business and networking world to build every day. We only see the surface of what it takes to be successful, there are hours of behind the scenes work each day.

[noemiii]

If it creates profit, it’s a real job. Doesn’t matter what you’re doing. The reason streamers and YouTubers make so much more money is because they are their own brand and can choose their price vs. working for someone else’s company for a fixed income just to say “hey, look I’m a sheep of society!”

[BoobMan]

It is if you're making seven figures doing it! But if you have 3 followers and make 1.99 a month, then no.

So for any streamer/youtuber you hear about--yes, yes it most certainly IS a real job. VERY real.

But for the 10s or 100s of 1,000s of others, no it ain't!

[bingbongbangbung]

That's not what the definition of a job is

[HaveNoName]

Depends what you call a real job. You have to be very good and relevant to make a lot of money. And there are people who are making a lot of money.

However, you cannot call it a professional job or a sustainable job that will last till you can retire.

[Heolurt]

Yes because it takes work and talent, I am trying to be a streamer but can't really do anything, I can't show my face because of my ugly face deformity and I don't know what to say or talk about while streaming and recently I did have a viewer and they said they couldn't hear my gameplay so I did have to talk to until they could hear the game and when I watched the gameplay footage after and I hate the way I sound when I talk. So yea I consider them a real job.

[Smashingdoozy]

What constitutes a "real job"?

You're doing tasks, you're completing them... you're earning money, paying taxes... like what else would it be considered?

[Constatine]

If it educational then they are just teachers online and i say Yes!

If it is about crazy people uploading stupid content like reacts on... then NO!

[Anemone978]

Yes it is hard to be relevant in this day and age, so if you can do it then good for you..
My kid wants to be a youtuber.. so we will see how that goes LOL

[Randogirl491]

It's a real job when it actually earns you enough money to live off. Your buddy or the three men who hope to see you naked sending 10 once in a while doesn't count

[Phoenix98]

It's a real job if your actually making a living off of it. And I do know that it actually takes quite a bit of work to be a streamer and youtuber, working the algorithm, avoiding copyright strikes, editing, etc.

[normalice]

I think the more someone takes on the unpleasant aspects that make a job out of streaming, the more likely it is to pay like a job.