If you don’t remember, the YouTube fellow PewDiePie got himself into some trouble a little while ago when he posted some ‘shock humor’ type videos on the YouTube…
A couple of big names are severing ties with Felix Kjellberg, otherwise known as PewDiePie on YouTube. The Wall Street Journal reported that Disney’s Maker Studios dropped PewDiePie from its company, which had previously partnered with the YouTube creator to make the entertainment network Revelmode. Shortly after that announcement, Variety reported that YouTube cancelled the second season of Scare PewDiePie, the YouTube Red show starring Kjellberg, and dropped PewDiePie from Google Preferred, one of the company’s advertising programs for top-tier brands and talent.
All of this follows PewDiePie’s video posted last month in which he paid two Indian men to hold up a sign that said “Death to all Jews.” He did this using a site called Fiverr, a freelance website that lets anyone pay for a variety of services—including graphic design and programming—for just $5. One of the services listed at the time was for Funny Guys, a comedy duo consisting of the two Indian men who would hold up a sign with anything written on it for $5.
Source: https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2017/02/youtube-disney-come-down-hard-on-pewdiepie-after-anti-semitic-stunt/
Yeah so I don’t understand the appeal of PewDiePie at all… but hey, personal tastes right.
Anyways, you’d think people would be put off by that kind of behavior wouldn’t you?
Nahhhh…
When the controversy over PewDiePie’s videos started he had 53,169,873 followers and over 14 and a half billion views for his videos.
The next day he was down… no up… about 6,000 followers.
And now, over one month later PewDiePie has 1.1 million more followers on his YouTube account and almost 200 million more views on his videos.
So yeah, I guess there really is no such thing as bad press.
When it comes to the business of art remember the rules!
If you have celebrity status, you can do and say whatever you’d like without negative consequences… there are no rules for you!
But if you’re a normal person… keep your mouth shut or else experience financial ruin.
I guess this just goes to show how offensive content sustains an audience. Bad press from those offended only further advertises the content.