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THE OCEAN WAVES VIDEO IS BACK!!!!!!
Fucking FINALLY!!!!
I'm SO FREAKING HAPPY! haha
To celebrate, for the next couple of days I'm going to respond to ALL new comments on the video. So, if you want to ask me something or just express whatever opinion you have, you can expect a response :)
Also, feel free to rewatch it or share it around and let folks know it's back.
Woooooo!!!!!!!
P.S. Sorry for all the caps and exclamation points..I'm usually much more restrained...but I'm genuinely over the moon right now!
EDIT: Thanks everyone for the questions and comments. It was a lot of fun replying to them :)
Heya!
I've got some good news..I think
1) On Jan. 1st, my counter notification for the Ocean Waves claim was processed by Youtube and forwarded to the claimant, which means Ghibli now has 10-14 business days to show Youtube that they have taken legal action against me or the video will go back up!
I don't wanna get ahead of myself and say this automatically means the video will be back, (Ghibli suing me is still a possiblity despite being fairly unlikely), however, assuming all goes well, video will hopefully be back on the channel in a week or so.
I'm *super* excited about it going back up (it's just been such a shitty experience). I'll probably celebrate on the day by grabbing a drink and hanging out in the comments of the video, replying to any new ones! So, be on the look out for that day soon :) (hopefully)
2) A few weeks ago, I guested on a podcast called 'Kicking and Streaming', which has a really fun concept of taking a streaming film, usually from Netflix, and then countering it with a classic 'cinema' film, usually from the Criterion Collection. Lots of interesting topics come up as a result.
For this episode they were nice enough to reverse the order because I *really* wanted to talk about Masaki Kobayashi's 'The Inheritance'(1962), which is a favorite of mine. They countered with the Netflix film 'Paddleton'(2019).
The episode is now up!
kickingnstreaming.com/podcast...
It was a ton of fun. Give it a listen if that sound interesting to you..or if you just wanna find out why I shy away from unscripted stuff (I'm barely coherent...it's frankly quite embarassing).
Hey everybody,
This was originally supposed to be a quick post to wish you all Happy Holidays and to let you know that I'm still deep in work on the next video (which is proving to be quite a doozy..a video I'm both excited and nervous about).
But instead, 2020 being the shit year that it is, it's only fitting that this post has now become an update about two issues the channel is going through.
1) Early this morning my Ocean Waves video was taken down due to a copyright claim...9 months after its release. If you go to my channel right now, you won't see it there anymore. The claim was done manually by Ghibli themselves and my channel now has a strike on it.
I've appealed, as the video completely falls within any definition of fair use, and the counter notification is currently being reviewed by Youtube. If the appeal is accepted, it'll be forwarded to Ghibli who will have "10 U.S. business days" to review and respond.
It's a waiting game. I don't know what else I can do other than hope for the best, I guess.
The random timing of the claim, along with the fact that as far as I can tell my video is the ONLY video on Ocean Waves that was taken down is very odd.
(I'm not saying I want this to happen to the other channels, obviously...just that I'm a bit confused and that these facts lead to some unfortunate conclusions).
I wanted to post screenshots and details, but the community post on Youtube only allows one screenshot (which I'm using for the next point). If you want to see more details about it, I've posted them on my twitter.
2) A while back, a subscriber sent me a dm to let me know that they couldn't turn on notifications on my channel (i.e. click the bell or whatever), because apparently my videos were "content that is made for children". You can see this in the super-pixelated screenshot they sent me.
Now, this was very confusing to me because I explicitly selected the option "No, not made for children" for all my videos.
Long story short, after much research, I found out that apparently Youtube's system will sometimes automatically and temporarily categorize a channel as "children's content", regardless of what the uploader has chosen...and if you happened to subscribe to me during that small window then my channel will be considered a "children's channel" for you (and will therefore limit a bunch of options).
If this is the case with you, as with the person who dm-ed me, the solution is simply to unsubscribe then re-subscribe straightaway. It worked for them and if this is something you've dealt with, hopefully it'll work for you.
(Just please don't forget to re-subscribe :P )
It sucks that this is the type of update you guys get after a few months of relative silence on here, but this is what we're dealing with.
I was hoping this would be a fun post where I'd get to hint at my next video and also let you know that I recently guested on a podcast where I got to talk about one of my favorite films 'The Inheritance' (1962) by Masaki Kobayashi (episode should be up in a couple of weeks, I'll post the links here and on twitter) but...yeah.
Nonetheless, Happy Holidays everyone! And I hope you guys have a lovely time in the weeks ahead. Take care :)
Hey everybody!
The channel crossed 70K subscribers earlier this week and the Coco video just hit 400K views last night, so I just wanted to say a BIG thank you to all of you for the support you've shown me!
Obviously, the past few weeks have been quite difficult for me (see previous post) but your support has really helped me stay afloat in many ways and I'm very grateful for that!
I especially wanna thank everybody who shared their own experiences in the comments of the Coco video. I feel more so than with anything I've ever made that the comments are kind of an "extension" of the video itself and really help give a more complete perspective on the things I spoke about.
And lastly, for those who don't know, I'm on twitter:
twitter.com/eliquorice
Tbh, I'm actually posting way more than I thought would (given my general aversion to social media) and my current struggle is finding a balance between shitposting and the embarrassingly heartfelt threads I'm writing at 3 a.m....
So, if that sounds like fun, feel free to join me there!
Otherwise, I'll see you at the next video :)
Hey everybody,
Buckle up, because this is going to be one of the weirder community posts you ever read.
So, the Coco video I've just uploaded is not "complete". I mean technically it's a complete video..but it hasn't gone through the usual polishing and revisions stages where I make sure the video 'flows', clean up any rough transitions or unclear arguments, and cut out sections that aren't working etcā¦
And that's because, after a surreal and heartbreaking event last week, I realized I wasn't going to be able to get back to work on this specific piece in any clear-minded way.
The video suddenly felt..at once a bit too relevant to the current situation, yet at the same time naĆÆve and dumbā¦and just worthless.
The choice came down to scrapping it completely, or uploading it in its current state. And usually I would do the former without a second thought, but given how long itās been since my last upload (and that everything feels pretty uncertain at the moment), I felt to do that would be unfair to folks who might have been waiting for another video.
So, I decided to upload it while also being transparent and giving you all some context.
You see, I come from and currently live in Beirut, Lebanon. Yesā¦that Beirut, Lebanon. In fact, I'm writing this post in an apartment that is only about 3.5 or so km away from the blast site.
To quickly answer your first questions: thankfully, my family and I are 'ok' and safe. And miraculously, though some of them lost their homes, my friends and loved ones are also ok.
Many others in the city weren't so lucky.
As for any follow-up questions you may have about the explosion, the only appropriate answer I think I have is: I don't know.
It was surreal, confusing, and scary. And it continues to be all three.
Growing up here, I've lived through the bombings between 2004 and 2007, as well as the 33 day war in July 2006. So, these types of things aren't the 'most unusual' thing for me.
But, I have NEVER experienced anything that comes close to what happened on August 4th.
And from the conversations I've had since, no one else has eitherā¦not even older folk who lived through the worst days of the Civil War.
Itās pretty clear to me that this will be a collective trauma for many of us for a very long time.
Originally, the plan for the channel was not to say where I was from and just leave it as a sort of mystery that is teased out over a bunch of videos (that's why I never specify it in the Coco video despite indirectly talking about it for an entire third of the runtime), but these are exceptional circumstances and, after last week, it suddenly felt really āoffā not to say it.
I'm not sure why...but it did.
I don't really know how to end this post. So, what I'm going to do is copy-paste a draft I wrote a few weeks ago of the original community post that was supposed to go up with the video. And then at the end, Iāll put a couple of link to places you can donate to help some of those who were most affected by the blast.
The original post was meant to be a funny(?) thank you of sorts for your support, updating you that I haven't disappeared and also letting you know that I now have a twitter.
I'm mostly putting it here because it has a couple of jokes I like and, being the pathetic fool that I am, I will never let a mediocre joke go to waste.
So, I apologize for the drastic shift in tone that's going to follow but, in a way, it gives you a somewhat accurate impression of what the past 10 days have been like for us: violent and sudden mood swings from laughter and a sense of community to tears and a sense of isolation and anger..then back to the laughter and community etc..
Thank you.
"Hey everybody!
So, wow...a lot has happened since that last community post. And I don't really know how to talk about it all, so what better way than a list!
1) I'm sorry it took so long for a new video. I was trying something specifically different/personal with this one and when you mix that with the fact that everything in my life (including the channel!) decided to happen all at once between late-May and mid-July, it made the progress on the video very slow and the progress on my mental health deterioration very fast.
2) Holy.Crap. Both the Brave and Ocean Waves videos crossed 1 million views and pretty much at the same time.
Thank you so much! This is justā¦.I don't know what it is..
I mean, I'm feeling a lot ofā¦something. It's an emotion, I'm sure of thatā¦.just not sure which one exactly.
And it's definitely NOT debilitating impostor syndrome..so, don't you worry about that..because that's not the case.
Nope.
Absolutely notā¦no chance in hellā¦none, full self-confidence here. Believe you me. Alright?
3) Did I mention that it's definitely not debilitating impostor syndrome?
4) After overwhelming demand (and by "overwhelming demand", I mean a single e-mail where the dude said "Bro, you have a twitter?"), I've decided, against my better judgment, to listen to him and to 'have a twitter' . twitter.com/eliquorice
I've heard people are very welcoming on the platform.
And after a couple of weeks of lurking, itās clear that nothing but good-faith discussions take place.
So, come join me there and laugh at me as I slowly figure out how to use the damn thing.
I'll try my best to tweet more frequently than I upload videos.
Thanks and stay safe!"
Disaster Relief for the Lebanese Transgender Community:
www.gofundme.com/f/financial-aid-for-lebanese-tranā¦
Food and Medicine for Kafala Victims:
www.gofundme.com/f/food-and-medicine-for-kafala-viā¦
Hey everybody!
I just wanted to say that I am absolutely floored by the reception the videos and the channel have gotten. About a week ago, the Ocean Waves video had just passed 2000 views, the Brave video had stalled at 160 views, and I was somewhat excited at the far-fetched possibility of hitting 100 subscribers by the end of the month.
Now, the numbers I'm looking at don't even make sense to me..What is life. I'm humbled, overwhelmed, grateful, andā¦just plain confused. It's all been a bit sudden.
I also wanted to thank everyone who commented, sharing personal anecdotes and discussing the points they agreed or disagreed with. I've read basically all of them and it's been a real treat.
I was in the middle of working on my next video when all of this took off and, needless to say, I haven't been able to get much (or really any) work done in the time since. So, I'm gonna go offline for about a week to get back into the rhythm of my workflow, which means I won't be able to respond to comments the way I've been doing for the past few days.
Thanks again for the amazing support and stay safe!
Remember to wash your hands and social distance if you're able to :)
I make videos. Unfortunately that takes a lot of time and effort