We Stole Their Identity... | Simple Life Reclaimed | Episode 59 | 9.05.22

Well, good morning, everybody. Good morning. Good morning. Welcome back to Real Talk with SLR. How are you guys doing today? I'm doing really good. How are you? You sleep good? I slept pretty good. It was really nice. I was able to sleep pretty good last night and wake up pretty well refreshed. Ready to hit it today. Oh, yeah, today's gonna be a big day. Yes. We will touch on that in a little while. I'm sure that you guys have read the title of this video and right off the bat I'm gonna say that we are probably gonna catch a lot of crap for this video. This is one that we did not want to make but you know what over the weekend things are brought to our attention and it's a situation that we need to address. Yes, so basically in short over the weekend there were several people that were bringing a video to that was published on a separate page to our attention and it's by a person that is also inside our community and it was essentially like a bashing video. It was essentially bashing anybody who is in our community and who has maybe a separate channel for chatting, for live chats, a separate channel for maybe podcasting or separate channel exactly like this channel is to our main channel where we take you guys behind the scenes. We go on walks with you guys. We do mail calls. We answer your questions and essentially it was bashing anybody for for doing that for separating the channels because this person believes that they were the first person to ever do it at least in our community and it's a it's a total pat on the back video and stepping on anybody else who dares to to take a certain strategy which YouTube the platform itself has laid out before us content creators as a path to take. Correct. So, I mean, it's it's really honestly just it was a slap in the face because we really thought that person was a friend of ours and we've done nothing but support and praise and I guess try to be there and try to initiate friendship and just do everything that we can and the friendship and stuff literally has nothing to do with YouTube. YouTube was just like the platform that we met on. We thought that there was a genuine friendship there. I mean look at the friendships and the relationships that we have with all of our family out here in Arkansas. In our community. In our community. We met through the platform. Sure. But that the platform is not the glue that holds us together. We have friends that started on the platform and now they're no longer on the platform for life reasons or whatever. We still talk to them. We're still friends with them. It has nothing to do with you know, like we want to be friends with them so we could help ourselves. We don't think in that mindset. So it's just kind of take us back when we see people that do think in that mindset it just it's very comical to me in a sense but it's not comical to the community. It's very disgraceful to the community when you as a subscriber itself are investing your time and everything else and this community isn't strictly just one community itself. It's multiple, right? We don't make up this one area exactly and it's not just one niche. It's everything. It's just way of life of vlogging wise and trying to put it out there in a sense and it's just like I said, it's just to me. It's disrespectful to the community. Yeah, and I didn't want to make this video whatsoever mainly because I know that that's what they're looking for but at the same time when we have in multiple people in our comments and in the community coming and addressing it and constantly saying something about it something's got to be said. It's not the first time with little things like this and that and it's just just sad. There's been little smacks here, little smacks there. It's been going on for a really long time and we've kind of just ignored it and you know and this we could have we could have passively just ignored this because there was no name drops. We're not gonna name drop. Nope. People that know what we're talking about. They know what we're talking about and others. I'm sorry for you guys. I'm so sorry to all of our wonderful subscribers that are now having to listen to this BS and nonsense and I promise this video is not going to be entirely about that. We will get back to some normal stuff, but this needed to be addressed. Yes, and it's it's mostly because you know what in I'll break it down for you like this in the youtuber community where we are homesteaders and we're home builders and we're vloggers first and foremost. We are just recording our day-to-day life and a lot of our friends in this in this community we're all on similar journeys where we're recording our day-to-day life, but we're doing similar things in our life. Whether it be building or whether it be moving across the country or trying new things. We all have like that adventurous spirit and we love to share it with people. Now there's a lot of people a lot of our subscribers that are not physically capable to actually go out and do those things so they enjoy watching what we're doing because it's it's a dream of theirs. And that's kind of how we started doing YouTube back in the beginning is we were the ones sitting at home. We were the ones dreaming. We were the ones that had this big grand plan on what we wanted to do and we were watching other people go out and get it. And so we devised our own plan on how we were going to actually get it. Well the rest of it's pretty much YouTube history, but in the very short of things we got ourselves financially stable, got ourselves debt-free, we built out the camper, sold the house, went searching for property, yada, yada, yada, and now we're here. We're staring at our basement that's completely dried in. It's been a very long journey, but we were once the people that were dreaming and trying to make the preparations. The subscriber. Yeah, we were and we were trying to make the preparations and we were trying to make the plans so we could have that impact in our own life. And doing YouTube to me has been most beneficial because not only do we get excellent home movies out of it that we could share with our kids, our family members, our family in Vegas and California and like everywhere else. They can see what we're doing and watch our progress. But I know because you guys have told us explicitly that we have encouraged you guys to go out there and do things. That we have made an impact on your life and that to me is beyond a blessing beyond measure. And that's why we continue to do it. That's why we really, really find fulfillment and enjoyment out of it. Because I know that we're, even if it's ever so slightly, even if it's just one person, we are making an impact on other people's lives. And I really do believe in this lifestyle of living more simple, living more with, you know, the earth and like growing, being self-sustainable and doing things. Like if you're getting out of your comfort zone, I really do firmly believe in that. And I think that if there's a group of people that can get together, all we're going to do is empower and strengthen each other. It's not going to hurt anybody. If me and Gary doing our own thing and living self-sustainably has zero effect on the other guy living self-sustainably and doing their thing. If anything, it's just encouragement. For more people to actually do it as well. Yeah. So I don't know. It just really took us aback. It's the greatest thing about YouTube itself. There's multiple strokes for different folks. That's right. I mean, we're not everybody's cup of tea. Some people don't like our personalities. That's cool. Lots of people do, though. And there's a space for us. And I want to encourage you out there that there's a space for you. And so, I don't know, with the YouTube thing and I'll touch on some of the reasonings for having like this side channel, because that's ultimately what was really getting bashed on in the biggest, most highest way. Now, Gary and I are not the only people to have a second channel to their main. There are hundreds of thousands, billions, I would even say. I mean, I don't know the exact figures, but I know that there is a lot of people out there that have more than one channel and they have it for multiple reasons. And I will get into the background of it analytically about YouTube and how YouTube works as a career. A lot of people are not going to be interested in this, but here it goes. So, YouTube. In order to be monetized on YouTube, you have to have 4,000 watch hours and you have to have 1,000 subscribers. Okay. When you first start out, getting that 4,000 watch hours is very difficult to do if you're posting 10 minute videos. That means you have to have a buttload of people watching all 10 minutes of that video and you have to be posting consistently in order just to get your 4,000 watch hours. Now, live streams are wonderful and they are so much fun because they allow us to interact and communicate with our community. But live streams is really where a lot of small channels will get their watch hours so they can start the monetization process. There's so many YouTubers out there that I know personally that have their watch hours because they do live streams, but they're still trying to catch up on their subscriber base. And so, it's like one of those games that YouTube, the platform, puts us in where we have to follow the rules and we have to do the X, Y, and Z. And ultimately, if you want to be a content creator, which we enjoy being content creators, I have a photography background. And so, I've always enjoyed images and I've always enjoyed putting things together. It's like visual scrapbooking for me. And so, there's lots of people like me out there. And if you want to be able to turn your hobby into somewhat of a career or at least a side hustle or something, which who wouldn't want that for doing something that they love, you have to follow by the rules of the platform. And so, one of the things is 4,000 watch hours, 1,000 subscribers. Once you hit that, then you actually get accepted into the affiliate program or it's the partner program. I forget the exact word. You have to go through your channel too and make sure that you're eligible for it and everything else. Yes. And they have to make sure that your content is semi PG-rated kind of a stuff. You don't go over too many hot topics that could be controversial, et cetera, et cetera. There's a lot of hoops that you guys have to go through. Plus, that's all you're doing and there's niches for it all and everything else. But that's where it just comes back into or the community itself. Yeah, it's also nice having a talking channel because I was going to touch on this. So, after you become monetized and after your channel is established and you are you are a monetized channel on YouTube and you are a full fledged content creator. Right. If you decide to say you say all your posting is, let's just say sawmill and say your channel is a sawmill and channel. And you are a sawmill and son of a gun. You're out there cutting wood and your your subscribers have gotten used to you doing that. And that's the content that you deliver. And that's the content that they enjoy. If you go outside of your niche at all, even just a little bit, then YouTube actually kind of punishes you. Because what happens is, is your video will still go out to all the people that are subscribed to you. But if it's something that they are maybe not so interested in watching and they skip it and they don't watch it. Or, you know, if it's if the notification goes to them and they don't watch it, what ends up happening is, is the platform will stop sending out those notifications and they will stop showing you on the home page. And they will stop suggesting your video to come up next after other people, after other people in your similar niche have their video ends and other suggested video comes up. Right. While a lot of YouTubers end up making more than one channel. Yes. And so if you have, you know, for instance, for us and why we started this channel was because we were getting requested, like you guys out here that are watching it right now, you guys requested for us. So that way we can answer questions and answers and get back to building on the actual main blog channel and do that more instead of trying to answer questions with it and everything else, which we understood. And not only that, but that also gives us now another avenue of, you know, creating content will will end up helping us build on to this house because multiple ways of avenues for income is the better way to go. But not having all your eggs in one basket. Yeah. And like, you know, the live streams, there are so many people that really do enjoy our live streams, but there is a lot of people that don't like the live streams. And so again, with the analytic part, if we're posting a live stream and it's on our main channel, Simple Life Reclaimed, right, and all of our subscribers get that notification that we went live, but 80% of them did not watch the live. Well, then YouTube is going to punish us on our next video. And when I say punish, I mean, I'm saying that very loosely. It's going to not push our video out as strongly as it would before. I'm not saying it's going to completely not post it out because it does. They still post it out, but maybe a smaller percentage. And so and it won't end up on the home screen as much. And so there is all this background stuff that you do have to learn when you want to take your YouTube channel to the next level and become more of a full time content creator. There is a lot to it. It is not just pushing the button and sending it out to the world. And then that's it. I mean, there are people that have been successful that way, but the majority, there's a lot more to it. You've got to work for it. It's a full time job, man. And so we did this side channel. As you guys have noticed, we've been doing all of our live streams here on this channel. We haven't been doing live streams on Simple Life Reclaimed anymore. And that is ultimately the reason why. So we wanted to get the watch hours up over here. And then it's also once we got that done, we're like, well, we're just talking on the lives. I mean, that's all lives are. So we might as well just keep it on the talking channel on Real Talk. Simple Life Reclaimed, just our edited vlogs itself. So, yeah, it just makes it go back around. And then a really nice aspect of that. Yeah. So it's, I don't know, like I said, it's very, I was, it's comical on what was, uh, what was being said and how it was going down on that video and everything else. Because it just shows the, that arrogancy of, uh, wow. And I don't know, it's just disgraceful to the community itself. And it's not, I'm not putting you guys all into that one community box. I'm not doing that. No, no. Because I know all of you guys aren't just homestead or part of the homesteading is part of it. Because there's a lot of people that like watching mechanics and stuff. And then there's people that like watching the arts and crafts, the sewing and cooking channels and stuff. Right. Like it's a very, homesteading is a very broad niche. Yes, there's, there's so much to it. I mean, like there's people that watch us just because we like to build or we're building right now. And that's why they're watching us. And some people like to watch us just because we're a crazy family that moved out here and we're doing something with three kids, you know, staying in a trailer. So there's multiple reasons. There's multiple reasons. I will never put myself in one bubble. No, and I don't think anybody should or ever care or worry about what other people are doing around the corner. No. So, and you know, if you're, the thing is, is Gary and I have never, and even this video, I don't think we're talking badly, but Gary and I have never, ever talked poorly about another channel on our, on any of our platforms. And we never will. Um, if we talk about another channel, it's, it's usually always 100% to help promote and to help gather attention towards them. Or we saw something that they did and we're cheering them on, you know, from the sidelines with the, you can do it and you guys are awesome. Um, I just find it very distasteful for someone to go on there. And it's not like Gary said earlier, it's not the first time. This is like a wash, rinse, repeat cycle. Try to clear the air. Yeah. That is, uh, just starting out now to feel discouraged about doing what they think is best for them. Uh, just because, you know, the Simpsons did it. Can you see that? Remember that South park episode, professor chaos, the Simpsons did it. Simpsons did it. I don't want anybody to get discouraged. Man, there's nothing in this world. That's really, uh, you know, hasn't been done unique in a sense of like, I mean, it's unique because of, because it's that's what makes it unique. But yeah, I know it's, I mean, Gary and I are definitely not the first people, full disclosure, guys, we are not the first people to, uh, to take a crazy journey like this on. I know for a fact, because you guys in our comment section have told us about it, you know, Oh, I'm just not, I'm 60 years old. And when I was a kid, my parents did this and you're bringing back so many wonderful memories to me. That makes my heart feel really good that we are walking. It makes me feel almost more confident, right. That we are not just completely out there in the dark. That's what I mean. Back in the thirties. I mean, during the great depression, it was huge back then. Yeah. Everybody's moving out of everywhere. Trying to find Oregon trail. I mean, everything. So, yeah. So full disclosure, we're not the first people to ever move out here. Um, and you know, take our fit, crazy family on a journey and build a basement and, uh, and film it. We are definitely not the first to ever film it and put it out there. Um, we are not the first to ever sit around and talk with you guys, but it doesn't. I think that that is a whole lot less relevant, uh, than just the fact that we're doing it and it's our journey and that nothing, and nobody can ever take that away from us. And, you know, it really sucks because Gary and I are really on a super high point right now in our life. And with our build, I mean, we just got this place completely dried in watertight doors and windows. Watch out. We're working on a. Closing it off with the drywall, the insulation, all that, which you guys are going to see on our main channel today. I got a video edited out. It's uploading. You guys are going to have it on simple life reclaimed hopefully by two o'clock, but it's a shame that, you know, we're on this really high point and like everything is going so good. And somebody who we thought was a friend of ours is out there trying to take us down to put themselves up higher for whatever reason. Like it's so uncalled for, I'm not losing sleep over it either. The only time when I lose sleep is when I'm getting those notifications, but ding, but ding, but ding, did you see this? But ding, but ding. And it's just unnecessary for real. So unnecessary. So I don't know. It's, um, it's something that we didn't want to, uh, to have to address, but it is something that we felt like we needed to address. We will not be, uh, continuing down this path. We will not be continuing down this, this destructive, um, drama filled path. We're going to keep doing what we want to do. We're going to keep loving the people that love us. And if they hate us, well, then I will wish them the best in the world. I don't have any bad feelings towards anyone whatsoever. Um, I truly do wish everyone the best in life. I really, really do. Watch out Lola with that. Watch out our dogs. They're going nuts. We got some work we got to do. Uh, but we really do. We really do wish everybody the best things in life. I wish that everybody can be successful. I think that everybody is capable. You just gotta, you know, you gotta put in the work and you gotta learn a few things when it comes to this platform. And there are a lot of ways, um, that you can learn that they have. There's certain YouTubers that have their channels dedicated on teaching you how to grow your channel. And I've watched them and I've learned a thing or two. So if you are a smaller content creator and you're trying to, uh, to do the same, um, there's one girl I could suggest her name. Her name used to be, uh, the content bug. I think that she changed her name recently, but she's got some good information out there as well. Um, and then a tube buddy app works really well with helping you to learn and watch your analytics. Um, but you can just do Google searches on how you can help your channel grow and what, how to read the YouTube analytics and, um, you know, you have to study at it and you have to work at it. And I think that if I can do it, y'all can do it. So I want to, I want to be this a message of encouragement. Um, and I, again, we don't want to spend any more time on this. No, this is the one video that we felt we really needed to make. Um, just because of the scuttle that's going around within the community, it needed to be addressed. Um, but you know, it's just, it's just really bad taste for a channel that is that large to be stepping on people that are below him. Correct. I mean, it doesn't matter on any of that aspect of that. It, it definitely is like, wow. But, uh, yeah, no, I mean, it's very distasteful. And, uh, like I said, I, we really wanted to say something because it's addressing you guys in the community itself and, uh, letting you guys know, Hey, it's not cool. And, uh, you guys, you know, don't like us because of what was said or anything else like that. Sorry. I wish you guys the best. Um, but we are real and we're going to stay real. Yeah. It's not, uh, it's not okay. You have to speak up when you see somebody being a bully. And you know what, that this, this situation is not the first. Unfortunately, I wish it, I mean, I don't think it's going to be the last. I wish it would be the last, but history. Tends to repeat itself. And I have a feeling it's just, you'll see what we're saying. Yeah. I have a feeling that you'll see what we're talking about, but I hope not because honestly, we don't want anything to do with it. This will be our last, uh, our last time bringing up this conversation. There's only one thing that can happen that would make us, it's either they'll see it or they've already seen it. I'm just saying. Oh yeah. It's either they, this, like I said, this isn't the first. Yeah. This, this is by far from the first, like it's a third, if not sixth. Directed towards this situation, but with dozens and dozens of others, that's what I'm saying. It's just, yeah. It's a very known. Yeah. So we gotta go. We've spent plenty of time now talking about this. We don't wish to continue babbling on about it. It's something that is so just gross. Yes. It's gross, but we have lots of, lots of things to do. Like, uh, you know, me and Gary are on a high point in our builds and I want to continue that high energy. I want to continue spreading joy and happiness and excitement with you guys. Cause my golly, like I, we really are happy and excited. We got so much to do. There's no, there's nothing that can take that away. You know, there's really nothing. I know that we earned our, uh, what we have here in front of us actually with blood, sweat, tears, finances, everything. We've earned everything that we have there. And, um, as far as our channels are concerned, we've earned it there as well. I mean, it's, uh, nobody gave us anything. Nope. It's just sad. Yeah. Just sad. But enough of that. We got work to do. Stay tuned for a video on Simple Life Reclaimed. I got one uploading for you guys right now. Um, I hope you guys like it. It's a good one. And maybe two o'clock it should be live. Possibly two, three. I don't know. We'll see. We got lots of work we got to finish up today. Um, and we're just going to keep on being our happy go lucky selves. I want to wish you guys a wonderful day today. Um, don't feed into negativity. Don't, don't think so. Don't put yourself so much. It don't step on other people to put yourself up. And I just, just don't do that. It's just not good taste. Don't feed into any negativity and have a wonderful day. Be a good person. And, uh, until the next one, guys, we love y'all. And we hope you have a good one. We'll catch you on the next one. Bye you guys. Later, later.