A viewer today asked for my thoughts about a potential LEGO fan safety issue in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic. They have a friend who is abstaining from making part orders on the popular Bricklink marketplace out of fear of contamination, and wanted to know if I felt this was an overreaction. Below was my response:"I think everyone has a right to be as safe as they feel they need to. There's no single right answer. The fact is, no matter what we do, the majority of people on the planet are going to contract this illness, it's just a matter of when. Even if every country completely "flattens the curve" we're not going to exterminate this virus from existence, we're just slowing its spread so healthcare systems can keep up, while also trying our best to not transmit the darn thing to particularly vulnerable fellow humans that we or...
...and they got me on lock dowwwwwwn! I have a theory that for every situation in life, classic Hip-Hop music has a reference. Today's proof comes courtesy of Cypress Hill. I'm in one of six contiguous counties in the state of California, USA, covering approximately 7 million inhabitants, now operating under "shelter in place orders" from local governments in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Technically we're not on full "lockdown" like some parts of the world. We're still legally allowed to exit our homes without explicit permission, but we're not allowed to gather in groups larger than 10 or with people from outside our own households, and we're not supposed to travel by foot, scooter, bicycle, or car to any place we don't absolutely need to. All "non-essential" establishments have been ordered closed including some municipal offices and all schools.You may have seen news reports about people stockpiling toilet paper in...
The official JANGBRiCKS Patreon page is now open and accepting signups! I heard your requests, collected your specific feedback, consulted with experts, and did my best to put together a selection of membership tiers and rewards that would really fit both what I do and what fans want.Become a Patron!Pledging is of course 100% optional and I have exactly zero plans to remove anything from my normal stream of YouTube content. However, in spite of the chorus of assurances that the very continuation of my videos & builds is itself "the reward," I insist on giving supporters more. There will be additional content made available through Patreon, including videos YouTube's algorithms don't want me to publish as well as early access to uploads before they're made public and really raw & candid peeks behind the scenes.YouTube has knocked me down & kicked me numerous times over the years. Now, through Patreon, the fans, the...
For a little more than a month now I've been back to work on a "new normal" basis, getting caught up on reviews and figuring out how to most comfortably & efficiently work in the all-new studio. Viewer reaction to the new format has been shockingly positive. I, myself, have felt perfectly comfortable being in front of the camera again, though I do yet need to work on physical access to review subjects from behind the filming rig when doing the traditional close-up shots.I've been marking new videos honestly as "not for kids" and YouTube hasn't overridden this choice on any of them as yet, though I still don't know if I'm completely in the clear as COPPA settlement enforcement actions have not begun to date, to my knowledge. I remain unfortunately confident that I need to leave most of my previous 10 years of work marked "for kids" forever, though,...
I've covered the fallout of the FTC vs. Google settlement for YouTube's flagrant violation of COPPA in three dedicated blog posts, five videos, and probably over a hundred smaller postings. Anyone concerned about the issue with regards to me and my channel should have no questions about where I stand on it all and why. Yet, questions & confusions remain, so here we are again. In my last video on the subject I very clearly explained that the real-world effects on me after YouTube's compliance update necessitated a significant and immediate change to my video style & approach, otherwise JANGBRiCKS as you all know it was all but done for. During 2 & 1/2 weeks of downtime that followed, I figured out a new plan, completely disassembled & eliminated my review studio setup, and built something entirely new.Read more »Original linkOriginal author: theJANG
Above is the exact photo, pulled from its original upload location, that opened the very first post on my earliest LEGO-related blog, Zeyek's BIONICLE: Untold. The in-character narratives of Zeyekti-Iiloptinous Mazzourel and a simultaneously-launched "Behind the Scenes" blog of custom creations would later give rise to my "Unofficial Hero Factory MOCs Blog," all three of which I would subsequently combine under the "LEGOJANG" banner, finally renamed in 2014 to "JANGBRiCKS." Good times, all, and still going like the Energizer Bunny! [Edit: Wait, is the Energizer Bunny still a thing?][Edit2: Yes, yes it is, whew.]Original linkOriginal author: theJANG
It's been two weeks since I was forced to yank the e-brake and put a full stop on the JANGBRiCKS channel on YouTube (and almost everything else, for that matter). By the time I posted my video explaining how YouTube had killed nearly all value in nearly all of my work of the past 10 years, I had formed a mental image of what my primary content, LEGO reviews, could look like in the post-COPPAcalypse era. Based on viewer feedback, I discarded that initial concept and eventually figured out something that would be less of a dramatic departure from the style many people had come to really enjoy.Read more »Original linkOriginal author: theJANG
This evening while pursuing my usual modus operandus (research, brainstorm, plan, repeat) regarding Patreon & properly rewarding/supporting patrons, I had a mind-clearing epiphany. A lot of my kindest and strongest supporters have insisted that if I accept their direct monetary support, the biggest & most important reward they'll receive in return is that I'll be able continue on doing what I've been doing up to now, making the best content I can. I now realize this is incorrect. I'll be able to do so much more, so much better.Read more »Original linkOriginal author: theJANG
For years I've gotten a consistent stream of requests for a Patreon page, PayPal "tip jar," or other means of directly, tangibly supporting my work, and I've always pushed the idea away. All that time, family & friends have tried to reason with me and explain why I should work past this holdup. A lot of what they've argued makes perfect sense, but at the end of the day, there's always been a single point I've returned to: I didn't need the extra support, thus I couldn't bring myself to accept it. Even through numerous YouTube maladies, I've always resolved to do whatever I can to keep my involvement in this hobby and contributions to this community self-sufficient through normal, reasonable ad placements.Days into 2020, everything changed. The latest batch of YouTube changes utterly decimated residual ad income from nearly a decade of past work. I finally accept that I need...
"Twenty-four little hours..."Deep breath.Right. So, the video above explains it all. Final data from YouTube's January changes arrived and the picture is extremely bleak for me, more than twice as bad as a supposedly accurate real-world test suggested it would be. I really should be panicking right now, but somehow I'm not.I need to make bigger changes than I have in the over 10 years I've been doing this whole LEGO thing (almost 7 of them full-time). I'm up to the challenge, though! In the coming days & weeks you're going to see me asking a lot of questions of fans across multiple media & communication platforms, including some with which I've never before engaged. I have a lot of ideas swirling around and will need your direct input to help shape the best of them into a new reality.My primary YouTube video style in particular needs a significant adjustment to overcome the...