CollegeHumor did not shut down, from the article itself:
“In words that I’m sure are as surreal to read as they are to type, I will soon become the new majority owner of CH Media,” said Reich, a longtime executive at CollegeHumor. “Of course, I can’t keep it going like you’re used to. While we were on the way to becoming profitable, we were nonetheless losing money — and I myself have no money to be able to lose.”
Dropout, its streaming service, will continue for at least the next six months while it churns out content already slated for release, Reich said. The future of CollegeHumor itself, and other humor sites run by the company, are less certain.
“In these six months, I hope to be able to save Dropout, CollegeHumor, Drawfee, Dorkly, and many of our shows,” Reich said. “Some will need to take on bold new creative directions in order to survive.”
The CH Media staff contracted from more than 100 to between five and 10 employees, according to Bloomberg News.
I don't follow. How is that not "shutting down"? It's contracted to life support in order to empty the existing pipeline to minimize losses.
Maybe this is a Ship of Theseus kind of thing. They get rid of almost all employees, empty the pipeline, and then retool. What's left of College Humor?
BTW, Sam Reich also acted in a bunch of CollegeHumor videos (e.g. https://youtu.be/N0ps6HuThMs). Of any executives to have control of the company, Sam seems the most likely to preserve CollegeHumor's style.
Facebook faking viewership numbers is really an under-reported story. So many publishing companies had moderately successful business models. Then Facebook came along with their amazing viewership numbers. Everyone "pivoted to video", switched to targeting native Facebook views, and chasing those unbelievable viewership totals. The views ended up being well lower than reported which means the promising revenue never materialized like expected. By the time companies realized this, it was too late to pivot back to hosting their content on their own site because the behavior of their users had already been broken by Facebook. This destroyed countless publishers including CollegeHumor and the similar Funny or Die. It is amazing that Facebook only paid a $40m settlement for this fraud.
Some content creators are already doing this. I'm seeing more spinning up their own newsletters or RSS feeds, patreons, direct donations, subscriptions services (or completely independent platforms). There is an awareness of the dangers of putting your eggs in one basket, let alone the dangers of putting them in a basket as opaque and uncertain as Facebook.
CollegeHumor had a lot of hits and spawned some genuine talent that is now earning money on its own merits (Jake and Amir, Adam Conover) but overall the content was not consistent enough to have an overall draw that was worth subscribing to.
> This isn't the first time Facebook killed culture
You know, I never really thought about it this way, but the way you worded it is perfect.
I talk about the "good old days" of the Internet, and it always comes down to Facebook ruining everything. I'd pin it around 2012. You're spot on though - Facebook outright murders internet culture. God, I despise that company and what it stands for so much.
Platform giveth, platform taketh away. There used to be a time where you actually had to go to collegehumor.com to watch the videos. Once everyone turned into sharecroppers on FB, Youtube or whatever, this was the risk they took.
I'm extremely torn between "This is an outrage" and "Buyer beware."
Nobody forced College Humor, Funny or Die, or any of the other companies that shifted resources to believe Facebook. They took a calculated market risk and the gamble didn't pay off (and they don't have enough reserve capital to survive a failed gamble). In an ideal market, the back-stop on this behavior would be "Nobody trusts Facebook's self-reported numbers moving forward."
Is that a sufficient back-stop, or should there be (further) government intervention?
> CollegeHumor is blaming this on Facebook for faking viewership numbers.
This is fraud and Facebook employees should feel threatened about going to jail. This was not a sleazy sales pitch. This was outright fraud to convince content producers that they were making more money than they actually were.
Even then, it's not like they've been doing that well on YouTube... I mean, you can only do the same tired millennial jokes so many times, as much as I like bashing millennial culture, it's tired and played out.
Aside: If Google Was a Guy series is one of the funniest things online.
A lot of their efforts just don't land very well. Compare this to say RoosterTeeth (Red vs. Blue, RWBY and others) has done very well in terms of adapting overall, including a couple movie releases (not huge, but out there).
>CollegeHumor is blaming this on Facebook for faking viewership numbers.
Facebook should certainly be held responsible for their part, but let's not let CollegeHumor of the hook. In the end, they are responsible for their business, and moving to an unproven platform is very risky no matter what promises FB sales people tell you.
There are so many ways to make money without going near Facebook that this is a terrible excuse. If you have good content that brings in viewers there will be a way to monetize. Nobody is driving good content off the internet, collegehumor simply didn't keep up with what people wanted.
CollegeHumor had same damn well written, well produced comedic satire. I hope all of their material is archived.
One thing to watch out for is if this posted under their Geuite account to YouTube, when the gsuite bill isn’t paid, all the YouTube videos will get deleted, leaving a cultural hole.
Of all the Google crimes, this one is accidental but the most damaging to society.
This is a misleading title based on even the article. CH still has an owner (Sam Reich) and still has content that they are still airing (D20 with the McElroy family among other things) through Dropout. Basically they went to being an externally funded company to turning into a startup that has to bootstrap, but still has an entire video subscription streaming infrastructure built out with Dropout and some content to stay afloat.
Title isn't completely accurate - WP article says that the site was sold to Sam Reich, one of their execs, and some servicess will continue for a while as he works on retooling the site.
Presumably Sam now owns the rights to all the content. He could shop it around to Netflix/Hulu/Amazon. I’ll bet one of them would pick it up and maybe even give him a budget to hire some of the writers back and make new content again.
Their parent company, IAC, has been trying to sell CH for months now. I'm sure they tried shopping around Netflix/Hulu/Amazon. I'm skeptical that Sam on his own will be able to accomplish a more desirable deal than what IAC would've been able to get. (Skeptical, but hopeful.)
CH used to run a facebook competitor called "Campus Hook". I met who would later become my wife there in the early 2000s. Online dating was yet to become mainstream, so we made up a story about how we met lest we look like weirdos. Now that app dating is a thing, we can just tell the story as it happened.
That's amazing! We started Campus Hook in 2002 (I think) but the timing was bad for a few reasons:
1. A few years early in terms of college student adoption of internet
2. A few years later in terms of founders' ages (we were seniors and didn't really care about campus dating anymore)
So happy to hear you met on there, and, apparently, are still married! Perhaps it wasn't a failure after all :)
I remember when CH was just a site where people uploaded funny pics, and once in a while they had a well-written article. How far they came - sad to see them shut down.
Connected Ventures, the company that owned CollegeHumor and Bustedtees was acquired by IAC. At the time Vimeo was a side project of Jake Lodwick and was part of the Connected Ventures business, but it wasn't making any money and didn't impact the IAC acquisition price. Long story short, Vimeo's cost to operate became very expensive and started to impact Connected Ventures core business (CollegeHumor and Bustedtees). So Vimeo was spun out of Connected Ventures and made its own division in IAC.
"You have to learn how to stay in a good mood as you overthrow the sour, puckered hallucination that is mistakenly referred to as reality." - Rob Brezsny
Unrelated... but on the Washington Post I clicked through to the page that sells subscriptions, only to find that they hijack you back button and do not allow you to go back in your browser history.
What a joke. Makes me want to never visit their site again. That is unacceptable.
> “In order to beat YouTube, Facebook faked incredible viewership numbers, so [CollegeHumor] pivoted to FB,” former CollegeHumor writer Adam Conover presciently tweeted last October. “So did Funny or Die, many others. The result: A once-thriving online comedy industry was decimated."
They allegedly fell victim to the whole "pivot to facebook video" craze caused by Facebook misreporting their video engagement figures.
Whether some business unit inside Facebook did this intentionally or not, it's a big reason why I think media companies have turned against Facebook as they feel like they got ratfucked.
[+] [-] ErikAugust|6 years ago|reply
“In words that I’m sure are as surreal to read as they are to type, I will soon become the new majority owner of CH Media,” said Reich, a longtime executive at CollegeHumor. “Of course, I can’t keep it going like you’re used to. While we were on the way to becoming profitable, we were nonetheless losing money — and I myself have no money to be able to lose.”
Dropout, its streaming service, will continue for at least the next six months while it churns out content already slated for release, Reich said. The future of CollegeHumor itself, and other humor sites run by the company, are less certain.
“In these six months, I hope to be able to save Dropout, CollegeHumor, Drawfee, Dorkly, and many of our shows,” Reich said. “Some will need to take on bold new creative directions in order to survive.”
The CH Media staff contracted from more than 100 to between five and 10 employees, according to Bloomberg News.
[+] [-] Waterluvian|6 years ago|reply
Maybe this is a Ship of Theseus kind of thing. They get rid of almost all employees, empty the pipeline, and then retool. What's left of College Humor?
[+] [-] hexane360|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] eyeinthepyramid|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ohples|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tempsy|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jtaillon|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] echelon|6 years ago|reply
This isn't the first time Facebook killed culture, and it won't be the last.
We really need to de-platform or find a way Facebook can't steal value.
[+] [-] slg|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Zhyl|6 years ago|reply
CollegeHumor had a lot of hits and spawned some genuine talent that is now earning money on its own merits (Jake and Amir, Adam Conover) but overall the content was not consistent enough to have an overall draw that was worth subscribing to.
[+] [-] geddy|6 years ago|reply
You know, I never really thought about it this way, but the way you worded it is perfect.
I talk about the "good old days" of the Internet, and it always comes down to Facebook ruining everything. I'd pin it around 2012. You're spot on though - Facebook outright murders internet culture. God, I despise that company and what it stands for so much.
[+] [-] rchaud|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] shadowgovt|6 years ago|reply
Nobody forced College Humor, Funny or Die, or any of the other companies that shifted resources to believe Facebook. They took a calculated market risk and the gamble didn't pay off (and they don't have enough reserve capital to survive a failed gamble). In an ideal market, the back-stop on this behavior would be "Nobody trusts Facebook's self-reported numbers moving forward."
Is that a sufficient back-stop, or should there be (further) government intervention?
[+] [-] yardie|6 years ago|reply
This is fraud and Facebook employees should feel threatened about going to jail. This was not a sleazy sales pitch. This was outright fraud to convince content producers that they were making more money than they actually were.
[+] [-] tracker1|6 years ago|reply
Aside: If Google Was a Guy series is one of the funniest things online.
A lot of their efforts just don't land very well. Compare this to say RoosterTeeth (Red vs. Blue, RWBY and others) has done very well in terms of adapting overall, including a couple movie releases (not huge, but out there).
[+] [-] macspoofing|6 years ago|reply
Facebook should certainly be held responsible for their part, but let's not let CollegeHumor of the hook. In the end, they are responsible for their business, and moving to an unproven platform is very risky no matter what promises FB sales people tell you.
[+] [-] justinhj|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sitkack|6 years ago|reply
One thing to watch out for is if this posted under their Geuite account to YouTube, when the gsuite bill isn’t paid, all the YouTube videos will get deleted, leaving a cultural hole.
Of all the Google crimes, this one is accidental but the most damaging to society.
[+] [-] yincrash|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] neonate|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unwiredben|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jedberg|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nerevarthelame|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] geddy|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Domenic_S|6 years ago|reply
Thanks, CH!
[+] [-] jlodwick|6 years ago|reply
So happy to hear you met on there, and, apparently, are still married! Perhaps it wasn't a failure after all :)
[+] [-] awillen|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lgleason|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Raed667|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] brianbreslin|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] chx|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] agotterer|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] 8bitsrule|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|6 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] tomaszs|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] 40four|6 years ago|reply
What a joke. Makes me want to never visit their site again. That is unacceptable.
[+] [-] unknown|6 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] emodendroket|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] antidaily|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bhouston|6 years ago|reply
But I guess its costs were too high such that if it just distributed it all via YouTube it couldn't make any money?
[+] [-] jannes|6 years ago|reply
> “In order to beat YouTube, Facebook faked incredible viewership numbers, so [CollegeHumor] pivoted to FB,” former CollegeHumor writer Adam Conover presciently tweeted last October. “So did Funny or Die, many others. The result: A once-thriving online comedy industry was decimated."
[+] [-] spamizbad|6 years ago|reply
Whether some business unit inside Facebook did this intentionally or not, it's a big reason why I think media companies have turned against Facebook as they feel like they got ratfucked.
[+] [-] paulcole|6 years ago|reply
Then don't comment? It's Hacker News not Hacker Speculation.