Overall, I think the main reason why I quit
was because it just wasn't for me. It wasn't for me, it wasn't what I wanted I
didn't want a career in that industry bad enough that I could put up with all
the bad stuff, but if you are someone who DOES want a career in traditional
media, in TV and radio, you want to make yourself a personality,
I think if your motivation is there, that maybe you can withstand the things that
I didn't like, but I think for a lot of YouTubers, and a lot of "fresh off the
boat" foreigners, who come to Japan and think that it's something they might
want to get into, I do want to share my experience so you know exactly what
you're getting into.
Hold on I'm getting thirsty. So the first thing I want to talk about is the
exploitation of YouTubers with the "myth of exposure".
I had tons of offers to appear on TV shows, or to have
programs made about me, about my life, about who I am, and not ONE of them paid.
And this was a huge problem for me because I was teaching English at the time.
I had scaled down a lot to accommodate the new job but I still kept
a bunch of classes because I still needed the money.
Nobody mentioned that these TV interviews would not be paid, and I would
have to cancel my English classes. In fact, to get teachers to come out and
cover my classes last minute I was paying more than I was actually making per class.
So I was actually losing money to appear on TV shows
being on TV gives people the illusion that you're "rich" or that you're "successful".
I don't know what it is, but they're like "Oh! TV is the pinnacle of success!"
"You're you're famous now, wow! You're just you're so amazing!"
When, you know, I was actually doing better when I had a job.
The myth of exposure is just--it's such bullshit and they will get so many people willing to do it at least once,
for free, because they think that they're going to somehow benefit from it.
As someone who has been blogging pretty much my
whole life you know like before YouTube it was livejournal and like different
websites like that, being on TV has never brought me more traffic than being
linked on another blog has.
If you want to grow your channel with exposure collab with
someone or get someone to write about you on their website that's definitely
gonna bring you a lot more traffic than appearing on TV
another really frustrating thing about being a YouTuber in Japan and being
asked to be on TV
is that a lot of the time TV companies are after your viewership so many times
the TV company would not pay me for my work but then they would ask me to
please tweet and Facebook post and "maybe even make a video letting people know to
watch the show", and it was clearly just an attempt to you know harness the
viewers and the viewership that I've taken years to build without paying for it,
without compensating me for it. And maybe, to someone really inexperienced
this might sound really selfish, but we deserve to be compensated for our work.
We all deserve to be compensated for our work, it doesn't matter if it's your
first time on TV, or 20th time on TV, there's really no excuse not to
compensate bloggers. Another thing that really bothered me about being on TV in Japan,
is how often they would want to use MY name and My face and MY
background, but give me a personality that was NOT mine.
One of the worst "shuzai" I've ever had, first of all, the Director came to my house,
and he looked through my stuff, and he said, "Don't you have anything interesting?"
And I said, "Well like, here are my books and my DVDs", and he goes,
"Don't you have any manga or anime or like, Morning Musume? Don't you listen to
idols?" And I'm like, no, and he's like, "Oh, that's boring."
Sorry guy! He eventually came back and we decided to do a report in a Japanese
convenience store, because I had not done a video about them at that point, and I
said you know like, "Hey I bet this would be interesting!" So we went to the
convenience store, and he said, "Pick out something that you think is interesting."
and I said "Hey, this is really cool."
"There's so many different types of Japanese ramen, and in Canada, I think we
only have like, one or two, so one of the things that I really like about Japanese
convenience stores, is how there are different types of ramen!" And he goes,
"Oh, we can't use that, I'm sure you like bentos. Bentos are interesting! Talk
about how Bento are interesting!"
So, I did that. I was like, 'Well bentos, yes, there're so many different bentos, and
in Canada we only have sandwiches~"
"Wow, Japan's crazy! Wow!" So the whole time we were shooting the director was
saying like, "Oh can you be more excited?" "Can you be more excited about being here?" And I
was like, "It's just the convenience store, like I've lived here, (I think for
like six or seven years at this point). It's just a convenience store, like it's
not ~amazing~ to me." And like, the whole time we were doing this shoot he was like,
"Can you just be more excited? Be more excited! Smile more! Be more energetic!" And so I
was like, hahaha, whatever. When we watched the final broadcast, the narration,
it was some some girl who was narrating over it, she said, "To Micaela, being in a Japanese
convenience store, is like being in a theme park!" and I was like...
I didn't say that. I didn't say that.
That's not how--I wouldn't say that. What the hell? If they're gonna be
making this stuff up, why do I have to use my real name?
Why do I have to use my real name? Why do I have to say this is me when it's
not me???
Every TV show says, "Hey, can yout tweet? Can you blog? Can you post about it, so all
these people watch it?" and, I told people to watch it, and remember them being like
"This isn't you. You've changed." And I was like "No, no, I have not changed!"
"I didn't approve of this, I swear. I don't know what's going on!" And so
actually by the end of my contract, by the end of like last year I
kinda just stopped telling people when I was on TV, because it's not worth it and
I never know what the final product is going to be, I don't know if I'm going to
endorse what they turn it into, and if you're not paying me, you know,
if they're not paying me enough for my time, or if it's not something I'm
super-proud of, I'm not gonna waste my viewers time with it.
basically I don't know what I'm trying to get at is that when you're a youtuber
if you've already established a following and if you're already able to
like make a living through YouTube it's best just to keep doing that, it's better
not to betray your fans. One of the things I noticed over time was how good
I felt when people would pull me aside and say they love my videos when you say
you love my videos it's like you accept what I put out as a representation of
myself. But you know when people said that they saw me on TV I didn't feel
that pride. I didn't feel that same pride at all, it was like, oh then
you don't know who I am at all. I feel like people who watch my youtube videos
and they come up and they're like, "I've seen your YouTube videos and I really like them!"
I feel like those are the people that can accept me for who I am, and when
people are like, "I saw you on TV, can I have your picture?" It's like, I'm really happy
that you're happy to see me, but I don't know if you actually know who I am.
And that's kind of sad.
Another thing that I want to talk about, is the general "hazing", I don't know if
I should call it that, sounds kind of mean, but I think that's it is, the "hazing"
that follows when you join a talent agency where there's so many
famous people at the top, and when you start to work with them, I feel like the
managers, they work really hard to like, instill these sort of practices on
the newer guys, the lower-tier talent which admittedly, I was.
I was at the very bottom and I felt like my managers did everything they could to
make sure that I knew that, and that did not feel good. I think ... I want to say,
if you were someone who wants to be on TV and this is the path that you've chosen,
I think you can't help it, you can't, you have to start at the bottom and work your way up,
But for me, I didn't ask for this.
I didn't ask for this and it just came as part of my job and it just kept
building and to be constantly reminded of how I'm a lower tier person with like fewer
rights and privileges than everyone else in my agency it was just depressing.
I did develop social anxiety and I think a lot of it stems from the imposter
syndrome and the imposter syndrome is where you feel like your life is a lie
and the reason for that is because so many people have thiss "sparkly-eyed view"
of Television, it's like if you're on TV you must be successful, you must be famous!
Oh my god. I had people like, spreading rumors about me about how much money I
was making, I had no idea what was going on or like I wasn't getting paid to
actually do things, or how you know, I felt like I was being exploited as a
vlogger as a blogger as a foreigner
but people would come and be like "Oh, you're so amazing," or "Oh, we like you!" but
the version of the person they liked was not even close to the real me
so I was felt like I was constantly letting people down.
I felt like I was constantly disappointing people. I think that was
the one side effect was definitely not prepared for, when i took this little
journey, and I've been spending the last eight months kind of recovering, and
trying to figure out where I am, and who I am, who I really am, like
"Who I am" versus the "Me" that has been projected to the world with my name on it.
Like, I've been trying to get rid of that, and kind of find "this", and I feel like finally after
like eight months of not being anything in particular other than myself I'm kind
of figuring that out again. I think I was really really blessed and I had great
opportunities and I'm thankful that I was able to explore that path but it
really was not for me and I think that if you're a creator on YouTube you're going
to understand; it's much better to be liked for who you are then to pretend
you're someone you're not.
And ultimately I enjoy YouTube and I did not enjoy television
I enjoy making things and having people genuinely enjoy the things that
make more genuinely enjoy the opinions and ideas that I have that I expressed
it just feels so much better so that's my story thank you so much for listening
I'm losing my voice now, can you tell?