Note: This article contains both factual data and the author’s interpretation (opinion) of said data.
During much of the 2010s, the legacy, corporate (liberal) media viewed social media as something that only kids and disengaged adults used. They failed to realize that independent creators would turn to sites, such as YouTube and Facebook, to establish conservative media companies and become dominate cultural institutions. Dollar-for-dollar, legacy media giants have official been dethroned by a beanie-wearing skateboarder and a pissed off special education teacher who grew sick of being a liberal after working at a public school all day. Both during the previous decade and this one, the large number of independent media success stories- such as those of Tim Pool and Salty Cracker- will elevate American conservative media to a new height that will effectively euthanize corporate, liberal media.
CNN Plus kept their lights on for less than a month. CNN’s flagship shows often bring in less than 200,000 daily views. The top 5 percent of conservative YouTubers 4x or 5x that in a day. Go to YouTube and visit the channels of CNBC, ABC News, or Bloomberg Technology. You will find that- despite having millions of subscribers- these corporate giants have no more than 5,000 views on roughly half of their videos. Many of their videos only get 1,000-2,000 views. I am a YouTuber with less than 5,000 subscribers and I surpass 2,000 views at least a couple times per month. These news companies are either on financial life support or are being heavily subsidized. Not even the fraudulent January 6th hearings can be milked for much longer. Americans are increasingly seeing through the veil.
More significant than legacy media failing is the sheer dominance of independent creators and now well-staffed media companies such as the powerhouse that is The Daily Wire. Ben Shapiro’s company recently hired the leading conservative and liberty-oriented mind in all of Canada- Dr. Jordan B. Peterson. Peterson, a clinical psychologist with an IQ of 156, and as nearly as high as Albert Einstein’s, first came to fame for openly declaring against the Canadian government that imposing forced speak is almost identical to impeding freedom of thought.
Right before Peterson joined The Daily Wire, he was suspended from Twitter for declaring that an obese Sports Illustrated model was “not beautiful” and that sociological authoritarianism cannot overrule biological attraction. Between the brains of Ben Shapiro and Dr. Jordan Peterson, there isn’t an authoritarian leftist in the entire western hemisphere who could honorably defend their desire for more governmental control. Expect The Daily Wire to rapidly increase in influence and reporting power as they continue to diversify their lineup with courageous top minds of the day. They’re also exploring children’s content which will be a strong blow against the leftist indoctrination of America’s youth.
Tim Pool, the 36 year-old beanie-wearing skateboarder referred to earlier, started off as a solo act reporting on YouTube from the ground all over the world after leaving corrupt, corporate media companies. He gained significant influence after livestreaming Occupy Wall Street in 2011. A self-described moderate liberal, Pool is now a multi-millionaire with over 30 employees, and is pissed off at Biden and the authoritarian left.
After having Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene on a livestream in January, Tim has been swatted nine times by police after calls/texts from an individual or group still at-large. On June 8, Pool’s most recent swatting, the police forced him and others to evacuate their studio due to a potentially real threat, and the livestream cameras were rolling for three hours before the cast returned. 40,000 viewers watched empty chairs for 3 hours.
Pool’s studio while he’s being kept outside with police after a swatting on June 8, 2022.
On that same night of June 8th, the highest rated cable program only had 34,000 individuals between 18-49 (core marketing demographic) watching. Among the key demographic, this man’s chairs literally received more viewers than the best programming on cable. While a few broadcast programs outperformed Pool’s chair’s with the key demographic age range, they should not even be in the same league. Independent creators ARE the new media.
Like Psaki, I’ll circle back. The pissed off special education teacher is the legend Salty Cracker. There is a subgenre of conservative news for everyone’s desires. Salty attacks the left with the same vigor and vitriol that the left attacks conservatives. Like an increasing number of men in America, he grew tired and pissed off at our country going to hell and no one standing up. His videos often sound like the rantings of a crazy man, but he is always politically astute and sees the truth of the matter.
YouTube refuses to monetize Salty’s vulgar content. Instead of toning it down, he took his 50,000 livestream viewership to YouTube’s alt-tech competitor- Rumble.com where he often receives several thousands of dollars in donations each stream. This one streamer making the decision to only accept money via Rumble is costing YouTube several hundreds of thousands of dollars each year. Big tech like YouTube, and Twitter (with its woke owners still in possession at time of publishing) banning personalities will be their death in ten years tops. Web3 will decentralize the internet (servers hardware and content owned by users- not by woke companies) and no one will be fully cancelled ever again. Big tech censorship is only accelerating their inevitable death or obscure existence.
If you’re still unconvinced, allow me to introduce the King of ratings. Even three years ago, Joe Rogan was receiving 11 million podcast views/listens each day. Factoring in all of Rogan’s content, he is likely exceeding 400 million views per month. He is single-handedly giving the entire Fox News lineup a run for their money.
There is no one host even close. Rogan is a former UFC fighter who simply wanted to have interesting conversations with people. While he is liberal by 1990 standards, he would easily be labeled conservative in 2022 and stands for the values of freedom and liberty that classical liberals stood for long ago. He is anti-authoritarian as you’ll ever find.
On every list of top influential political channels, there are hundreds of conservative (and/or non-authoritarian moderates) who are dominating their legacy and liberal peers. Not everyone consumes news, but those that are, or will soon start, will increasingly turn to independent creators who are majority conservative by audience share. It is only a matter of time before their message hits critical mass and a HUGE cultural shift takes place. Most of these highly successful individuals are in their mid-thirties. They’re positioning themselves to become the voices of truth for the next three decades. Sit back and enjoy.
David Potter is the Founder of Red Pill News, a solopreneur, conservative media company doing its part to win the culture war.
