3) and then advertising the video tutorials by suggesting users can earn as much as he can.
Thanks for your perspective here -- very interesting and much appreciated! I've always wondered what medical students make of him (and not just the ones I've seen on Reddit).
Just wanted to highlight your third point here which I think is what made me give Ali some serious side-eye because:
1) Ali has clearly worked hard to produce his videos, use SEO, etc. to market his channel, and his regular upload schedule and content all played into his success. However, he was also lucky. Not all YouTubers who make videos regularly get thousands of subscribers, let alone hundreds of thousands or a million like Ali has now reached. For a while he had that special something I suppose -- the content, persona, etc. that made you and I watch him and like him and perhaps spread the word, etc, and his USP of being a Cambridge medic which definitely was interesting to me. The USP + good production + timing/luck really shouldn't be discounted in his success.
2) ^ leads onto my second point, which is privilege. Ali was able to get all the equipment and tech needed to produce good quality videos thanks to other ventures. His finances have always been (I'm assuming given his company) solid. Wouldn't most students would have to save hard to afford basic equipment like a camera, tripod, etc?
3) I seriously doubt Ali lets us into all of his ~~secrets~~ to success in these videos. Good SEO, regular uploading, etc. are really pretty obvious things to highlight, though I haven't watched the tutorial so maybe I'm wrong there. At first I was intrigued and surprised he was talking openly about his success on YouTube. And the videos were very interesting! But then came all the SkillShare shite and somehow the image of a benevolent benefactor was kind of muddied when you realise how much he earned from Skillshare...
Back to the point and your final observation: that he advertises tutorials
suggesting users can make as much money as he can. It seems so sleazy that the focus here is on income. Yes, income = financial security. But content creators aren't guaranteed income. And if you are successful, there's a slog during which you probably won't get a bloody penny. There's the mystical YouTube algorithm and changing trends and surely, if you want to create content, it would be because you want to share your content? Wouldn't money be a real perk, but not the reason why you started creating videos in the first instance?
It just feels fucking disingenuous to sit there at the top and extol how great it is making content for the ££ and that it's really not that hard!!! when there will be many, many, many factors that played into Ali's success and monetary gains. He probably just sees it as helping others out, but then he's earning that ££ from these very video tutorials that probably benefit him far more than his viewers.
Sorry for the essay -- this guy just grates my fucking cheese. Try-hard but alright-seeming lad turned hardcore shiller & influencer moron. I've said it before and I'll say it again: he's got caught up in the fame and ££ and people are starting to realise it.
TL;DR: Ali can makes all the money he likes but it's disingenuous to act like everyone can have his level of success but then again he makes coin off of it all so
