Does Cancer Have a "Skip" Button?

 

Surviving Amateurish Advertising

On making the decision to do a series of blogs about the personal experience of dealing with a cancer diagnosis, I had not counted on the ravages of chemo treatments side effects, especially the deep and demotivating fatigue. During those times I had no willingness to do anything other than lie on the sofa with YouTube to keep me company.

In time, I became steeped in video streaming lore and culture. I watched hours of content, advertising, and content about content. I watched streaming videos to make of me something of an expert in its advertising: enough to warrant a letter to the king of video streaming services.

 Dear YouTube.

I have enjoyed many of your streaming channels ranging in interest to cabbage recipes to Kantian ethics, and from writing with ink to zebra camouflage, and I have nothing but praise for your contributors. However, most of your advertising has the “look and feel” of promotional videos produced by a cinematography classroom of eight-year-olds.

Wait. I take that back. Our theoretical classroom could produce more professional quality ads than a hefty percentage of ads I see on your service.

Let me offer some advice to your advertisers. First and most important, any ad that runs longer than thirty seconds must be interesting if I, for one, am going to give it my attention. Ads that tip the clock at forty-five seconds must be interesting and informative. If an ad lasts longer than forty-five seconds, it must be interesting, informative, and entertaining. Advertising that does not meet these criteria gets skipped. Most people simply go for another beer or coffee during those ninety-second ads that feature screeching or ultra-authoritative voices that reek of desperation.

C’mon, YouTube, you damn near own a monopoly in the service you provide, and yet your advertising comes across like amateur hour. You are a visual media. Act like it. Get imaginative companies to sponsor your product.

With our mutual interests at heart, I am,

 Sincerely,

Ken Shelton

 

I had subscribed to YouTubes competitor, Nebula, but soon ran into a problem there: That streaming service does not like controversial topics, and so one of my favorite channels left Nebula rather than compromise their message. Kudos to them, but woe to me. I’m back to YouTube for cutting edge video content  peppered with amateurish, boring, ads that left nothing to do to break the monotony and misery that follows chemo treatments.

͢Those treatments are completed now, and the fatigue and nausea side effects have all but disappeared. Now, perhaps, I can get back to my original intent here—that of offering friendly, upbeat advice for the cancer novice.

Honestly, there isn’t a whole lot of advice I can offer other than, if you’re going into chemo, be prepared for a lot of television. But if you intend to spend your time on video streaming services, make sure spare batteries are at hand, super-easy-to-prepare meals are stocked in, and your remote “skip ad” button is functioning.

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