More and more content creators on the online video platform are overwhelmed by stress, to the point of being forced to take more or less long breaks, or even stop their activity completely.
:quality(50)/2023/07/07/64a7df4c5fe71_placeholder-36b69ec8.png)
Published
Reading time: 4 min
:quality(50)/2024/02/21/florian-henn-tchernobyl-65d67cfd63c81268827063.jpg)
In front of the camera, it’s often the smile that takes precedence. However, some YouTubers confess that they are no longer able to do their job because of stress. The first name that comes to mind is Squeezie, 18 million subscribers. Quite simply the most followed Frenchman on YouTube. A month ago, he explained his need to take a break, “a little YouTube break of two, three months”. And he’s not the only one talking about it. In recent months, McFly and Carlito, Vilebrequin and Mastu have also announced that they are taking a break. Léna Situations spoke about “stress-related health problems”.
This is also what happened to Florian Henn, face of the Mamytwink collective, known for his videos exploring abandoned places. He has over 2 million subscribers today. Initially, YouTube was simply a hobby for him, but he became professional and became overwhelmed. “My brain is in such creative turmoil that it never stops, he confides. Obviously, after a while, it was too much. It materialized in physical symptoms. I felt that I was going to risk my health, myself first, and even my partners.”
The stress of live statistics
We often have this image of the little YouTuber all alone behind his screen. But today, some have several employees to support them. Mamytwink, for example, employs a camera operator, an editor, a graphic designer, and even a historian. So you have to pay them a salary every month. “It’s clear that it adds pressure, explains Florian Henn. If you have a period where you have fewer views, you receive less income, you have worse sponsors. It can add pressure, but like any business and business owner.”
The numbers that Florian looks at every day on an application on his phone are another source of stress: “We have all the figures, views, subscribers, viewing times, estimated revenue, he lists. When you release a new video, you want to see in real time how many views it has and you will have, for example, the ranking by number of views. And it’s anxiety-inducing because at the moment, if you see that your video is not good, you say to yourself: what I do no longer interests people, I’m no longer going to exist.”
And all these statistics depend a lot on one thing: the platform’s algorithm. This is even the main problem for content creators. These are lines of code which decide whether or not to favor certain videos, and often in an arbitrary manner, analyzes Laurence Allard, researcher at the University of Lille who has studied the influence market on the internet: “Their boss is an algorithm. A platform can decide to change its rules almost overnight. This can result in reduced visibility and a whole body of work that is ultimately prevented from being seen,” she explains.
“It became very competitive. Everyone showed up in droves.”
Marjorie Le Noanat franceinfo
This algorithm is increasingly anxiety-provoking as competition grows. This is what Marjorie Le Noan observed: “Suddenly, brands had a lot more choice between creators. So little by little, there are fewer promotional operations. That means that the 3 000 euros that you earned four months ago, you better ration them well because you have absolutely no idea when your next paycheck is going to come.” Marjorie Le Noan finally broke down. She left YouTube to devote herself to Instagram, a social network which, according to her, values amateur content more.
“No more working on the weekend”
Some of these YouTubers stop completely, like Vilebrequin, and others, like Mcfly and Carlito, or Squeezie, take a break. And when they start publishing again, the pace is generally much slower. This is the choice that Mamytwink made: “We no longer make one video per week, we’re going to do one per monthsays Florian Henn. We have put in place a whole bunch of processes and tips to keep us going. We work office hours as much as possible, we’re done working on the weekend, when we go home, we no longer check emails, we don’t look at anything, we take a vacation. Because for a long time, we didn’t take vacations.”
And these breaks do not necessarily penalize YouTubers. After announcing a burnout, empathy often takes precedence among subscribers. Florian and Mamytwink’s videos are getting many more views than before their break.