Not with a bang...

[jayhenry]

Since the discovery that Jess Rose played Bree, the number of subscribers to lonelygirl15 on YouTube has skyrocketed -- Nearly tripling from 20,000 to over 60,000. In several recent media interviews, the creators (note the lowercase 'c') have been quoted saying the show's popularity has only grown.

Really guys?

Subscribers are up, but are you looking at the same numbers as me?

Here are the YouTube numbers for the run of the show:


In TV land, they've hit the point where they move from Tuesday to Saturday, and then from NBC to the CW to, like, A&E III (only available in Montana).

The first blue dot is "My Lazy Eye," their biggest early hit. This one initially got 700,000 views or so, and since it was lonelygirl15's profile picture climbed for a long time.

The purple dot is the Swimming video. If you weren't watching, it's hard to imagine the mania sparked by Swimming. A one piece bathing suit? WTF is Cassie? What was that song? It was the pinnacle of phorumania.

The red dot is House Arrest. The video that came out after A Message From the Creators hit the internet. It's by far the most watched Revver video (56,000). The green dot is My First Kiss, propelled to stardom by the discovery of Jess Rose.

Then, the audience evaporated. Yeah, some videos blipped higher, but look how low these videos get. The lower episodes are more telling than the higher ones. How many real fans (like us at the Cove) haven't watched every episode? Not many. Aleister Crowley, who was presumably the main event, has only been watched 65,762 times on YouTube.

The audience tuned back in for the Ceremony -- the yellow dot -- the last video to cross 500,000. But people evidently didn't like it. The viewership went into a nosedive.

It's tempting to look at the numbers and say, "these newer videos haven't been out as long, as course they haven't been watched as much," but it's also false. My Parents Suck hit 500,000 in its first two days. And in the four months after, has only garnered 8,000 or so views a week. And the Revver numbers have never been much higher than 20,000.

The show hasn't crossed 300,000 since "Where are my parents?" That's the threshhold for a successful cable show. In other words -- the show is no longer successful even by cable standards.

If you assume that, on any given vid, there are an assortment of curiousity clicks -- people who don't follow the show and just watch out of vague curiousity (or hatred) -- the actual number of fans may be under 100,000, and the core fans only around 15,000.

[hookedonmonics]

I usually watch the vids on the lonelygirl fansite. do those numbers count for revver numbers? If not, that could account for a dip in overall views. If so, bummer.

[trash180]

jayhenry said:

<snip>And the Revver numbers have never been much higher than 20,000.
<snip>

I think those count as revver views and they've never been above 20k.
NICE GRAPH! exalt!

[hyemew]

Thanks for the awesome graph. Recently I had noticed the severe drop in views LG videos were getting and wondering if Revver was partly to blame, but no they only have 20k views at most as stated, so that has no real bearing on it. It's clear that LG has been losing steam, you can feel it just by being at the phorums. The threads never get to their out-of-control long number of pages and it really seems like you see the same names over and over posting. The disillusionment with LG15 was never stronger than after the ceremony, something which had been built up for so insanely long was a complete flop. I think that was a real turning point for the series jumping the shark (something I hoped would never happen).

One thing, the Creators just had a post at the phorum talking about their idea for fans being able to create their own Breeniverse characters to really graps that long-touted yet ever-illusive "fan interaction". They said it's really in it's rudimentary stages now, but that in a bunch of months the website will be going through a new amazing change and that'll be up and running.
Months? Creators I don't even know if you have that long. At this point it should be all hands on deck, it's clear that LG is a sinking ship. There no use planning next year's ports of call when it's taking on water as we speak.

[milowent]

Great work on the stats, Jay. This showing is going up and down like the O.C., but in internet time.

[buckwheat]

Jay: The graph is terrific, but I don't think the picture is as dire as it suggests. You're comparing current LG numbers with its own earlier peaks. The picture looks better when you compare LG to present conditions at YT. Just when it looks like LG is plateaued at 50,000 - 100,000 territory per vid, Survival Skills clocks 273 K in a few days and Date is over 100000 in just a day and looks to surpass 200K. Not crazy high numbers, but substantial when compared to anything else out there. DB's numbers have steadily risen since the peak of September (Hiding Out passed 200K! Go DB!), and then there is Gemmers' amazingly rapid ascent (occuring during LG's own viewer decline). Gemmers blasted right past NoHo, WeHo, and Lucy (each was heralded as LG's replacement) G's vids get 150K and above regularly. All this suggests that LG has very long (deep? wide?) coattails. If you look at the LG franchise (and not just the LG vids) their prospects don't look at all bad, especially since their 60K+ subscribers gives them a huge leg up on anything else out there that's trying to topple them. In fact, if you use their competiton's performance at YT, LG's looks increasingly dominant: Katers stalled at around 11K subscribers, Noho girls at 10 K, yet LG still adds a few hundred subscribers a week (who's left?)I'm guessing (and I really am guessing here) that it's this picture rather than your numbers that lets the creators sleep at night....

[hyemew]

Thank you buckwheat for an equally interesting and informative interpretation of the current situation! I love your contributions to the Cove!

[Smashing]

Nice work, jay. With the hoax element gone, interest didn't have to decline, but the creators would've had to come up with some new hook quickly to keep people's attention. At the time of the reveal, the story's hook was the 10-12-06 ceremony. The ceremony didn't happen, and I agree with those who say that was the turning point. Having Bree and Daniel go on the run, adding Gemma and Jonas, and a so-called ARG are new hooks, but are too little too late. The fact that they are beating the wannabrees like NoHos and Katers is worth something, but if I were a potential advertiser, I would also be noting that this month Will it Blend? got more views.

[buckwheat]

Smashing: Re Will It Blend: Some poster or channel will always be getting more views than LG at any given time ....the point is, it's never the same poster or channel for very long. LG's dominance of YT (#1,#12, #17 all time subscrbers) is unmatched. No second place, really. If I'm an advertiser, I want something with legs. Until further notice, in the world of Internet IMS's, there is only one. (That's what lets ME sleep at night....)

[jayhenry]

buckwheat said:

Jay: The graph is terrific, but I don't think the picture is as dire as it suggests. You're comparing current LG numbers with its own earlier peaks.

Yes, that's exactly what I'm doing. I'm comparing current LG numbers with its own earlier peaks. I'm sorry if anyone thought I was comparing it to something else.

buckwheat said:

The picture looks better when you compare LG to present conditions at YT. Just when it looks like LG is plateaued at 50,000 - 100,000 territory per vid, Survival Skills clocks 273 K in a few days and Date is over 100000 in just a day and looks to surpass 200K.

I pulled my graph from stats.agentidea.com/, spliced the videos in their chronologically, put it in Excel, added dots in MS Paint. Not very elaborate or time consuming.

Go to stats.agentidea.com -- here's something interesting -- look how, as the viewership numbers increase, the ratings decrease. When an episode hits that critical mass and shows up on the most-viewed pages, the people that add that last 100,000 or so hits don't like lonelygirl15.

Those numbers are the numbers. I didn't dress them up, and I didn't put any spin on them. Less people are watching. Less people are watching the peaks, less people are watching the valleys. Fact.

I'm not claiming for one iota of a second that LG isn't the dominant YouTube show. I wanted this show to succeed, and if you read through the threads you'll see I've been one of the show's most regular defenders. But, I can also step back and take a sober look at the show's performance.

The numbers are accurate. The scale is linear. The graph speaks for itself.

[jayhenry]

Since I'm having fun with Excel instead of gunning for Employee of the Month right now, I figured I'd update the LG numbers too!



Numbers were up strong in the 1st quarter of 2007. But has the strategy of neglecting the YouTube audience by posting the videos on Revver paid off?

Note: It's kind of hard to eyeball the trend line there, because views are so dynamic. So the yellow line is the "5 video average" -- the average views of the two videos before and the two videos after.

_{Other Note: These are just the YouTube numbers. I couldn't figure out a simple way to add the Revver numbers.}

[slainte]

not with a bang but please not with a sloppy, desperate, clutching, gasping, creepy whimpering either...

In another thread siemone suggested a nice riff on the obvious demise of things; a tongue in cheek or a "wink of the eye" finish would show so much class.

Please, please you guys (and I KNOW you - or one of your minions- reads this forum) please do something nice. Leave us with some sense of closure and a recognition of our loyal viewing.

Go to England if that's where the money takes you , but tie up the loose ends here puh-leeze!!!