This is just a warning to anyone not aware of this sort of scam. I left a comment on a popular outdoor adventures YouTuber only to receive an email telling me that someone had replied to my comment. When I looked at the comment it appeared to come from the channel host inviting me to claim a prize from him by texting to a number. Apparently this sort of thing is common and needless to say I did not respond
Youtube coffee content.
Happens loads. Usually the spam account looks identical to the actual users too.
Decent De1pro v1.45 - Niche Duo - Niche Zero - Decent is the best machine ever made -
a year later
Was a bit bored today looking for some coffee related nonsense and came across this:
An interesting account for sure. I’m taking with a pinch of salt, but shows that life as a YouTuber is not as simple as one might think.
This is the guy who was pretty horrible in his comments section to me, yeah it can be hard doing what he’s doing but so is a 50hr week grafting.
Sorry if my heart doesn’t bleed but closing patreon just to start YouTube subscription as it’s easier, ….
We all get burned out,
Decent De1pro v1.45 - Niche Duo - Niche Zero - Decent is the best machine ever made -
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I’ve watched a few of his videos, I never felt he was qualified to be making many of them (repeating a lot of received wisdom… though he’s far from the only one on that score) but mostly the humanity/warmth/emotion that is apparent in this video seemed to be missing from them. I don’t really know how the Youtube thing works (beyond posting the occasional vid) but I’d be surprised if it wasn’t the gear videos that were the mainstay of his bread & butter. I hope his new approach works out for him.
I don’t like to see anyone unhappy, but Youtube seems a precarious (style seems to win over substance) and ever expanding field in which to place all your eggs.
Cuprajake This is the guy who was pretty horrible in his comments section to me, yeah it can be hard doing what he’s doing but so is a 50hr week grafting.
Same here, quite rude in his replies to polite comments
Am a little confused with his video. Does he have a job, or is it just posting Youtube videos? He mentions he was a coffee roaster for 2 years - does hes still do this? Going to be honest here and perhaps a tad harsh…I don’t have much sympathy as burnout is a part of life. My partner and I work in a hospital (different departments) and we feel this way all the time. Our work/life balance has been out of sync for several years now…we have to put in a lot of effort to do things together as a lot of the time our shifts don’t match, so it’s like passing ships in the night. There are times when I am so overworked and feel so tired I could almost fall asleep at my desk. The beauty is when we feel this way we have annual leave to fall back on, which helps to re-energise the mind, gives us much needed quality time together and gives us time for our bodies to rest, and get paid for doing it.
Looking at his channel he has over 160k subs, but can barely pull in 50k views. His viewer engagement is very low in my opinion for someone that has that many subs…his highest viewed video over the last 4 months is the Niche Duo (81k) with under 300 comments and 1800 likes. In short, the viewer engagement statistics are not that great. Also, unless you have sponsers, you have to constantly spend and bleed money on new gadgets etc to keep people invested and interested.
Anyway, it’s late and I’m rambling here, but if he does not have a job outside of what he does on Youtube I think he seriously needs to consider getting one, and do Youtube on the side. Youtube is fickle and has always been unstable…certainly not a platform you should put all your eggs in one basket.
On the one hand I admire people entrepreneurial enough to say stuff the day job and build their own income stream through creating content rather than busting their backside in a some salary-capped job.
Online content can be one of the most lucrative jobs in the world by a large margin. Regular jobs don’t even come close.
However, resting your entire financial and subsequently mental well-being on the opinions and thoughts of the general public is a recipe for disaster and I’ve seen a number of videos like this.
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Look, let us be honest please. Most You Tubers worry about two things only: view count and income stream. I read him saying that for the effort he puts in he is not getting the right income stream. @Beverast hits the nail on the head when he says his view count is low. There must be a reason for that.
I challenged him politely on a recent video where he TOLD everyone that whenever you swop burrs on the Duo, you HAD to go through the alignment process……..nonsense.
I admire his openness about not monetising his channel to the nth degree as most do, I mean, who can remember Hedrick in the early days when he claimed he was not being paid by Breville to promote their products, yet that was all he talked about. No one would send him gear to review so he bought his own low end stuff like hand grinders. he even started to promote 10th grade imitation Japanese knife sets!
I guess they probably all have an interest in what they are doing but if it’s a job then it has to pay the bills and who wouldn’t choose the easiest way to do that. You always hear YouTubers talking about the YouTube algorithm and liking/subscribing. If you look at the most watched videos of a lot of YouTubers then you’ll often see it’s the click baity titled ones and not the detailed, in depth and most helpful/knowledgeable videos. Do you stay truthful to what you love or sell out for a quick buck.
“Man realizes making little films of niche coffee accessories may not be viable business”. Who’d have thought?
His engagement is low probably because his stuff is just regurgitated - people get it from the source first.
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The thing with YouTube is that there’s a huge audience who just like to watch nice things, and the truth/transparency is secondary. Same with motorbikes, guitars, cameras, I’m sure any other hobby. The majority will watch the videos shot cinematically with the 4k 60fps camera, studio lights, short focal lengths, great colour correction etc, over the guy stating the facts clearly but shooting in his living room with an old smartphone. Of course it’s great when both happen, but entertainment value usually comes first.
Slightly off-topic but in my industry we sometimes reference a principle called ‘The Aesthetic Usability Effect’ which basically says people perceive an experience (in this case design) as better if it looks nicer, even if it’s not technically better.
It’s why James Hoffman has done so well, especially recently. His videos might not be the most useful for those of us wanting an in-depth, honest review of new gear, but they’re usually well shot, informative and quite enjoyable to watch.
I guess similar to the Netflix effect on things. Most of us have watched documentaries on subjects we didn’t think we were interested in because it was been beautifully shot, even if the content is questionable.
I’ve pretty much stopped watching coffee youtube influencers, or if I do, it’s through gritted teeth.
It does feel like James Hoffmann has moved away from serious coffee into more fun and entertaining stuff. I can see why as I bet it takes months to properly test equipment for reviews and won’t always be much fun, it might also only appeal to a few coffee geeks who are willing to spend thousands on a grinder. His fun videos will be more fun to shoot, take him less time and take him to new locations rather than his test kitchen. Based on that it seems like a no brainer what you would focus on.
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Yeah 100%.
Creating good niche content for a limited audience (in the grand scheme of the general public) ends up being time consuming for zero to very little financial reward. At that point you’re doing it purely as a hobby or for the benefit of your community and shouldn’t worry about engagement.
If the goal is monetisation, viewership and engagement then why wouldn’t you make content more people will watch.
The funniest thing of all, these influencers are actually killing their own businesses without realising it.
Dusk It does feel like James Hoffmann has moved away from serious coffee into more fun and entertaining stuff.
Hoffmann is also different from the other influencers being discussed on this thread in that he hasn’t put all his eggs in the YouTube basket. He’s an owner and executive of Square Mile coffee roasters – among, I believe, other coffee business – an author and a consultant to various coffee manufacturers. And this is just what I know from information I’ve picked up over the years up without searching.
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mathof2 Hoffmann is also different from the other influencers being discussed on this thread in that he hasn’t put all his eggs in the YouTube basket.
He is also not heavily shilling products for financial gain. The amount of shilling going on in the coffee world has increased substantially, so much so, I have been reluctant to make YouTube videos for a long time now. Home Barista is an ideal place for things to be shilled hard because of the North American Market, it’s happened before, is happening now (big time and don’t try and guess the machine) and it will happen in the future.
This shilling and influencers is hugely bad for the world of coffee, especially here in the UK:
- The Chinesium shill (wonder what happened to all the UK coffee resellers, what a shame we have no bricks and mortar companies, if a company set up selling machines and grinders it would do really well etc..). These Chinese companies that sell direct genuinely don’t care…often if you get a bad product you’re stuck with it
- The Chinese burr shill….they are generally not great in big grinders, there, I’ve said it. Lots of fancy words like DLC thrown around etc..perhaps they will become better…perhaps some are good. However don’t trust the likes of Hedrick to know and the Chinese only tell you what they want to generally. Only time will tell
- Useful product development grinds to a halt, sure the easy stuff gets done, but not the difficult stuff, and certainly not the stuff you actually need, but don’t realise you need. It’s all sh*t and shinola as my dad used to say
- so much more but CBA to type it
Grinders - Imagine, we now have a world where it’s OK for grinders to stall on really lightly roasted hard beans, even ones costing £4,000. or grinders you have to run then add beans gradually…this is unbelievable, how on earth did we ever get here and where is the pushback??
Machines that work by magic, with the manufacturers spouting obvious contradictions which are totally unchallenged
Roasters (people) that spring up from nowhere and are brilliant, but have zero experience
Closed forums and groups for products, rather than openness and people don’t seem to worry about that, believing whatever reasons the manufacturer gives. e.g. Ah well “non owners will simply dilute the discussions with irrelevancies”. This is easily solved by making the forums read only but visible to non owners and having a specific area where non owners can ask questions.. Of course the closed forum is about “control”, if you are excommunicated from it, you cannot read anything and in some cases have no support/warranty. I have spoken to many people this has happened to!!
And “we” (royal we) are letting it happen….It’s partly why I set up this place.
You do realise Dave you can never retire from this, the last bastion of coffee the whole coffee and nothing but the coffee, so help you God.