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Dont miss Dropouts event at Vulture Festival, November 1617 in Los Angeles.Get tickets herebefore they sell out!
But unlike so many other companies that ran aground on the shores ofFacebook, CollegeHumor came back.
In 2018 the brand launched Dropout, a subscription-based platform with original, mostly unscripted, mostly longform content.
Since then, Dropout has had remarkable success with shows likeDimension 20, Game Changer,andUm, Actually.
you’ve got the option to sort of guess what that means.
We have a huge amount in development.
We started really kicking development into high gear in the middle of the year.
From a broad-strokes perspective, when we spun out of IAC, the question was Can this sustain itself?
And we answered that affirmatively within a year.
Then the question became, Can we grow?
Weve all been sort of amazed by the extent to which this has worked.
But the company is in better shape than its ever been before.
Lets talk about a subscription model versus YouTube audience.
And even in that case, social media might be able to help you better than we could.
Year by year, it just became more and more difficult to sell ads.
Theres an economic distinction between these business models, and I think people are scared to go subscription.
But appealing to those fans is a better creative exercise.
Then theres the censorship issue.
It needs to be a little milquetoast.
All they need to do is think that your material is worth paying for.
TheDungeons & Dragonsfolks have embraced him with open arms.[Laughs.]
What has it been like seeing that fandom emerge?Everybody has a different relationship with that stuff.
Im lucky, because I was onThe CollegeHumor Showon MTV in 2009.
I had this brief and glimmering moment of popularity, and then it went away.
But its enough to give anyone the bends.
Its huge and has only gotten huger.We didnt greenlightDimension 20until we were well into the production process for Dropout.
One wasCritical Role,which had a huge fan base, and were huge fans of it.
But its long, and we thought the barrier to entry was high because its serialized.
Then there wasHarmonQuest, which was Dan Harmons answer to this.
It really wasnt taking it seriously.
We thought there was room for something in between.
He had submitted to be a cast member.
We liked his reel, but we had made other decisions that year.
Lets bring him into the fold in a peripheral way.
Then Brennan appeared in a sketch or two, and he started impressing us as a performer.
I learned only after we had hired him that he was an experienced game master.
Are those different goals?
Does one take precedence?Sustainability takes precedence.
We rebooted the company as seven people.
Growth was the only objective.
The capitalist mandate.Thats corporate America.
Our experience was we wouldnt objectively fail, but we wouldnt succeed beyond anyones expectations.
In that middle space, our parent company would get bored and be like, This isnt worth it.
The first year of Dropout was the final instance of that.
Then they tried to quickly sell us, and that didnt go well.
Honestly, if they hadnt been in such a rush, we would have never had this opportunity.
When we talk about growth, I really think theres such a thing as being unhealthily ambitious.
I dont believe in unfettered capitalism.
The strongest argument for growth is that its a hedge against shrinking.
Ireadthat youre working toward being a company that is able to pay residuals.
The world of new media is tricky.
There arent even clear minimums in some of those contracts.
Since were deciding a lot of this stuff for ourselves, we want to be as generous as possible.
We want folks to work with us for a long time.
Weve seen talent outgrow other companies, especially new media companies.
And we want to be a company that grows with its talent.
CollegeHumor came up during the digital-comedy/new-media boom.
For somebody just starting out, there were a lot of opportunities.Sure.
And now it seems like those entry-level spots dont exist as much.
And now all of us have abandoned those business models.
The Onion is just the website, Funny or Die is just TV, and were subscription.
I think what Mythical, Rhett and Links company, is doing is really interesting.
Were living in a moment where its easier to build your own audience than ever before.
So that would be my first piece of advice.
My second piece of advice, which I give all the time, comes from my high-school drama teacher.
They said its not how much you want something, its how long you want it for.
But you sort of need to be willing to put in a decade.
We do very little paid marketing.
We did no paid marketing until the end of last year.
Our organic awareness strategy is chiefly responsible for the growth of the platform.
I think that largely withDimension 20andGame Changer, those were happy accidents.
Clips still often perform like gangbusters.
We are now creating content with those platforms in mind.
And secondarily, were thinking about what could thrive on social.
Youre making longer shows that can be cut into smaller chunks.
Thats a big departure from what CollegeHumor was originally known for, which was shortform sketch.
Everyone goes longer now.
And meaningful generally means longer.
It doesntalwaysmean longer, but it often does.
The first place we saw that is YouTube.
Then folks started to recognize, No, the algorithm is catering to certain types of content.
To play that game, you gotta be creating that kind of content, too.
Its clear that TikTok is now going through YouTubes journey.
The questions theyre asking themselves are How can we capture more meaningful attention?
and How can we monetize this platform?
So youre seeing two things.
As you were saying, Dropout fans are extremely devoted.
Is the length of the videos part of that?
Its for a few different reasons.
I think that because its unscripted, theres a way in.
Weve got a little bit of both fandoms in our stable.
Just laughs and good vibes.
What we immediately found was that unscripted did both, while scripted did neither.
I think as creative people, its inevitable.
Theyve said so they miss sketch on the platform.
But it will be a very cautious move when we get there.
So were going to do it carefully.
