Welcome to the Internet Wasteland | Stanpai's Soapbox Ep. 6 I spent longer than the episode to write a response but ended up erasing it. I mainly said that I don't see it as this dreadful state of the world of media and art you seem to describe and that things aren't that bad now. There is something for everyone now. If you want videos like before, there are channels who still make them and who have evolved them naturally, just as there are musicians who still make music that sounds straight up from the 60s but with modern techniques (Greta Van Fleet comes to mind).
It's the best time to be nostalgic, because everyone else who is nostalgic about the same things you are can gather around a create communities, reference those things, finance creators, and share their love around, slowly bringing in new people who never knew the old stuff while it was contemporary.
I agree that it's harder now to stumble upon great things given the mountains of shit and how everything seems an echo of everything else. As a result it's harder to grow organically if you make that sort of thing. I just think that the best way to move forward is not to retreat into a smaller place, but rather to proudly present what we have made even if 99.99% of people ignores it.
We defeat mediocrity with excellence. Mediocre shit will always fill up whatever vacuum great works leave open wherever there are people who want quantity. People who are hungry for quality will always receive good works with their arms open. Good news is that more and more, those people can make a living out of it even with small audiences.
When the creators you cite were big, others were small or couldn't even exist. Long form reviewers spent years in the shadows until audiences started to shift their way. There will come a time where mainstream audiences want the 3 minutes videos again because they grew tired of the long and the vine-like videos (hell TikTok is allowing longer vids now and Instagram went from 15sec limit to many minutes).
It will never be the same, but I don't see it as a bad thing.
Now I've spent even longer to write what was supposed to be a short version of what I said before. Fuck me.
#36 - Boom Kitty 
#33 - Milkbar Lads (Dead Estate team) 
CAT WITH TWO TAILS 
