Fun fact the idea that actually started this Jake Paul Film Theory-athon didn't have anything to do with Jake at all; it had to do with those insane faze clan
and clout clan houses they showed Nick and Elissa living in in Shane's series.
Did you see those monsters that both mysteriously had the same Hollywood sign tiled into the pool?
I used to live in the house...two down, but we still have that-
That's like the faze house and then...this is like the clout house
It struck me as an unusual coincidence
And Shane never looked into it so I did a little digging myself.
The houses, which we actually found the addresses for, are part of a complex of four mega-mansions
all built by a Los Angeles real estate mogul and builder who never designed the houses to be lived in by real people
No - They were always designed to be party houses or celebrity rentals or movie sets.
His signature style was including features for what he called the doucheousie
like colored lighting, glass everything, and of course that signature Hollywood sign by the pool.
And if you think Jake's old neighbors had it rough, apparently the neighborhood hates these eyesores and have complained
for years that the noise and people coming and going into the house ruins the area.
If you'd like to pick them off the market,
the asking price for all four on the developers website is a cool
fifty million dollars,
which sounds like a lot, but actually for the size of these houses and their location is kind of a steal.
Faze Clan and Clout gang live there now which I thought was kind of an interesting coincidence in the series that they would both live in these bizarrely
identical influencer houses like some kind of digital
Twilight Zone, until I learned that basically both clans are the same because they're both owned by a company called W8 Media
They're set to live in those houses until at least 2020
and I know this because I inquired about the next time that the houses would be available. Long story short I win this year's
Streamy for creepiest internet stalker and I just really wanted to fit this in somewhere because it's interesting but it had nothing to do with
the main points of the other episodes that I'm doing in the series so now you know
[clips of the Pauls being the Pauls]
Hello Internet welcome to Film Theory - the show that isn't about spilling tea; it's about sipping tea while applying facts.
Today I'm continuing to follow in the footsteps of Shane Dawson by exploring all the issues that he didn't in his tell-all series on Jake Paul or
at least all the issues that he allowed Jake to just dismiss
You see, during Shane Dawson's documentary we come to some of the final moments of the docu-series when Shane finally
finally sits down with Jake.
During the conversation, Shane
rightfully brings up a video from the channel Nerd City who's done a pretty darn thorough job of researching Jake's history when it comes to merch
openly claiming that Jake is exploiting and manipulating children by hawking merch to them in every single video.
Nerd City: Out of a 13 minute and 50 sec video, nearly seven minutes of that time is devoted to advertising products.
It's an interesting video and - another fun fact here - Shane may have just been inspired by it when he was brainstorming names
for the title of his Jake Paul docu-series
In response to these allegations,
Jake doesn't really have much of an answer he just vehemently denies that he could possibly
manipulate children, calling the claims ridiculous, and that he wants people trying to make the connection to just shut up
Here's the thing though Jake, and yeah I'm talking directly to you in hopes that you do end up watching this, I'm not gonna shut
up about this it's important for you to understand why what you're doing is wrong and not just wrong to little kids but also
Illegal and also against YouTube's ad policies so even if you don't care about the kids who watch you do it for that billion-dollar business
hoping to build up cuz guess what nothing kills a business quite like a class-action lawsuit by a bunch of angry parents
Oh, yeah and I know you don't like teachers nothing my teachers taught me in school
do I
utilize in my day-to-day life don't worry even though we're covering a lot of educational stuff today
keep it interesting for you they I wish my teachers did teach me I mean millions of your own dollars are at stake after all
now it's important to note that merch
Itself isn't the problem here and that a creator isn't wrong to promote their own products if that were the case
I'd be the pot calling the kettle black
Having to do my own series on the manipulation of Matt pats because by the way new game theory and film theory merch is launching
on November 24th and it looks great there are hoodies and
reversible jackets and socks and holy crap why am I not getting in trouble for any of this
while our favorite blonde punching bag is well it's because this isn't a kids show whereas the Jake Paul channel is
but Matt Pat I'm not doing a kids show I'm faking pranks with my friends and fake getting kidnapped by clowns and doing up shots
of girls climbing ladders and close-ups of my dad kissing girls and covering up videos where I use racial slurs Jake yeah I know I
hear you and I get it I know I wouldn't let my kids watch yeah but let's look at what defines a kids show
the media's
Official definition of children's programming is a show that's aimed at 6 to 11 year olds with a few key
hallmarks one it can be animated or IRL 2 it often contains
comedy and slapstick humor 3 it's designed to entertain and not to educate
and 4 it doesn't contain open cursing Jake you meet all four of these
criteria in spades you have an animated character you feature plenty of slapstick humor you are certainly not educational
and you beep out any cursing
And one look at videos from your live tour show exactly who's watching you what do you like so much about Jake Paul
You even have several members of your team under the age of 10 with the youngest being four
for a more cynical person would assume that you're using those kids as a means of adding audience surrogates into your crew kids who younger
Viewers can project themselves onto and that you just happen to own 20% of their future business but media definitions and audience demos don't even
because you yourself are intentionally trying to target these kids my audience is definitely younger
I'd say it's like eight years old so like 16 years old so now that we've established that you have a bona fide Kids program
On your hands or at least that you wanna have one then what's the big problem
well there's nothing wrong with a kids show where people do a bunch of stupid things but there is a
problem with a kids show that breaks a bunch of regulations regarding advertising you see
psychological studies have shown time and time again that young children are unable to understand when they're being sold to for instance in a
2002 study by Oates, Blades, and Günther of the eight year olds that were tested fewer than half
Understood that ads were meant to persuade them to do something for instance if I threw Batman on screen right now and did this
attention kids it's me Batman
the Joker is attacking at Gotham City needs your help
Give me your age name and mom's credit card number so I can stop it do it and you could be a superhero just like
Me well we all know it's just me doing a bad Batman impression but to
developing kids they can't understand that that's not Batman and that that could be someone taking on the mantle of Batman
lying to them and in the effort to rip them off it's not their fault either you can't write it off as stupid kids our
brains just develop that way up until age 7 children exist in what's known as a pre
operational phase where a child is only able to focus on themselves they can't really hop into someone else's brain and
understand that that other person might think or feel differently than they do it's like Twitter but
actual eight-year-old children and not people acting like it your own children so when any children's program someone says this
These are such like high quality nice
elastic because these sports bras are absolutely amazing
Wearing something that like actually means something in like minds you have been positive reminds you have been happy these kids are just
physically unable to process that your shorts won't be able to help them achieve their dreams
Unless of course their dream is to buy merch from a company who doesn't do returns on a lot of its items and doesn't do
Cancellations after 20 hours or less than one day after purchase mom and dad better figure out that jr
stole their credit card in a hurry because of all this the federal government started to
down on children's advertising in the 80s before that time kids programs primarily only
existed as advertising tools for toys or products think
Transformers
he-man and
Street sharks because there is no other reason why street sharks should have existed in short Jake any of your advertising to children would have
been totally legal in the early 1980s and if laws against children's advertising weren't around today
all the kids shows on TV would look a lot like your vlogs but now because of these regulations
FTC now requires that any advertising happening around these kids
programs one have a clear distinction between the program and the commercial to that the main character in the show
Doesn't sell the products during the show and three that products can't be integrated into the program's content
Only have 24 hours to enter this competition if you get yourself someone's already competent camo collection
Checkout mini Jake Paul rocking these mini J
Oh so cute gun fans Wakko backslash Jake Paul and I get yourself a baseball jersey and sunglasses
Lucky for you Jake you're on YouTube so those TV regulations don't apply but
YouTube also has a pretty clear advertising policy for anything
qualifying as kids content and it's here Jake buddy where you're not doing much better for yourself
I'm actually gonna show you the policy not because I want to bore you to death but because in your Shane interview you seem really
Unconcerned with how these sorts of policies could affect you I don't see a problem with it at all like just because my fans are
younger does that
Mean I'm manipulating to read from YouTube's ad policy for kids which they implement for any kids between the ages of 6 and 11
quote your child may see an ad intro followed by a video ad marked with AD before the video you selected
all
paid ads undergo a rigorous review process for compliance with our
policies paid ads won't include any click throughs to websites or product purchase flows this means that when you have a show for kids there
Should never be a link in the description to buy merch or in the end screen or an eye card or anywhere
no
Clicking on stuff to go to a website that's going to sell you something or promote a product this kind of promotion to children between
the ages of 6 to 11 is forbidden by YouTube according to the rules set forth in their kids app YouTube
disables these kinds of links for children because again it was children being much more easily manipulated than adults and well for lack of a
nicer way of putting it do what they're told by the
character that they idolize that's you Jake all while being told that Jake Paul errs are unique push the boundaries and are totally edgy by
wearing their merch every day bro
Then there's YouTube's requirement that short animated messages appear before a paid ad to help a child understand that the paid ad will be played
Clearly an effort like on TV to try and help children
distinguish between the show that they want to be watching and the ad that they can skip to go get a juicy juice refill but
In your content there is none of that division there can be no after these messages when your whole vlog is practically the message or
50% of your blog according to that nerd city video out of a 13 minute and 50 second video
nearly 7 minutes of that time is devoted to
advertising products but I wanted to give you a fair shake Jake because in this nerd city video he just showed one example
So maybe he was just
cherry-picking what video he showed so I cast a bit broader of a net across the 20 random videos that I selected if some were almost
entirely
advertisements like this one don't watch this with your parents really inspires confidence through that title where no, less than
65 percent of the video was dedicated to selling your underwear while others like don't watch this with your parents yeah they
Have the same title only in this one his girlfriend isn't in her underwear nearly as much contained only about
15% of the run time as promotion and then you had videos which had almost 0%
promotion sure they contained really uncomfortable transitions from we're supporting a march for gun control to here's my girlfriend taking off her shirt
the matter how old you are doesn't matter you know if you don't think you can get involved or make a difference you can do
at home can make a difference baby get better every single day help the world every single day smile every single day yo let's March
But next to no promotion so yay...
overall on average when looking across all twenty videos merch and other promotional pushes took up between twenty and thirty
three percent of his videos certainly not the 50 percent mark that nerd City said but still over the regulated limit allowed in children's programming
it also limited how many minutes per hour of commercials that children's programming can contain that
17.5 percent and 20 percent of the watch time
maximum so Jake you're actively producing a
self-identified kids show that openly sells to kids who aren't mentally mature enough to understand that their ads in turn breaking at least two major
federal
regulations around children's
advertising as well as YouTube's general guidelines for ads aimed at
children but you know what Jake US Ohio boys have to stick together I will proudly wear my
hometown pride merch that I just got for the low low price of
$10 I mean at this point of Cameron returning I know this whole Shane Dawson thing was just an image
rehabilitation for you so here let me give you a scapegoat to pin this all on since like PewDiePie's apology video taught us
number two what you want to do is shift blame shift blame whatever you could do okay if you're taking
responsibility and that's omitting that you're wrong remember the last episode where I talked about the fact that you aren't really a
youtuber that you're just a cog in your own corporate machine well that means that there are a lot of other parts in that machine
cogs in that machine who should know better much better many of your investors hold a slew of
investments across the media landscape I mean don't get me wrong these guys have done some awesome work and funded companies that now help millions
of people everything from nest to Spotify but they are huge names in the entertainment world there is no way that these
powerhouse investors don't have a basic understanding of children's
advertising laws and didn't do their due diligence
On you and your content before giving you that small loan of a million dollars here's the thing by funding you they are
implicitly supporting your business decisions
including marketing directly to children whether good or ill if Jake Paul is in their portfolio and
presumably a significant portion of Jay Paul's revenue is coming from his merch then they are
potentially recouping their investments on the backs of illegally manipulated
Children and believe me that is not a good look for anyone so Jake what's it gonna be you want to be a famous social
media businessman but that means taking the blame for this yourself or
Are you gonna pass the blame off to your investors who should have known better and should have been
Guiding you away from your business practices but in doing so it means they're gonna have to give up some of that businessman
Swagger that you're so proud of choice is yours and here's the last thing I'll say about this issue yes
I wish Shane Dawson had pressed Jake more about this but honestly I don't think he could notice the weird editing around this particular
series of questions and only this series of questions
it's like
it's ridiculous I
So you spoke your truth on that we should respect
Sentence is oddly cut off full cut at the end of it and even Jake's
responses felt
Different here than they did for the rest of the interview so I've been doing that my whole life so like for me really trying
To say like I'm just doing it to manipulate and try to make money over kids like
It was almost like Shane was getting into territory that Jake were the people pulling the strings behind Jake decided to remove from the table
But it does beg the question should it have been in there? should he have pushed harder? Does Shane have a moral responsibility
to include stuff like this in his documentary and ultimately what does a documentary need to contain in order to be a
documentary? Do Shane Dawson's docu-series actually qualify? Are his race and exposees is doing more harm
than good? Is the Shane Dawson documentary format dangerous? Eh, I could talk about it now but then how would
I extend this to a part 3 of this theory so make sure you manhandle that subscribe button
tell him Jake give it a little bit of a headbutt a little bit
So that way you know in a couple days when the third and final part of this theory goes live and
remember in the meantime that's just a theory a film theory aaaaaaand
cut.
