Wednesday, January 01, 2020

2009 to 2019

Ten years ago, I was on the verge of turning 30. I was anxious, as I felt I wasn't in the place I wanted to be by the time I turned 30. I was still single. I had finished school for web design, rather than working on my PHD in Psychology like I had originally intended, and had not successfully launched my career that entire year.

J-Dubb's Theatre had taken a bit of a turn. I focused more on connecting with local  media types, both traditional and new media, via Twitter. My involvement with YouTube waned. First of all, I learned that the music that I used for the first two years of videos, even though it was royalty free, required expensive licensing to use, and I was worried that I might have to ditch every video I had made prior to that year. Secondly, YouTube was changing. There was less emphasis on the community from 2007, and more of an emphasis on a few YouTube celebrities. YouTube did away with having editors select videos to feature on the home page. The beginnings of the dreaded algorithm were put into effect, selecting only the top few YouTubers to feature over and over again. These few YouTubers had multiple channels being featured, and even got together and started a collab channel called "The Station". A YouTuber named Mr. Chi City made a video called "Is The YouTube Community Dying?"

At the end of 2008, I started the J-Dubb's Theatre Twitter account. In 2009, I began to use Twitter regularly. I connected with Portland radio personalities Cort and Fatboy, and the Rick Emerson show, of former station 101 KUFO, and several people who were connected with this group. This was fitting, as KUFO had a heavy influence in the beginnings of this blog, several years prior. Bobby "Fat Boy", and several others Portland people became readers of J-Dubb's Theatre. A guy named Robert Wagner, who hosted a podcast called "PDX Sucks" and ran a podcasting network called "PDX.fm" also became connected with this group. Through this group, I connected  with several local  media personalities. There was a big push to unite traditional media with new media, largely fostered by a guy named Mitch Nolan, who authored an online  journal called Oregon Media Central.

A company called Alpha  Broadcasting purchased several local radio stations, including KUFO. That Fall, the new management of KUFO canned Cort and Fatboy, and the Rick Emerson crew, and  began airing a countdown over the radio station, counting down till  the beginning of the  "new" KUFO, in which several shock jocks had been hired to replace the previous personalities. This outraged many Portlanders, including local media personalities. This also shortly after lead to the demise of KUFO, which was replaced by a talk radio station.

Robert Wagner invited Cort and Fatboy to continue the Cort and Fatboy show as a podcast on PDX.fm. Eventually, Rick Emerson and friend Dawn Taylor began a new Rick Emerson Show on PDX.fm, as well. Cort and Fatboy continued to host local events, such as screenings at the Bagdad Theater. Sarah X. Dylan, and Greg Nibbler from the Rick Emerson Show started a podcast, in Greg Nibbler's spare room, called "Funemployment Radio". This was originally something to do while they were unemployed, but as of this past October, they celebrated their 10th anniversary. They broadcast out of a studio and host a podcast network. Funemployment Radio has ironically been their source of employment for the last decade.  

My involvement in YouTube waned, and would take a hiatus for the first few months of 2010. In April of 2010, however, J-Dubb's Theatre videos would make a come back into what was possibly the the most successful year of J-Dubb's Theatre on YouTube. That year also shaped the format of J-Dubb's Theatre's videos for the majority of its existence.

That year, Adam, my bff since I was 8, moved back up to Oregon from California. Prior to this, I had been spending a lot of time with our high school friend, Jon, ever since leaving my security job in 2006. When Adam moved up, we became a tight-knit group of 3.

That New Year's Eve, I stayed home. The last New Year's Eve of my 20s was my first year not having any plans for a New Year's celebration. Just me and Twitter. I felt completely lame for this. However, in my 30s, I would find that it's really not a big deal to not party on New Year's Eve.

As my 30s loomed closer, over the next 22 days, I felt a sense of dread. However, during my last day of being 29, something happened. I decided that all my goals up to that point, had been for the purpose of other people's expectations. As I was walking around the park, I realized that now I was free to do whatever I wanted with my life. I went to my 30th birthday party feeling like a free spirit, and had a great year.

10 years later, the year 2020 has just begun, and I'm on my way out of my 30s. Things are a lot different this time around. I'm married, I have a business apprenticeship, and a job in insurance, and the future is very promising. People always talk about the futures of young people, but life is still going when we get older. We still have futures when we are in our 40s, 50s, 60s, ect.

At the end of 2009, I decided to end my New Year's blog post by embedding Knights of Cydonia. Prior to that, I had typically embedded something melancholy to signify the passing of years. But that year, I decided to go with something upbeat to signify a promising future. This year, I wanted to end with a video montage, in the same spirit as the video from 2009, like I did last year. But I was too busy this year, and the new year crept up on me. So I will embed a video in the upbeat spirit of the 2009 blog post.