A Scott Cramer Video Changed My Views on Content Creation

When I watch TV, I usually throw on YouTube. Most of the time, I am watching a video about a case that I'm researching or ASMR to keep my mind calm and relaxed. Sometimes, though, I like to watch commentary on pop culture. A genre that I would love to write in more.

Scott Cramer is a well-known YouTuber. He's gone through a lot of different eras and different styles of videos. His empire is built on his personality rather than a certain style of videos.

His most recent video was about parody movies. At least on the surface, that's what it was about. But underneath was a message about creating content with love.

Many interpreted the video, especially the ending, as his way of announcing another new era in his journey. Maybe even going back to making the videos that he wants to make, like comedy skits, rather than the commentary videos that he's been doing the last few years.

By the end of the video, I was crying and feeling super emotional. Like Scott, I felt pressure to create content that I didn't always love. On Medium and other platforms, I am known as the true crime guy, the one who is well versed in almost any case that can be thrown at me. It's a lot of pressure.

Because of the fanbase that I have built up, I have been able to dabble in other genres. But if I stray too far or stay away from true crime too long, I get questioned about it.

Back in 2010, I lost my job at a local museum. For the first time in my adult life, I didn't have a full-time job and was confused about what my next move should be.

My best friend suggested that I give writing a chance. He pointed out that even if I failed, I would have unemployment to fall back on until I found something else.

Thankfully, I didn't fail.

In the early years of my career, I wrote erotica. It was a lot of fun. Sure, I wasn't really building an audience, but finding different combinations of characters to bring together in adult situations was so much fun for me.

Then around 2018, it started to become a chore. I wanted to branch out, but anything else I wrote on the platform failed to make any sort of impression. It felt like I was stuck writing in this genre that I no longer loved.

An answer came to me one night while I was waiting for writing group to start; I read an article that changed my life. It was about the McDonald's Monopoly scam.

It was told in a non-linear and confusing way. I text my bestie and said I could do better than this. He challenged me to write my own version. I did.

That night, as I walked with my friend to Grand Central Terminal, I noticed that my stats were going crazy. I'd gone viral for the first time.

Over the last eight years, I have read, researched, and written about hundreds of cases. Sometimes I even still get a thrill from doing it. But it's becoming less and less; the thrills are fewer and fewer over time.

One case that still gets me going is the Luigi Mangione case. There's a lot to be mined from it. I even have a book coming out about it. But one case does not make a career.

For a while, I was making headway in the history genre. However, like everything else, it wasn't on the same scale that true crime was for me. With the one exception of historical true crime, for some reason that seems to be one of my sweet spots.

In fact, the only other genre that I seem to have gotten the same level of success in is soap opera commentary. To be fair, I have been doing snark for Beyond the Gates for more than a year now. But that is done under a not-so-subtle screen name, SnarkEd.

Why does it work?

Part of it is because I genuinely love soaps. For a long time, my goal in life was to become a headwaiter of one. Then I played with the idea of creating my own. But there were obstacles in the way that I wasn't sure how to combat.

The conclusion I came to after watching the Scott Cramer video and thinking about my time snarking was that I can do soap commentary in a way that no one else is doing it. Basically, the same thing that happened when I switched from erotica to true crime.