Dungeontube Panic and calling my human readers

This is a long winded post about the click based environment on blogger and yoiutube and the larger post ai world. If its not your bag skip to the end where I ask readers questions. 

Ive seen 2 vids on the decline in views. I'm wary of YouTube and Google's counting and even paying creators transparently. The first vid was a rambling livestream and i didnt finish. Then I found another more scripted piece questioning this. They mentioned 2 creators id not seen. Then I found this.

48 creators rate best modules
id like more tag team vids like this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t3PCUadXFAg&t=970s

A great resource with all kinds of D&D fans and editions.
Some rated my least favourite products and makes me want to reconsider them.
I'm going to hunt some of these and rewatch it and follow lots of the creators.

So in one day of ppl telling me about death of dungeontube i found 60+ creators id never seen. 

Im seeing more variety in games and editions. 
I have youtube running most of the day im home like tv or radio used to be.
And none of these ppl were recommended to me before by youtube. 

Feel free to recommend creators you like in the comments below to share.
I've heard babies in prams asking ppl to like and subscribe while on the bus.

5 years involved in archaeology online and googledubunker vs crackpots and today FB recommended me a history page with no AI, no racists, no ufo/giant/angels/fantasy global civilisations with no evidence. I read journals and have a degree in archaeology and have friends in field (some say it shows here). 5 years to recommend a page just showing work as art with no BS speculation as fact. So dont trust AI recommendations because they can steer you to garbage or worse.

As im not really motivated by money or being in business at this point Im a bit biased but its best to make stuff from the heart and not worry about numbers. PPL said craft videos dont score but some guys make a living making craft vids very well. Actually watching them got me building and then aquariums and now i have 50 frogs and 2 bluetoungue lizards and a bunch of friends in this new hobby.

Having been into lots of hobbies and fandoms im in that have come and gone over 35 years like d&d, graffitti, drwho, comics, music you see things come and go. Sometimes a quiet spell gets rid of the biggest posers and grifters so it isnt always bad. Also lots of creative weirdos go pro. In Graffiti, we used to sit around drinking and drawing in each others black books. Some were sent around the world and then ppl did as a cash cow not love. A few years later people would be shy with their books secrets, become more competitive and only stay friends with ppl who helped their careers. I guess wizards do this with spells too.

G+ was amazing and many of my peers from then have gone pro and ther have been rifts. At its peak I could read all day and not keep up with output of creativity. Actually, my oldschool gamer scene split ups ended up including the rest of the world. I first heard many of the leading shitty biggot pundits in politics now from G+ game nerds first. By years. The splits are probably for the best. It possibly helped inoculate me against the wider world pop bigots.

Ive seen a few bigoted D&D channels preaching against human rights and kindness (woke stuff) and they wear it on their sleeve mostly and are obvious. The worst one subverted the Golem of Prague into an vile act against god, gave advice on manliness and bullied woke ideas in games like treating disabled ok. These anti empathy goons are rare or restrained from saying what they really think. Im finding ppl who are wonderful or just talking about a game and not the wider world if they are smart enough to hide it.

So there is lots of great stuff and lower hits are not always bad. Australia's biggest videogame store chain dumping d&d lifestyle brand stuff might be better for the planet. Did anyone ever make D&D toiletpaper? I guess we need something for kids to give their D&D dads. I have D&D socks. I got most of my 5th ed books on sale this year as chain stores dumping 2014 compliant stuff under half price. I am only a DM for 5th ed now because the older version had an index i coulnt read even with glasses. New one got me more into modern D&D while others crying about it. Possibly I dont fit markets well, im poor, im not a fanboy or a hero worshipper. So me liking stuff isnt a sure bet on hits and numbers. I will keep making shit despite other ppl for me first rather to farm clicks. 

Clicks in the age of AI and the non-transparent goal posts of algorithms have devalued. Zac Snyder got to do a 4 hour film with a fake social media campaign with overseas-based bots and hacker scam sweatshops. Politicians are making it normal. I played with AI for under a year and honestly, I've not seen it improve since and im still seeing stuff look like what I did then. These automated plagiarism systems are in fact mass mass-producing cliches which will age badly. Im sick of certain rendering styles. AI Images makers derivative cartoon meme styles flood and they become passe as they are used by too many people. Averaging cliches is not art its the opposite. in memes for a few weeks. Their use by the cheapest businesses (that are shit artist clients often too) is inherently an inauthentic grift. AI Images use in fraudulent science and history make it more inauthentic. Im slightly more understanding of non profits using it but the data centre drama makes it terrible for the natural world, and makes our power, water and computer chips go up in price.I tend to avoid pages and vids using it in thumbs. Ive become sick of a whole style of rendering in a short time from AI. It has a much smaller half-life than well made human work. I will be revising the handful of pdf works that I used it.

Our tech and hobby landscapes are always changing.
Im happy not everyone does the same or thinks the same as me in a diverse world.

So I have the opposite problem here as dungeontube
I get more hits and less engagement now and it feels more meaningless.

year and top views per year (not total) 
2012 804 views
2013 17542 views
2014 21178 views
2015 15944 views
2016 60296 views
2017 30582 views
2018 35362 views
2019 26052 views
2020 29324 views
2021 26436 views
2022 39647 views
2023 80293 views
2024 55813 ciews
2025 192793 views - also had 178k and 181k since then

Comments and engagement has been decreasing the whole time.

Spam has been consistent but offers of wizards, vampires and Illuminati are mildly amusing. New style of spam is ai written to appear more personal and reflecting on content but not quite right then promotes plumbing on the other side of the planet.

Google ads, when i had briefly, would tell me some post had said a bad word - but not say which post or 50k words a month were forbidden. So I quit Google Ads, grift economics and monetisation of hobbies is another topic.

Hits are nice. Money is handy.
But id rather know im not just being scraped by ai for those hits
Id rather not feel like im screaming into an enlarging AI void.

So if your a human please comment occasionally
Conversation and suggestions help me make more posts more often
Especially when my games are not driving new content

What YouTubers do you like?
What did you like most on this page?
What old stuff I did would you like to see come back?
Did anyone like any adventures, zines or 3folds?
Any of my PDF on my downloads page do people like to use?
Did anything weird happen in a game because of my tables?
What games do you want to run 2026?

I could make a survey perhaps

Have a good holiday and take care of yourselves and your loved ones or else


oh and bob on this topic
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=23DldCQqjKs