High Functioning Autism and YouTube

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Hi,

A bit of a plea for help. My 13 year old son was diagnosed with high Functioning Autism a couple of years ago, and we have gone through much the same as many on the forum….exclusion from school, fighting the system to get help, frustration, despair etc. Current situation is he has not really been to school for two years, has agreed to visit a couple of times to a very good Autisms specialist school but no real progress currently. He is a bright, smart and clever boy, but very hard to communicate with, and the number of conversations we are able to have is few. He is aware that he is special but will not discuss it.

The one constant throughout has been his fascination over many years with making Video’s, he started with his laptop when he was 7 or 8 and more recently discovered YouTube and Capture Cards. He seems to be able to chat away very articulately, is even funny for hours on end to the Camera. Watching his You Tube Video is one way to see our son in a way that we cannot see him in real life, he makes us smile.
And now the sad bit…., after doing everything to create his YouTube site, recording hundreds of videos on Minecraft, Tom &Jerry and more recently Call of Duty over the past two years, he has no followers, and has very few views. He loves chatting away to the imaginary hoards, but never gets any comments or feedback…as you might imagine it is very hard for him to join multiple Forums and chat away, dropping in his YouTube Channel link into the forum to ‘market’ his videos. His last video to his Audience indicated it was the End, he wants to give up and close that little window we have on our son that we never see in real life.

My plea…very simple! Please could you like his YouTube channel, which is ‘WhiskersTheEvil’ and if you think its funny lets others know. For those into CoD, add some positve comments …he does seem to be rather good, and if anyone knows how he can get more followers then please help him, we need him back.

I can't post the URL, but his channel is 'WhiskersTheEvil', please have a look
thankyou
BlueMax

Has he put the right tags onto his videos? Those tags go a long way in helping Youtube visitors find your channel and videos, because they send the videos right into "suggested" videos when someone has watched something related.

The tags field can be found when you click the Advanced tab while uploading a video, or the Edit link on an existing video. There needs to be keywords people search on such as minecraft,games,video games, etc. Type in each word with just a comm after each word, no spaces, and the field takes care of it.

The only problem is, gaming is such a popular area of life that even a well-tagged video will be competing with other channels with the same content and the same search keywords in the tags.

It can be done though; my channel has content with massive competition as it's such a widespread interest, but I've managed to get my videos to appear in the Suggestion panel quite heavily and I get followers now.

Also, in Advanced, make sure "allow embedding" is checked, so that anyone who does run across the channel or videos and wants to show other people a video, can embed it on their own site or blog, which may get it a wide audience.

I will like your son's channel -- check up on those tags to make sure he's optimizing his chances of being found at random.

Absolutely I will 100%! I've posted vid on yt myself. I don't talk, just film trains and the beach and stuff. I don't get many views either. But I think there's a formula to that using tags and labels. But I will subscribe like and comment. And I will ask my friends on the GovTeen forum to help out. WiskersTheEvil lol they'll love that, they're really into cat memes.

Ezra/BirdInFlight,

Thankyou for your kind replies. I think he has done all the tagging, not sure if he has done it all properly, he also set up a twitter feed and an associated twitch channel...he's pretty good when it comes to that sport of things, always has been. he even managed to 'monitise' the Channel, not sure how he just told us he had, but he's only got 1 cent so far!

We really hope he does not stop posting video's, it's a bit like looking at someone from the other side of a mirror. In the real world he does not say much, often nothing and won't have a conversation at all. On his YouTube channel he can chat for an hour at a time, and I think he is really quite good at some games, knows all about Minecraft and Gary's MOD and how to set up servers even the scripts, but as he has no friends its an empty world for him...such a pity.

His video called 'The End?' is what made me want to ask for help from as many people as possible who might understand him.

Thank-you for passing on the URL to anyone to go and have a look! I can't post the URL here as i am a new user, perhaps you would help me and post the URL here and on GovTeenso others can just click on it? That would be awesome.

he designed his 'WhiskersTheEvil' Avatar himself, made me smile a lot

Bluemax

Wow, it sounds like he does indeed have the tags thing and the monetizing all under control, that's pretty great!

And I've only made 7 cents, hahahah! So don't worry too much about the 1 cent, it's actually quite hard to make any money unless or until something on your channel goes crazy-viral like that cat playing a piano -- making money on Youtube comes quite hard, but even 1 cent earnings is good for a channel that doesn't have subscribers yet!

I hope your son keeps it up -- if nothing else, it's a good hobby to have if he enjoys putting his videos together. And as you say, it's a massive outlet of self expression and communication for him, it would be such a shame if he stopped.

I can post the link to his channel here, everyone go check it out:

WhiskersTheEvil on Youtube!

I just watched him play Sonic the Hedgehog. What a cutie! He is adorable. I pressed like on his video and posted a comment for him. I don't know if my comment will actually show though because of the security on my computer. Hopefully it will show up for him. I noticed he says "bloody" a lot. Isn't that a bad word in the UK? I hope he gets lots of views from us and nice comments. He sounds like such a great kid.

Thanks, i remember the time he made it, he made me smile too. he can be quite witty on-line, but never jokes or says more than a few words at home.

yeah, it is a bad word.....and we try to suggest he does not swear, but he is almost 14yo and pretty much uses the same language s other 14 yo that he hears on the online games. In the big scheme of things I like hear him talk, the odd swear word is not the end of the world.
BlueMax

Yeah, it's ok. It is great that he speaks so well. I will try to look at his videos regularly. Take a look at the sonic one and see if my comment showed up. It should be the first comment. I hope it did. I really want to encourage him.

Can't see any comments, maybe it takes a while to show. Did you subscribe? he is quite funny in the Bad Bear one, and Tekkit!
Bluemax

No I did not subscribe. I don't even know how to do that. I am not very skilled at things like youtube and facebook. I will have to look to see if I can. I don't even know how to log on with our youtube account. I can't remember the password. I will take a look to see if I can figure it out.

But everyone who is able, this kid is a really sweet kid and he deserves our support. If you guys can look at his stuff and encourage him, please do.

His videos are really quite good and funny. I watched the sonic one and liked it. I watched a few of the others but I don't play that sort of video game, so they are a bit less interesting to me. If I liked that type of video game I'd very likely subscribe.

Bluemax, if I were you I would change the title of your thread. I would make it more of a plea. The title does not say enough for people to understand that you are asking for help. Even just adding the words "Please Help" might be helpful. I want your kid to feel success with his channel. I think that is very important.

Tetris, if you can, I would subscribe anyway even if it's not your cup of tea. I think supporting him is really important. I have a hard time watching because it is visually overstimulating but he has put in so much effort and no one has encouraged him. I think that if you think he is funny and the video is good, if you can, go ahead and subscribe so that he can understand that his efforts are appreciated. We all know how hard it is to be a young Aspie teen and to try so hard and to get no positive response for our efforts. Let's really show this kid some love.

Hi! I did manage to subscribe, and leave a comment. I don't go to youtube very often, but I might check back sometimes. Seems like he's put in a lot of work, for a kid!

He does, as he is at home all day he has plenty of time to play the game, record it, do the voice over and then upload. I think it s a more positive thing that just playing the game, its so difficult for him to express his thoughts in the real world, but he seems to be able to express real insight and thoughts when he records a video.

His Tom and Jerry video is quite good, and Teddy Bears picnic if you are not into the COD or Tekkit. For some reason he calls these 'Whiskers One Off's', not sure why. He is very into retro gaming as well, so one hour he can be on COD the next he plays a 1980's Nintendo game. he even had me buy him an old original DS!

Bluemax

Thanks for all the positive posts. I am not sure how to see the comments, an subscriptions, maybe they show up on Whiskers Channel when he loos at it...any positive comments for him please post on his channel as I thinks its good to have an outlet. he seems to have lost his mojo at the moment.
If anyone in into Pokemon, he has a large collection, all the Pokemon Games on almost all platforms, including some japanese variants. I wonder if there would be any interest in showing people how to make some fo the rare Pokemon?

https://youtu.be/h9XXV6uQkvM

Bluemax