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High Functioning Autism and YouTube

BlueMax

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.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h9XXV6uQkvM

https://www.youtube.com/user/WhiskersTheEvil

thankyou

BlueMax

  • Hi Bluemax,

    Thanks for bringing your issue to the Community. Whilst we are happy for you to add this link to your son's videos, I would just like to add a note of caution. I am sure this is already on your mind but do make sure your son is careful not to disclose any contact or personal details in his videos. I hope he does get an audience and is not discouraged.

    Bob - Mod

  • Thanks

    Azalea, Can he change the titles once he has uploaded?

    nmr1991, I don't think he is doing it as a career, he started making videos when he was about 8 on a hand held, and then using his webcam on the laptop, and then discovered YouTube. I think he does it as its a safe way to communicate, he does not do face to face conversations, we can go for days when the only wordshe will say is 'i don't know' in rsponse to any question asked, even if eh is hungry!! and yet when the dorr to his room shuts he will spend an hour chatting away to no-one, and uploading it. As I said, we, as parents, only get to see that side of our son when we wnatch his videos. An hour watching him e hear more than in the real world all week. Almost all his views are ours.... I think he has a twitch live stream, and twitter, but not sure anyone has ever watched it, I think the video broadcast are more therapeautic than a business. His way of dealing with the Social Communication difficulties he has.

    As I said any help to give him a 'moral' boost, or suggestion for changing a video name (he is not very good at the marketing side) are welcome, please leave comments on the video, he may read them, i can't get him to join any Autism Forums.

  • I've followed alot of people on Youtube, related to gaming, reviews and documentaries, and one thing I know is it is something that people got popular doing because they started quite early making this a niche market, another factor could be they have friends/contacts, if you know a big youtuber personally you could ask them to endorse your channel, might be slow at first but views will pick up.

    I also made youtube videos myself, except without voice or facecam, except at the time I was making videos in the hopes of getting as much views as the big youtubers, one of whom has made over a £1m on his youtube channel and he's younger than me (24), makes you think what sort of quirk you might be lacking or there are probably too many youtubers out there and this notion is gradually getting less popular, with the higher up youtubers pushing down the start-ups much like in business.

    In my experience it was a mistake to make a channel because I didn't think it through, it did reach about 150k views from the total views on my videos which took about 6 years to get, so on average 70 views per day, not enough to consider making a job out of it. I had no real social life outside of gaming, not really any friends on any games either.

    TLDR: If this move is just for him to prove himself that he can't be lazing around all day on the computer, I would advise trying another hobby out

    or if this is really the thing you want him to invest his time into, livestreaming could be a thing, i'm not sure about age restrictions on Twitch but there are some youtubers who get less money from youtube but get a load of money from twitch donations on live streams. They do of course require a decent enough bandwidth. And some streams usually last some hours.

    I'm not advocating anything here, just my experience, just know alot of youtubers who have lived on this stuff though a bit older.