By Seth Pytleski
Gil Shur is an entertainment content creator who focuses on popular and indie films/television shows on his YouTube channel: OneTake. Shur has accumulated over 229,000 subscribers on YouTube for OneTake and his most popular video has more than 24,000,000 views. The channel has a variety of different types of content including entertainment news, recaps, analysis videos, and podcasts Shur hosts with his brothers.
UM Journalism student Seth Pytleski recently interviewed Shur over email about his use of social media and specifically the platform of YouTube, how he found success and what he has observed during his career. Below is a transcript of their conversation, edited slightly for brevity.
Q: Outlets/channels that cover entertainment often use outrageous controversies and celebrity gossip that surround a cultural product to get attention, have you ever been tempted to use this angle? Why or why not?
A: I’ve never been tempted to use that angle for a few reasons. One, I spent many years before YouTube working in jobs where I would often have to do things I do not enjoy. Part of my motivation for making YouTube my full-time job was to minimize the time I spend on things I do not enjoy. So, I have a very strong bias against compromising my integrity or desires for a potential short-cut to views.
I try to maintain a positive environment around myself and focusing on outrage, controversies, or gossip would achieve the opposite. Thankfully, in my experience with YouTube, there are basically infinite paths to success. So, as long as you are patient, committed, and always looking for ways to improve, you can select the best path for you. Not every day will be 100% positive or easy, but you can definitely avoid going out of your way into negativity.
Q: Your bigger videos are mostly related to huge franchises like Marvel or The Matrix, but you also find success in more niche categories, talking about smaller movies and television shows. How do you strike a balance between appealing to a wide audience and talking about things that are important to you?
A: Thankfully, my tastes are fairly broad, so it does not feel like a compromise when I talk about genre stuff like Marvel. Even when Marvel movies are dipping significantly in quality, I can still enjoy them as a puzzle (the problem solving part of me has a fun time trying to piece the movies together on a timeline, for example) or as an intellectual exercise (i.e., why don’t these movies work as well as some other ones?).
Having said that, my success in the big franchise stuff usually comes from my timeline videos. I enjoy making them but they are not as intellectually or creatively stimulating as video essays, reviews, or other analysis/opinion-based videos. That is where I do have to find a balance. So, I basically approach it the same way many filmmakers approach their careers with a “one for them, one for me” mentality. I’ll make a timeline or two since they bring in big audiences and I do enjoy making them, but before I tire of timelines, I change things up with a retrospective or WIRBA (What ___ Is Really About).
I often try to make a formula out of it with schedules/spreadsheets, but it also just comes down to listening to my feelings/energy levels. If I’m not up to making a particular video, or something smaller/more niche excites me, I don’t fight it, I follow that feeling. Thankfully, YouTube-ing is a career that allows for that kind of flexibility.
Q: The YouTube algorithm is infamously complex and constantly changing, what steps do you take to make sure your videos will find an audience?
A: I honestly do not think too much about the algorithm. Many big YouTubers and YouTube themselves will tell you to get rid of the world algorithm from your mind and instead use the word “audience.” At the end of the day, the algorithm is just trying to follow the audience and give them what they want. That makes things pretty simple for me strategically. It comes down to A-B testing. I started the channel by trying many different types of videos. Some of them worked better than others so I did more of them (at first this was reviews of individual episodes on a TV show). While continuing to do individual episode reviews, I continued experimenting with other formats, then found that theory videos were even more successful, so I started doing those too.
At that point, I did TV episode reviews and theory videos, then I continued to experiment… I eventually discovered that video essays/analysis videos were even more successful than theory videos. Not just in terms of views but also in terms of their relevance over time. I.e., a TV review is relevant for a week until the next episode, theory videos are relevant until the show proves or disproves your theory, but an analysis of a character or a show/movie’s themes is evergreen. That video will be relevant as long as people care about that show or movie. In business terms, it becomes part of a portfolio that can generate revenue for months or even years vs other videos that generate revenue for a day or a few weeks. This was a crucial discovery for transitioning into YouTube full time.
I could keep going but the bottom line is you will never understand the total inner-workings of the algorithm (I doubt YouTube themselves even understands it fully). But, you don’t need to. You show your audience different things. See what works. Do more of what works while continuing to experiment because even if thing A works, you never know if thing B will work even better.
Q: You have amassed almost a quarter million subscribers on YouTube, yet only have a little over 300 followers on X/Twitter—what is the reason for that discrepancy? How do the two platforms differ in terms of gaining a following?
A: That’s a great question. My theory is that in general, my most popular content is pretty impersonal. For example, I gained over 50K subscribers from my most popular video, the recap of every Spider-Man movie. Think of the people who watched that video: they do not know my name (only the name of my channel), they do not know any of my opinions, they’ve never heard me make a joke, they’ve never seen my face, etc. To them, I’m a disembodied voice who summarizes some movies they like. Twitter/X or Instagram, etc. are places you go to follow a personality: to hear their opinions, observations, etc. That’s a very different offering from the video which introduced me to those viewers.
In general, when people discover a new channel or personality they like, I think their instinct is to go looking for more of the content that got them hooked on that channel/person in the first place. So, if someone finds OneTake and enjoys my Spider-Man Recap, it’s an easy sell to say “Hey, you should also check out my MCU Timeline.” But, “Go follow me on X” is a harder sell. They know X will not provide more of the same (i.e., they will not get super detailed, long-form recaps on X).
To me, the proof is that almost all of my Twitter followers and Patrons came from 2 – 3 years ago when we were doing the podcast Saulcast. Podcasts are heavily personality-driven. It’s a casual conversion where our personalities, senses of humor, observations, etc. are fully on display. People connect with us as people in an almost social way. So, of course, this more readily lends itself to followers on social media.
My retrospective videos where I’m on camera more, offering opinions/analysis, and my recent attempt to start podcasting about movies are both attempts to cultivate more of a community/social presence.
Q: How important do you think marketing yourself on social media platforms outside of YouTube can be for content creators?
A: I think it totally depends on the type of content creator you are. As you can see with OneTake, I’ve been able to find success on YouTube with virtually no presence on other social media platforms. As much as people hate the algorithm, the beautiful thing about it is that it creates a discovery engine. I can put videos out on YouTube and it will do the work of getting it in front of people. So, in that sense, it has not been important to me at all. I think that is true for a lot of YouTubers.
However, I’m sure that depends on the type of content creator you are. I.e., if you are heavily opinion-based and discussing current events, I’m sure having a presence on X would help you gain even more followers.
There’s also the question of diversification: it’s a little scary having YouTube as a sole source of income. What if my channel were to get shut down tomorrow? I would essentially have to start building again from scratch. However, if I had a following on social media, I could start a new channel, potentially on another platform and some percentage of them would follow me there.
Q: How do you think some of your colleagues fail at using social media responsibly?
A: In real-life conversations, there is a lot of leeway to sort of “test” ideas outloud. If I’m talking to close friends, we might throw crazy ideas, theories, or opinions out there just to talk them out and see if they hold any merit. Or, if there’s some big news headline, we might say our immediate reaction/opinion out loud before actually reading the article and giving it real thought. After talking things out, reading more, or thinking about things further, we often come to a conclusion that differs totally from our original one.
However, on X or similar platforms, I think people follow the same impulse… They see a headline and throw an opinion out there without fully thinking it through. That might be okay in real-life between friends where you can change your opinion later, possibly even in the span of one conversation at no cost. But online, that initial reaction is there… People will respond to it, share it, retweet it, etc. Even if you change your opinion later and delete that original tweet/post, it still exists in everyone’s minds. That can change the way people look at you, contribute to the spread of inaccurate information, etc.
It’s hard to know where exactly to draw the line in terms of responsibility. There probably should be a degree of leeway in “talking things out” online the same way you do in-person. But, you can also cross a line of posting irresponsibly… I.e., it is okay to be ignorant on something, but on certain important topics, maybe if you are ignorant, you should not post with conviction until you have actually done the research or discussed it privately.
Q: Is there anything else you would like to share about your experiences working with the internet/social media?
A: Just that I love it. I love that it has democratized the media. Growing up, I loved to watch TV and Film. I loved the idea of making “content” myself but it felt impossible. I did not conceptualize human beings actually making this stuff, it just magically came out of my TV or movie screens. As I got older, sure I realized there were people working on these things but it was always presented as a “dream job”. Something not worth pursuing unless you are absolutely insane and special.
Things like YouTube have changed all that. There is now a path for virtually anyone to share their creativity with the world in a virtually infinite number of niches- as a hobby, part-time job, full-time job, or anything in-between. As much as people often focus on the dangers of social media, etc… There is also undoubtedly something amazing happening. We have to remember how new all of this is. In the grand scheme of human history, it is all so so new. I’m hopeful that over the next few decades, we’ll find a better balance and healthier ways to integrate the internet/technology into our lives. I’m picturing less phone addiction, less hate, etc. More education, creativity, and community.
This Q&A is part of a series created by students in Courtney Cowgill’s Social Media and Audience Engagement course at the University of Montana School of Journalism. Students sought out people in media who are doing social media for good to offer tips and insights into the ever-evolving landscape of social media.
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