I’ve been making airsoft content for six years, and what a journey it’s been. I started my YouTube channel with an airsoft gameplay video I spent all night editing after receiving a laptop for Christmas and posted my first video on December 26, 2014. If you want to watch this video, here it is. Fair warning, it’s bad.
I never could have expected what would come from that video. Years later I’ve made countless friends from this hobby, learned so much, and even created my own website. In today’s article I’d like to talk about what I’ve learned, reflect on what happened in 2020, and discuss what’s coming in the future.
You don’t need a guy who writes articles about toy guns on the internet to tell you 2020 was a crazy year. Personally, I’m tired of seeing words like “unprecedented” other ways to sugarcoat how truly awful 2020 was. Life sucked, plain and simple. With that out of the way, I want to talk about what happened with The BB Warrior this year.
I’m sure many people feel this way about their lives, but I feel like things went in the wrong direction this year. I didn’t post videos as consecutively as I would have liked, YouTube continued to demonetize my content, and I felt an incredible amount of stress surrounding the channel. Without the ability to play airsoft, I find it inherently difficult to talk about airsoft. This made content creation a challenge for me this year considering I only played airsoft once in 2020. In a way, knowing that I’m not the only who faced obstacles this year makes me feel better about it, but it’s still something I’d like to improve upon in the coming year.
While it’s important to work on the mistakes of the past, I don’t believe you should dwell on them too long. A lot of good things happened this year that I’d like to acknowledge, and I’m really proud of them. I think the largest things would be the website you’re reading this article on. I had the idea for a website over two years ago, but it was always put off or I didn’t think it was possible.
In the winter of ‘19/20 I started to think about creating a website more and more because of YouTube’s monetization policies. YouTube’s agreement is that content creators who allow advertisements on the watch page of their videos can share in the revenue, with the split favoring the creator. If you’re unaware, YouTube does not allow videos that show the modification of firearm or the use of them in certain ways to run advertisements. Airsoft gets grouped into this, which leads to many of the videos I post end up not having ads. Roughly 45% of the content I made in 2020 ran limited or no advertisements. I’m not making these videos in the hopes of getting rich, but they do help me afford my college tuition, and have been crucial in keeping a roof over my head in the past.
I also made significant strides in the quality of the videos I post. My set up has always been pretty low budget, but this summer especially more than any other I made improvements in overall video quality. Lighting, framing and the editing of my videos have all been improved to make the content better for you, the viewer. I have much more space which will allow for types of videos I’ve never had the ability to make before.
With that being said, what’s in store for 2021? Well, I want to continue my focus on helping players with their questions about airsoft. I want to push The BB Warrior in a direction to make it a source of information for new and experienced players. To accomplish this, I’m bringing in some help. This has been something I’ve put a lot of thought into over the years, but I’m ready to make the leap. It’s a little scary to let others work on something that I’ve done by myself for all this time, putting countless hours of work and love into this project, but I have a deep trust and respect for those I’ve invited to collaborate. Expect to see some guest contributors on the website sharing their expertise and knowledge in the coming months.
My goal is to return to a steady schedule of posting new video content on YouTube and written content on the website. To accomplish this, I’m working to make as much content as I can now while I’m between college semesters, and then scheduling them throughout the coming weeks. It may have been COVID, or college, or maybe even work but telling myself “you’ll have time tonight after X to make videos” just didn’t work in 2020. I also want to connect with my viewers and readers more in 2021, and to do this I’ve already began working to improve our Discord server and Facebook pages (links to each below!)
That brings us to the final thing I’d like to discuss, you. Without the support of everyone reading this The BB Warrior simply wouldn’t be possible. It is impossible to express the gratitude I have towards all of you, but it means the world to me that you enjoy this project I have worked on for the last six years. Here’s to 2021 being a much better year for everyone, and to more airsoft adventures in the future.
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That’s great! I can’t wait for what else is to come : )