When Resorts World conducted their soft opening on June 24th to much fanfare and many live Vlogs, the wife and I spent the evening bouncing back and forth between a few of them to check out the new resort, and to get an idea of the opening festivities.
We saw the pool.
And many blurry shots of Paris Hilton in the distance.
We also saw lines and people walking around the mall area, running into other Vloggers doing the same thing. There was the tell-tale fuzzy footage of a wi-fi system being stretched beyond it's maximum band-width and then more shots of the pool. And Paris Hilton again, I think. It was terribly hard to make out.
We also saw footage of many, many Vegas Vloggers walking to the place, and almost all of them getting the "insider" tip that the Conrad entrance was WAY easier to get into than the main entrances, and we witnessed the confusion by almost all regarding where the pool actually was.
Then we saw the pool, and someone who might have possibly been Paris Hilton.
Fast forward to last week and the subject du jour was Posh Burger. I've seen around 15 Vlogs about this place (Did you know it replaced the Burger Bar at Aria? Or that it offers a $100 burger?) and they are all pretty much the same.
The new trend is to cross the streams, vloggers vlogging vloggers vlogging other vloggers virtual group pulls or vlogger meet-ups that are partially vlogged by other vloggers vlogging people who are vlogging them, usually talking to even more vloggers.
To be perfectly honest, I have now limited my viewing to a select few, and pretty much just gloss over the rest. I've unsubscribed to many of late because the content on offer is just not original or new.
Look, I'm not going to name names here. The intention of this is to not "shame" anyone or disparage their product. Some of the ones that I ignore might be among your favorites and that's fine. And, to be perfectly honest, unless you're trying to make a living out of this who and what you vlog should not really be driven by anyone other than you.
I'm sure this is going to anger some who vlog and I can live with that, because the criticism here is meant to be constructive rather than destructive. Many people are working hard on their vlogs almost daily and they should be commended for that.
But, and this is important, from an entertainment, informative perspective things are going a little off the rails.
And this is a problem, because some of the vloggers regurgitating the same things claim to be being made with the intent of educating folks about Vegas. But, by just showing other vloggers and meet-ups and all heading to the same places, you're not.
Now, other vlogs are just put out there as video logs of a person, or couple's, trip through Vegas, and from that scenario vlogging vloggers vlogging is perfectly fine. That WAS your trip after all.
Also, in today's day and age a sense of community is important, and I would argue that there is no stronger community than this one of Vegas Vloggers, of which I am on the periphery (by choice and by circumstance [and the fact that I sucked at vlogging]). So in some aspects vlogs showing groups of vloggers running around looking for Strippers and Cocaine (by "strippers" we mean pizza and by "cocaine", we mean donuts usually) is a GOOD thing because it does show a way Vegas can be, a great place to meet new friends, do fun things and gain a ton of followers doing just that.
But some diversity of content can go a long way.
Perhaps that's the problem with the Las Vegas Strip right now as a whole, and why I pretty much avoid it at all costs. There IS no diversity of content on the Strip. It's all night clubs and bottle service and people walking around to the next big club. EVERYONE is required by law to say that Pizza Rock has the best Pizza in Vegas, that the Plaza is the Bestest downtown hotel. Which it is, IF you've got a sizable vlog following and are catered to by Jonathan Jossell, if not, then it's a pretty crappy experience to be perfectly honest, full of surly, unhelpful staff, dirty, dated rooms and a casino floor on which it's impossible to find an empty VP bartop because the bartenders are talking to their friends, or vloggers, who are not gaming..
When the casino is catering to you and clearing out places to play for free advertising it's the bee's knees. If you're just a schmuck with a camera, 30 something followers and no advertising angle it's really not all that.
But I digress....
When I decided to hang up my pathetic attempt at a vlog it was not because I did not like the other Las Vegas Vloggers. Far from it. I have met a few and like many of them. I quit because I suck at it, I'm boring and people do not want to follow along and look at my pictures with captions because I forgot to record shit. Even when I did remember to record shit the quality was bad and I could not be bothered to purchase decent editing software. Shit, I would not have followed me.
This is not sour grapes. Many of these people are brilliant at editing and creating content and they really put a lot of effort into it, their vlogs are very enjoyable and we like watching them very much.
It's just that I think more diversity in content is going to be needed if the genre is going to survive and thrive.
Of course, what the hell do I know? I only convinced 38 people to follow me.
Be safe, bet smart, win Jackpots. (and vlog them if you do)
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