How CollegeHumor Became Irrelevant 

I'm guessing they all graduated..

Man these are fascinating and really well done, but I am not looking forward to watching the one about me. "How Binging with Babish Lost it All and Went Insane Trying to Perfect the Cheese Grater (He's Finally Dead)"

One year later seeing how well Dropout is doing puts this in perspective. A real "My death was highly exaggerated" moment.

This is such a bad take you’d think it was written by Grant Anthony O’Brien.

They actually aren’t that bad in a position right now. Their app is doing good. Their D&D stuff is incredibly popular and their game show format is doing great

I will 100% add my voice to the “Dropout is worth it” crowd. Maybe these guys aren’t good at making money on RU-vid but they are dam good at making content

They didn’t fail, they just have a smaller, yet SIGNIFICANTLY mroe dedicated fanbase that pays for their content, and is actually thriving off that model.

Literally only clicked on this video to make sure that the comment section was setting the record straight about Dropout, aka college humor, absolutely thriving with their new model. Glad the people know what is actually happening.

Something to note is that when CollegeHumor lost their funding, they still had months of content that had already been filmed and was either on track to be released or in post production. The technical staff focused on completing the content that had already been filmed, and they continuted their Dimension 20 series, as DM Brennan Lee Mulligan was the only creative who was retained during that fallout. Also, much of the creative staff still appears in videos, though it is likely that most of them are paid on a project basis vs Brennan who is on the payroll. The transfer of power from AIC to Sam also happened right before the pandemic which made it nearly impossible to create new content under COVID guidelines until more recently. As they return to their studio, I am hopeful for a revival of the brand.

this channel was my childhood, after your buzfeed video it made me think what happened to college humour. RU-vid 100% doesn’t promote them anywhere near as much. Sad

So it seems like most of us agree that this guy either isn’t aware of what CollegeHumor has really become or decided to ignore it for content. Dropout is worth it, some of the funniest and most charming shows I l’ve seen.

I cannot express enough how worth it dropout is. The content is incredible and idk if I’ve ever laughed so hard in my life as I have watching their shows

Collegehumor is gone, but Dropout is still going strong as ever, Dimension 20 and Gamechanger are so goddamn good.

I think the problem also was something unavoidable: they grew with their audience. I watched CH when I was in college and the humor was what you'd expect. Staff and cast moved on (Streeter, Sarah, Jake, Amir, Adam, Dan, etc) and the new cast filled in. But by the time they did, the tone shifted from college kids to people adjusting to the "real world", jobs and etc. Then it morphed into just office stuff. Funny, but it was just cubicle talk from a brand that used to produce legitimately funny music video parodies. As they grew up, they resembled basically everything else on the internet and got drown out by literally everything else. And I like many of the later cast members (Grant, Katie, Mike Trapp, others), but I also can't tell you the last time I sought out one of their videos, even going pre-layoff.

Gotta love how this age poorly, while Collegehumor is gone in name. From what's been shown, Dropout is flourishing in the new direction it went

You should do a video about their SUCCESS story. They're ALL I see online now and everyone I know is trying to get me to watch Dimension 20!

As a current member of Dropout, I feel like I can give some insight behind the paywall (lots of text be ready): 1. Skits are gone. They are solely doing about 5 full series now, which get new episodes either weekly or Bi-weekly. These series are: Dimension 20, their dnd show with Brennan Lee Mulligan Game Changer, their game show with Sam Reich Um-Actually, their correction game show with Mike Trapp And Breaking News, their no laugh game show (I said 5 because they have the occasional side project) 2. All of the cast is still there...kinda. You will still see the full CH cast (Ally Beardsly, Grant O'Brien, Lou Wilson etc) on any and all projects, it's just that they are hired on for the individual projects, not full time. (Something like that, don't correct me) 3. They have a pretty good amount of support. If the number of people in the dropout exclusive discord is a fair measure of support, they are doing very well. Even if you said half of the members on there only subscribed to a month or less, thats still several thousand members paying $6 a month for a production team of probably under 20 4. The Content is really well done. While you only get about 2 to 3 new uploads a week, the content is genuinely strong enough and unique enough that I have no intention of canceling my subscription any time soon.

I honestly only knew this channel cause of the "If Google Was a Person" videos. But hey this video was very entertaining to watch. 👍🏼

Glad everyone agreed to call him out on his cherry picked arguments, Dropout was doing fine and most of genuinely would recommend them shows like Game Changer, Make some noise, and Dimensions 20 has been some of the most fun tv shows i watched these two years.

gotta love when these video essays just ignore everything that doesnt match their agenda going in.

Other people have mentioned this, but a lot of this isn't quite accurate to CollegeHumor's current situation. The general arc of their history and loss of funding is correct, but the company's doing much better now than the video makes it out to be. Long story short, they are profitable at this point in time. Their business model is pretty much entirely focused on Dropout which still has a lot of content being produced. Dimension 20, their D&D show, is incredibly successful and has a strong fanbase, and they still produce mostly unscripted content like Game Changer, Um Actually, and Breaking News (the last one is technically "scripted" but it's the same concept). The RU-vid channel is pretty much there to draw people into Dropout at this point, as that's how their business is structured now, and they have other side channels for the individual shows (like Dimension 20 and Game Changer) that do the same thing. Although most of the cast members at the beginning of 2020 don't officially work for them anymore and they're doing their own things, they're all still very good friends and come together on a project-by-project basis. They don't really see themselves going back to a lot of the scripted content anytime soon, as it just isn't financially sound, but they're doing quite well on the unscripted content. No disrespect meant to SunnyV2. The video provides a good intro to the topic. But it's important to know that Dropout is thriving, and, in my personal opinion, it's producing some of the best stuff out there. Everyone's working together to keep the content going, and better yet, they're all lovely people having a great time while still pursuing their own careers. It's a wonderful sight to see and it's honestly much more hopeful than it may seem at first glance.

Collegehumor has gone from strength to strength via Dropout, survived an almost unfathomable situation with the job cuts and funding being pulled, and is a successful streaming platform that has outgrown its youtube channel, something that seems to be glaringly omitted.

My girlfriend does on set work for dropout Aka college humor. They do very very well for themselves, the business model just had to change in order to keep up with the times.

Its great to see Sam pull the company up from the ashes and building it back up slowly. I hope they bring back some of its older scripted style content.

Running a comedy channel indefinitely is basically impossible. I’d say CH got a decent amount of years at the top and that’s as good as it could get. They started the careers of many talented comedians and writers. I’d consider that a success

As a frequent “dropout” content watcher I don’t think they failed, they changed course. The game shows are great and dimension 20 is phenomenal.

Adding to the dropout train. Its really good, their skits are great and there is a lot of content to choose from. Honestly, with how things in youtube are trending, I wouldn't be surprised if Dropout expanded to other creators like youtube did back in the early days. We need a streaming site that puts creators first and profit second. This video is good, but it is slightly misleading, Collegehumor is thriving and Sam Reich, as of the writing of this comment, is beloved and well respected.

Recently subscribed to Droupout, literally $5 a month for some of the funniest original series I’ve seen D20 and Game Changer are almost too good, I feel like I’m not paying enough for this kind of quality

This video feels like it ends the story 1 year early. CH is currently doing great. The reason this video makes it look like it's suffering is because it's focused on the RU-vid channel, but there's a specific reason the RU-vid channel looks the way it does now: it's no longer the focus of the business. Dropout is. And Dropout is doing phenomenally well, with some of the best content CH has ever made. The company is now profitable, and Dimention 20, Gamechanger, and Um Actually are all extremely popular.

I just wanted to say that Collegehumor also split off basically every show into a different RU-vid channel. Some with there own patreon pages, seperate corporate structures, and decent viewership. Everyone slimmed down staffing and used the promoted guest or contract work model though. Really it just makes it look like everyone who was friends kept popping up on others content and that properties was split to better monitor and prioritize user donations, since you can't ad monitize large portions of there work. Collegehumor spinoff channels include: Lowbrow (the contracted animation studio) Um Actually! Dorkly (seperate brand before layoffs) Dimension 20 Drawfee Dropout The biggest thing I notice is the reduction in set pieces and travel locations. Now they're sticking to set places much of the time to actually make some profit maybe, also cheaper location filming is probably banned in California during focus unless you get a permit for waver. Really I'm just glad to have seen some things stay alive and focus on financial sustainability.

I rediscovered CollegeHumor sometime during the pandemic and had a whole lot of old and new content to get through. I eventually loved the Breaking News segment enough to buy a channel membership to see all of the episodes that were behind that paywall, and I haven't regretted that decision yet. It's also opened me up to the whole host of other shows they do, and I truly hope they can find a balance of what to release for free and what to keep for Dropout/channel members. I don't have a real stake in the matter, but I do hope that CollegeHumor can keep doing what they're doing.

They’ve made an amazing comeback

This leaves out a lot of stuff. Adam Conover a former cast member and now the host of Adam Ruins Everything (which started as a CH series) said that one big reason for the company’s downfall was that they got misleading metrics from Facebook and RU-vid. It made them think that videos were way more profitable than they actually were. This led them to neglecting things like the website. Also with regard to the channel’s current videos, those are all from dropout and were recorded in 2018-19.After the layoff, they had to put nearly all of their time and energy into the platform that was for sure making money as opposed to the one that was dependent on ads. And they have continued making new content for dropout. Recently they seem to have built up enough of a buffer to start really increasing the budget on some of their projects. I know it’s behind a paywall, but you could have paid $5 to see that there was a very steady stream of new stuff coming out and then canceled the subscription.

I didn't actually get really into CollegeHumor until 2021. Now, I'm subscribed to the Dropout service. I dont regret it. As a matter of fact in the official Dropout discord, the CEO Sam Reich states that Dropout is currently profitable. Dimension 20, Um Actually, and Game Changer are all great shows.

A lot of people have mentioned here and I agree I think they just shifted gears. Shows like Um, Actually and other spin offs with the CH cast are still pretty enjoyable just a lot less edgy, a lot more approachable for a more family-friendly audience. Which is nice as a now father to be able to watch a cast I like, with my son around.

If you have ever even chuckled at a college humor video getting dropout will be 100% worth it. I finally broke down an bought it the other day and i havent gotten any work done ive been watching it so much

The ending of "they now only make this 1 show and :\" is straight up misinformation, they have a lot of good shows, dimension 20 and game changer are literally some of the best online-centric content out there to my mind.

There are some things to note here. CH content wasn't limited to its main channel. It could also be found on the Um Actually channel, Dimension 20, and Drawfee (the latter now independent from CH). This is not even taking into account the Shorts that they have been putting out recently which are doing really well despite them being chopped up clips of their shows on Dropout. This has been a real boon to their membership count according to Sam. I can personally advocate that Dropout is well worth the cost. They regularly have 3+ new videos a week with no drop in quality of content (some drop in quality of video during the pandemic though). I wouldn't count them out just yet. It seems like they are rallying back.

I would say their programming expansion and focus on shorts and showing just enough to get you hooked in the last year has had a major impact on their channel. I haven't looked at any numbers but just based on the changes I've personally seen

At their peak. College humour is a better SNL that we never get

This video is like saying Netflix failed since they don't sell any DvDs anymore. Like maybe before saying something is a financial failure check their main revenue source?

This feels like a school project where you were trying to make a point and decided to ignore half of the evidence, which suggested that your point was wrong and called it a day.

I'm pretty new to Dropout. Only been watching for about a year. And I'm no businessman but I don't think it's all that bad of an idea to really start paring down to multiple shows whose formats have been tinkered to peak likability and fun comedy and guests. Um, Actually is a perfect premise for a show. Game Changer allows them to be able to do almost anything so it lets them always be doing something new. Dimension 20 is a staple and will always be as long as the service is around. And I feel like No Laugh News can be another hit series like that as long as it stays fresh. But I think my main point to really keep Dropout successful is put Lou Wilson in as many episodes as possible.

I watched most of colledgehumor's backcatalog way back in like 2013 when I was 10 years old on my phone in incognito mode every night, those vids made me grow up way too early lol

I would actually say that the shift into only uploading No Laugh Newsroom instead of a diverse variety of small sketches is actually indicative of their shift away from being a youtube channel and into being a streaming network. Rather than a bunch of small, unrelated sketches, they're pouring resources into recurring shows like Gamechanger and Dimension 20, which are incredibly good. No Laugh Newsroom has very short episodes, which makes it more suited for the RU-vid audience. Honestly Dropout is where CH is now, and measuring its health or success by RU-vid metrics doesn't make sense. Their money is coming from subscriptions to the service. It's like saying that Hbomberguy is a failing channel because he's uploading like 3 videos a year now, but he has 11k patreon subscribers. Getting good RU-vid analytics is not how he pays the bills.

Just like with Smosh, the mismanagement of the brand ultimately led to the channel's demise. Very sad

Got this as a recommendation while watching a college humor video

Honestly don’t know how I got to your channel not why it was o Ku recently suggested to me, not do i know roughly 72% of the people you cover, but this kind of video essay deep dive expose style of video is really working for me. So glad to have found this and I will continue to watch/ listen while driving to work or doing chores at home. It is perfect for this. Thanks for making these.

This makes sad, because college humor has some of the most professionally produced content and they are decently funny, I had no idea any of this has happened to them.

It's fascinating to me bc I started watching Colleghumor when I was young and never even thought about how the business works, especially having a full actual office (esp in NYC originally) and team for high production internet comedy videos. I just thought things work out if you make content people like; then it should just exist. Now as an adult I'm surprised that they were ever financially stable enough to last as long as they did. It's kind of like internet SNL, an ever changing ensemble comedy cast that gets boosts of ratings due to specific actors but then they leave and the show struggles trying to replace them, except CH doesn't have a network that completely owns the IP footing the bill. And comparing it to Smosh's decline I feel like we're seeing the end of the early internet video content era. It was a new an exciting time when these comedy channels that were the progenitors of turning video content on the internet into businesses, with investors trying to get in early. But they were kind of set up like traditional production companies, and we eventually have seen that smaller scale personality driven content is what works. Especially with the pandemic, needing an office structure only hurt them more. Keeping budgets low and having consistent faces keeps the audience around and leads to profitability (Linus is a great example, he grew slowly and has been there the whole time, which I feel like has helped his sustainability). Sad to see a staple of internet content falling under, but personally except for ones with Brennan I don't really find most of their output entertaining anymore.

College humor is thriving rn, they just changed their name to dropout and the company is run my Sam.

Was also one of the people instantly subscribing once dropout got announced. And I also have not regretted it for a single minute. Um actually was practically made for me and i love it dearly. Game changer had me laughing the hardest i have ever laughed in my life (Official cast recording, noise boys quadrology, Do I hear 1$?, A sponsored episode). I regularly rewatch the painful total forgiveness. This is content i like, this is content I am willing to shed a buck for.

Honestly I only subbed to their dropout because I love Brennan and his work on dimension 20. But then I came across Total Forgivenes, where two of the most in debt cast members do a show to pay off their student debt (More like put a small dent in it) and that is easily one of the best 9 episodes of something I've seen in my life. Hilarious and tragic. I'm glad they aren't doing a S2.

I don't know how "sucessful" dropout is but I must say some of their shows like Dimension 20 and Game chager are really good and enjoyable.

Except, they're back and popular now with their improv comedy show!😄

I actually just subscribed to dropout last week and I feel like they are doing great work.

For anybody that doesn’t know college humor has had financial problems for a few years. A lot of this is because they made content that wasn’t considered advertiser friendly and only made money off channel members, Patreon, and sponsors. They had investors and a parent company but after a while it reached a point where they were basically making the same amount of money that they were spending to create the content which isn’t good for a business. However they do still make videos on RU-vid but they’re a bit different than what they used to do. They do some game shows now and a couple skits here and there

It’s a shame that collegehumour had to deal with this, but im happy to let you all know that yes even though there’s a paywall, the content that is on Dropout is soooo good (esp Dimension 20) and im very happy to keep subscribing :)

Came here looking for people talking about Dimension20....guess the connection between them isn't as obvious as I thought. They've moved fully into the nerd side of culture and seem to have carved out a spot for themselves just fine.

I got hooked on Dropout and it's now something I look forward to watching MORE than youtube if you can imagine that. That's probably why their viewership is down on youtube. I just can't stand the excessive advertisements.

I used to love CollegeHumor. Great group. Its a shame they stopped doing well.

My biggest complaint with most of the videos you make is it's often too early to count someone out. Especially on youtube. I cannot stress the importance of BREAKS enough. Just because a channel seems down at the moment doesn't mean it can't pick back up. Personally I've fluctuated from 1.5 million views per month to 6 million views per month. If you look at a graph during my 1.5 million view months or what lead up to it and only focus on that you wouldn't realize that perhaps the next month I'd release a really good video bringing views back up. This is the RU-vid game. It's often one good video/good video series away from picking back up again for many of these channels.

i love your channel, these short informative videos are more addicting than pellets of crack

I love CH, always will have a special place in my heart

They just hired me a while back for a freelance job in production design. It’s a lot of that kind of work, more controlled budgets, and clearly a more small but very very driven core team. I actually the opportunity to talk so Sam for a very quick second and he seemed very excited about how things were going. This video is being overly negative, and not all changes are bad. Edit: almost 95% of their content is Dropout now, and I think that’s great. It’s reasonably priced, very funny, and they know exactly what it is, unlike a bunch of other streaming services like paramount plus. It’s a pretty good system, and I don’t think this video represents that.

It's just crazy to me that media that has literally millions of people watching it monthly can't survive "cuz RU-vid"... but mainstream TV where their viewership may be 1000 TV sets tuned in at any given time, is able to stay affloat. Just goes to show how backwards-thinking the whole advertising world is.

I love how they still kept true to their passion

Dropout is thriving. The amount of shows and the level of quality of said shows is great. Even if their youtube is hurting they are thriving

Another well edited and researched video, good stuff!

The originals cast members of College Humor were legit huge talents. I highly recommend their Hardly Working sketches. A lot of them were comedy gold. Jake and Amir was fantastic too. Those videos are still on RU-vid, no reason not to watch them!

Something important you forgot to mention, or didn’t think it prevalent, is that college humor on RU-vid specifically has almost entirely shifted focus to the shorts. They’re hilarious, get a lot of views and comments, and as far as I’m aware, probably make them a good bit of money for the level of production. Take a game changers clip, edit it a little for time, add subtitles, and boom you’re done. Really helps that the whole cast and guests are always fucking funny, so they get like 8 shorts out of one episode from dropout. Also, the RU-vid shorts function allows them to get more traffic directly to Dropout, because you can’t find the full episodes on RU-vid. Admittedly I subscribed for D20, but if I hadn’t I probably would be now to watch the full episodes of Gamechangers and Make Some Noise. I think College Humor is on a steady growth at this point (a year after this vid… oops.), not going to go viral, but still exist and make good content under this crew.

The best thing College humor has going for it now (idk if it's even still part of college humor) is Um, Actually. I freaking love that show and catch every episode.

CollegeHumor became irrelevant.. *because of being in debt, being a college student is hard..*

- Says "Making internet videos pays dick" - Hires 100 employees

i’ll add a voice to those backing dropout- i absolutely love it. it’s one of the only streaming services i pay for. i think it would be more than enough just for the dimension 20 content, but everything else is great too. definitely worth checking out, i’m happy to help support these really cool and talented people

I kinda shook me head and laughed to myself when I saw Dropout was premiering as a platform six-ish years ago in bumpers they'd put on the CH videos. I remember thinking "wtf are you guys doing, people won't pay for that." Joke was on me, the platform is incredible. It's certainly the last streaming service I'd axe from my lineup in a budget situation. They make quality shit and people get paid what they're worth across the board. Sam Reich is the patron saint of ethical modern media production who deserves so, so much more recognition.

I was applying to work for CH Media before the shutdown, I was really sad about losing the opportunity, but now that I've seen their newer content, I'm even more motivated to join their smaller team

Hot take: College kids are just more serious and depressing now than they were in 2008-2014.

I feel like CH's current cast is 👌. I'm subscribed to dropout. It reminds me of the British Dave channel with a bunch of different shows staring different combos of the same set of comedians. Best it's ever been IMO.

Dropout is FANTASTIC and so worth the small subscription fee. So many incredible, original series and 100s of hours of content

Even though they fell off you got to respect that they were on the internet creating for over 20 years. Not many people can do that

I remember when I used to watch collegehumor all the time when I was a kid really sad to see how far they had fall

dropout is super good. dimension 20 is singhandedly responsible for getting me obsessed with D&D, and game changer/make some noise are this generation's whose line is it anyway

Dropout is still a super good streaming app. The show they did ‘total forgiveness’ made me laugh and cry like no other

Hard to commend this as 'well researched' when he doesn't bother getting a 3 day free trial to check out the mountains of content CH are putting out on Dropout, plus all their sister channels. Got the blinders on here! Also no follow through on where CH staff went/any curiosity beyond numbers.

Really weird timing to release this now, when College Humor/Dropout is actually operating in the black and preparing to launch multiple new shows. If that's what irrelevance looks like, I'll take it.

I just got dropout the other day and it slaps. I love Game Changers and Make Some Noise. I like Dirty Laundry and Breaking News. And I absolutely loved the series Total Forgiveness, where Ally and Grant do increasingly awful things to each other in order to pay off their student loans (... It's SO funny and then it gets SO real).

This video aged like Milk….

I'm glad that the Drawfee crew was able to get back on their feet after the downsizing.

Whoever is running CH nowadays owes their second wind to Brennan. That dude is a comedy goldmine, even when talking outside a script. Beyond the fact they have a limited resource pool, he's in EVERY succesfull show they have nowadays: Dimension20, Gamechanger, Don't Laugh News, and even their brilliant CEO PSA skits.

They are putting out new episodes on dropout TV on 5 different shows and have 4 seasons of D20 in post production. They are doing just fine

10:10, it should be noted here that CH had a six-month buffer of high-quality unreleased content, and that's why things looked pretty much the same after the funding was pulled.

I got dropout for the new year after watching game changer and dimension 20 shorts. No regrets, best subscription service I’ve ever had by a landslide. Variety is great, Shows are amazing, and all the staff really seem like they care about each other. 10/10 recommend

The sheer amount of talent behind Brennan Lee Muligan is astronomical

man how i loved the old collegehumor cast, hope theyre all doing well now, still sad friends with benefits never got an ending

I watch way more dropout than Netflix these days. Its completely worth the sub.

I remember Jake was at my college for one semester. He seemed like a pretty cool guy but then he transferred to a college in NYC. I was like "whatever happened to that guy" and then i saw him on CH and that is the weakest flex of meeting a celebrity.

Slight correction: They ARE uploading more than just breaking news, it's just locked behind a youtube paywall now. They're uploading most of their dropout content to youtube, you just have to pay to access it, and youtube doesn't put videos you have to pay for in the uploads section for some stupid reason.

CollegeHumor has never been stale and chewed up while 90% of the youtube gold stars. They retain their zing, money always gets in the way of comedy, now their zing is behind a pay wall. Doesn't mean it's no longer what it was. It just means the people making it are getting paid (or so I hope). Companies have no place in youtube, it was never their platform. Can't make a round peg go into a triangle hole. The video did shine some light on layoffs but it does treat them like a one hit wonder, a one trick pony, when it's completely incomparable to Bu**f**d.

Thanks for the awesome nap time video Sunny. Very informative too!