JANGBRiCKS' new review channel

Cool - thanks for the info. Jang is one of the few Youtubers who don’t annoy me. I shall have a look,.

legends supporting legends, we love to see it :)
hope the new channel goes well.

He's simply the best. Straightforward, high-quality, and honest.

As long as I can still watch reviews from Jang, I’m happy

I wonder why it is called "JANG's Based LEGO Reviews" i.o. "JANG's LEGO Reviews"

Started following, thank you.

I understand his decision, but I disagree. I think many of these issues are user error, and personally, when channels split their content up into too many channels, I don't like it and watch less.

Take, for example, The Dice Tower, possibly the largest channel about board games. Not all of their content interests me, but I can easily tell from the title and thumbnail which videos would be of interest. If they split everything of into 6 separate channels, I wouldn't want all of them clogging up my subscription menu as it would make it more of a mess to go scroll through.

I also think that many of the problems are "user error" on the viewer's part.
- In my 10 years of using YouTube, I have never been unsubscribed by "the system". There have been times where I've accidently Subscribed to a channel, so it's entirely possible that many people accidentally do the opposite.
- Also, when a channel rebrands under a new name, some people might not recognize it and unintentionally unsubscribe.
- Additionally, the YouTube app defaults to "Home" when you open it, which will only shows you videos that YouTube's algorithm decides you want. In order to view all of your subscriptions without missing a video, you actually need to go to the "Subscription" tab. (You can long press on Android for a shortcut)
- This can also lead to instances where people think they are subscribed when really they never were, it's just that they watched that channel enough that it showed up on their "Home" tab consistently. Then, later, they think they got "unsubscribed" when, in fact, they never were in the first place.
- Notifications are a mess and it is easy to unintentionally turn them off. I have accidently clicked "Don't show these notifications" or a similar toggle when I get too many and then I have to go back in and turn them on again. Also you need to make sure that 1) Subscriptions are allowed on the App itself, 2) YouTube subscriptions are not blocked by your phone under Phone Settings and 3) Your phone is not on "Do not disturb".

That said, I wish Jang the best of luck, I have always appreciated the quality and candidness of his reviews.

Definitely subscribe to the new channel, it's the same reviews just on another channel, so nothing to lose and only more informative reviews

Just A Nice Guy
(One of the best Lego YouTubers)

@Dash_Justice said:
"I understand his decision, but I disagree. I think many of these issues are user error, and personally, when channels split their content up into too many channels, I don't like it and watch less."

I don't think you're right on this one. I have heard of many examples of the phenomena that Jang describes, but generally I've only seen those in the context of political channels - which Jang's obviously isn't, and therefore it feels shocking to me that YouTube has treated him so callously (don't forget that this is far from being his first go-around - the whole "adpocalypse" and the YouTube Kids debacle almost ended his channel twice, and that's just what I can remember).

@DavidBrick said:
"I love Jang so thanks for bringing this to people's attention.

I'm not really sure what the point is in a new channel. Youtube screwed him, and most everyone else, over with how the site is run, so a new channel on a bad site fixes that?"

Of course stepping away would certainly take away all the issues with the platform, but it'd ultimately just cause more problems than it would solve. Think about it, Jang's entire career is centered around his channel and I'm pretty sure that's what most of his income comes from as well. One of the reasons he created the new channel is that his main channel is somehow still locked from certain new features like memberships and such, which strangely are immediately available when creating a brand new account. He's moved past the whole COPPA thing now, that's not what this is about. It's about some newly arisen issues that have been disrupting his work for some time now, and he's decided to finally take action. Of course there's always more than one solution, but this is the one he has taken and I'm sure he's thought this through more than enough to know it's worth the risk.

Everyone subscribe RIGHT NOW!

Thanks for the info. I was wondering why for a while the YouTube app on our TV hasn't shown me Jang's content anymore even though I am a regular viewer.
I don't have a YouTube account though and I can't click on subscription or notification buttons as the app only shows the videos themselves but none of the associated content/functionality.
Not the end of the world for me though, now that I know where to look.

Jang is one of my top five YouTubers, next to Techmoan, the 8-bit guy, Bob Ross* and Marty from Marty's Matchbook Makeovers.
(Runners up would be Fully Charged, Doug deMuro, CinemaSins, Abandoned, and Unfinished London/PoliticsUnboringed/MapMen or basically anything from Jay Foreman).

*Disclaimer: of course I know that technically Bob Ross is not a YouTuber, but I mean I enjoy watching content featuring him.
R. I. P. and God bless, my friend.

Jang always delivers with his reviews, THE go-to reviewer imo. I wish him the best of luck and have subscribed.

Is Gnajbricks staying in the same place? This is the most pressing issue.

@BelgianBricker said:
"I wonder why it is called "JANG's Based LEGO Reviews" i.o. "JANG's LEGO Reviews""

Because they are based, clearly ;)

I feel like all his verdicts boil down to, "For the amount of stuff here, it would be better if it was $10 less".

I am a native English speaker, but I still don’t understand why the word “Based” is in his channel name. It seriously looks like a typo in my eyes. “Biased” or “Basic” make more sense, grammatically. Can some English major please convince me how the word “Based” makes sense?? Am I missing a neuron or something??

Sounds like his account has some legacy issues or something, which is unfortunate. I will definitely subscribe to the new channel and support it. His stuff is great!

And I think I’m just too uncool to know what “based” means. But I’ve accepted that. :D

'Based' isn't common parlance in my US world, either but my recovering heroin-addict son tells me it's common in the illicit drug and its entertainment/music subculture. To give the most generous gloss, for me it's a mix of saying 'this content isn't for your generation' and 'yep, LEGO definitely can be plastic crack.'

@Huw said:
"I have to admit that I am puzzled by the use of that word, too. I looked it up to see if it had a meaning that I was not aware of. I assume it's used as in...

Adjective
based (comparative more based, superlative most based)

(slang, of a person) Not caring what others think about one's personality, style, or behaviour; focused on maintaining individuality.

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/based

It's not common parlance in the UK, for sure."

@Huw said:
"I have to admit that I am puzzled by the use of that word, too. I looked it up to see if it had a meaning that I was not aware of. I assume it's used as in...

Adjective
based (comparative more based, superlative most based)

(slang, of a person) Not caring what others think about one's personality, style, or behaviour; focused on maintaining individuality.

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/based

It's not common parlance in the UK, for sure."

It's common parlance among millennials and genZ on the internet regardless of country since it's in a bunch of memes. Essentially "not giving a **** and doing one's own thing."

@Huw said:
"I have to admit that I am puzzled by the use of that word, too.
...
It's not common parlance in the UK, for sure."

From Jang's latest video FAQ:

Q: What does "Based" in "Jang's Based LEGO Reviews" mean? Bad grammar?
A: It's American Slang, created in its current format by a hip-hop artist in my local area & later adopted by people across the country. It's complex & nuanced, but primarily means grounded and real or genuine, in a human sense.

While his production value is better than the rest, and he does cover many sets, I think he get a bit off road once all of the whining when the Child content/YouTube Block started. It feels as it's more about him than the Lego now, I liked it better when he was off camera and without doing a live 5 hours video of him chatting :) I Wish him luck, but I switched to Brickset as my main Lego review source.

I always understood the age group of commenters here to be at least a small ways older than me, but it is surprising to me the number of people who aren't familiar with the word "based".

Or he's making and yet ANOTHER channel to get more money when he already has donations from patrons in spite of the fact his reviews are less frequent and less expansive. The man has what, 5 or 6 channels already? It's getting old.

And the "accidental unsubscribe" thing - c'mon. We all tell ourselves little comforting lies. My pants don't fit anymore because they shrank in the wash, not because I gained weight. My subscribers are leaving because of a system error, not because I flooded my own audience with too many things that don't interest them.

Been subscribed to Jang's various channels for a while but never experienced any of the issues he's mentioned, but it's not great hardship to sign up to another channel so I wish him the best.

I was also confused by the new channel title, using local/regional slang seems an odd choice as it will either confuse people or get out dated really quickly.

May have been the reason my 'Pukka Lego Reviews for teapot lids' channel never took off :P

@quixotequest said:
"'Based' isn't common parlance in my US world, either but my recovering heroin-addict son tells me it's common in the illicit drug and its entertainment/music subculture. To give the most generous gloss, for me it's a mix of saying 'this content isn't for your generation' and 'yep, LEGO definitely can be plastic crack.'

@Huw said:
"I have to admit that I am puzzled by the use of that word, too. I looked it up to see if it had a meaning that I was not aware of. I assume it's used as in...

Adjective
based (comparative more based, superlative most based)

(slang, of a person) Not caring what others think about one's personality, style, or behaviour; focused on maintaining individuality.

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/based

It's not common parlance in the UK, for sure."

"

I hope your son recovers, drug addiction is a serious problem and I’m sorry to hear that a loved one is dealing with it.

I haven’t once seen the term “based” used in drug-related stuff until now, it’s mostly either political or (more frequently) apolitical memes. On my Discord server, “based” means cool and I think quite a few of Jang’s fans will catch onto that.

The main context I have heard the term "based" is with far right political online communities where it is usually used interchangeably with "pilled" or "red pilled" and normally involves an individual espousing their belief in all sorts of awful stuff that isn't appropriate for Brickset. Additionally, it has since then been used in some far left online communities, but to a much lesser degree, to be synonymous with "woke".

Do I think Jang is using it in either of these contexts? No. So it is definitely an odd choice.

^ The majority of Bricksetters, perhaps? If only we could find out what portion of JANG's viewerbase does and doesn't (the majority of people *commenting* on the videos surrounding this matter seem to understand it to have positive connotations, but that's no more representative of the overall viewerbase than this comment section would be).

@Huw said:
"I think one thing is clear: it seems the majority of people don't understand the meaning of the word, or if they do, think it has negative connotations, so it was probably not a good idea to use it in the channel's name."

In an apolitical context, "based" would generally be the opposite of being a shill. A LEGO shill channel/reviewer would be someone who gets free stuff from LEGO and then only says nice things about it. Jang claims that he buys all of his LEGO retail and is not shy about levelling criticism when he thinks it is warranted.

I think it has nothing to do with leftwing/rightwing.

I've never heard the term "based" used in this context before. I think it's more confusing than necessary.

And to the person who doesn't like seeing JANG in his videos, I think it was in response to COPPA and how YouTube reacted. Something about seeing a human mean the YouTube algorithms didn't go crazy and block his website.

@Harmonious_Building said:
" @Huw said:
"I think one thing is clear: it seems the majority of people don't understand the meaning of the word, or if they do, think it has negative connotations, so it was probably not a good idea to use it in the channel's name."

In an apolitical context, "based" would generally be the opposite of being a shill. A LEGO shill channel/reviewer would be someone who gets free stuff from LEGO and then only says nice things about it. Jang claims that he buys all of his LEGO retail and is not shy about levelling criticism when he thinks it is warranted.

I think it has nothing to do with leftwing/rightwing. "

But that is not what others think. I saw it and immediately thought it was some dumb nod to 4Chan / Reddit meme culture. It seems like sort of a dog whistle to me.

Jang's efforts to reorient his channel(s) seems to have coincided with him being a more negative and less enthusiastic reviewer. I don't really blame him as it seems like Youtube is what he does full time, but it isn't really that engaging to listen to him moan about wonky R2 heads, sticker sheets and lacklustre white printing on dark torsos. All the more often it seems like he actively resents Lego, which isn't exactly the sort of thing I watch a youtube video for. It's a shame because he has great production quality and his reviews are otherwise really thorough.

@LegoSonicBoy said:
" @elangab said:
"While his production value is better than the rest, and he does cover many sets, I think he get a bit off road once all of the whining when the Child content/YouTube Block started. It feels as it's more about him than the Lego now, I liked it better when he was off camera and without doing a live 5 hours video of him chatting :) I Wish him luck, but I switched to Brickset as my main Lego review source."
I agree, I preferred his objective, matter-of-fact but still positive style and am not really a fan of the "fellow kids" approach he's been taking. Every once in a while is fine, but it's getting a little bit excessive. It's also getting tiresome that having such a wide audience means he's constantly having to remind people (not unlike Bricksetters) that PPP isn't the be all and end all, colorful interior parts are to aid with building, AFOLs aren't the primary demographic for most non-18+ themes, and so on. Not that I blame him, I just wish more people understood these things coming into the hobby and didn't need constant reminders.

I did, however, sit in for what was it, eight? hours of one of his NINJAGO City Gardens livestreams, participating every now and then. No regrets, it was an enjoyable experience through and through.

@Panchox1 said:
" @Mechalex said:
"I like his straightforwardness, but does anyone know of reviewers or Lego channels that are a bit more tongue-in-cheek and fun?"

Jeremy Herbert's reviews are super informative and very fun/ tongue in cheek. Check out his one on the Winne the pooh set where he mentions his wife's love of Piglet. pretty funny.

https://youtu.be/PnzYi8r0fgA "
+1 for Jeremy Herbert. His review of 40235 and JANG's review of 60150 were among the ones that got me back into LEGO in early 2018 — although my primary credit remains to my own passion for the 60th anniversary set 10404 .

@Sandinista said:
"Or he's making and yet ANOTHER channel to get more money when he already has donations from patrons in spite of the fact his reviews are less frequent and less expansive. The man has what, 5 or 6 channels already? It's getting old.

And the "accidental unsubscribe" thing - c'mon. We all tell ourselves little comforting lies. My pants don't fit anymore because they shrank in the wash, not because I gained weight. My subscribers are leaving because of a system error, not because I flooded my own audience with too many things that don't interest them. "
Edginess aside, I don't get this. If you think people are unsubbing because JANG has too many kinds of content in one channel for them then isn't having that many channels for each type of content the logical thing to do, not just a cash grab? Or are you in the "JANG doesn't deserve as many subs as he has" camp (in which case, go off, I guess)?"

No, I think he sold out and his audience is responding. People are unsubbing because he shifted his main channel away from what he was good at: reviews. The livestreams, his initial thoughts on new releases before even having the sets in hand, a request for a Patreon donation, plugs for his half dozen other channels, having his face on camera for everything (because somehow that's the solution to COPPA compliance?), when will it end?? In my eyes he fell in love with his own ego, gave himself to his audience, and now it's boring to watch.

@Dash_Justice said:
"I understand his decision, but I disagree. I think many of these issues are user error, and personally, when channels split their content up into too many channels, I don't like it and watch less.

..."

Those are interesting arguments, but... have you considered that these things aren't conjecture and that he *actually* has confirmed these issues? Like, maybe he received complaints from actual subscribers? And it's not like YouTube isn't **very notorious** among content creators for having a content management system that's almost actively hostile against its users.

It seems strange to deny Jang's experiences and claim them to be mere accidents – as if he made the decision to abandon a 1 million-subscriber channel not based on accumulated issues that couldn't be resolved in simpler ways, but as if he did it on a whim after hitting a couple potholes.

People can blame it on age if they like, but I'm 43 and know exactly who the Based God is. It's a pretty fitting reference given how prolific and positive Lil B is. Although if we're going with the Bay Area hip-hop theme, "JANG's Hyphy LEGO Reviews" would have been funnier. The thumbnail could be JANG shaking his dreads.

As far as the comments above regarding the old name LEGOJANG and "JANG's LEGO Reviews", as a trademark attorney I can explain the difference. LEGOJANG was a straightforward infringement of LEGO's trademark because it was effectively profiting from the LEGO trademark, and because it could potentially cause confusion as to whether or not JANG is officially affiliated with LEGO. Whereas "JANG's LEGO Reviews" is not infringing because it falls into the nominative fair use exception under trademark law. Nominative fair use allows you to use someone else's trademark to refer specifically to the trademark owner's products or services. So if you have a channel where you are doing nothing but reviewing LEGO products, you are allowed to call it a LEGO review channel.

"No, I think he sold out and his audience is responding. People are unsubbing because he shifted his main channel away from what he was good at: reviews. The livestreams, his initial thoughts on new releases before even having the sets in hand, a request for a Patreon donation, plugs for his half dozen other channels, having his face on camera for everything (because somehow that's the solution to COPPA compliance?), when will it end?? In my eyes he fell in love with his own ego, gave himself to his audience, and now it's boring to watch."

I think you're partially right @Sandinista
I didn't like that he split up the channel especially with his moc cityscape. I loved seeing those mix inbetween the regular reviews he'd do.
It gave more variety to the channel. I thought he did it to maximize more revenue but I'm not youTube business savvy.
Not crazy about the livestreams. They seem boring to me (just my opinion) but in the past he did go over sets that were coming out when he'd go through the Lego catalogue. Those were fun to listen to as well. So that's not unusual for him to give thoughts about upcoming sets especially with such hi-res photos Lego puts out at times before sets release.
I don't fault him on the Patreon. I don't subscribe to those things but if people are into it and he can get some extra monies, all good for him and the patrons.
I do agree seeing him on camera takes away from the reviews imho. Not everyone is a camera friendly personality. Humor or the gift of gab, relatable, talent is all important being in front of the lens. For me I skip to the reviews itself. It's just better if he narrates his reviews, his lego city, etc.

I do wish him well with his new channel. From what he said, youTube doesn't give him all his 'features' and has unsubscribed people.
His views are so low for a guy who used to get hundreds of thousands to millions regularly. The views aren't terrible but should be MUCH higher given his great photography/filming the models and thorough reviews.

@Sandinista said:
"In my eyes he fell in love with his own ego
"

To me he seems a really chilled guy, and I can't see him as egotistical at all.

I think he has constantly strived to improve all elements of his content and easily has the best production values for content of his type. I'm sure the latter has cost him a lot of money and countless hours too, so I don't begrudge him offering Patreon rewards to those who can afford to sponsor him.

I think both you and I would struggle to produce a few hundred review videos of Lego sets without a) repeating ourselves often, and b) feeling the need to diversify and/or try new ways of doing things.

He's an asset to my hobby for sure.

@Andhe said:
"'Pukka Lego Reviews for teapot lids'"

Subscribed.

@Huw said:
"I think one thing is clear: it seems the majority of people don't understand the meaning of the word, or if they do, think it has negative connotations, so it was probably not a good idea to use it in the channel's name."
While I agree the new name is a bit strange, I just watch the content because I like the way Jang presents it. Couldn't care less about the name. He could call the channel "Jang's LEGO addict hideout" and I would still watch it.
:-)

Chris & Huw thanks so much for sharing this here. Splitting off my main type of content to a brand new, empty, unknown, search-unfindable channel and leaving behind 10+ years of 7 days/week building & struggle was no easy decision. I've previously done everything I could to manage the increasingly outrageous undocumented disadvantages & restrictions YT has piled onto me, but nothing was enough.

Splitting off the city & custom work to its own channel provided a welcoming & focused place for folks who just want that type of content and don't care for reviews, and viewer satisfaction has been fantastic (I just need to make more time to actually work on the city!). Separating out the speed builds (and later the real-time footage) has further benefitted all, including both those interested & those not.

Just the video announcing the review channel and the clear & factual reasons for it resulted in a large number of people confirming that they had indeed been unsubscribed from the old main channel against their will (and to their surprise), and an absolutely astonishing number of them re-subscribed on the spot, thus proving at least one of the problems was worse than I even surmised.

Now with new LEGO set reviews appearing exclusively in one place, people who only want that content and nothing else are better served. With the exact same format of videos being uploaded with no other changes, I'm already hearing from people shocked to see the content they want from me showing up in their subscription feeds, where it hasn't appeared in months, if not years, and the analytical data on the back end is almost alien to me, entirely unrecognizable (in a good and logical way).

This has been a frightening & risky change to make and an almost inconceivable loss (of a 1M subscriber pool) up front to start from scratch, but I'm 100% confident now that it was the right way to go.

For folks complaining about the existence of live streams yet watching them for hours regardless, I have no other answer but the one I repeat exhaustively: Don't watch what you don't want to watch. For those concerned splitting a fixed amount of content into multiple focused channels somehow creates "clogging" or unwanted "spam," I don't have anything to offer as that's fundamentally, arithmetically illogical at best, backwards at worst.

For everyone with kind remarks & support, I thank you greatly and hope to continue to evolve my work in a positive way for years to come.

@Odeinoichus said:
" but I do question how long his channels can last when it seems there is so much negativity towards him these days."
It's the Internet. Negative/hateful voices are the loudest. The number of real regular people who happily enjoy whatever content they want and avoid what they don't is actually rather overwhelming, and I'm deeply grateful for it!

"Based" is basically a youth slang for mean "cool, grounded, etc." It has become internet slang, so it's used across demographics and communities. I'm in my early 20's, and many of my friends use it (or at least understand its meaning). Brickset comment sections typically skew towards an older demographic, so the confusion is understandable.

It is also apolitical and fairly mainstream within the American youth culture, so if your child is saying it, it is VERY UNLIKELY that they've become a fringe political extremist or drug addict.