
Ice Poseidon’s Lucrative, Stressful Life as a Live Streamer - danso
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/07/09/ice-poseidons-lucrative-stressful-life-as-a-live-streamer
======
Bartweiss
> _The restaurant starts getting a lot of unusual phone calls... An employee
> asks the man if he is Paul Denino. He says yes, but then explains that the
> callers are pranking him. He is live-streaming through the camera on the
> stick, and some of the thousands of people watching are trying to fuck with
> him. The calls grow more disturbing... The restaurant manager asks Denino to
> leave. Almost immediately, the restaurant’s rating on Yelp begins to
> plummet. Dozens of one-star reviews flood the page within seconds._

It's hard for me to see things like Ice Poseidon's stream as media or
entertainment, really. If this is a predictable consequence of streaming which
restaurant he's going to, then Denino is basically just ruining someone's day
(and possibly much more) because he thinks he'll make money off of it. Nor is
this anywhere near the bottom of the pile. Trollstation has picked up jail
time over three different 'pranks' \- a bomb threat, a fake armed robbery, and
a fake kidnapping. Which puts "fire in a crowded theater" to shame, honestly -
waving a fake gun around specifically to frighten people isn't even something
that gets _considered_ in most free speech debates, and rightly so. (I shudder
to think how that prank might have ended in the US.)

My favorite example, though, is still RossCreations. Whose idea of a prank
was... taking down stopsigns. Just that, going to an intersection and taking
away stopsigns so maybe some people would get in a car accident. He was
apparently charged with felony grand theft (stop signs aren't cheap), but I'm
a bit surprised no one threw in a public endangerment charge alongside it.

I guess I don't understand how we got here. I know people doing stupid stuff
and misjudging pranks is nothing new, this isn't a "kids these days"
complaint, but where did people get the idea that "it's for my channel"
changes the ethics or legality of things they _know_ will go wrong?

~~~
yebyen
I never even heard of this guy until I was in a bar in Phoenix Arizona and
listening to a flight attendant tell the story about how her plane was raided
by SWAT armed response earlier that day, because of him. It looks like that
was April 28 last year.

She was absolutely terrified and all of the passengers were asked to keep
their window covers shut while armed personnel surrounded the plane and
prepared to board from the rear entrance and take him out of there. It's a
predictable consequence of him going places and streaming. He'll even say
things like "I hope nobody figures out what plane I'm on and calls in a bomb
threat" but honestly what actual law is being violated and by whom in this
situation?

I mean I can personally see he knows he has antagonists and he is specifically
egging them on, and he is profiting from it, but I don't know the specific
actual law that he'd be breaking in this case, as much as I'd like for there
to be one. Ruining dozens of peoples' day just isn't a violation of the law in
and of itself.

~~~
pjc50
Terrorism "conspiracy" charges can be pretty wide-ranging. It sounds like that
incident alone would have incurred tens of thousands of dollars of costs for
both law enforcement and the airline.

~~~
yebyen
Yes but how do you prosecute someone because a bomb threat was called in
against them?

Which part of what he was doing should he not be doing? It was all external
parties that caused the kerfuffle. He's obviously a successful broadcaster,
and he's making money at it without himself breaking the law, so you can't
tell him not to do that anymore. (That's a prior restraint, no?)

I agree that it's problematic and it's costing money, but if those trolls that
called in the bomb threats cause his show to be closed, isn't that basically
the end of free speech? The fraudulent reporting caller should be prosecuted,
sure.

Anyone can call in a SWAT raid on anyone else. I myself haven't watched the
show, so I don't know to what extent a conspiracy charge would stick, but ...

If I go somewhere and start a Live Vlog, and someone watching figures out
where I am and manages to put the police onto my camera, "for the lulz," and
that's the whole story, then why should my "broadcasting license" be revoked?
Never mind no such license is required, just hypothetically.

~~~
Mirioron
If I remember correctly, he wasn't even streaming during the whole thing. The
fans simply pieced it together by things like departure times and roughly
where he's going etc.

------
samfriedman
Man, Adrien Chen has done some really interesting pieces while at the New
Yorker. I'm constantly impressed by his ability to cover niche parts of web
culture and technology in a way that is always engaging and at least close to
topical.

Other recommended reads:

A "Daily Show" style satirical program tries to get off the ground in Nigeria:
[https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/01/22/using-
comedy-t...](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/01/22/using-comedy-to-
strengthen-nigerias-democracy)

Making ironic, absurd art and gaining an internet following:
[https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/01/30/brad-
troemel-t...](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/01/30/brad-troemel-the-
troll-of-internet-art)

Lessons from the radio era for the "fake news" era:
[https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/09/04/the-fake-
news-...](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/09/04/the-fake-news-fallacy)

~~~
TarpitCarnivore
He also wrote about Russian troll farms back in 2015:
[https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/07/magazine/the-
agency.html](https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/07/magazine/the-agency.html)

------
vortico
>Denino often lands at the top of a message board called LivestreamFails

This is no longer true. His stream has been banned on that subreddit for
producing scripted content.
[https://www.reddit.com/r/LivestreamFail/comments/8p7sib/ice_...](https://www.reddit.com/r/LivestreamFail/comments/8p7sib/ice_poseidon_is_now_banned_from_rlivestreamfail/)

------
arcsin
There was an interesting event recently that happened to another live-streamer
named Arab Andy. Arab Andy streams himself walking around with a speaker
strapped on that plays text-to-speech and audio clips of whatever his viewers
send him in their twitch donations. One viewer sent him a sound clip of a bomb
countdown and detonation, and Arab Andy was subsequently arrested and last I
heard was possibly facing prison time on a felony charge. Personally I don't
think he should have to go to prison, but it's an interesting question what,
if anything, should happen in cases like this.

Here's a video of the incident:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nVWX7r1WQLg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nVWX7r1WQLg)

~~~
canardlaquay
"Arab Andy" cared more about the donation than his own life. He clearly let
the bomb sound happen on purpose for the sake of fame. He didn't even bother
muting it or at least muffling it.

Weakly moaning "It's TTS!" (Text-to-speech) as an excuse to the officer that
arrested him not so long later is enough of a proof that this guy was
disconnected from reality and just doing that for the money.

It doesn't matter where you're coming from, you just don't play a bomb
countdown - especially not in a room crowded full of people. You're scaring
people on purpose, and that's called terrorism. He deserves that prison
sentence.

~~~
icsllaf
Isn't one of the main caveats of the first amendment that you can't say "Fire"
or "Bomb" in a crowded theater?

As someone who watches live streams normally, it's weird to see the clashing
of the online world with its disdain for social norms and encouragement of
casual racism mix in with the normal day to day lives of people. A future
where a good chunk of people walking on the streets are disconnected from the
people around them and instead are trying to please a faceless mob which
demands that life constantly be reality TV is a weird one to think about but I
honestly believe that this is a future that is possible.

~~~
mieseratte
> Isn't one of the main caveats of the first amendment that you can't say
> "Fire" or "Bomb" in a crowded theater?

It's a complicated and, IMO, interesting topic.[0][1]

[0] - [https://www.popehat.com/2012/09/19/three-generations-of-a-
ha...](https://www.popehat.com/2012/09/19/three-generations-of-a-hackneyed-
apologia-for-censorship-are-enough/)

[1] - [https://legaltalknetwork.com/podcasts/make-no-
law/2018/06/fi...](https://legaltalknetwork.com/podcasts/make-no-
law/2018/06/fire-in-a-crowded-theater/)

~~~
notafraudster
I confess to having read the Popehat link quickly (I do not have audio right
now to be able to listen to the podcast) and it is possible I missed some
subtext, but the link seems more to speak to that the quote was made in a
context many today would find disagreeable as part of a series of bad rulings,
and that it has subsequently often been invoked to support restrictions on
speech as though the existence of some restriction on speech automatically
justifies others. Both points are well taken.

But this is quite literally a situation where a person shouts about a fake
threat so as to cause alarm in a crowded fora -- the article does not seem to
argue that doing so would be legal or that it would not be a permissible
restriction on speech.

So I defer to anyone who knows more than I do about speech law -- to be clear,
it is still impermissible to (falsely) shout fire in a crowded theater, right?

~~~
mieseratte
> it is still impermissible to (falsely) shout fire in a crowded theater,
> right?

The underlying point is that, it's a complicated topic that is not easily
answered. This is like saying "Shooting someone is illegal, right?" Well, it's
complicated. You have Murder 1, Murder 2, (sometimes more), Manslaughter
(Voluntary, or Involuntary), and you have shootings of self-defense which are
legal. It entirely depends on the circumstances under which you shout "Fire!"
and the outcome of that situation.

There are legal principles involving whether or not you caused harm, whether
or not you intended to cause harm, whether or not you reasonably knew it
_could_ cause harm but proceeded anyway. These questions will have outcome on
which charges are applicable, if any are at all.

Should you shout fire in a crowded theater, and folks stampede. Expect to be
charged for inciting a riot or at least disturbing the peace. Should nothing
happen? You might be asked to leave and not come back by staff and have a no-
trespass order, you may even get picked up on a disturbing the peace charge.
One of the "You can beat the rap, but you can't beat the ride" situations.

------
treis
That was a really interesting piece. All I can think of after reading it is
Grandpa's quote from the Simpsons:

I used to be with ‘it’, but then they changed what ‘it’ was. Now what I’m with
isn’t ‘it’ anymore and what’s ‘it’ seems weird and scary. It’ll happen to you!

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LV0wTtiJygY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LV0wTtiJygY)

~~~
sushid
If you don't get the whole Twitch/YouTube live streaming concept, then sure,
but don't mistakenly think that Ice Poseidon is what's mainstream and "it."

This is essentially social media 2.0 for 4channer.

------
trgv
I thought this was a good article.

I think the relationship between streamers and their audience is a more
extreme form of the relationship between celebrities and their fans (some of
whom may tend toward fanatical).

It's not surprising that things end up this way. When you remove the
music/movies/whatever that the celebrity is producing and give the fans
direct, real-time access to the celebrity's life things were bound to get
weird.

One area where I disagree with the article is this characterization:

> [Viewers] are immersed in an online culture that believes that “social-
> justice warriors” and political correctness are the main obstacles to self-
> actualization

In my opinion this kind of "extreme speech" should rarely be taken literally.
Instead, misogny/racism/xenophobia/ranting about "SJWs" on the internet should
be viewed as a weird kind of performance art rather than an expression of
genuine beliefs.

None of that makes it pleasant to an uninitiated spectator, but I'd compare
that to how someone might find a dead baby joke terribly offensive. Really,
I'd compare the whole thing to an inside joke between friends that would be
considered "over the line" if someone else heard it. There's nothing new about
that.

~~~
rft34g4e3t
> In my opinion this kind of "extreme speech" should rarely be taken literally

That's what surrogates said about donald trump before the election. The muslim
ban was just hyperbole. Then he got elected, and people were getting detained
at the airport.

Now I'm not naive, and I know that some of the outrageous speech of online
trolls is just for show. The problem is, you can't detect sarcasm online.
White supremacist groups are actively recruiting on chan boards. You can't say
it's all just a joke.

------
__flo
That was a disturbing read. That guy is practically a slave to his followers.
There may be money in it, but I have the impression he is beyond the point of
no return. Even if he would want to stop streaming, the more sociopathic lot
of his "community" will probably sniff him out and expose him.

> “It was just easier to break up with her than to deal with it.”

I don't know whom I find more pathetic, him or his followers. This is just
sick.

~~~
wpietri
A while back I had the chance to watch user research interviews of streamers.
People clearly loved doing it, but also struggled to find a healthy balance.
Being on camera that much, especially with the expectation of continuous
engagement with lots of followers, is an extraordinarily intense situation.

Long ago I was an exchange student in Ecuador, where some workers would still
chew coca as they worked, basically the same way people consume coffee. It was
normal and boring for locals. Refine that same leaf, though, to cocaine and
crack, and you get something so compelling that it becomes dangerous.

I sort of think of streaming as a similar thing: it takes normal human
sociality and refines is to a degree previously never seen. I'm sure some
people will find healthy ways to deal with it, but I'm not shocked at all that
it breaks people.

~~~
rasz
The problem I keep hearing from gamer streamers is searching for your niche,
and stumbling into something you dont enjoy, but suddenly you start making
real $$. Jump from streaming for 20-50 people to 2000-3000 does things to you.

------
wgerard
What an oddly modern version of The Truman Show (I guess?).

> Denino resisted for months—Caroline made him happy—but eventually he
> relented. “It just got too much, dude,” he told me. “It was just easier to
> break up with her than to deal with it.

There's something really deeply somber about that.

I'm always curious what happens to these people in twenty (or even ten) years.
I imagine this isn't a long-term career, but obviously I could be 100% wrong
about that (e.g. Reality TV doesn't just star young adults anymore).

Of course some of these people are also earning (maybe just near) pro-athlete
levels of income, so I guess with some foresight maybe they don't have to work
ever again after retiring, really.

~~~
heavenlyblue
Come on:

> Yet he felt that he had to act as if he didn’t care, or his viewers might
> suspect that he and Caroline hadn’t actually broken up.

There's some hope for humanity, isn't there?

------
TheBranca18
My favorite story about Ice Poseidon was when he and his friends were at a
Denny's talking shit about black people and a person comes up to them and
calls them out to fight outside for being racist. They backed down so fast.

That's the problem with people who grew up streaming their lives, there is no
normal life for them. Everything is a meme, etc.

Regardless of his political views, they can't be that important to him to back
down from his toxicity when called on it.

------
rft34g4e3t
How did we become so lonely and disconnected that watching a stranger's live-
stream became a substitute for human contact?

It's something I see in all online video. Lets plays, mukbangs, makeup
tutorials.. the game, the eyeshadow, the food is not important. It's having
someone talk to you about their day. It makes you feel like you're not alone.
Take ReviewBra for example. He barely reviews food anymore. He just sits at a
table and says comforting things.

At least he's trying to use this for good. But why has this content taken off
in the first place? So many young people I encounter are practically
hikikomori.

~~~
salvar
I get your point, but aren't you writing this on an online message board
that's essentially a slightly different kind of substitute for human contact?

~~~
rft34g4e3t
Digital communication is not inherently substituting human contact. It can be
used to augment our relationships - organizing meetups in real life, and
keeping in touch with long distance friends. It can also help you make new
friendships in real life, or online-only. Online-only friendships are not a
problem, as long as you have IRL friendships also.

But read the article. When they talk about this streamers fan base. How some
of them felt so depressed, and the stream made them feel like they had a
friend. Maybe the stream kept them from ending their life. What makes people
so lonely that the stream is the only thing keeping them going?

I'm not critiquing online video. There will always be a need for
entertainment. What I'm asking is why so much of it, lately, seems designed to
comfort lonely people. And why are so many people in need of that?

~~~
lovehashbrowns
> How some of them felt so depressed, and the stream made them feel like they
> had a friend. Maybe the stream kept them from ending their life. What makes
> people so lonely that the stream is the only thing keeping them going?

> depressed

> Maybe the stream kept them from ending their life.

Did you not answer your own question? As someone with a lot of social anxiety
(it's hard for me to even comment in forums/here) Twitch streams make it feel
like I'm getting human interaction. But it's mainly a distraction from the
feeling of loneliness, obviously. Hopefully it gives these people the time
they need to deal with their social anxiety/depression rather than progressing
further down the spiral.

~~~
rft34g4e3t
Thank you for commenting. I know it can be hard with the anxiety. I appreciate
getting your insight.

I agree with you. These streams can distract you when you feel alone. That
might even be a good thing for some.

But I'm trying to figure out why so many people are lonely in the first place,
that we would need these streams to fill the void. Maybe we've always been
this disconnected, and it just feels worse now. But I have noticed more people
feeling isolated and alone.

I remember when I was in college, I felt so much pressure with my courseload
that I hid away for days binge watching a tv show. I was avoiding writing a
term paper. I was also avoiding my classmates.

I work with teenagers in my profession. And I'm seeing lots of high school
students dealing with the same type of anxiety and withdrawl. Is it normal? At
that age? Is this becoming more widespread? And if so, what is causing it?

I read this last year, and it confirms what I'm seeing. One of the schools
mentioned is actually in my area.

[https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/11/magazine/why-are-more-
ame...](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/11/magazine/why-are-more-american-
teenagers-than-ever-suffering-from-severe-anxiety.html)

Again, thank you for your comments.

~~~
lovehashbrowns
I have no idea why that is, honestly. I think, at least for me, there's always
some sort of pressure to have a lot of friends or social interactions. Go on
FB, everyone's hanging out with each other and posting about it or talking.
Snapchat, same thing. Dating sites everywhere. Dating apps.

But that's about all I can think of. There's probably more going on. I'm just
personally thankful that I was able to get that anxiety out of the way via
Twitch/streams.

------
yedava
The dystopian literature of the last century tended to view the TV as a device
that enslaved the masses, turning them into obsessive, entertainment consuming
automatons. I feel like we're living in that dystopia, only with the Internet
taking over TV.

~~~
yifanl
Worse than that, it's faceless people taking willing participants and turning
them into amusement bots.

~~~
digi_owl
Two things comes to mind:

First of all, Max Headroom. I think there it was a felony to turn your TV off
or some such.

Second, Ghost In the Shell: Stand Alone Complex. It is a anime tv series that
involves an undercover security force in future Japan.

------
minimaxir
Ice Poseidon's subreddit is also drawing absurd engagement numbers for a
subreddit devoted to a single person:
[https://twitter.com/minimaxir/status/1004387299273027584](https://twitter.com/minimaxir/status/1004387299273027584)

~~~
kmfrk
Their presence is ... easily felt on other subreddits. It's like saying
"Bloody Mary" to a mirror.

~~~
scruple
That's great. It's a really good take on the phenomenon. You see it between
different subreddits frequently these days.

------
funfunfunction
The thing Ice Posidean has going for him is an almost cult like following.
Unfortunately the way that plays out is often quite negative who people who
aren't a part of the community. I wonder if building a community with this
level of dedication is even possible without victimizing people or causing
mayhem.

~~~
com2kid
There are other streamers who have a cult like following that isn't toxic.
Some of the Twitch streamers pull this off, if the streamer has mods who wield
the ban hammer hard and earlier, it is possible to shape the community that
grows up.

All of the cult of personality type of streamers are going to have a viewer
base that is a bit odd, but they don't have to be malicious.

As an example, one community I'm part of decided one day that we were going to
play punk music on stream. Since on Twitch, $=free speech, music requests are
$3 a minute or so.

It (de?)volved into a battle of the bands as fans of different bands went back
and forth.

~~~
Mirioron
I think it's rather that people like Ice Poseidon do everyone else a favor by
being a magnet for all of those toxic people so they don't go and be toxic
elsewhere.

~~~
scruple
IRL streamers as a containment board. Not far from the truth...

------
ghostbrainalpha
I've never understood what "Ice Poseidon" was, but I notice at any given point
on Reddit if you search by "NEW" posts basically 25% of posts will be in the
Ice Poseidon subbreddit.

It's really the only community that keeps pace with r/The_Donald.

------
jxub
Newspaper headlines sound like taken from a Black Mirror episode by the day.

------
digi_owl
I find myself thinking of how for a few years the local TV channels offered
night time SMS driven chat services.

The thing was that said chat had a 30 second delay, because every message was
read by channel staff before being allowed on the air.

On a different note, i can't shake the thought that there was an uptick of
"pranksters" online after the whole Anonymous circus hit the airwaves...

------
psychometry
Who's more obnoxious, the streamer or the viewers? I really can't decide.

------
tomtimtall
So many people Seem to be extrapolating this into something it just isn’t. He
could stop tomorrow and live a normal life in a couple of months. This isn’t
the trueman show or someone propelled into international fame against their
will. It’s the long tail of the network effect. You can sustain yourself by
being moderately entertaining to some 50k people but you have to stick to the
role. Ice Poseidon has chisen a role of being a huge jackass who runs the
border of criminal behavior. That was his choice, not something his fans
pushed on him, and honestly I wish serious media like HN and the New Yorker
would just ignore him. There are NeoNazi personalities and Scientologist
preachers with more followers than him, and we’d don’t give them screen time
because they don’t contribute anything to society so why wast your attention
on this but?

