>>153707116
Views can help determine if a show is worth continuing.

Obviously, this means more to a company that has to pay people than a singular passionate animator, but the knowledge that other people are interested in your work can be a good morale booster.

I blame TADC for mindbreaking /co/ and giving them unrealistically high expectations for how many viewers an indie cartoon should have.
Homestar Runner would probably be considered trash if it came out today for not pulling in millions of views.

Viewcount correlates with quality for the most part, unless there's a serious problem with the show's reach or marketing.
And without a large audience, it is hard to obtain funding.

>>153707416
Homestar Runner did have millions of views. That's partly why it was so popular.

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>>153707416
BFDI didn't even have that many views back then when it first came out either. And if you were to look at II's views from today's perspective, you'd think it's somehow "worse" than MW.

>>153707453
That's why never gonna give you up is the greatest piece of art ever made

>>153707116
>Why should "views" matter?
this is like saying why should ticket sales matter, views help tremendously, high amount means more people, more people means more chances of those willing to support (buying merch for example) high views help with the youtube algo further increasing exposure to more people

high views arent just bragging rights, they imply and affect so much more, thats why its important if you wanna continue producing your slop, ESPECIALLY if you r producing said slop at a loss (ehem.. MW)

>>153707561
That point seems highly suspect when BFDI was made pre-algorithm. (Though, I suppose the algorithm is why BFB ended up catering to a younger audience.)

>>153707498
Technically it got spammed as a bait-and-switch, that's why.

>>153707814
It was also an incredibly popular song even beyond the meme.

Even when we take "views" into account, that still makes only a fraction of money compared to other means. Some indies are made by one person, so there isn't much of a profit incentive.

>>153707116
Independent filmmakers still got bills to pay

Something I never really see anybody talking about in regards to views is that there are things with absolutely astronomical amounts of views that have made zero impact on the audience or pop culture as a whole. The true measure of impact is memory and how much something sticks in the mind. Everybody remembers old viral internet animations, but nobody remembers or cares about a clip from some streamer that got 100 million views on TikTok. There are entire movies in the billion dollar theatrical run club that nobody remembers or gives a shit about.

Counterargument: Justin Bieber is popular and he sucks and he's gay and I hate Justin Bieber

>>153707116
They do matter, but the problem with retards her and everywhere else on the net is that they focus only on the views. If something isn't a knockout success or breaks records, then it's a flop. I guess it can be more complicated when talking about Glitch shows since I hesitate to really call those indie, they have a bunch of animators and other workers that need to be paid.

>>153707116
yes, especially if the show is more niche audience

>>153707116
if we had to put it down to an equation, then views would be a variable in that equation
if you made absolute trash, then it would get 0 views and if you made perfection it would get as many views as there are people with screens

thats obviously not what happens, but there is a correlation between views and quality nonetheless
good things usually, not always but often, get more views than bad ones
other factors can be equally or more important than strict views in determining quality, but views themselves are an indicator nonetheless

people just fixate on views because its one of the only things that are purely objective
more views is always better than less views
whereas arguing "quality" as an innate quality is deeply subjective and depends heavily on personal taste
even within "objective" indicators of quality like good animation and good music can be weighted differently from individual to indivual, someone might concede A has better animation than B, but he personally values music more than animation and thus still prefers B

so you can argue for days about quality but number of views is inarguable, A is seen more than B
and trying to bring out the views dont matter card just seems like cope at times

>>153712585
I think I get what you're saying. So basically, views are meant to be an easier-to-understand statistic, while opinions vary and aren't as easy to comprehend?

>>153707116
You're right, but at the same time, it proves how big of a market it has at least sparked interest in. It can also correlate with how many people who want to help fund more episodes.

>>153707116
Because people that don't get views give up eventually.

e.g.
This person kept making cartoons for months, and none have over 1000 views, maybe not even 500.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dWG1XMvXIN0

You can see he consistently uploaded, until 8 months ago. Then he stopped.

https://www.youtube.com/@snowliontheater/videos

>>153712608
theres also the fact they arent arguing in good faith
people have an agenda, which is that X is better than Y

they likely dont actually believe that more views is better, its just a convenient, and objective, argument for them to use to prove that their thing is better than your thing

trying to argue a subjective point like quality is open to the other side counter-arguing
you cant just say "bad animation" because they can respond "well it has music so good it compensates" or "the bad animation has soul"
but views are views, they can use that as proof that nobody watches their thing

>>153708417
Like any other pop music. The Buggles