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The story
The YouTube channel “Despair Line Worker Ch” (絶望ライン工ch) built its image around being run by a single, low-income temp factory worker — but it’s now been pointed out that the entire setup was fake, sparking a buzz on a 5ch live-commentary thread. The uploader reportedly does have genuine past experience working as a temp or dispatch factory hand, but appears to have kept milking that persona for ad revenue long after it stopped being true. Reactions in the thread ranged from matter-of-fact (“anyone can tell from the view count alone that he’s earning more than an average person”) to outright anger (“he wasted my time”), and the discussion spread into the broader reality behind similar “poverty YouTuber” channels.
What people said
Probably his factory-line income was higher than he let on too, honestly.
Also curious whether it counts as fraud under Japanese criminal law.
I don't think it counts as fraud since he didn't directly con anyone out of money.
No idea about the corporate terms of service though.
Forgot his name, but there's a heavyset YouTuber living in a run-down house that I honestly thought was really poor.
His channel's blown up since then, so he's probably got money now.
Can't really say "no harm done" when people had their time wasted by a guy faking being a broke factory worker.
I really can't stand YouTube fanboy comment sections.
Yeah, pretty much this.
I mean, if you think about it, someone who can actually produce videos and pull in views isn't going to be a genuinely incompetent bottom-rung loser in real life.
Watched it once — he just travels somewhere domestic and silently eats food.
Just empty content, the only thing "good" about it being the lack of pointless chatter.
That's the one.
Used to watch it a lot for a while.
There was also some heavyset guy who cooked inside his Prius.
Cooking in a Prius? Kind of want to see that now. Thanks (サンガツ, net slang for "thanks").
I get that's a dilemma for the person himself, but viewers failing to notice the shift is a separate problem.
Kind of like the "pure and innocent" persona in porn (AV), huh?
Seriously, this — you sympathize with someone precisely because they're below you.
Stop hiding the fact that you're bald.
Seems like it's true he was once a temp or dispatch factory worker, but the lie is that he's still doing it now.
In other words, he's pretending to still be on the factory floor while actually making money from YouTube and other ventures, having quit the factory job long ago.
Do they just rent out the shop for filming?
That's basically just theater.
If a quick search turns him up, he's definitely raking in ad revenue.
Idiots just don't get that.
Both "Useless Dispatch Worker Masao" and "Despair Line Worker" basically just post videos of themselves cooking with nothing interesting to say — normally nobody would watch that, but everyone tuned in because of the "I'm at the bottom" angle.
More like a "fellow sufferer" than someone "below" you, no?
That's why people feel betrayed and get furious.
Background and Key Points of This Story
So-called “poverty” or “bottom-rung” YouTubers are a well-known genre that tends to draw viewer sympathy and easily rack up views. What complicates this particular case is that the uploader reportedly does have genuine past experience as a temp or dispatch factory worker, so the persona wasn’t a complete fabrication from scratch. In the thread, some raised the legal angle — that since he didn’t directly deceive anyone out of money, it likely wouldn’t count as fraud — while opinions were split on how it holds up against YouTube’s terms of service and basic content honesty. Since a channel’s real living standard inevitably changes once it gains views and popularity, the view that “someone who’s truly at the bottom wouldn’t even have the energy to make videos” reads as a general rule of thumb worth keeping in mind when watching similar channels.
※This article is compiled and summarized from the 5ch (Live News General) thread “[Sad News] Despair Line Worker Ch turns out to have lied about being single, low-income, and a temp worker — wwwwwwwwwww“.
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