Fishtank Live

I don't use my own site here as much as I should, but I'm totally engrossed in the new Fishtank Live series. Wanted to word-vomit about it a bit and figured "hey I should just make a Cwcki thread".

What is Fishtank Live?:
In my own words I'd sum it up as taking the barebones form of your typical reality TV style series in the sense that it has handpicked contestants who will gradually be knocked out throughout the show with the final standing participant winning $10,000. With the challenge being simply living in the same house as the others over the course of 6 weeks without being able to step outside or use a phone. The major twist is the fact that the show is 24/7 livestreamed from 10 cameras within the house, nothing prerecorded, nothing scripted. Now because of the fact it's truly live, the audience participation factor went through the roof. The audience has a direct say during live votes, can directly send text-to-speech messages into the house, and trigger both chaotic and beneficial events called Fish Toys upon the house through a micropayment system to directly influence the show itself. The payments are a bit steep, but watching alone is free and the show's funding in itself was meant to mostly come from these audience interactions.

Links:
Main Site: https://www.fishtank.live/
Temp YouTube Channel with Daily Fishtank LiveSteam Link: https://www.youtube.com/@PerfectGuyLife
Best Source for Nearly 24/7 Updates: https://twitter.com/fishtankdotlive

My Take:
I fuggin hate reality TV. It usually feels way overproduced to the point where I'm questioning if at least a portion of the things participants do are genuine, or if literally everything is fed into their ear beforehand. BUT, Fishtank's approach has me hooked and I totally get why some people love debating shit like "best character" in real time. Especially after the internet sleuthing starts and the audience starts findings all kinds of wild shit in their past which in turn will absolutely affect the final outcome/winner. Another huge plus was how well they picked most of the cast. Given the scenario of "no phones, no internet, trapped in the same house for 6 weeks", they gravitated more heavily towards the terminally online folk on the spectrum who absolutely would benefit from a internet vacay and would react more heavily towards to being prodded a bit. Real "content" generators.

On the downside there's a lot of dead air and it isn't something I'd ever suggest to someone to randomly tune into and solely stare at. It's one of those thing you've got to invest some time into the lore to make watching a lot of the live feed worth it. I've found it much easier to just follow highlight clips/updates and then only watch live during parts when there's an upcoming vote or major event that's been broadcasted.

Side Note:
At the time of this writing literally EVERYTHING is offline for Fishtank because their home address got doxed and someone called in a SWAT team to disrupt it.

EDIT: As of 4/25 the main Fishtank site has been restored

 

You can still "tap the glass" tho like it's an aquarium.

Glaive's Current Fishtank Cast Review + Rankings

1. Jon - Had a hard time getting past his speech impediment and Andrew Tate obsession at first. Lots of his stories are massively embellished and he's clearly nowhere near as accomplished as he suggests. No one can be for pitting yourself in a 6 week content to MAYBE only win 10k. Average bloke will pull 4k-7k in that time from simply continuing to work. So Jon's illusion of grandeur is pretty grating. Despite all that he's my favorite to win currently. He's the most enthusiastic and contributes the most to the show in spite of how hard both Sam and the audience dogged him the first two days. Big main character vibes and manages to engage with everyone to be the center of attention. His gullibility and sheer stupidity have become endearing and show will drop off a cliff if he's eliminated too soon. #Jontent
2. Josie - My favorite as far as actual the people themselves go. She's the clear fan favorite by a stupid margin, so if the audience gets full control of the elimination votes she may as well have locked in the win already. She doesn't socialize the most, but makes up for it with having the most snippet clip moments just flapping and stimming all over the place. Funny how all the weeb/otaku stuff she likes is part of why she's the current favorite, yet she downplays it when questioned in the house. She's also one of the few to popular a phrase among the audience with "what the spruce", folks need to do more of that in general to help boost their likability.
3. Simmons - I probably like Simmons more than most. Yes he's annoying and hate how seriously he takes the random meetings that he tries to coordinate for shit like "let's find the plant by all standing in a circle and just asking if you're the plant". Fugging pointless. But hey it's still content and some of the dumb stuff he suggests leads to amusing interactions and sets others off. Besides Jon I think he's currently adding the most to the show and is very needed for that to pick up the slack from some of the other duds. Love when he sets Jon straight on his religion/political/historical rants. Hope he stays longer than most because of his engagement and higher enthusiasm.
4. Damiel - Very split on Damiel. He's a good agitator and seems like he's mostly detoxed from whatever had him walking around like a zombie the first two days. I do like the few times he's directly talked into a camera, need more of that from everyone. His personality is shit, and even though Sylvia and Letty might be more degen in their private lives, Damiels trashiness is just all-around and on full display. He's got that scrubbby juggalo vibe of the average dude you'd find in a trap house slinging percs. He's the needed heel of the show right now and want him to stick around fairly long, just not win. Especially if the "planted by Jet/Sam" theory is true. I do indeed believe that, but think people are overstating the impact. As long as he's abiding by the same rules and not getting special treatment or feeding intel back to the Fishtank team I doubt it matters. Oh and doesn't win. Jet probably threw him in as a rehab treatment.
5. Sylvia - She's the smartest imo, just really hard to get over her demeanor and appearance. There's just something about girls with no eyebrows I can't trust. Less scary when she doesn't put makeup on. She was super talkative and more interesting on the first day but has closed up quite a bit. Think she's running out of steam already, either that or the text-to-speech messages hit a bad nerve. She would benefit from tossing out more initial ideas and trying to befriend Josie even if it's forced. They clearly don't like each other and audience will dogpile votes against her if it means giving Josie her own room.
6. Vance - What a wasted contestant slot. Out of everyone Vance is easily who I'd pick to actually be friends with and probably have the most in common with. His Twitter/Youtube content is solid and he seems like a pretty funny bloke who probably has been a longtime MDE/Sam Hyde fan. But for whatever reason that all went out the window when he got on Fishtank. Guy just sits there and hardly says anything. He's had a few good quips but not anywhere near enough to save him. Even Sam told him to turn it around already and stop being so silent.
   
7. Mauro - Total milktoast, biggest normie, sleeps half the show, and has very low engagement and doesn't contribute much at all. Can't tell if he's just disinterested in doing much of anything or just low energy. Will say he was smart for scrubbing all of his online profiles and internet presence, think he's the only one left standing that can say hasn't had their personal life/socials dug into. He does seem like possibly the most genuinely nice person, will give him that. He's approachable and will sit and listen to even Jon and Simmons nonsensical rants. Doubt that will save him for very long, guessing he'll be gone second or third. Also doesn't help that in some of the few times he is social, his commentary turns very catty high-school girl like.
8. Letty - I do feel really bad for her with how porn listed under her own legal full name got circulated. Was a very clear case of "revenge porn", and it seems like the audience intends on still bringing it up the second text-to-speech messages are enabled. Not her fault and Sam clearly knew ahead with setting up certain word bans related to her and her family's socials. Despite all that she's still my least favorite. I like that she's in-tune with a bunch of niche internet shit, but that's like her entire shtick to a fault. Feels very forced and one-dimensional. Want her voted off.

Okay blogpost done.

 

Blog post more often please. It's fun watching people get into shit.

 

Significant Fishtank Update:

First contestant officially nuked from orbit off the show. Audience flipped through some of Simmon's Amazon books and found one in particular with some questionable language. While mostly focused on the true-to-tile subject of "How to be the best camp counselor", within some sections Simmons delves into how to date other counselors and blurs the line between counselor vs. adolescent campers quite poorly. Which of course then leads to a pedophile hunt strongarmed by the production staff itself who read several lines out loud to the full crew. Simmons is then immediately kicked off:

https://twitter.com/fishtankdotlive/status/1651370716380446720?s=20
https://twitter.com/fishtankdotlive/status/1651371034228977664?s=20

I didn't see any damning evidence here despite being beyond creepy with that wording. Think staff wanted him gone in general and this served as a perfect piece of ammo to weaponize and pitch it as the "right" call despite it not happening through an elimination challenge or vote. Granted the audience would have also easily voted him off at this point too. There's absolutely zero road to recovery once someone slaps the pedophile label on you and you've got published work mentioning inferred text of "getting naughty with campers". R.I.P.

Glaive's New Fishtank Power Rankings:

• Jon
• Josie
• Damiel
• Vance
• Mauro
• Sylvia
• Letty

Also apparently Jon is now off-limits for text-to-speech bullying. Jon was crushed with the whole Simmons reveal deal today and barricaded himself in the bathroom for over an hour. As a big Jon fan I think this is fair in the short term to not completely crush his soul right now, but it's a limp wrist decision if meant to stay as a permarule. That's borderline immunity from the most caustic element, us, the audience. Letty already got TTS immunity so I guess now it's at least fair among them...

 

Yes mostly. Higher than usual investment needed to try and dive into it off the bat. Fair comparison would be like showing someone a random insignificant Chris Chan captain's log update video as their intro to CWC as expecting them to be interested. Gotta have some background context. The update posts via the @fishtankdotlive tweets serve that purpose. I see no political angle with the community though beyond the what the show's premise itself might attract. 24/7 monitoring livestreamed to the Internet of humans fussing over a relatively low lump sum of cash considering the 6-week investment it takes is bound to stir a few pots.

 

https://twitter.com/fishtankdotlive/status/1652942991441502208?cxt=HHwWgIC97ZO5t_AtAAAA
What in the blue fuck have i fallen into?

 

>Josie casually walks into frame with broom at end of clip

Chef's kiss

 

https://twitter.com/live_fishtank/status/1653143481433333765?cxt=HHwWioCx2ZrPkvEtAAAA
@Glaive ok you win, i'm convinced. How much does it cost to view this?

 

It's free to simply view, just have to make an account on fishtank.live and sign in to access. There's a workaround method to access stream directly with like AceStreamer or VLC Player, but not worth it imo. Easy to make an account with just email addy. No payment info or personal shit needed.

 

Jon left, i'm actually gutted, his constant foot-in-mouth speech was hilarious.

 

You beat me to my update post. Major loss for the fans in terms on content, or rather Jontent. Whole fugging house was pretty much silent for the rest of the day. This will pose a major challenge for the show. Very similar to CWC, Jon is simply funny when left to his own devices without much extra poking or prodding. Can't say that about any other Fishtank fish, he was the driver whether you liked him or not. So now the production staff has to step up their involvement to keep things interesting. My original assumption was that Jon would be kept around as long as possible for the views, which leads into some theories about what exactly went down.

• Was Jon forcibly let go because he was becoming a liability?

I'd say no. That was cited as the reason for kicking Simmons but he passed a background check and there was no evidence he actually did anything questionable besides what's in his writing. Just a creepy dude who got punted in a very humorous way to stir up the pot. They LET Jon get beyond wasted and was left half-deceased in the laundry room for a full day. So any actual risk to the show or Jon himself seems negligible compared to what they already played out and glossed over. They don't care as much as they suggest. It's all posturing.

• So then that means the show is actually fair right, Jon lost a recent poll that day yeah?

It's true he scored badly on both a Fishtank and Twitter poll that day. Sylvia DID actually score worse on the Twitter one, but they jacked it up by placing options across two separate polls. Timing of the poll was also sus, pitched during a peak forced non-Jontent moment. I don't think the staff is actually impartial to whom leaves. Literally more people were viewing Jon's livestream yesterday than Fishtank itself, they wouldn't let that viewership go without a fight.

• So then Jon asked to leave on his own?

This is mostly what I think. During one of the many off-camera chats he got I'm sure he expressed doubt in staying. Had some meltdown moments where he was clearly stressed and barricaded himself away with ear plugs. I don't think he verbatim said he wanted to tap out. But think he expressed the want clearly enough without being able to directly pull the plug himself. So they gave him a proper farewell instead which was posed as a vote decision or contest loss.

So yeah will be interesting to see how the show fairs now. Views were shit since this played out, but they are decent now back at 11k. The impersonation skits today were actually well thought out, so if that same level of thought and involvement keeps up it might be saved.

Glaive's New Fishtank Power Rankings:

• Josie
• Vance
• Damiel
  
• Sylvia
• Letty

 

Most R.I.P. Moment of that day:

https://twitter.com/0xZuwu/status/1653894403025412097?s=20

 

Semi-Major Fishtank Update: The Freeloaders

In an effort to keep things amusing with new faces, production staff have introduced two new characters in the tank thus far listed as "freeloader" participants.
From my understanding, the freeloaders are not able to win the current 30k prize pot but will be able to still win challenges and earn fishbucks. They may or may not be getting some other type of compensation for their time, how long they last into the remaining 3 weeks last may add to that theory. Since both had at least some background knowledge of the existing show, their roles seem to be meant more along the lines of being agitators.

Freeloader 1: Simon

Simon is an amateur stand up comedian from Texas who's real name is Tai Nguyen. Vertically challenged, killer balding pattern, and with a heavy Vietnamese accent, Simon would have been a possible pick from the get-go with his unique image. Some of his actual comedy material itself seems decent, which has transferred over to making some solid jokes since being placed in the fishtank. He's not gotten under anyone's skin too much, instead he's been pretty well liked as a whole but with some weird off the wall comments like asking if he's permitted to wank off in the bathrooms. Very good blurring of line between what's just acting versus him being genuinely weird. Would rate him a 8/10 pick as a freeloader, however within the past day he's already slowing down a bit and has expressed that he does not intend to stay the remaining 3 weeks.

Freeloader 2: Lance

Lance is an Australian fan of the show itself who pointed out his visual likeness with Vance. Four days and a 20hr plane flight later, he's dropped into the Fishtank wearing the same clothes as Vance. They do in fact look decently similar, and Lance has done a spot on job of impersonating Vance's speech and demeanor. It's a 10/10 gag, but not sure how much else they can squeeze out of it. Lance himself really hasn't done much on his own besides copy Vance, who on his own doesn't say much of anything to begin with. There's apparently a challenge in which Vance may get replaced by Lance through simply "being a better Vance". If the audience gets to vote on it I'm betting they pick Vance by a mile. Still getting my head around flying 20 hours to sit in the Fishtank to impersonate someone who says two dozen sentences a day. I guess props for the dedication, don't see him lasting long.

 

Significant Fishtank Update:

A LOT has happened this past week with both new Fishtank entrances and exits. Still planning on keeping these updates going even if it's only for my own blogging's sake.

Damiel Leaves:

Damiel has officially been flushed from the tank earlier this week which brings our standings down to a final four. His departure came as a result of his own choice rather than a voting or production staff choice. And unlike many other contestant exits, I think this one holds water as far as being "what we're told is actually the true reasoning". I'm still on board with the general consensus that he was indeed a "plant" as far as being the contestant clearly aware of the show's content and intentions prior to filming and not in the running for the full 30k prize. He obviously had some contact with Jet beforehand if not being actual friends, so my current guess is he was added as an agitator akin to what many of the current "Freeloader" cast are supposed to being doing. That being said I think Damiel likely had some legitimate reason to go back home and did a solid job keeping the tank spicy during his time there. Not likeable as a person throughout his whole run whatsoever in my mind, but his interactions between the time Jon left and now help bridge at least some of the content void.

Freeloader Changes:

Simon has officially left. I was convinced at first that he hadn't bought the gaslighting plot to convince Simon that he had been cancelled by the various fake news articles and Tweets that Sam showed him about being booted from his local comedy club community. He seemed rightfully skeptical. But then his moping and whining over the next few days seemed genuine so I felt like he took the bait after all. DESPITE that, Simon stuck around for quite a few days afterwards and perked up at least a little. So gotta give him props for that to stick it out on the show for being one of the few there that seemed like they actually had some decent life back home to value over sitting in a hell house for a few bucks won through Fishbuck prizes. Overall was a great sport.

Likewise Lance has also left, which was followed by a short lived return for a day, and then left again. We were told he was leaving to help work on the production of World Peace 2 alongside Sam but it was obvious Lance had other reasons he needed to leave. On his Twitter account he mentioned that this was indeed his first time in America. So I'm betting he didn't want his first visit from Auzland to end up as just a house squatting chore, toured around a bit, made a quick stop back, and went back home to presumably his job as one of the few visitors with consistent work alongside Simon.

New Freeloader Ella:

This will be a quick entry. New freeloader Ella now holds the title for shortest lived Fishtank appearance. After being initially added as what was pitched as being a Josie clone, she dropped the act mere hours after joining. Most content she added ended up being the target of easy androgynous jokes with her almost Kurt Cobain like appearance. Glad she dipped, was made as he own choice.

New Freeloader AirsoftFatty:

Probably my favorite of the new freeloader. Never heard of him before to be truthful, but he's got a near lolcow presence online with a decently sized following on YouTube. His size is unmatched even compared to Sylvia which has made for some amusing moments as he hoards mattresses and couch parts closer and closer to the kitchen. I found him surprisingly personable and likeable as he came in hotter than anyone else on his first day with decent roasts against the Fishtank cast. There are times where he talks WAY too much, which from what I've read up on is typically AirsoftFatty behavior as he likes to insert himself as an expert on basically everything then talk your ear off. Which also makes him a good freeloader for annoying the shit out of people. He's told some pretty sad stories to the camera about losing his cat recently and being unable to afford his meds since joining which did make me feel for him a bit after learning he's not really a bad dude. Hoping he ends up winning a decent amount of challenges on Fishtank to help with that.

New Freeloader Frank Hassle:

The one and only Frank Hassle joined the tank 3 days ago after the audience successfully filled the "Hassle Meter". As expected, most of his antics involved physically inconveniencing the contents by breaking their stuff and overall just making a mess. It's a big low-brow on the funny scale but it's what he does and what people wanted. Left a few shits in random places, smashed some vapes, pissed on some things, decapitated some of Josie's plushies, some real hassling. Nothing too creative but I'll take it for the shock value. His best bit was having genuine conversations with both Josie and AirsoftFatty. Did not expect Frank to ever open up about honest sincere stuff like that. Especially with comforting AirsoftFatty regarding his trolling issues and money problems. Stand up guy during that. BUT Frank has already left. I'm assuming this was predetermined and he might come back randomly.


Glaive's New Fishtank Power Rankings:

• Josie
• Vance
• Sylvia
• Letty

 

I find it hard to care about the remaining fish honestly, After Simon and Damial left Letty is the only entertaining one and her bit has long past gone stale.

 

Somewhat agree. I might have not necessarily liked Damiel as a person, but I liked him decent enough as a contestant. And while I HATE Letty and don’t want her to win, she’s at least adding the most conflict to the show currently and want her to stick around long enough for that reason alone.

AirsoftFatty isn’t a full contestant but he’s also adding a bit of content. Betting staff will continue to bring in additional Freeloaders like him to keep things interesting up until the last week. Because you’re right, Fish by themselves aren’t doing enough usually.
Probably why there’s also this celebrity guest visiting tomorrow, as staff realized they need to just keep tossing more bodies in there as a whole to keep pace from totally dying.

 

It sucks that the most entertaining fish like Simmons and Jon were also weird, creepy douchebags. It wouldn't be fair to expect the other fish to have to deal with their bullshit for weeks after they were already hated but the show is also a lot less fun without them.

 

Simmons and Jon were well selected from the pool of applicants. Think the design of the show itself being a full 6-week commitment for a lower prize pot naturally attracted some real characters on it's own. Almost all of them are jobless or gig-workers. One close exception would be Jon, but even he vastly overstated his work involvement, as I know his mum and brother handle parts of his business. Like his mom for sure does all the written content on the site (she left her name in a few places), hence the proper spelling and grammar lol.

Anywho I think potential payout value for those 6 grueling weeks is inversely correlated with amusement/quality of contestants that apply. Like you've got to be unhinged, sporadic, poor, and have little to no real life commitments to consider going in the Tank. Those folks of course make for the best viewing! It's got an almost lolcow-esche following in that sense.

Pretty off-course from what you were saying, but yeah I hope they keep the prize money lowish still if there's a Season 2 for this reason. I sent this idea over to Lance for him to cover in some sort of post-Fishtank video recap he's planning on his YouTube.