Lonelygirl15

luvved · Casual Observer Joined: 09 Sep 2006 Posts: 34

I'm a horror fan as much as the next person... but I don't like where cassieiswatching is going. I like the alternate plot, of course. It's like fanfiction, except with videos. It's entertaining, but I'm glad to hear it isn't official plot material.

Terryfic · Lonely Fan Joined: 06 Sep 2006 Posts: 169

I agree. I really liked the concept of cassieiswatching. The first video was great. But after that the project has had repeated problems in its excution, from constant gamejacking to inapproperiate imagary. I think the makers of this series had some good ideas and I hope them all the best with their project, but I hope they have gotten in contact with people with more experience in running an ARG and will be able to prevent any further problems.

I am also glad that the Creators have broken character and took the time to distance themselves from this project, as theirs has always been of the utmost quality and any association with this project makes them appear more amuteurish then they really are.

juliangrimm · Posted: Wed Sep 20, 2006 2:15 pm Post subject:

IMNSHO I think they are still involved and given the quality fo the videos and complexity fo the current CiW stuff it still looks like their still there.

As to the imagry; I think people need to get the knot out of their panties grab some kleenex and wipe the tears and quit bitching about it.
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jammer · Casual Observer Joined: 14 Sep 2006 Posts: 86

Julian-

I agree, both about the creators likely being involved as well as about the panties in a bunch comment.

Both Cassie AND the ridiculous hysteria about murder imagery in a horror story (!) really seem of one piece. The creators and their confederates really seem to be screaming "Don't throw me in the briar patch!"

In other words, "Oh, this Cassie story is not us and is TOO DANGEROUS! Pay no attention. By the way, here is a section on our official site to keep the Cassie story going."

And that section currently has more than 10 times the posts of any other section.

Yeah, they're not involved, and they think it's waaaay too dark.

Sure.
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twistofreality · Casual Observer Joined: 17 Sep 2006 Posts: 118

winterdreams123 · Suspiciously Absent Joined: 20 Sep 2006 Posts: 1

I was watching the last cassie video, and I accidentally hit the pause button, and the image it paused at was kind of weird. It looked like bodies on the ground, maybe it's my imagination.. but does anyone else see it? It's after the birds, and then there is two shots of bree, then right before it goes into other shots of the playground, about five seconds into it.... ?

afewthings · Suspiciously Absent Joined: 20 Sep 2006 Posts: 10

I also doubt their claim that cassieiswatching is completely separate from LG15.

even if the people behind CIW are not part of the main group working on LG15, I think they must be linked in some way, simply based on the knowledge of the locations.

Also, I take anything the LG15 people say with a grain of salt anyway, they haven't exactly got a good track record when it comes to honesty and being upfront.

I find CIW more interesting, LG is a bit too "teen-soap" for me. With that said though, the LG team definitely appears more organised in the delivery.

sparklenvy · Lonely Fan Joined: 10 Sep 2006 Posts: 135

I agree that there is probably some connection between LG and CiW.

The CiW timing was almost to perfect with the LG15 coming out as fake.

aldiboronti · Suspiciously Absent Joined: 09 Sep 2006 Posts: 1

Cassieiswatching is a fake, say the Creators.

Oh, the irony, it burns!

SippyGirl · Posted: Thu Sep 21, 2006 9:31 am Post subject:

CiW is pretty damn creepy. I have to admit that I pulled my sister into the room so that I wouldn't be alone to watch the videos.
As for the murder footage ... I think that was over the top seeing as LG seems to be an all-ages affair.
Granted, I find CiW much more complex and interesting. Still love the plot of LG, too.

The mysteries and secrets are pretty intense. lol

VanillaFlava · Casual Observer Joined: 14 Sep 2006 Posts: 32

I think Cassieiswatching was very compelling with the first video. It was just so surprising and different, and it really shone a (maybe darker) light on the story. That is cool, and I think also pretty much what the Creators want to achieve.

You could look at it from a perspective of X-Files (PG) and Millenium (almost R), which co-exist in a shared universe exploring things from different angles. You could even add all kinds of other narratives (like for example a story just about Bree's ancestors ... invent a mystery about her grandparents, for example, how they got into all things cultish, etc).

The problem I have with cassieiswatching is the execution. The last installment seemed rushed, which introduced the elements many people objected to. I suspect that might not have even been the intention, but it happened, and there seemed to be no mechanism to quality control it.

More alarmingly, there is the ARG element, which in essence is an awesome idea. But to set up a functional ARG you really need to put a lot of upfront effort in, because if we look at just how vigorously people are investigating it, they will explore avenues that you should pre-suppose.

So, cassie left a lot of gaps for people to inject their third (fourth?) party stuff. And exactly here begins the problem. Going to an official Cassie playground in the middle of the day is no problem, going to somebody's secret bat cave in the woods is not ok. But how should the audience distinguish? Especially, since we have so many people new to ARGs here. Fools rush in, you know?

If you want to allow third party (fan, or let's say Creator-affiliate) content, you still need to be able to assert some control. Why? You effectively allow the third party to speak implicitly in your own voice. And some of these voices aren't cool at all.

You need to be able to have some control over it to make sure everybody is having fun and staying safe.

I don't know what went wrong with Cassie in detail, and I am glad they might be re-assessing how to conduct their game. It's not fun for people who want to play to realise that after a day of clue dissection to learn the clue was bogus, nor is it fun, or professional to rush and make a video that offends a lot of people.

I hope we'll be seeing an element brought into the mix here, that will allow either us as audience, or the Creators to rank third party content, or better yet to establish in which relation it stands to the canon. While you could, of course, allow anything, it will start to frustrate people to suddenly have three cassies, four Bree's mom, etc. Ultimately, the audience should be able to move things into or out of the canon, or you will have created a web of stories, that everybody just will get stuck in, and not being able to make any sense out of it anymore.

So, I would say, it's not so important if something is officiall by the creators or not. What should be important whether it is of any quality.
Does it matter if Cassie is from them, if it is fun? The only criterion should be whether it is fun and has good quality, really. Don't fall into the 'it is fake trap'. The YT commentors also couldn't get over themselves with LG15 is fake! So what? It's the number #1 subscribed channel because it's cool to watch. That is the only thing that should matter in the end.

And this element of quality should be associated with the material. Either by teh audience deciding it, or by the Creators pushing a big 'approve' button.

Finally, do not overestimate the taste of this hardcore audience. Looking at video stats at YT, it seems LG15 has an audience of around 200-300.000 people. If we take this board, and Anchor Cove together, we maybe represent 10.000 unique viewers, plus or minus. We may be the hardcore, but there's so many more people out there, who haven't even heard of Cassie, etc. And the Creators need to cater to the entire audience if they want to grow. Just some perspective.
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juliangrimm · Posted: Thu Sep 21, 2006 1:43 pm Post subject:

VanillaFlava · Casual Observer Joined: 14 Sep 2006 Posts: 32

juliangrimm · Posted: Thu Sep 21, 2006 2:15 pm Post subject:

jammer · Casual Observer Joined: 14 Sep 2006 Posts: 86

It's interesting that the consistent line coming from the official sources is that Cassie did great with her first video, but things took a wrong turn with the second.

Yet, it was actually with that second video that Cassie's popularity took off like a rocket.

So clearly the popular perception of the Cassie story is very different than the official line.

Which makes me suspicious of the official line on this. Almost like this "we're shocked! shocked!" thing had to be manufactued by those behind the Cassie story because people weren't getting that the Cassie story was "DANGEROUS!" and "IN BAD TASTE!"

People were actually, you know, just digging it. They saw it as a kind of punk rock filmmaking and were more interested in following the next turn than in pausing to "tsk tsk" the whole thing.

And that may not have been enough for how the Creators wanted to position this new offshoot. After all, if your horror movie isn't being denounced as dangerous to teens, you're doing something wrong.

Perhaps they expected that Cassie defacing the Bible would result in its own controversy? But then people weren't really shocked by that? So they had to go with something else? Oh look! Manson! Terrible terrible use of Manson imagery, which nobody has ever ever done before. (We all know how dangerous Marilyn Manson is, after all, causing the Columbine slayings and everything.)

No matter what, the fact that the Moral-Majority-style posturing and condemnation started from and is still coming from the INSIDE is highly suspicious. Everyone kind of liked Cassie until we started to get bombarded with messages about how bad bad bad bad bad the filmmakers were for being so very shocking.

And now she's as popular as ever, with built-in controversy.

Nah, must be a fluke...
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