Originally Posted by
William Chain
I’ve posted about this in the past, but I have little tolerance for the sponsored schlock. Sponsors screw everything up. Social media screws everything up. Just look at what PWW and WJ have become. YouTube and Instagram are a revolving door of sponsored bobble heads. And I’m sure manufactures are simply following the tide, it is what it is with print and traditional radio/tv media now.
If you get entertainment from these folks, great. I was done with AW way back when during the episode of making a tool wall with all my shiny triton tools to hold all my shiny triton tools (or perhaps using all those Rockler doodads to make a cart to hold all my Rockler doodads). I was done with WW after he posted his diatribe on Festool after the $ pipe dried up. They are transparent traveling salesman. Would WW be doing what he’s doing without the shed full of gold painted power tools? Would AW be doing what she’s doing without all the free orange and green tools? The whole botched dovetails thing with WW was just another data point on the familiar curve.
Say what you will about Norm Abram and TNYW, and yes some of the demonstrated techniques are cringe worthy, and yes he had tv sponsors. But did he ever stop to flog the brand of table saw or jointer or whatever? Nope. You could see what they were but at no point did he make a big deal of it. That’s a classy bit that’s just gone from the modern offerings.