Hey everyone, welcome to another edition of Homeroom Announcements, my Friday podcast type video where I give thoughts and updates about the Skooled Zone channel.

This going to be just a quick update video letting you know that I completed the input submission forms on the Skooled Zone website. By the way, if you want to know more about the Skooled Zone website, check out a video I did about that several weeks ago. I'll put a link in the description and in the iCard top right.

But this video is to let you know about a specific section of the website on the Contact page. If you go to the Contact page, you'll see a series of links on the right. Under each of the headings there is a place where you can shoot me an email on some specific topic.

If you're an advertiser, there's a form for sponsorships. If you're an MCN, there's a form for that, etc., etc. But mainly, near the top, is a section for everyday viewers to reach out to me with suggestions and feedback. And that is what I wanted to emphasize in today's video.

This channel is doing very well for having only been up a few months. But it's still got much growing to do. Learning and evolving. And the best way for me to get better is to hear back from you guys what you like and don't like about channel. You know, your suggestions for improvement.

I'm very good at taking constructive criticism. Not all content creators are. Some people can be pretty thin-skinned on YouTube. But here's the way I view criticism... If someone is going to take the time out of their day to tell you what you're doing wrong, you should listen. It may not always be practical to implement but, in a roundabout way, they are showing they care.

Now of course, some people are terrible communicators and their version of caring, quote-unquote, comes off as mean or douchey. But you gotta hand it to them for taking the time to offer you their critique. I mean, there are plenty of other things they could be doing with their day than spending it trying to get you to improve. And there are always lessons to be learned in life and a person who closes themselves off to feedback will never learn and grow.

To be clear, though, there's a monumental difference between constructive criticism and cyberbullying. I'm adamantly against cyberbullying. Constructive criticism is constructive, cyberbullying is destructive. They're night and day. There's no nuance about that.

Commenters should know the difference when writing a post or an email and YouTubers should learn to tell the difference. There are some highly valuable gems that can be gleaned from constructive criticism.

I'll give you an example. When I first started my channel, I was still very much learning about audio editing. Things like dynamic range, normalization vs. compression, clipping vs. peaking, proper decibel readings, background noise reduction, frequency, amplitude, even ways to improve my vocal clarity were all very foreign to me. It was almost like learning a new language. And so I used the Dishonored series as my proving ground. And if you go back and listen to my early episodes, well they're a little embarrassing. But you'll hear a huge improvement in my audio quality from those early episode to the later episodes. The learning curve was swift.

However, I wouldn't have been prompted to make improvements so quickly if I hadn't received a rather vigorous comment within the first week of my videos going up. I say that euphemistically because the comment contained some profanity. Definitely wasn't the nicest way to get a point across. It never made it past the YouTube flagging system but sometimes YouTubers can still see comments that aren't seen publicly. There's a backroom review section of sorts.

That comment was a huge kick in the butt for me, though. I needed to get on ball with my audio, especially since I wasn't face-caming it on my channel. And I did. I learned everything I could over the next month on ways to improve my audio. I'm still not even done. There's so much more to learn actually. But I got my first validation that the research and practice paid off yesterday when I got a private email that my voice over work was fantastic. That was his exact quote. Someone I'm going to be collabing with in November actually. So that was pleasant surprise.

And by the way, even if you're not a YouTuber, the concept of being open to constructive criticism is something that applies to all facets of life. We don't seem to question constructive criticism from like athletic coaches, military drill sergeants, college professors, martial arts teachers, for example. In fact, we sort of expect it from them and even yearn for it. But we seem to dismiss it from people in other walks of life. So I say open your mind and learn to listen. That's some useful advice yo!

Now to bring it all home, I encourage all of you to go to the Contact page on the Skooled Zone website. That's www.SkooledZone.com or you can just simply type Skooled.Zone, and click over to the Contact page then on the General Feedback tab. Pick which area you'd like to leave me some feedback, whether it be Comments, Game Suggestions, Questions to answer for my FAQ page, etc.

As long as it's a friendly and constructive comment, in all likelihood you'll get a reply from me. And I'll definitely learn from and try to implement all of your suggestions. So thanks in advance for helping me to shape and evolve this channel to your liking. I love gaming, I love educating, and I love making videos. The Skooled Zone is for you guys! And on that note, have a good weekend and I'll see you on Monday with another gaming episode.

LPK

Love, Peace, Knowledge.