My Internet: Kofie Yeboah
The Twitch streamer thinks Lil Nas X should be taught in colleges everywhere.
Embedded is your essential guide to what’s good on the internet, from Kate Lindsay and Nick Catucci.
Every week, we quiz a “very online” person for their essential guide to what’s good on the internet.
Today we welcome Kofie Yeboah, a variety Twitch streamer and all-around multiplatform online creative. Kofie hates that the TikTok algorithm favors clips of bad podcasts, only uses Instagram to upload Reels and look at gaming setups, and buys cool ass anime earrings on Etsy. —Nick
EMBEDDED: What’s a recent meme or other post that made you laugh?
KOFIE YEBOAH: As someone who made memes for a job/has been surrounded by them for five years it’s hard to remember the meme timeline. However, there was this recent tweet about if you would live in Gotham for $300 a month rent and the replies are some of the funniest things i’ve seen in a minute.
EMBEDDED: What types of videos do you watch on YouTube?
KOFIE YEBOAH: Bruh I could type about this for hours. I watch every thing from Xs and Os sports analysis to Video Essays of TV shows I haven’t seen. I love NakeyJakey, Cosmonaut Variety Hour, Foolish Baseball, SummoningSalt, Swagkage, NoClip, Scott the Woz, Brian David Gilbert, 24 frames of Nick, Breadsword, Hitop Films, Brett Kollman, Thinking Basketball, Oversimplified, FivePoints Vids, Bengal, GiraffeNeckMarc, Fuzzy, Nathan Zed, and Commentary Channels of Drew Gooden and Jarvis Johnson.
I also listen to a lot of music sets that doesn’t show up on streaming services like Boiler Room sets or that video of FKJ playing music in Bolivia. I also like this Youtube channel called Parked in Traffic that traces samples in music. I freaking love samples.
For Comedy I love RDCWorld1 and CalebCity, CircleToons. Ryan and Shane of Watcher are hilarious.
EMBEDDED: Do you use TikTok? What shows up on your For You page?
KOFIE YEBOAH: I got a considerable following and most of it came from me staring at cooking videos and stopping the video when I’d be too lazy to make the recipe. People don’t know that some of them are a comedic bit but that’s for them to find out in this newsletter. Also there is a considerable portion of my tiktok audience that doesn’t know that I’m a sports/gaming content creator full time. That platform rebrand will be a hilarious process.
My For You page currently consists of NBA tiktok, funny people like tonystatovci and carlomalis, clips of podcasts I’ve never seen before, this dude that works at the South Pole, some of the worst man on the street interviews i’ve ever seen. A dude that can make a harpoon, comic book analysis. My for you page is all over the place … because my interests are all over the place.
EMBEDDED: What do you use Instagram for?
KOFIE YEBOAH: Uploading my reels and looking at gaming setups and that’s it at this point. I always regard instagram as one of the social platforms I couldn’t “crack.” Before reels, my content always felt out of place there. However, I’m starting to make more vertical short form videos and having a ton of fun putting them basically everywhere.
EMBEDDED: Do you tweet? Why?
KOFIE YEBOAH: Yeah I spent years building a platform on twitter and got to 70K which is cool, but now I’m more focused on platforms like Tiktok, Twitch and Youtube so that I can get more of a following for the content I put effort into instead of the tweets that I send from the toilet.
EMBEDDED: Have you ever had a post go viral? What was that experience like?
KOFIE YEBOAH: So I’ve recently gone viral from tweeting about AAU.
And I’ve had a couple of 10,000 RT tweets. I went viral on tiktok for staring at this interesting recipe.
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The viral experience is always weird because I never really notice until hours later. I have had all social media push notifications turned off for four years now. It’s cool for a second on twitter then gets super annoying because hundreds of people who haven’t seen your page before have now seen only ONE tweet and now have an idea of who you are in their mind and that happens for every single new person so now people start arguing with themselves, and it’s just funny because I have these notifications off.
On tiktok it’s different because their notifications tab/page is a mess. Everything moves super fast and on tiktok you can’t filter your notifications to just people that you follow which is infuriating and doesn’t make sense.
People sometimes contact me to say that they saw a screenshot my tweet on facebook or reddit or something like that. It reminds me that the internet is both big and small at the same time.
EMBEDDED: Who’s the coolest person who follows you?
KOFIE YEBOAH: Everyone is my coolest follow. There are a lot of content creators that I look up to and take inspiration from and it’s cool to be able to relate and talk with them online or offline.
EMBEDDED: Who’s someone more people should follow?
KOFIE YEBOAH: Twitter: @KwaniALunis, @JasmineLWatkins , @JoeAli, @MikeDSykes, @missjourdy, @FourVerts, @megreyes_, @RJ_Writes, @harrylylesjr, @mellentuck, @mannyfidel, @JMorel_JR, @alex_kirshner, @taxastweets, @NekiasNBA, @TheBlackHokage, @secretbase, @JoshNeedelman, @lil_buts , @Seigi_VA, @meghanstheworst, @KofieWhy (I’m not slick I know), @dianejeanty, @aeis17, @erinasimon, @vikkie, @JomiAdeniran.
Twitch: Somjuu, hayleykat_, cheebs, tannerlikesstuff, headshotchick, dusttinb, senseicj, nikkijustine, mischacrossing, pikachulita, briandavidgilbert, jarvisjohnson, kimischilling, yourbudtevin, seigiva, yznsa.
EMBEDDED: Which big celebrity has your favorite internet presence, and why?
KOFIE YEBOAH: Lil Nas X. A lot of celebrities don’t understand how this social media shit really works. Lil Nas X is a mastermind when it comes to it. His “old town road” marketing campaign should be taught in colleges everywhere. I’m not kidding.
EMBEDDED: Where do you tend to get your news?
KOFIE YEBOAH: Twitter/Tiktok and Reddit.
EMBEDDED: What’s one positive trend you see in media right now? What's one negative trend?
KOFIE YEBOAH: One positive trend is that I think there is more room for niches than ever before. If you have a niche your content can be put in front of other people for you instead of you having to search far and wide and get discouraged that no one seems interested in your videos. I think there are types of content that exist where you didn’t know you were interested in it until you see it. For example, I didn’t know I was interested in a tiktok account of people playing along to video game music but then I saw it and I’m hooked.
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EMBEDDED: A negative trend?
KOFIE YEBOAH: There are too many shitty podcasts out there. I see the clips everywhere. Man, enough is enough. I hate that you have a bad podcast do well on tiktok because the algorithm rewards controversy instead of quality stuff lol. Did I just lol in a newsletter. I’m sorry. I’ll try to be better.
EMBEDDED: Do you subscribe to any Substacks or other independent newsletters? What are your favorites?
KOFIE YEBOAH: Michael Sykes’ sneaker substack and Jordan Uhl’s substack.
EMBEDDED: Are you into any podcasts right now? How and when do you usually listen?
KOFIE YEBOAH: I don’t listen to podcasts 1. Because when I’m at work, I’m audio/video editing or streaming and 2. Whenever I would have the time to listen to a podcast I would rather watch Youtube, Twitch stream, play video games or listen to music. If you’re my homie, I’ll retweet your podcast because I know that the people that follow me might be interested in that sort of thing.
Just how I don’t expect all my friends to watch all of my streams/videos/tiktoks they don’t expect me to listen to all of their podcasts. There’s so much content in the world and it’s impossible to get to all of it. I root for my buddies to succeed in this content hellscape, but I’m going to be honest about listening to your podcast. I mean do the math you have 24 friends with hour-long podcasts that all drop in the same day. That’s 24 hours of listening to a podcast. Math *drops chalk*. Class dismissed.
I will say if a podcast clip comes up on Youtube or Tiktok I’ll watch that if I’m intrigued, but I’m not sitting here putting on like an hour of audio in the background if that makes sense.
EMBEDDED: Have you ever been heavily into Snapchat? Around what age?
KOFIE YEBOAH: I was and then I graduated college. Remember when they changed the U/I that one time and everyone hated it? Yeah that was my jumping off point. I did try again when they came out with Snapchat Spotlight some time ago but they won’t accept my submissions lol.
EMBEDDED: When was the last time you browsed Pinterest? What for?
KOFIE YEBOAH: I tried it out once. It’s not for me.
EMBEDDED: Are you nostalgic for Vine or Tumblr? Why?
KOFIE YEBOAH: I used to be nostalgic for Vine, but then I realized that I only miss the good parts of vine which rarely had to do with the app. The app had an abysmal search feature, the comedy section would always promote the same 16 people and Vine comment sections were some of the worst pieces of internet ever made. Tiktok has its flaws too, but those flaws don’t make me pine for vine. I’ll watch classic vine compilations now and then. i miss my Vine likes archive but that’s about it. Also I have 210K followers on tiktok compared to like 400 on Vine lol. I’m good.
Tumblr still fascinates me. What I loved about it back then was the fact that you could upload a variety of things. I remember when it was a process to put gifs on twitter or put videos on instagram and then here was this site that was like “Put whatever ya feel on here.” I used to make random niche tumblr accounts just to study how different audiences reacted to different forms of content. Cats, Food, Sports etc.
EMBEDDED: Are you in any groups on Reddit, Slack, Discord, or Facebook? What’s the most useful or entertaining one?
KOFIE YEBOAH: I’m not in a reddit group but I’ll go on reddit every once in a while. I find that place as more of gathering information or seeing new things. I have my own discord so I spend most of my time on there.
EMBEDDED: Are you playing any games right now?
KOFIE YEBOAH: Yup! As a twitch streamer I just finished streaming this game called Stray. Also since I never played it as a kid I’m streaming Kingdom Hearts as a playthrough. I have 9 consoles and hella games to get through. Tap in!
EMBEDDED: What’s something you might want to do in the metaverse? What’s something you wouldn’t want to do?
KOFIE YEBOAH: I’d play some Yu-Gi-Oh? I’m going to be honest I have no idea what the options are.
EMBEDDED: What purpose do you see in NFTs?
KOFIE YEBOAH: I kept an open mind with crypto, NFTs is where I start falling asleep.
EMBEDDED: Do you think Web3 will mean a better internet?
KOFIE YEBOAH: Does it make my internet faster?
EMBEDDED: Do you text people voice notes? If not, how do you feel about getting them?
KOFIE YEBOAH: The only person allowed to send me voice notes are my girlfriend and my mom. Anyone else it comes off like a minipodcast, and you know how I feel about podcasts.
EMBEDDED: Do any of your group chats have a name that you’re willing to share? What’s something that recently inspired debate in the chat?
KOFIE YEBOAH: Group Chats are classified information.
EMBEDDED: What’s your go-to emoji, and what does it mean to you?
KOFIE YEBOAH: 😭 The crying emoji is so versatile. I could be sad or I could be laughing so hard that I’m crying (usually paired like 😂😭)
EMBEDDED: What’s a playlist, song, album, or style of music you’ve listened to a lot lately?
KOFIE YEBOAH: I have a 200+ song karaoke playlist
EMBEDDED: Do you pay for a music streaming service, and if so, which one? When was the last time you bought a music download or vinyl record, CD, or tape?
KOFIE YEBOAH: I bought a couple vinyls to decorate my apartment recently. One of them was the Sugar Hill Gang’s “Rappers Delight.”
EMBEDDED: If you could only keep Netflix, Disney, HBO Max, or one other streaming service, which would it be, and why?
KOFIE YEBOAH: I’m going to say Twitch honestly. I watch way more twitch streamers day in and day out in comparison to watching TV shows nowadays. I’m looking to gain inspiration and motivation on how to make my twitch streams better everyday so that’s my main streaming fix rn.
EMBEDDED: What’s your favorite non-social media app?
KOFIE YEBOAH: Drizly.
EMBEDDED: What’s the most basic internet thing that you love?
KOFIE YEBOAH: That I can find the answer to a question or learn how to do something with ease. I learn new stuff about content creation every day. There’s so much to learn and master. It’s truly fascinating. I also love that with 1 one minute vertical video I can now post it on IG reels, Facebook Reels, Tiktok, Snapchat, Twitter, Youtube Shorts and more. I remember in journalism school we were taught vertical shooting was frowned upon. That was 2014. It’s a new era.
EMBEDDED: Is there any content you want that you can’t seem to find anywhere online?
KOFIE YEBOAH: My Cincinnati Bengals winning a Super Bowl but I’ll keep looking. Last year was tough.
EMBEDDED: Do you regularly use eBay, Depop, or other shopping platforms? What’s a recent thing you’ve bought or sold?
KOFIE YEBOAH: I use Etsy to buy cool ass anime earrings. I bought these Seven Deadly Sins earrings a while ago.
EMBEDDED: Have you recently read an article, book, or social media post about the internet that you’ve found particularly insightful?
KOFIE YEBOAH: I was intrigued about all of the Marvel VFX workers that shed some light on an industry that I’m trying to learn more about. I want to get into screenwriting and TV one day and when I finally focus and hunker down on it I want to be ready.
EMBEDDED: What’s the last thing that brought you joy online?
KOFIE YEBOAH: This. But in all seriousness, this Cosmonaut Variety Hour video is a masterpiece.
Thanks Kofie! Follow him on Twitch, TikTok, YouTube, Instagram, and Twitter. 😭 😂
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