niki
Maddie
Liv
Belladina
Alex's Wife
Mariya
Natalie
Predz88
FullNelsonGaming Audio
There has been considerable dialogue surrounding Girls Play (GP) and the people that have been involved with it over the last year now. There have been accusations and questions raised regarding a variety of things including lawsuits, friendships, and how people are treated in GP. We have received death threats, hate posts, and cyberbullying regarding these subjects and others.
All of us at GP have tried our best to not get dragged into arguments. We have actively tried to keep the peace by not going on our various social media accounts and making claims that could not be backed up by evidence. We have seen, however, few needed any evidence to target those at GP as a monster or a villain.
If anyone at GP decided to express themselves, they were called liars and manipulators. They would be bullied until they left social media or no longer felt the need to respond to tweets. We were suppressed into no longer speaking out on any of the topics in question. Most would agree GP has changed in more ways than just its members. However, not many know all the details that led to all these changes or a thorough history of the channel from its birth. This is that story.
In 2012, a group of people worked together at Target in Oregon. Sydney, Rashae, Mariya, Stacy, Ceccelia, Amber, Kelli, and Alex. They were all friendly coworkers or knew each other through others that worked there. Sydney and Alex had known each other the longest, at that time, 5 years.
Alex had an idea of a cross between Fine Bros React Channel and a Gaming Channel. Except that it would be all women, a class under-represented in the genre. For a couple months, Alex discussed his ideas with his friends as named above. They were also intrigued by the idea. Alex began researching how to get started.
After a few months of purchasing equipment and building a PC, we were ready to test everything. Because we had no money we used a spare bedroom in Alex’s home to film in and mobile construction lights to help with proper lighting. We set a day for a couple girls to come and film the first video. Shortly before the start date, Rashae informed us that she would be unable to film due to some things going on in her life at that time. Her sister, Renae, began working at Target with us and offered to take her place. We agreed.
Everyone was invited to Alex’s home to film the first video. This first video took a few days of shoots to get everyone’s footage. During the shoot times Alex’s wife would cook and serve everyone while they were there and offered to get each girls’ drink of choice stocked in the house. Each time the girls got there Alex would have it setup for the shoot. If you look back you can tell, we still had a lot to figure out. But on that day in Feb of 2013 we began a project that would grow into something none of us could have predicted.
Alex hired an editor that he knew personally. After 3 weeks with all the footage and only ¼ finished Alex took back the footage and spent his evenings after work at Target to learn how to edit. It took 6 weeks before Cat Mario was uploaded and posted. Alex spent 6 days alone adding subtitles. He would go to work at Target at 5am, come home and edit until sleep, and repeat.
Alex’s vision was a family friendly channel which is also why it was censored. He wanted a place that wasn’t full of adult content.
GP had to be organized so we could reach goals and try to make an impression on YouTube that might help the channel grow. But since everyone worked full-time it was a challenge. So, Alex helped organize a schedule. Each girl would come once a month and shoot 2-4 videos. Then they would be done and not worry about it till next month. Alex would set up each shoot and help the girls to learn ways to express themselves while gaming. He also spent time helping the girls work on their gaming skill.
Things continued this way for a few months. At that time Amber and Stacy expressed the need to move on to other things in life. Kelli and Ceccelia also stopped being able to participate in GP. Each one had their own personal life reasons for leaving. At this time Rashae was now able to spend some time in GP. Sydney, Mariya, and Renae were all that remained of the original group. Renae and Rashae suggested a girl they knew named Andrea. We really wanted to continue to grow and make this a group channel, so we invited her to a shoot. However, Drea didn’t have a driver’s license and couldn't drive. Alex volunteered to drive 45 min round trip to pick her up and drop her off for shoots. Others would also assist in picking her up and bringing to shoots. The first impression of Drea was off-putting for some of us. When she arrived for her first shoot her behavior and wardrobe was shocking. After some time and adjustments, we welcomed her and her unique personality into the channel.
After Drea was in GP a little while she wanted to bring in her best friend Kenzie. Drea and Kenzie had a very different personality compared to the girls currently in GP. We began to see that it was important that everyone be themselves and not feel censored. The channel wanted to showcase the differences in personality between the girls which made it so unique and special. Since the channel is a place where the girls can be themselves, we chose to no longer censor the videos. This was the first big shift in GP content.
We began increasing our output toward the end of the 2013-year which meant more shoot days and more videos to edit during the month. Now each girl was scheduled 1-2 days a month to shoot anywhere from 4-8 videos and a video was edited every 2-4 days. This schedule was very difficult since many had school and jobs.
We received our first paycheck after nearly a year on YouTube, one hundred dollars. At this point the channel had accrued a year of debt and no one had received any money, including the editor. Alex, who believed enthusiastically about the channel’s potential as something that could grow, attempted to organize all the heavy workload around his own schedule and to do as much as he could himself so as not take advantage of anyone since there was no money being earned at this time.
We had nearly reached a full year of GP. At some point, Rashae and Drea got into an argument and Rashae quit GP. Rashae expressed to us that she did not agree with Drea’s mature behavior and wardrobe on the channel and no longer wanted to be involved in a channel that did not censor Drea. It caused a stir in GP at the time.
After Rashae had left GP, Drea suggested her friend Molly to fill in. About this time, GP got some traction from the FNAF game released that year. We also decided to start a long play game, Alien: Isolation, as a montage (that GP was becoming known for) to see if it would be received well. The shooting for that was a nightmare because each girl had to shoot every chapter separately and we would spend days shooting a single episode. Then it would take days to edit it into a video.
We began making about $100 a month after the FNAF series helped GP gain a larger audience. Alex and Renae would even text each other throughout the day every time subs would go up by 1. The group even started to get excited about numbers finally changing quicker than we had ever seen before. It was amazing that after a year and a half people were finally finding GP.
It became clear we needed to change shoot locations. It was too much having people in and out constantly throughout the week and we needed a separate space to work production. To reduce the workload on Alex, the girls would need to learn how to host their own shoots and setup for filming games.
We discussed moving it to Sydney's house, over an hour away from most girls, but Kenzie offered her garage for us to use, with private side access, allowing anyone from the team with a key to come in and out without the need to have anyone home. Alex built a shoot box inside a portion of the garage with our setup and put in an AC to help keep us cool in the summer. We also put in a small sitting area and a small mini fridge with drinks. We also built a new PC and upgraded our recording equipment and microphone.
While building the new shoot box and getting it set up, we found out Renae was leaving GP. We all texted her trying to find out what was wrong, and she told us that her anxiety made doing GP too difficult and that she wanted to go to nursing school anyway. We tried to get her to come do a goodbye video, but she refused and she told us it was all just too much for her and she wanted to focus on herself and have nothing to do with GP. Sydney and Mariya did an announcement video for the channel instead of Renae.
There was certainly a sadness when she left. We always thought she would be one of the girls to run GP one day. And it was an odd exit, rather abrupt, but we had no choice but to move forward. After some time, Kenzie asked her friend Mariah to come and help in GP. To make it simpler, since there would be 2 named Mariah/Mariya, we nicknamed her Mars.
We had so many issues getting the new shoot box to work and perfecting the equipment setup. We had a big learning curve too, since until now, Alex made sure it was all set before and after each shoot. It was a long road for sure. That year we also heard about Twitch and, though it would prove to be a huge learning curve, decided to try live streaming. Before this, a girl could get all their videos done in a single day. Adding streams would increase work load for everyone but we were excited to try it.
At first, we only streamed a couple times a month. We only had the one computer and a singular location to get all the YouTube videos shot as well as using the same space when we wanted to stream. So, we had to diligently stay organized in order to do both with no overlap and still meet our deadlines.
Just starting out on Twitch we had no ability to gain subscriptions or emotes. Twitch’s version of currency, Bits, didn't exist yet either. We received a few donations in the beginning that showed the potential for income for the channel by streaming. We also found that our viewers loved being able to interact with us live rather than just seeing us on our recorded videos.
Money earned at this point was put back into GP in order to keep upgrading or for new equipment but for the first time it was also enough to share with the girls. This was a new concept though, as we had not ever had money to give to payroll for time spent working in GP. So we all discussed what should be done with the money and made verbal agreements on how the money made should be used. We also discussed the debt GP has accrued in its two and a half years thus far.
GP became a partner on Twitch. We were now able to offer subscriptions and emotes to our followers. We were beginning to realize the need to expand our stream channel and make sure it was the best it could be for the loyal fans. To do that we needed to invest more time and energy into being live. This would require finding a better balance of time spent between shoots, streams.
At this point, the fact that we were in the garage, at Kenzie’s, was beginning to give us some problems. Kenzie’s roommates and boyfriend were not happy with the noise or the fact that the girls would come in to the bathroom during a shoot or stream. It was presented to Alex that if he paid some rent to the household and contributed to costs incurred for using the garage it would be better. On the other side of the discussion, the girls that would go and shoot were a bit uncomfortable with the whole situation and wouldn’t use the bathroom while they were there. They would also try hard to be much quieter during filming. This situation was starting to cause stress and affect the level of enthusiasm both to film and stream.
Therefore, we knew it was important to figure out a new location from which to operate GP. We began looking for a place. We knew a residential home would have too many challenges with noise and constantly having people in and out. Not to mention that girls coming and going could be doing so at very late hours in order to find time for shoots and streams. Instead we investigated commercial locations we could rent. Many questions filled our minds as we debated our next steps. One of the scariest questions being, did we want to sign a lease, and could we guarantee the ability to fulfill that obligation in the future? We were very unsure of GP’s future and if we could keep up with rent and other costs.
About the same time Maddie came on to GP for the Halloween makeup special. Everyone just loved her. We wanted to have her visit the channel again in the future even just as a guest. She said her focus was going to be Makeup Effects school out-of-state and wouldn’t be able to help GP long-term. We told her she was welcome to join us anytime she wanted to until she was no longer able. Maddie was the first person that the group unanimously agreed to invite into GP.
During this time, Molly was in a relationship with someone. He had young children from a previous relationship. As Molly warmed up to his children, she began seeing herself as a mom. As she started to see herself more in this role she began to question the graphic content from some of the girls in GP. She did not want to be involved in something she would not be able to show those children without concern for the content. She also made other changes in her own personal life in order to be a part of that family. Because of these things, Molly decided to leave GP.
Molly and Alex worked on how best to say goodbye and she did an emotional stream and video to say how much she loved GP and its community and to say goodbye. Another very sad day in GP.
Sydney, Mariya, and Alex tore down the box and equipment in Kenzie’s garage. We patched and repainted the walls that had been altered by the shoot box. The box was destroyed but the equipment went into storage until we could find a place to rent. That was a huge challenge to undertake. We contacted several places that were on the lower end of the price spectrum. Most of the places we found were shared spaces and with how much noise GP can make while filming or streaming, no place was interested in letting us rent.
Finally, we found a basement space underneath a lawyer’s office. They seemed to be ok with GP as long as we wouldn’t use the space before 5pm and disturb the lawyers or other daytime offices upstairs. Though it was a sacrifice, we felt we could at least make it work since most of us had classes or worked during the day anyway. We began working on paperwork, deposit, and keys. Once everything was just days from being finalized, we found out that after some of the offices were said to be closed one office above us hosted kids of families that needed rehabilitation. Alex and Sydney discovered this one night when visiting the space to plan out the studio setup and test sound. We knew that GP could be loud when the girls were filming or streaming. The fact that there would be children above the studio and some of the girls use graphic language made us rethink our decision to rent that space.
For that reason, we quickly began working on a new plan. Looking for a new place was necessary, but finding one was proving to be a huge challenge. Then one day we got referred to a lady that knew of an office space that might work really well for what we needed. Again in a basement, but had a lot more privacy and the ability to build a box to shoot in and sound proof with plenty of room.
With this new location we started to rebuild again. Alex was the only person able to get approved for the lease rent. We also needed a 1 million-dollar liability policy in order to sign the lease for this space, which Alex had to procure under his business. He was worried that his business was now on the hook for a commercial lease and insurance for a year. In addition, we needed to order business internet that required a 2-year contract with no early termination because it was the only internet given to a business space. All of this had to be done in Alex’s name because no one else had the credit or income history in order to have a space like this. The new shoot box needed to be built and installed. At this point it was the end of 2015 and GP had made about $5,000 from streaming and YouTube and was still holding a large amount of debt accrued over the last 3 years. At this time, money was only paid to the girls and to GP debt, none had been paid to Alex for his contributions in editing time, building or business management. He, again, spent a few construction days to build a box and install all the soundproofing. Furniture and equipment were brought in and setup. He even later set up AC and sealed the windows in order to counteract the heat in the summer. We were ready to begin using the new studio.
Kenzie wanted to bring her roommate’s girlfriend into the channel more. Her name was Stephanie. Kenzie felt she would be perfect since she loved games and had recently moved to Oregon and could use some friends. Stephanie said how much she was overwhelmed by the community and the people in GP accepting her for who she was. We spent the next few months teaching her how the GP setup worked, how to shoot videos, use the equipment, and so on.
Stephanie began getting paid almost immediately due to the fact that GP was beginning to make some money from streaming. This frustrated Kenzie and Drea because they spent months and months doing work with no money involved and now we were so quick to pay Stephanie for her work at GP. However, with all the hours she was investing, it was the right and fair thing to do.
It was important that Drea be able to drive so Alex took her out to let her practice driving his car. He also helped her get a driver’s license and setup a personal bank account, even co-signing since her credit history was very bad. Once Drea got her driver’s license Alex helped her shop for a used car. He took her to dealerships and helped her find a good car. Later, she gives up that used car that she purchased and Alex helped her buy another one, loaning her the money to get the car. After working together and spending so much time together over the years, Alex cared for Drea like a sister and would always be there for her and help her in any way she needed.
Around this time Stephanie and Kenzie began getting frustrated with Drea's wardrobe and behavior. They felt it was misrepresenting GP to the community trying to build. We met and discussed what everyone felt and how to properly balance being yourself, while not turning streams into what is commonly known as a “booby streamer” channel. This started some internal turmoil between girls as they had very different opinions on what was appropriate during a stream. In addition, some felt restricted by the balance and like they couldn’t just be themselves.
Stephanie also became frustrated with the gaming skill of some of the girls on the channel. She began to resent the fact that we represented ourselves as a gaming channel yet were not practiced gamers. Stephanie and Alex discussed at length that being proficient in gaming is not an overnight process. The same thing that makes GP special is also its challenge. The girls were basic gamers but that also made it unique to watch because it was not just about skill it was about the interaction with the game and the personality. Alex tried to convey that improving on any skill will take time.
Alex wanted to surprise the girls for their 3-year anniversary on YouTube so he reached out to Steven Chung, a member of the GP community both on Twitch and YouTube, to help build a surprise react video for the girls. They made a list of people that he would reach out to and request footage from. Alex told Steven that he wanted to remain behind the scenes. So, to the public we would have Steven named as the person that orchestrated, organized and edited the entire thing. Steven understood and helped work on the video. It turned out awesome, and credit was given to Steven. Though the idea and final edit was done by Alex.
We also heard that Steven was interested in editing some highlights of streams, so Alex reached out to him again and asked if he would like to edit some. We already had a lot of footage to edit for regular videos, but we could use the help to edit streams to share on YouTube. He was very excited. Steven was also a moderator on the GP Twitch channel. Steven edited a few of these videos, with freedom to put his own spin on them, and Alex had them posted to GP with credit given to Steven. Over the next few weeks Steven got more and more aggressive with his ideas and began pushing himself into an authority role in GP, in some cases speaking for GP and the girls.
Alex and Sydney discussed the issues and it reached critical mass when we addressed it with him and he lashed out and berated Sydney. It was then decided that because of Steven’s behavior toward Sydney and unwillingness to adjust for the needs of the girls, as well as not speaking for the channel, we told him we would no longer use his videos and that we were un-modding him from the Twitch channel. For a while, Steven behaved childishly about the whole thing but no one in GP ever said anything about it to anyone. We agreed to let Steven make any statement as to why he would be un-modded. We didn’t publicly air out the issue to further embarrass him. And in time, Steven began coming around again and enjoying GP and the community.
GP began streaming more frequently and the community on the Twitch side began to grow steadily. GP got donations totaling in the thousands of dollars, it was insane. We couldn't understand it. Two things had to be addressed now. 1) How should finances be shared now that there is a more regular income through donations and 2) How do we properly protect what GP has built and the girls’ interest therein.
This was one of the hardest decisions the channel has ever made. We got everyone together and discussed the need to come up with something everyone could agree on. We talked about expenses, GP debt, income, and how money could be divided fairly. Two ideas for payroll were discussed, an hourly compensation and a percentage compensation. Obviously, a set hourly amount could get tricky since we cannot guarantee GP will make a certain amount of money any given month. After looking at it from many angles we concluded that it would be best for the team if we looked at payroll as a percentage every month.
In addition, the focus of the channel could become “getting money” instead of building a community and a channel to share. This was the logical answer for GP to grow a channel that was united as a group and not as individuals. We would all work hard and share the total income from GP. Of course, other things had to be considered. If a girl was involved in channel activities for 4 days at GP and another one did 20 days, they should obviously receive different amounts. That was where we decided that it would be divided based on amount of work done. This would promote an attitude of hard work toward a common group goal yet being rewarded more work.
The other thing we needed to determine, how do we protect GP from being used by someone and abandoned or just tossed aside. Some of those in GP spent years sacrificing time and opportunities to help get GP to what it was becoming. It is no easy feat to grow a YouTube or Twitch channel. GP had no special connections or gimmicks. It was merely hard work and sacrifice to keep pushing it forward. The GP community is a special group of people that was deeply loved by the girls in GP.
We needed to make sure that what GP had built, and the girls’ interests were protected from abuse. But how? It was decided that if someone wanted to be more than just a guest, to be a full member of GP and to receive a full percentage of the total income GP makes, they would need to agree that they would not leave the channel and compete in the same spaces that GP exists for a period of time. This would discourage someone from joining the channel and building up popularity in a short time with the channel's platform size, and then leaving and causing some sort of conflict or drama to cause rifts in the community already established within GP. So, we made contracts and they were discussed thoroughly by all. In addition to these we all signed a NDA’s (Non-Disclosure Agreement) release to protect the more sensitive information in GP and permissions forms to grant GP use of any footage and photos of a person obtained while working on GP projects.
Towards the end of the year Mars brought her friend Liv to guest on GP. Around the same time Stephanie, Drea, and Kenzie were arguing off and on. AFK's were nearly impossible for a long while because there was always someone who didn't want to be around someone else. Some girls began to only want to stream alone or with their preferred friend. We tried getting everyone together in the hopes that time outside of the work environment of GP would help the girls to bond again as friends. Alex tried to help them see the good in the others and to be flexible and kind to each other. But as the year came to a close, Stephanie said she was going to leave GP. Stephanie was becoming very unhappy being in GP, she found it frustrating to be on a gaming channel full of people who don't game on a regular basis, with the games GP would play for YouTube, and with some of the girls.
Stephanie and Alex were friends and she met with him to tell him she was going to leave and that she would be streaming on her own channel. She said it isn’t fair for GP to not promote those who spent time on the channel. Alex agreed he would not pursue any legal action against her breaking her contract. Stephanie knew there would be fallout. In a small way, she would be using the GP community to launch her own channel. There were some strong emotions in GP because this was the first time anyone had truly left but would stay within the same industry, even community. During one particular stream Alex called Drea to make sure she didn’t panic about what people were saying in chat about Stephanie and to make sure she take a moment to thank the GP community for their support of GP and how much we care about them. Drea and Renae began expressing strong feelings toward the situation. Though very hard to control raw emotions, Alex tried to get everyone to keep it off the channels and social media with the drama. Even Steven complained to Alex that he was asked to take down his video talking about the situation. There was another channel on YT that had made a video that we spent months reaching out to request it be removed. The most challenging people to get to leave it alone were Renae and Drea. They were the most upset about Stephanie using the channel and then leaving and breaking her agreement. Alex told them to stop dragging their feelings out on social media and to leave Stephanie alone.
By this time Steven and the channel had settled many of the issues from the past and he had been re-modded on Twitch. Though Drea was vocally against us having Steven work as editor, Alex saw a talent in Steven and felt that he would enjoy working behind the scenes on GP and wanted to extend to him the chance to do so.
Alex reached out to Steven to present him with the idea of working in GP with everyone as an editor for some videos on the GP YouTube channel. He was excited and on-board. He signed an NDA agreement at this time since he would be working closely with GP behind the scenes. Alex and Steven also worked out a contract for compensation for his work. He would get paid $75 per video edited. Every so often his compensation agreement could be considered for increase. He didn't have to complete a video, just get it close so it could be tweaked and adjusted. Since he didn't have a computer, Alex offered to build him one, ship it to him, and get him a nice setup to use in order to be able to have proper equipment to edit with. The agreement would be to edit 15 videos to pay off the computer and equipment.
After Steven had edited 7 or 8 videos we wanted to show him how much we appreciated him. We offered to fly him out to Oregon, put him up in a hotel, rent him a car, and meet all of us. While here he would spend some time with us and work on projects with Alex. Sydney worked with Mariya to purchase air-fare and a hotel and started planning the trip. At the same time Steven asked if he could stream with the girls while he was in Oregon. Everyone discussed this idea at the group meeting that month and decided we didn’t feel comfortable having Steven stream with us. We expressed this to him and he was quite upset.
The same week Mars tells us she needs to leave GP to focus on her family and career. She loved everyone and would honor all the contracts they made together. That information was not ready to be public. Mars wanted to wait to let everyone know once the schedule was finished. This would be the same time Steven was supposed to be out in Oregon. Since Mars leaving wasn’t something we were sharing, we told Steven some stuff was going on with Kenzie’s birthday and we needed to just postpone his visit a little bit because the timing wasn’t right. We also expressed at this time that we still wanted him to visit and would make the arrangements to move all his travel plans since we were the ones to book them on his behalf. It was at this time that things with Steven got very out of control.
Steven texts Alex to Skype him and that it was urgent. He Skypes Alex and begins by saying “You’re going to just sit there and listen to me and you’re not going to say a word!” Alex recorded the rest of the Skype call in case he needed to show the girls. After the Skype call ended Alex contacted the girls to meet and discuss what the next plan would be.
This was now the second time Steven had lashed out when a decision was made by the girls and we felt that he could not be trusted to keep a level head with the group when changes happened. Thus, we concluded that all contacts with Steven would end. At that time, he hadn’t quite finished paying off the PC and equipment we sent him. We agreed to just let it go and cut our losses which included the trip we paid for. Sydney, Maddie, and Drea met Alex at the Studio to Skype Steven to end our working relationship with him. We recorded the conversation to allow all the girls to know what happened later. The following recording is that call.
We never went public with any of that information. We didn't want any hate for Steven, we didn't want to embarrass him. We wanted to give Steven dignity, and it was not appropriate to blast the truth on social media.
It became clear that over the last year (2017-2018) some people, including Steven, have chosen to misrepresent GP and persons involved even making sure we at GP knew how he felt toward us personally. By sharing this we want to show that we did as much as we could to try to keep the peace and resolve any differences one-on-one.
During all that swirling drama with Steven, Mars says goodbye to GP to focus more on her family.
By this time YouTube was impacted badly by the advertisement revenue change and costing more money to put up content than was being made from it. When this was brought up with the girls Kenzie became very reluctant to film anything for YouTube any longer and the little she ended up filming never truly felt like she was invested into the process. She began to insist we drop YouTube since it wasn't profitable and she pushed very hard for that. Eventually, she said she wouldn't shoot anything and to take her off the list of games to shoot. Even though YouTube wasn’t doing as well financially as Twitch we felt it was our foundation and we didn’t want to give up on it, it still deserved resources.
Drea and Entoan were becoming very close during this time. As the channel grew and Drea made new friends on other channels she became more critical of the girls and the channel. She stressed that they represented her poorly to her new online friends from Entoan's world. She wanted to stream solo more and wasn't happy with the ability of the girls to take streaming more seriously. Kenzie and Drea also wanted to get rid of Maddie and Mariya because they were not doing enough to make it worth having them on the channel and on payroll. At the very least they wanted to have them be guests and not full members.
It took time to help them appreciate that not everyone can give the same amount to GP and that we all work together to help the whole. Drea was the highest paid person in GP, even though Sydney and Alex easily spent significantly more time working in GP. She was very popular and would often remind the other girls that they didn't do as much as she did and that without her GP would crumble. Often, Alex would try to mend relationships within GP to help everyone be respectable to each other. Drea’s attitude toward the other girls in the group got progressively worse throughout the year. Drea was also having issues in her home life with her family. They would steal from her and make it difficult for her to be at home. Alex actively helped her to find a place, even offering to help pay for it.
At this time Alex needed to go do a work assignment overseas for his regular job, SmartLink Solutions. For this particular job, he would be overseas for 6 weeks. This presented a challenge for Sydney (the new editor due to Steven not working out) as she now had to make sure the many, many tasks stayed organized with no real assistance from him while he was gone. Drea was worried Alex was leaving and the impact it might have on relationships between the girls in GP.
Sydney spent the next few weeks moderating and editing for the channel, along with trying to keep up with the many tasks. However, the YouTube side continued to suffer since Sydney could not convince Drea, Kenzie, and Renae to come in and spend time filming. Even still, Sydney tried to offer help to the girls in their personal lives also offering Drea help to find a new place to stay that could include Entoan moving to Oregon as well.
Alex returned from his trip and jumped back in to help Sydney get organized and caught up. A group meeting was set to discuss the upcoming weeks and make schedules with everyone. Maddie, Sydney, and Alex were working on plans and Drea came in and sat down. At that point in the meeting we had already started to lay out a new schedule and asked if she wanted to claim any days that might work best for her on the schedule. She says she can't and when we asked why she tells us that she is leaving GP. Maddie began to cry and Alex asked her what her plan was and why she was leaving. Drea said she was moving to Arizona because there was no place she could find in Oregon.
We asked if she wanted us to set her up a long-distance studio like Mariya so that she could stay on the channel even in Arizona. She said she didn’t want to travel back and forth to be in group things in Oregon and then solo in Arizona and that she wouldn't want to be in GP “half-assed like Mariya.” Alex asked if she was planning on breaking her contract, she said “probably.” Alex said she could go and Drea dropped her keys on the table and left the building. We were all struck with what was happening and felt very somber. We texted her to come back so we could understand more fully what was going on. Soon the rest of the girls arrived and Kenzie behaved shocked, though we found out much later she knew for some time before that Drea was going to leave. Renae admits that she knew but didn't feel it was her place to say something to anyone about it.
After speaking with Alex and Sydney for a while Drea says she loves GP and doesn’t want to leave out-of-the-blue but was unsure on how to act in this situation because it came with a lot of emotions. She said had no intentions of streaming in Arizona but just wanted a long vacation in the sun and to spend time with Entoan. She says she will do a goodbye stream to let everyone know and stay to do a few more GP videos before she leaves.
She also begins to open up to Alex and Sydney about how scared she is about moving and that maybe she shouldn’t at all but that she deeply cared for Entoan and really wanted a stable place to be with him. She said she hasn’t even begun to think about what she would do long-term in Arizona. She said she and Entoan agreed that she would take a year to just relax in the sun and then find a job after that. Alex and Sydney again offered to arrange for a studio to be built for her and to setup everything she needed to be able to shoot videos and stream for GP from her home. Again, she said she didn’t want to be like Mariya.
She began waffling about even going to Arizona. She cried and apologized for the way she came in and treated everyone she said she doesn’t know what to do anymore. We reminded her that we are her friends, we want to see her happy. She said she would call Entoan and discuss if the move was final or if Alex and Sydney could still help them find a place in Oregon so that she didn’t have to move so far away from her friends and family.
The next day she says she is going to move in with Entoan in Arizona. She said she will go for 3 months, on a nice extended vacation and do nothing but “lay in the sun” and then she said she will come back here and do things with GP again but not while she is in Arizona. We asked her if we can just setup a temporary studio in her home and keep her connected to GP for now, she said no. She said she had no intentions of streaming or starting a channel either.
The day of her goodbye stream came and we all said goodbye, got her gifts, hugged her, and wished her the best. Many were at the stream and saw how broken we were to lose her and hoped to see her soon.
Drea arrived in Arizona and within 14 days she starts streaming from a new studio fully setup with PC, equipment, green-screen, software, and games. We find out she is going to be streaming on her newly formed Twitch channel which she posts to her social media and begins streaming.
We were shocked. The fact that this was all accomplished while she moved states and in only 2 weeks and the fact that she never even mentioned the change of heart or her plans, hurt us. The community was surprised and we were surprised. Immediately, we reached out to her to try to figure out what was going on. She told us that she was doing this because streaming was all she knew and she needed to work. Drea stated that she didn’t want to come back to GP and that she liked having her own thing.
At the same time Alex's family had a horrible medical emergency and he needed to leave for a time and be with his family. He decided that it was time to let Sydney and Kenzie fully handle GP and leave the company in their hands. Alex would end up being gone off and on over the next 4 months trying to help his family.
We began the process of transferring all assets, financials, and accounts out of SmartLink Solutions’ name and into a DBA to be made by Sydney and Kenzie. Alex called a meeting with Kenzie and Sydney and made it clear to Kenzie that to be a good employer to all the girls, she would need to be unbiased and work together. She would need to prioritize the whole channel, not just her “friends” in the channel.
Now it was up to Kenzie and Sydney to plan payroll, discuss expenses, strategize, and budget. For a time, Kenzie would decide how much girls got paid based on participation. She prioritized herself and Cori who at the time signed up for the most stream days. During that time, Kenzie posted a now deleted message on Twitter. The message stated that an un-named person would never be anything and that their man probably wouldn’t have sex with her because of how repulsive they were. The same night she also sent the following messages to Sydney.
Something about Sydney’s actions at a PAX party caused Kenzie to show her true feelings toward Sydney and it showed that Kenzie didn’t want to work with Sydney. She seemed to want full control and to start getting rid of people in the channel she felt were not needed. She texted Alex that he was too nice and that it was time to make changes.
Alex spoke to Kenzie and said he wouldn’t allow her to demean others and to misuse GP like that and that he would be transferring it all only to Sydney. He told Kenzie that GP needed to be led with balance and respect. Kenzie seemed to be understanding of the situation, she even reached out to Sydney and apologized for her actions and respected that Sydney did not respond in anger and instead was level-headed.
Much weighed heavily on Sydney, she was learning how to run a company by herself as well as trying to do many tasks every day. Moderating and editing for the channel on top of all the organizational requirements to keep it moving forward was challenging. Alex assisted as much as he could but was gone and unable to help as much as was needed.
During the group meeting where Drea announced she would be leaving GP, Renae also said she was thinking of leaving GP along with Drea. After a discussion of why, Renae said she was exhausted with school and felt she couldn't give GP what was needed. She said she felt bad others were doing much more and that she was feeling overwhelmed trying to keep up with her own personal life and the channel. Over the previous months, Renae had rarely streamed and hadn't gotten around to shooting any videos.
We told her it wasn't necessary to try to carry a heavy load to be in GP. The team works together to accomplish what is needed. We told her she doesn’t have to leave GP because of not being able to do as much as perhaps others could. If she wants to be part of GP, we would work around her schedule like we had done for many others. Along with everyone else, they would all choose when they could come in, no one would make the schedule for them. So Renae could continue to do the same. We asked her to stay if she really wanted to, we cared about her. She agreed.
Skip ahead a few months and Renae was more and more difficult to communicate with. She was harder to get ahold of and to figure out how she was doing with everything. We attributed it to her busy school schedule and that her friend, Drea, left GP.
Renae texted Alex she was applying to OHP and asked for info from him to do that. The next time she spoke to Alex, it was that she “had no frustrations with GP”, but that she couldn’t balance the demands of school and GP. She also sent a text message to the girls that she will be leaving GP and that she doesn’t want to stream but wants to focus on school and that it was all just too much to handle at that time.
We all fully understood that she needed to leave. Many reached out to find out what was going on and to see how she would like to leave the channel. Like those that left in the past we asked if Renae wanted to do a video or goodbye stream. We asked this because in her message she expressed that she would if we asked her but we did not want to make the decision for her and wanted her to be comfortable with making that choice for herself. We also reached out to Renae to ask her permission to make a page dedicated to her in the upcoming 2017 Yearbook currently being put together, with no reply. Three days later we reached out to her to make sure she was ok. The following day she texted “yes,” but she’s been away.
We asked again about the yearbook page and if she would like to be in it. Two days later, she replied “no”. At that point we were very confused on what to do. We wanted to respect Renae’s right to choose how she left and inform the community herself about leaving the channel but could not seem to get an idea of what she wanted to do.
A few days later Renae begins tweeting out some accusations and expressing anger toward GP and in particular, Alex and Sydney. Alex reached out to her and asked what was going on to try to understand what was upsetting her. She replied in anger “you and the girls know everything.” Sydney also tried to reach out to Renae and was told that Renae had spoken to Alex and Kenzie and had no reason to talk to Sydney.
Three days later, Alex again attempted to find out what was going on and what Renae was upset about. Renae began to claim Alex sent spies after her to keep her departure a secret. We tried to reason with her that the person leaving is always the one who shares that information and that we didn’t know what she was talking about. Kenzie was irritated and annoyed and without asking anyone, logged into GP’s social media and blocked Renae. Renae began making accusations and after a few minutes of text messages she stopped replying and only began using social media to blast personal information and make accusations toward GP, Alex, and Sydney.
The hard part was watching GP getting attacked because of these claims. Even the screenshots Renae shared on Twitter showed us trying to kindly reason with her. Yet, many chose to attack GP and threaten people they didn’t even know existed two days prior.
The fallout continued. Drea and Renae joined forces in throwing accusations at GP, Alex, and Sydney. Alex and Sydney continued to try to reach out to them privately to resolve any issues they felt they had. And we got a lot of attacks. It got to the point that Renae and Drea shared personal information online about Alex. He and his wife received death threats in the mail. The other girls in GP at the time also received death threats and bullying.
YouTube, social media and Twitch were overrun with hate toward GP claiming that GP was some sort of secret underhanded organization that was manipulating people and had brainwashed the girls on the channel. Of course, nothing was ever backed by any evidence of such things. Regardless of the lack of evidence, GP was almost overnight turned into a monster.
Disgusting accusations about Alex and Sydney became daily events. People would say that Alex must drug and molest the girls at GP. Drea herself called Alex a pedophile on her twitter. The vicious attacks on Sydney were equally as sick. GP however continued to try to speak peacefully to Renae and Drea in private to figure out and address the issues they were having but they refused to speak to us.
It felt like Drea and Renae would not allow us to help resolve the issues they had. They would become irate and shout on social media regarding something like, GP “stole” her wigs. However, we never stopped trying to make sure Renae had the things she felt belonged to her. Renae also had her keys and was asked by many of us if she had things at the studio she would like back when she was leaving. Kenz also personally offered to bring Renae into the studio to collect anything she thought was hers and she could turn in her keys at that time. Those requests were refused. Eventually after many accusations on Twitter, Sydney gathered up all of Renae’s things she could find and drove it out to her home and dropped it off to her despite many attempts to work with Renae to get her own things. Drea also accused GP of stealing her games. However, those games were on the GP Steam account and not transferable. She herself stated she wouldn’t be able to take those games with her when she left due to the fact that they are on a GP shared account. We had also never heard about this issue being a problem until the Twitter accusations started, several months after she had left GP.
GP continued to be berated and took huge hits on all its platforms. GP began losing followers, subscribers, financial supporters, and so on. Support that GP used to have now left to support Drea and Renae. Renae, Drea, and others that were close to them began to make everyone believe that we at GP had mistreated and abused them while they were in the channel. These accusations were false and never backed with supporting evidence. Every time anyone from GP would try to say something in response to the accusations and settle the misunderstandings, the hate mob would attack. We couldn’t post anything about it on social media and we couldn’t even comment about it on our own YouTube channel. We became prisoners on our own channels. No matter what we would post we would get attacked over it. An example, GP posted that we should all be peaceable to one another and kind and the replies were full of hate and attacks. It got to the point that we wouldn’t even want to go on any of our social media anymore.
To try to set the record straight we decided to hold a live-stream to help answer questions. To not promote hate, we made sure our mods allowed all to express themselves with no fear of being timed out or banned. We felt all those involved deserved to be heard and addressed, she even unbanned people from chat so that they may speak. Sydney tried to explain, to the best of her ability, what had been happening and the details of all that had occurred over the last months. This stream, which was supposed to answer questions for our community and help people understand the situation caused more anger from Drea and Renae. Renae responded to some questions until Sydney asked her what she wanted from us and Renae never responded and left chat.
Drea and Renae later streamed from Drea’s channel in order to speak for themselves about the stream Sydney had done and made more accusations and doubled down on being taken advantage of and manipulated in various ways. They claimed we made them wear specific types of clothes. There was always an open discussion about wardrobe at GP. We as a group regularly talked about what clothing we all felt was appropriate but also encouraged each other to embrace our figures and feel good about looking good for a stream. We did all of these things as friends and a group, never as a boss telling someone to dress a certain way. Kenzie even reached out to Sydney about the negative way she was being portrayed.
They claimed they were manipulated while in GP and weren’t properly paid for their work or reimbursed for expenses. At group meetings we always discussed finances and expenses to anticipate how payroll would go. None of the girls, Sydney, or Alex have ever heard of the complaint, regarding finances, prior to them making the accusation on social media. Despite having contracts that were agreed upon, GP would often exceed the required payment by 25% or more. Of course, some months were better than others due to donations received. During good months we still paid everyone accordingly while considering large expenses, such as new equipment. By balancing each month between payroll and expenses GP did its best to share any income with all girls.
It became clear to us Renae and Drea were more focused on swaying the opinion of those in the GP community to pull support from the channel and instead support Drea’s personal channel. Despite still not producing any evidence supporting the claims against GP they continued to sway public opinion. GP was hit very hard, the morale was low, and the future seemed unsure. We felt like no one would listen anymore since we weren’t screaming the loudest. We didn’t want to continue to drag the drama onto the channel, so we remained quiet on the situation.
Alex had been away for several months now. And while he was at his dad's bedside, he and his wife watched the stream from Drea and Renae. He watched as Sydney tried to answer more questions and it was obvious people didn’t care about the answers. Drea allowed her chat to attack her over and over as she tried to answer questions which was very hard to do since they had turned on slow chat and it was hard to answer rapid fire questions so slowly. After a while, she gave up trying. They made claim after claim of how horrible of a monster Sydney was, and that she was a disgusting human. Alex and his wife just sat there in shock. Alex’s wife said, “you can't leave Sydney alone in this, she is no monster. If GP falls because of lies, and Sydney is remembered only as this, that would be something terrible.” So, Alex returned home and immediately went to helping Sydney and supporting GP.
At the same time, Mariya visited Oregon and had plans to say goodbye to GP. She had withdrawn since the drama began and felt very distant from everything and everyone. She was trying to focus on her own family and school at that time and knew trying to do all of it would be impossible. This would be another blow to the girls and to the community. She came out to Oregon and Sydney and Alex discussed with her how she wanted the information to come out and if she had interest in ever coming back or staying involved at all. For now, she decided that she would fully step back and not be involved in GP. All the girls had known about the stream and that this would be a goodbye to Mariya. Everyone came except Kenzie and Cori. Kenzie said she had a test she needed to prepare for and Cori said she couldn’t come and didn’t want to talk about it.
The stream was lovely and sweet. And we gave her hugs and things to take home with her to North Carolina with the hope that she may poke her head back into GP as she is able.
Alex called a group meeting to discuss what’s going on and what everyone wants to do. At this point it all became damage control and everyone at GP was just worn out from the last several months of stress and accusations made by Drea, Renae, Rashae, and their fandom. We would need to all come together and stand united if GP was going to survive all of this. It was important how we truly felt, that we all agree on what GP is and who Sydney and Alex are. At this point just about everyone was at their breaking points. Some didn’t want to work on anything and it was getting harder to do anything for GP while trying to get through all the emotions from the situation. Mentally we all needed a break, to step away and come back fresh. GP has always run at full steam but at this point in time it was hard to even want to interact with the community in fear of any reactions or hateful messages we might receive. So, it was decided that we would take a break so that everyone could rest for a week. Giving ourselves time to rediscover our love for GP and come back full of energy and ready to give the GP community a place where there is no drama and back to the place where we have fun again. With this in mind, we filmed a video about GP's unity, supporting each other, and their desire to take a mental break from it all and come back stronger.
Two days into the break, Kenzie and Cori say they are leaving GP together and they would be making a group gaming channel. This hit hard. We couldn’t help but ask ourselves, “Why was nothing said just days earlier when we had the group meeting?” There was shock and frustration and it felt like GP was lied to yet again. We found out later that Kenzie and Cori had already been telling people in the community about their plan to do leave GP and form a new group channel, as well as asking current GP mods to come mod for them when Kenzie and Cori leave GP. Kenzie and Cori hadn’t told any of us about their intentions to leave yet. Additionally, they asked Liv to go with them to their new channel and to leave GP. It truly felt like this could be the end for GP. We couldn’t even get the truth from each other within the channel. Kenzie and Cori lied right to our faces and then used the secrecy to coerce other girls and mods to leave with them to start a new channel.
The saddest realization was that the remaining girls in GP would possibly lose their channel because of more lies and greed. Alex and Sydney, defeated and exhausted, sat down and discussed everything in great detail. That was a low day for us, to know how much we have truly done for these girls over the years, to know they continue to lie about us and this place for their own gain, and to know that it was working. We had to decide if this would be the end for GP. In just 6 months, 5 girls left the channel and 4 of them were accusing it of misconduct. The community had been split, support waned, and discouragement was prevalent.
Then the rest of the girls came in to the meeting; Maddie, Liv, Bells and Niki. Sky also came to be supportive since she has been watching what Drea, Renae, Kenzie, and Cori have been doing and saying about her sister and was not ok with it. Sky wanted to help support GP during this difficult time.
As Sydney and Alex sat there listening to the girls, even though the stress had gotten to all of us, we realized something truly magnificent: For the first time, since we could remember, all these girls actually liked each other. There was no more internal drama, they actually loved each other as people. For as long as we could remember there was always someone upset with someone else in the channel and was vying for them to be kicked out of GP and now that attitude left with the Drea and Kenzie. GP was now showing signs of being what it was always supposed to be: friends building something special together.
Sydney and Alex had the same thought, “we can’t let GP fall here.” We know what we are capable of accomplishing. We've done it before. We know how to be disciplined and to push through the difficult storms. As we all talked, it became clear that the girls in GP now believed in this place. Even Liv, who was best friends with Kenzie and Cori, refused their offer to go to their channel and leave GP despite pressure from them. We got so many supportive messages from those in the community whose lives we had changed, and we were willing to fight for them.
Now the more difficult decisions had to be made. Part of why GP was dealing with all this was because GP did not enforce the legal contacts toward Drea, Renae, Kenzie, and Cori. GP went to every reasonable effort to keep lines of communication open and to handle everything amicably. We would never blast them on social media or fan the flames of the drama.
Kenzie and Cori organize a meeting with everyone at GP to discuss how they will be leaving. They tell everyone they will be giving two weeks’ notice and will be streaming after the 2 weeks are over. We refused those terms and said they signed a contract they would now honor. They said no. Attempts were made by GP to be flexible because we truly wanted to leave on good terms despite how they revealed this information.
Kenzie and Cori had turned in notice just as you would to a business employer, so we were open to discussing their exit since they were initially trying to work within their signed contracts. After a lengthy discussion both in person and later over the phone, Cori and Kenzie agreed to not stream for 30 days. Then stream only before or after GP would stream. There were some other things discussed as well, among them, Cori and Kenzie would repay GP nearly $2,000.00 for equipment and services GP purchased for them before they left. GP offered to buy back the equipment from them, though they declined and were agreeable to paying GP – back. All of this was discussed thoroughly over the next few days.
Sydney, Kenzie, and Cori discussed many ways in which this debt could be paid. As a kindness, we extended to Kenzie and Cori 90 days to pay it back. An agreement was drawn up to clarify all details agreed upon by GP, Kenzie, and Cori. Then before their goodbye stream to the community Sydney, Kenzie, and Cori all signed the contract. Over the next few months, relationships with Cori and Kenzie became more hostile and strained. We began seeing that the intention from Kenzie and Cori was to reunite with Drea's community. That community was still hostile toward GP and some of its fans. This is part of the reason GP was not enthusiastically in support of Strikehedonia, as well as there were no stipulations in the contract that required GP to support them in that way. GP was trying to maintain the peace but the truth is that Kenzie and Cori tried to pull other girls from GP as well as take mods with them. We were not happy about any of their behavior in all of this, but we wanted to try to move on peacefully.
After the 90-day agreement was over, despite communicating with them regarding the remaining parts of the contract, they refused to pay the amount owed to GP. During further communications with them they claimed to only owe $7.27 to GP, wanting to return equipment that had been in their possession for those months. When we reminded them this was all discussed and signed in the contract, including that we gave them 3 months to reimburse the channel, they sent us an email saying to contact their lawyer.
At this moment it became clear to us that GP was viewed as soft. And would roll over whenever anyone would push or bully us into something knowing that we would try to be friendly if at all possible and try not to cause drama. If we continue to be that way, then GP will always be used for anyone’s selfish desires. That could no longer happen
After another group meeting we all discussed the developments. In addition to everything, we now saw Kenzie joining in on the dialogue that Alex is a “pervert and manipulator.” It hurt to watch them speak of the channel and its members in this way after reworking a new contract for them. Kenzie and Cori were able to exit the channel on their terms, GP would carry the debt for them so they could start their channel with that equipment and yet, we are still the monster.
GP can no longer be stepped on. It must stand up and defend itself against the lies and accusations once and for all. Since Kenzie and Cori no longer wished to communicate with us, though we tried on many occasions, the only option left was a to pursue legal action. We waited another 30 days and after no answer from Kenzie and Cori, we filed the legal paperwork.
Of course, we knew they would use social media and their channels to claim scandal because that has proven itself to work. Even as we write this statement, GP's support wanes and hate messages continue to pour in. Even though GP has said nothing on the matter and isn’t trying to cause a one-sided view of the subject.
Kenzie and Cori have contested the case, even though they signed the contract that they themselves helped make. Kenzie also made a counter claim saying GP owes wages unpaid in 2016.
We prepared our statement to the court and began filing the paperwork to send to the court, Kenzie, and Cori. However, on September the 10th we received a letter from the judge saying the court date had been moved to November 2nd stating the reason that the defendant is “out of town” on September 25th.
Before that letter, from the judge, we had no knowledge of the fact that Kenzie and Cori wanted to move the date of the court hearing. So, we went to the court house to appeal in writing the date move. We received a phone call from the court house the following week saying they will not be able to move the date back, but could move the date forward more if it was difficult for our schedules. As it turns out November 2nd is Sydney’s birthday, but she decided to cancel her plans and just focus on getting the court case over with. We now look forward to November 2nd for our court case and receiving a judgment.
Syd and Cori relationship
How was the relationship between Alex and Renae? 1 2 3 4 5
How was the relationship between Alex and Drea? 1 2 3
How was the relationship between Alex and Kenzie? 1 2 3
January 20th Group Meeting
Kenz and Cori Meet with GP
Noncompete Agreement
Non-disclosure Agreement
Employee Requirements
Contractor Agreement
Video Release
SmartLink Solutions 2016 Financials (including GP) 1 2
SmartLink Solutions 2017 Financials (including GP) 1 2
Drea 2017 1099 (First 8 months only)
Sydney 2017 1099 (Full year)
Kenzie 2017 1099 (Full year)
Cori 2017 1099 (4 months only)
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