Shadiversity

Shad M. Brooks, better known online as Shadiversity (formerly I Am Shad or Shad), is an Australian YouTuber known for making videos about medieval culture and fantasy. He analyses the realism depicted in medieval fiction, especially major Hollywood movies, and deciphers if he feels that their castles, weapons, characters, and battles, among other things, are realistic to how things happened during medieval times. He is also an aspiring author who has a series of videos on creative writing. He makes vlogs either discussing certain topics in that field or, harshly critiquing writing samples that his fans have submitted into him.
==Personality & Personal life==
Shad has an outgoing and humorous personality. His videos are often described as Infotainment or Edutainment as he is not only talented at educating his audience of the subjects that he covers, but also at entertaining them with lots of humour as well. He has a wife and four children: three boys and one girl. After 12 years of work and deliberation, he decided to take the path self-publishing. He accomplished this goal on July 1, 2019, with his book, Chronicles of Everfall: Shadow of the Conqueror. Shad has a younger brother, Josiah, who is also a popular YouTuber. He runs the YouTube channel Jazza.
==Videos==
===Medieval===
===Creative Writing===
This is Shad's least frequent series, but still one of his most popular among his fans, which he started during July of 2017. As an aspiring author himself, and someone who has been writing stories for around 10 years or so, he started this series in an attempt to help those fans become better writers. The first video, How to Write a Novel, was simply an introduction to this series, going over the broad strokes on what it takes to become a writer and how difficult it can be. 
After that he made a video going through and ripping apart his first-ever manuscript, pointing out many of the novice mistakes that he made eight years before that video. This was to lead into a series of videos where he accepts submissions of writing samples from his fans. Before he did that, however, he wanted to show that he is just as harsh with his writing as he would be with theirs. In addition to those videos, he also occasionally makes videos where he talks about specific topics when it comes to creative writing.
==Youtube Decline==
On April 4, 2024, Shadiversity posted a video called "YouTube is KILLING this channel - Shadiversity is dying". Shad said that in January 2024, due to Youtube's changes in the algorithm, his video view count and new subscriptions reached a 5-year low (despite no significant decline in overall subscriber count). The profits of the Youtube channel have been in the red for months, meaning that the channel is unsustainable and has an uncertain future. He claims that the quality of his videos and the reputation of his series has not declined because other online video platforms (Rumble and Tiktok) show no viewer count decline, but Shad does say that Youtube's ad revenue had been essential in funding the series because the alternative sources of ad revenue are insufficient.https://youtu.be/z39dFnUCjRs?si=Sz5NJ8GC62GP0X81
==Books==
===Shadow of the Conqueror (Chronicles of Everfall Book 1)===
On July 1, 2019, Shad released a fantasy novel called Shadow of the Conqueror the first book in the Chronicles of Everfall series. Who better to fight back the darkness of the world than the one responsible for most of it?  Daylen, once known as the Great Bastard, the Scourge of Nations, Dayless the Conqueror, has lived in hiding since his presumed death. Burdened by age and tremendous guilt, he thinks his life is coming to an end. Unbeknownst to him he’s about to embark on a journey towards redemption where his ruthless abilities might save the world. 
Many battles await with friends to be made and a past filled with countless crimes to confront, all the while trying to keep his true identity a secret.  Indeed, it might be too much if not for the fabled power awaiting him.  Everfall is a world of perpetual day where the continents float in an endless sky. If one jumps from the continent they will fall for many hours before returning to the same place from which they fell. Skyships rule the air powered by shining sunstone and industrial darkstone. A legendary order of knights bears mystical powers which they use to hunt out the dreaded Shade, monsters that regular people turn into if trapped in darkness for the length of a fall.  It is a world of enchanted swords, merciless monsters, mystical knights and hard magic, filled with tales of wonder and adventure. 
===Shadow of the Conqueror (Potential Independent Short Film Adaptation)===
In collaboration with Shad, Production Diratia, a Montreal production company, is currently planning a short film adaptation of the book: Shadow of the Conqueror. Apparently, the producer and the author got in contact a few months ago and agreed that the book should be adopted by fans and not a big studio in order to keep the final result as close as possible to the original material. The response has been positive. The short film should be crowdfunded.
For info about the book and short film:https://www.facebook.com/Shadow-of-the-Conqueror-108651960814881/
Shad are announcing the casting for the short film on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/shadiversity/photos/rpp.1417427138566873/2286793701630208/?type=3&theater
Shad are announcing the casting for the short film on YouTube:https://www.youtube.com/post/UgxXvHUWE4lhpK_HlSl4AaABCQ?lc=UgzXCBgdlBrIQDHpGl14AaABAg.97_PF7vbDpw97hPDB8i0qC
== Controversy ==
Shad has a channel called "KNIGHTS WATCH" where he voices his personal and political opinions, many of which are seen as problematic by viewers due to being "overly conservative". This caused creators like Scholagladiatoria and Overly Sarcastic Productions to no longer collaborate with him, with Shad voicing his discontent about the former in a community post. He got heavily criticized for his reaction to the trailer of the Mario movie, which he described as "woke". Jack Saint made a video talking about numeral creators with similar reactions, including Shad, who responded with a video where he, clearly agitated, repeatedly calls Jack a liar and a "bad person", accusing Jack of misrepresenting him in his video. Jack Saint then made a one-hour-long video where he debunks Shad's points.https://youtu.be/Y4tZO4T72NI?si=BZfT_9SALFzt13ar Shad continues to defend his "outspoken" Christian conservatism and claims that controversies related to this has not been a crippling issue for his channel's success.https://youtu.be/z39dFnUCjRs?si=Sz5NJ8GC62GP0X81
==Trivia==
*Shad built a small, makeshift, medieval-style castle in his back yard for his children. He showed it off in a vlog-style video which also featured his kids, titled "Meet the Shadiversity Children and Their Castle".
*Shad is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
*He has five siblings, at least two of them were his brother, Josiah (Jazza) and Asher (Archery with Asher) who were featured in some of his videos. 
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==References==
Category:Australian YouTubers
Category:Users who joined in 2013
Category:Vlogging YouTubers
Category:Review YouTubers
Category:Book-narrating YouTubers
Category:Educational YouTubers
Category:Film YouTubers
Category:One million subscribers