It’s been two years since Paperclips disbanded, how are they doing?

Author: Stavan

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introduction

This article was written at the end of 2022.

At that time, we had just finished writing an article about the domestic media's participation in constructing COVID-19 discrimination , and we were amazed at the official discourse's appropriation and attack on science. We had some questions: For ordinary people, the absurdity in life is already unbearable, so how do science popularization workers deal with this? After raising the question, we thought of "Paperclip", a science popularization self-media that was once famous on the Chinese Internet and then completely disappeared.

One of my friends, Luo Mei, the protagonist of the article, once worked for this media. When he mentioned it during the interview, I remembered that I encouraged him to join this company. I saw him being recognized by many people for his popular science work, and then I saw them being scolded, and finally witnessed the disappearance of paper clips. Time flies, and it will be two years soon.

We interviewed several core members of Paperclip to find out what they think about this series of situations and what they are doing after the disbandment.

In fact, during the production process of this article, the interviewees in the article were worried that negative public opinion would affect their current team, and they once wanted to delete all their content. The platform that had agreed to publish the article had to abandon the article because of the interview, and several media outlets we are familiar with were unable to publish the article because of risks that we all knew about but could not talk about.

This is a very Chinese situation. The situation of this manuscript and the paper clip are even intertextual in a way.

So after getting the consent of all the interviewees, we decided to send the manuscripts out for free. If you think it's good, you can support us by giving us a reward.

01

Last March, Luo Mei posted a message on WeChat Moments that began with: "I'm broken!"

He said that because the client was not satisfied with the video script he submitted, he sent him a training document to learn how to write. In this document of less than 2,000 words, the reference case listed was exactly what Luo Mei wrote three years ago.

That was a popular science video he made in 2019, the theme of which was the hair dryer motor. At the end of the video, Luo Mei told everyone:

"If you like this episode, please forward it to support us. You can search for "Paperclip" on Weibo, WeChat, Bilibili, and YouTube to follow us..."

Paperclip was once one of the most influential science popularization self-media on the Chinese Internet. At the end of 2021, due to force majeure, most of the team members disbanded and sought their own way out. Luo Mei, one of the main writers, went to Dingxiang Doctor and later returned to the team. Now they are a video production company that serves enterprises and only accepts outsourcing, and no longer produces content for the general public.

They rented another office in the original park. It was a little dim and crowded, like a factory workshop. It was much smaller than the original office, and there were fewer skateboards and lazy sofas, but snacks and drinks were still provided. There were more than a dozen computer boxes and monitors stacked in the corner. Everyone sat in an orderly manner, but not all of them were working. Some were watching movies, some were playing games and watching live broadcasts, and some were having dinner at 5 pm.

A massage chair worth 20,000 yuan was placed at the door of the small utility room. There was a huge sofa inside and bunk beds opposite it. These were all the team's former assets.

Luo Mei sank into the sofa, pointed at the furniture in the utility room and said, "There used to be a lounge in the office, and anyone who wanted to sleep on this bed could sleep on it. No one sleeps here now, but the massage chair is used by people. I massage it occasionally, and it's quite comfortable."

Luo Mei always speaks in a tone of "it's none of my business". When he mentioned that Party A asked him to "reference" his past works, his tone did not fluctuate. In fact, as an outsourcing company, they are already Party B's Party B, and can be considered Party C. Luo Mei said: "I don't think Party B will tell the client that I made the video, because that would be very embarrassing. For me, this matter is not a big deal, but it is not useless either. I can post an interesting circle of friends."

02

Before joining this team, Luo Mei worked in another science popularization team.

The founders of this company all graduated from prestigious universities, which is something they are proud of in their publicity. After the team expanded, they also tended to recruit graduates from prestigious universities.

At first, Luo Mei, who graduated from a non-university university, did not seem out of place. He was happy most of the time at work, although he did not have a "sense of mission" like others in the science popularization industry, and was more like trying it out casually. But the effect of the try was very good. He did a series of science popularizations on syphilis, which became very famous and is still mentioned today.

However, by the third year, Luo Mei could no longer write as consistently and efficiently as before. He thought he could not concentrate and could not come up with good ideas. Several founders doubted whether he was qualified for "professional work such as popular science" and talked to him several times. The final result was that Luo Mei had to leave.

After playing games at home for four months, Luo Mei joined Paperclip.

According to team veteran Chen Bo, this is a "bad student team". Many of their topics are chosen just for "fun", such as how to build a prison, how to behead in film and television works, how to make ghost money, how to send junk text messages, how telephone sales robots call you, how cameras monitor people... "These are things from the perspective of very bad students. Good students will not do this."

"The characteristics of the science popularization industry determine that most practitioners are good students, but one style that I particularly dislike is the good student style." He listed these characteristics one by one: love of learning, good grades, compliance with rules, liked by teachers, etc.

The team was established at the end of 2017 and released its first video, "How Cameras Monitor 1.3 Billion People". Their videos like to start with how, how, and why, trying to explain patent documents, papers, national standards and other more professional things in a narrative that ordinary people can understand.

Chen Bo doesn't care about his appearance and pays more attention to reality than imagination. He has a lot of acne on his face, but he only asks his colleagues to help him remove it when he is on camera.

Recalling the reason why he joined the company in the beginning, he is still confident: "Why did we make popular science videos at that time? A big reason is that there have been no popular science video programs in China. We can do it well if we just make one."

Chen Bo spent his childhood with a group of "bad students", and was later called "the only hope" by these childhood playmates. In his view, if he could do a good job in popularizing science, it would be like a "provocation".

"Look at someone like Luo Mei, does he look like a good student?" Chen Bai asked us.

Luo Mei has long hair and a beard, and had a lip piercing, but later he got it removed because it hurt his teeth when he ate. He likes to drink, and because he always blacked out after drinking, he stopped taking lithium carbonate and lorazepam (an anti-anxiety drug). In fact, he had other drugs, but he really couldn't remember what they were called.

He looked unreliable, but he had a strange sense of order. The drinks ordered for takeout were neatly stacked next to the computer, like a city wall. In a group photo from a few years ago, everyone in the photo was smiling, except Luo Mei, who stood at the side with a depressed expression, glancing at the camera sideways, looking uncooperative.

03

Here, Luo Mei found a long-lost sense of belonging. "This world is a makeshift team, and this team is also a makeshift team." No one here has ever questioned whether he can write anything, and no one cares which college you graduated from.

"Everyone's background is very strange, and they don't seem like people who want to work seriously," Luo Mei explained. Some people in the team didn't finish college, some people dropped out after internship because they didn't want to go to school, and some people didn't even go to school for a few years. They went directly to the factory after graduating from junior high school, and taught themselves film and television post-production animation production in their spare time, and came here. He, who has been on the professional path for a few years, seems "ordinary".

The person in charge of post-production at Paperclip was Xu Yu, a native of Haidian District, Beijing, who did not go to high school. After graduating from junior high school, he distributed flyers and swept the floor in a movie theater. When he was 20 years old, he met a group of friends who were engaged in photography. They said that imaging might be a major trend in the future, so he signed up for a class and officially entered the industry after completing the course.

Before joining Paperclip, Xu Yu worked as a calligrapher for variety shows and as a post-production designer for an advertising company with only 7 employees. In August 2019, the advertising company went bankrupt. He had to pay more than 9,000 yuan in mortgage payments every month, and he had to find a new employer to help pay the five social insurances and one housing fund before he stopped paying. What exactly does Paperclip do, and how to use Bilibili - he figured out these questions on the way to the interview.

"After the interview, I asked him if he would take care of all the five social insurances and one housing fund, right? The salary should be the number I mentioned, right? Chen Bai said yes, and then he asked me if I had any questions about the company. I said, isn't that the case for all companies? Then he left. I was very anxious at the time because there was another interview right after that." Xu Yu was still very excited when talking about the interview four years ago.

Ran Yao, his girlfriend who was sitting next to him, added: "The colleague who interviewed him at the time came back to the office and said that he had interviewed someone today and said that he could finish our film in two days. I didn't believe it at the time, because at that time, post-production of a film took five days. Later I found that he could really do the work of two people."

Xu Yu and Ran Yao are colleagues. They confirmed their relationship in 2020. They used "the last year of the paper clip" to refer to this year. But when it comes to dating, Ran Yao said that after coming to work here, many people broke up with their partners.

"Everyone was working all day long, wishing they could stay there for 16 hours a day, with no days off. Those who didn't have a partner looked for one at the company, and those who had a partner just broke up if they couldn't meet each other." Ran Yao recalled, "But no one hated this working condition. We were so damn happy at the time."

Sometimes you can't tell whether people are playing or working. Xu Yu recalled the situation in the office at that time, "For example, if I want to make a shot or an animation, I will call people in the office, and everyone will start working immediately if they think it's interesting; if someone stands up while working and imitates The Godfather, you won't even want to call me God Father; it's the same when playing, if I want to play with lightsabers, play tennis, or wield red tassel spears, I will just call out and a large group of people will come to play."

No one in the team cares about time management, and the timetable is meaningless. Luo Mei believes that this is due to their high requirements for the creativity of the content and their reliance on inspiration. No one can estimate the duration of the project or when the inspiration will come.

Recalling those days, Luo Mei described them as happy and free: "Back then, unlike now, everyone was still there, the relationship between colleagues was very good, and we could work and have fun at the same time. The content we made could also satisfy some ideas of expression to a certain extent, and after it was published, it could also interact with the Internet."

04

This seemingly makeshift team gradually gained fame and supporters, and its size gradually expanded. At its peak, it had more than 100 employees.

In early 2020, Paperclip became popular with a popular science video about the then unknown novel coronavirus. At that time, Internet companies still had a large budget to advertise to these content teams, and knowledge and science short videos were favored, so content creators still had the possibility to do something in the gap.

During that period, whether it was cooperation or endorsement, the official media had a very close connection with them. In May of that year, they cooperated with Xinhua News Agency to launch a short film. In November, as the Chinese manned submersible Fendouzhe successfully landed on the bottom of the Mariana Trench, they co-produced a short film with CCTV; in December, they cooperated with CCTV again to release a short film.

This year, the team's total revenue was RMB 19.858 million and its profit was RMB 3.719 million.

Luo Mei believes that what they did at the time was more like reporting that allowed everyone to participate, rather than popular science that was high-handed. "The logic of some self-media is to tell you something you don't know, and they always try to teach you something. Their logic is, I didn't understand it at first, but I found a document released by a government at a certain time, and I found that it revealed such a thing. I think few media have done this before."

In a program introducing how a zoo is built, Luo Mei wrote: "You can sit in a bus and travel through a 2,300-acre wild park, and through the windows let the free-living sun bears, lemurs, golden antelopes and other animals see what you look like." The audience saw the joke of "letting animals see people" and gave direct feedback in the barrage. He enjoyed this tacit interaction.

The ultimate way to let the audience "participate in it" is that the company will disclose its annual revenue every year. Luo Mei said that the reason for doing so is simple, "Our original purpose of popularizing science is to uncover the black box behind a certain industry. In fact, the company itself is also a black box. Everyone also wants to know what our operations will bring and what is behind our operations. Revenue is part of it, and where the money is spent is also part of it. We have made these public in videos."

In addition, the author of each video needs to appear in real name at the end of the video and dub the video. Chen Bo later recalled this setting with reflection and disapproval, "The only purpose of doing this is to tell everyone that I am serious and I am responsible for the content of this video. It's like posting a Weibo with your ID card and real name. But now I think it's completely unnecessary. Doing this is the easiest way to get us killed."

Except for Chen Bai, no one seems to think that this company is a popular science team. Xu Yu thinks they are an animation team, and Luo Mei thinks they used to be a business team. "No one will really teach you how to make ghost money out of social responsibility. Only when you can ensure your own survival, can you consider social responsibility." Luo Mei obviously meant something.

05

Their "social responsibility" brought them fame, but also ultimately brought them disaster.

In March 2020, shortly after it came out, the video of the team’s collaboration with the World Wildlife Fund sparked strong controversy.

The video says: "In the era of economic globalization, a butterfly flapping its wings in Brazil may not necessarily cause a tornado in Texas. But our consumption of meat, eggs and milk can actually affect the extinction of Brazilian forests."

Critics say they are blaming China - because Chinese consumption of meat, eggs and dairy products has led to the reduction of the Brazilian rainforest.

"We didn't mean that at all," the team said in response. "What the video wants to say is that in the context of increasing demand for soybeans, soybean producing countries such as Brazil can slow down forest loss through better farming methods...'We' are not China, but all mankind."

The next day, someone found out that they had used the wrong map of China.

In a previous video about tap water, Taiwan was included in the B station version of the map of China, but not in the Youtube and Weibo versions. People think this is a matter of principle.

According to the founder's later statement on the team's official Weibo, the original map material of that video had Taiwan, but the color of Taiwan in the engineering file map overlapped with the background color, causing the Taiwan map to be blurred in the video; the same material was used in another part of the video, and Taiwan could be identified because the brightness was increased. The video was removed from station B in 2019 due to map issues and was re-listed after modification, but due to overlapping divisions within the team, the modified video was not updated on Weibo or YouTube. In that Weibo post, the founder admitted that he was the "main responsible person" and was willing to bear all related penalties and consequences.

Paperclip has stopped updating for a month. During this month, everyone's job is to check for errors in the content and conduct repeated self-examination.

In September of that year, the founder recruited 10 viewers who "could criticize me directly in person and talk about embarrassing things". The two-and-a-half-minute video was released without any cuts. The founder responded to the critics' questions calmly and clearly throughout the whole process, even though some people only asked the same question over and over again: "Is your butt crooked?", "I haven't eaten meat, eggs or milk for two days, can you kowtow to me?", "Your video is too ugly, no comments, no opinions", "You have a big influence, so I just want to scold you"...

The accusations did not disappear. In January 2021, "Sairei Three Minutes", also a popular science self-media, accused Paperclip of "smuggling private goods" in its works, and Paperclip once again became a hot topic.

"No one can avoid having their own opinions. I think it's quite difficult. But even if it is a correct opinion, people who don't like (this opinion) will definitely scold you and will definitely think that you are trying to instill something in me," said Luo Mei.

In June, the self-media "Sai Lei Hua Jin" released a video, claiming that two former employees of Paperclip were "foreign forces." A month later, Paperclip's accounts on all domestic platforms were permanently banned.

At this time, they still had a large number of business orders that had to be completed on time. Until November 15, 2021, the cleanup work was basically completed, and the company could no longer afford to support so many people. Paperclip "disbanded", leaving only about one-fifth of the team members to maintain the operation of the team by taking business orders.

Chen Bo was calm about the final result, "You have to face it." He was still working when he said this, tapping on the keyboard from time to time. He looked unwell and his hair had not been washed for a long time. Luo Mei said that Chen Bo had just given birth to his second child this year, and he was under great pressure from work and family. But Chen Bo's demeanor was still calm, "(My mentality) is quite pragmatic."

In contrast, others may not be so relaxed. Some have changed their careers completely, and some have suffered a mild cerebral infarction before the age of 30. "(Colleagues) think we have done nothing wrong, why do we have to do this, there are many such emotions." Chen Bai said.

No one told us the reason for the ban. Luo Mei guessed that it was because the public opinion was too loud. "Even if you don't do anything out of line, the discussion you caused is enough to make people unstable. We were not banned because of our political ideas or political stance, but because of the political environment."

The problem with the "political environment" is that it assumes that content creators must understand all the red lines that cannot be crossed, but this is very difficult for most ordinary people who have not been politically trained. Xu Yu said, "In the final analysis, we don't understand politics at all. It's not that we deliberately choose what content to post, but we really don't know. But in China, when making content, at least you have to know what not to say."

They all believe that as long as an account has enough attention, there will definitely be problems. "Once too many people are watching you, no (media) can survive."

Later, "Sai Lei Hua Jin", which criticized Paperclip, was also banned. The former members of Paperclip were both happy and ridiculous. Everyone's views on many things became empty and no longer serious. "It's also quite funny, because they may really have no idea what red line they have touched." Luo Mei analyzed calmly, "Everyone actually doesn't feel relieved. Even if the other party is punished again, our original team will be gone. And this is not a game, we are just defeated by the same thing."

06

Luo Mei has an orange that is 11 years old. It was given to him by his college roommate. He has never eaten it and always takes it with him wherever he moves.

Now, the orange is like a stubborn old lady, shrunken, dry, and with a dark skin. Once, the cleaning lady threw the orange away as garbage, but he picked it up again and found it like a treasure. "This is my instinctive behavior. I don't want things to be thrown away, and I don't want it to disappear when I think of it."

There is always a sticker with the "paper clip" logo on his computer. When asked why, he said: "Because I don't have the money to replace the computer. If I replace it, it will probably be gone."

The disbanding of the team not only meant the loss of a job that Luo Mei loved, but also the disintegration of her life in all aspects. "Your work, your life, your entire state, your relationship with the people around you, if any one of them is missing, you will feel very empty."

The office is no longer as lively as it used to be, with farewells coming one after another.

After leaving his job, he went to Hangzhou to travel for half a month. During this time, he still did part of his original work as a part-time worker, but his income dropped sharply to only a few thousand yuan a month. He paid 2,600 yuan for five social insurances and one housing fund. After spending the money, Luo Mei decided to start sending out resumes, "I must have a stable job, otherwise I can't make a living."

Afterwards, Luo Mei joined Dingxiang Doctor. He said that the biggest difference between this place and "Paperclip" is that it is "too formal".

On the one hand, "rules" mean rigor. Luo Mei admits that Dingxiang Doctor's content is much more rigorous than "Paperclip" because they are willing to pay experts in various fields to do knowledge proofreading and review; but on the other hand, he can't adapt to the "rules" of the new company at all: writing weekly reports, holding various meetings, and having various rules and procedures when communicating. Weekly reports are a big project, and the more you write, the more it shows that the employees have done something. This makes Luo Mei feel uncomfortable.

He couldn't adapt to the working style here: to get the highest number of views with the highest efficiency, without having to create or explore new things. "They already have a set of effective methodologies, so there is no need to explore. Exploration is more suitable for small teams. If a small team breaks out and everyone finds that this thing works, then I can copy it, but I don't need to explore it myself."

Frequent changes and turnover of business is also the norm in large companies: Luo Mei first worked as a long video planner, but the channel he was on was cut off; then he worked on short videos on Xiaohongshu, but the business was cut off again; finally he was assigned to write for the official account. "I don't want to write for the official account, there is no need for me to waste my time, so I just left."

After working for half a year, Luo Mei went out to play again. "I just want to go out and play. The reason I work is because I have no money. When I have money and don't have to work, I will definitely want to go out and play."

He traveled all the way from Zhejiang, Fujian and Guangdong to Hainan, drinking during the day and going up the mountain at night. When he saw a bar called "Pure Land of Bliss", he would say "Disco of Bliss".

When he thinks of "Paperclip", he goes to YouTube to watch the programs he made in the past. After the stampede in Itaewon, South Korea, Luo Mei posted a screenshot of a video on WeChat Moments. The theme of the video was how to protect yourself from a stampede. When talking about this video, he said "not bad" three times in a row. He hopes that people who see this WeChat Moments post will search for this video. "The video was made by an intern colleague who is quite good. He collected some cutting-edge research on crowd stampedes, and I liked it very much at the time."

Open this video, there are many new comments:

"I thought it was made after the Itaewon incident, but it turned out to be a video from last year. Thanks to the algorithm."

“The animation is really well done! I wonder if the channel owner can share what software was used to make it?”

There was a reply under this comment, "Their channel has been blocked and they may not be able to reply to you."

07

At the end of March 2022, the number of COVID-19 cases in Hainan surged, so Luo Mei had to return to Beijing.

He found a long-term cooperation project with Party A, so he joined the original team again and worked with Chen Bo. "Now we work in a scattered way, cooperating to take on some outsourced advertising to make a living," Luo Mei emphasized again.

Unlike before, no one treats the "work" in their hands as a work of art anymore, and no one gets together to brainstorm.

This team of former bad students had to make more stable choices like good students.

In fact, in the final stage, Luo Mei faced the same problem as in the previous company: she could not write anything. But with outsourced copywriting, this problem no longer exists, because "the writing is highly repetitive, and the pressure is more on not creating."

Xu Yu described Luo Mei as a "gold medal writer". After the team was disbanded, he and Ran Yao also made a living by taking on outsourcing, doing some projects that they were not interested in before. Generally, when a project came up, the first person they thought of to work with was Luo Mei, because he was quiet, honest and trustworthy.

"Many people who outsource copywriting may lose their temper or be too lazy to make changes. If they have done good things before, they will be arrogant and think that what they have done before is much better than these, so why does the client still want to teach me how to do things?" But Luo Mei is not like this. He has his own way of dealing with clients.

"Customers always want everything. Luo Mei will agree, but will not really solve all the needs of customers. Instead, he will solve those that can be solved. After several revisions, customers will find that the script has basically taken shape and there is really no place to add what they want. If the customer thinks that a certain part is not good enough, Luo Mei will say, I will add the part you want, but you can only delete the other part. It's like Tai Chi."

Xu Yu is also learning how to be a qualified "outsourcer". At the beginning, he would try his best to do things well and completely, but later he found that not only did the customers not need it, but he would also be scolded. After that, he would do whatever they said.

After leaving their jobs, Ran Yao and Xu Yu began taking private jobs, which they had never taken care of when they were on the job. "The company actually paid me quite a bit at the time, and I thought it was interesting to do things here. And it's not just me who's great, it's my colleagues who are all great. It's great that everyone is willing to work on something together. I wasn't tempted at all."

Under great pressure from mortgage payments, Xu Yu once had to take video editing jobs for 800 yuan to make a living. Now his clients and income are gradually stable, but he still encounters the problem of not being paid from time to time. Therefore, he prefers businesses with clear launch dates: "Just like this year's 618, Tmall's video will be launched on June 11th. Even if you change it to death, it will only take a week, right? I am afraid of those businesses with uncertain launch dates. They have delayed us for a year, and they still don't pay us, and they don't reply to our WeChat messages."

"In this environment, everyone who makes videos is a second party, and they are all dogs."

Xu Yu considered changing careers, and Ran Yao also wanted to sell luxury goods. The two thought about going abroad, but gave up because they were worried that they could not adapt to a different culture. "I feel that I have been stereotyped. Foreign culture is more self-centered, and I don't like people who are too self-centered."

Chen Bo holds a pragmatic optimism towards the team and the future. "As long as we have the opportunity to make visual video programs, we will be very happy."

But he went on to say, "It would be a lot of trouble for me to make a video again, right?"

Luo Mei doesn’t feel bad that she can’t express herself the way she used to. This relief comes from a new understanding of herself: “If I were to do the same things I did before, I wouldn’t be able to compete with others because there are so many strong people. If everyone can express and create freely, we may not be much better.”

He gave an example, saying that his former supervisor was a real academic master, the top scorer in the college entrance examination, "God has gifted me, I will never be able to surpass him." Luo Mei believes that he is a person without talent, and he added resignedly, "Anyway, I can't write particularly good humanities stuff. I'm actually not very curious and interested in a thing as a bystander."

Regarding his current job, he said that he was working as a part-time worker before, but now he wants to try to support the company with Chen Bo. His mentality has changed, and he has more say and a sense of participation. Luo Mei's idea is very practical, that is, to get things done. "As long as the company can survive, I can continue to pay social security."

In 2022, Luo Mei was quarantined at home for nearly 50 days. Faced with huge changes in work, life and social environment, his biggest feeling is uncertainty.

"I'm not sure what the world will be like in two years, but what I can be sure of is that I can continue with this job. I used to think that I could open a small bar later. But in the past few years, everything has to wait for notification, and I can't make plans, so there's no need to think about it."

08

The dramatic change in the environment has befallen everyone, and people are preparing for postgraduate and civil service examinations. This group of former bad students has to make more stable choices like good students.

There are not many opportunities left for bad students.

In his previous job at Paperclip, Luo Mei once made a long picture describing the process of a cow from birth to becoming a cowhide bag. He quoted a sentence from Wang Xiaobo's "The Golden Age":

"For ordinary bulls, you can just cut them off with a knife. But for those with special temperament, you have to use hammer castration, which means cutting open the scrotum, taking out the testicles, and smashing them to pieces with a wooden hammer. From then on, the recipient only knows how to eat grass and work, and nothing else. He doesn't even need to be tied up when he is killed."

Luo Mei's citation stops here, but the most famous part of this novel is actually the following paragraph:

"Later I realized that life is a slow process of being hammered. As people age, their extravagant hopes disappear day by day, and finally they become like a bull that has been hammered. I thought I would always be strong and vigorous, and nothing could hammer me."

At the end of the long picture, the calf with cloud patterns on its body, as the protagonist, was sent to the assembly line. The meat was sold as fresh food, and the fur was made into bags and placed on the shelves.

Does Luo Mei think that he and the paper clip are the cows that have been hammered? He doesn't think so. "I think being hammered is a law of the world," he said calmly. "Everyone will have a day when they feel that they have not made any progress. That is the day when they are hammered."