Don't forget that is also around the time he started pretaping his shows instead of broadcasting them live. They had a good cover for it. Bootleggers were posting clips of his live podcast before his own clips channel could. Considering he doesn't give two shits about youtube ad money I highly doubt that's the core reason for the change. I don't trust Alex or Joe or Elon. They can do good but I still think they are controlled opposition/limited hangouts. Perhaps Joe's move away from commiefornia was step 1 to breaking his handlers grip, but he has way too much to lose. He attacks Candace for her biblical beliefs but gets chummy with people ostracized from "traditional archeology" for thinking outside of the allowed box. As for Elon, you don't get to succeed in finance that way unless you are born/married into the club. He strikes me as another Zuckerberg. If anons were making money off Zuck's rise the way they were off Elon's, I'm willing to bet he wouldn't have such a big fan club.