Cody Ko, a popular YouTuber garnering nearly 5.7 million followers on his main YouTube channel, was accused of taking advantage of 17-year-old Tana Mongeau at 25 years old. This allegation was widespread, driving Cody to take a permanent hiatus from his podcast TMG (Tiny Meat Gang). Cody Ko took a lot of backlash from this, which also drove him away from YouTube entirely. He stopped posting directly after the allegations came to light (9 months ago) and only started creating content again two months ago. So, how did people react when Cody started creating content again? 

Cody has yet to post on his main YouTube channel but continues to post on Cody & Ko, his secondary YouTube channel with two million subscribers. At first, his YouTube videos were short, not consisting of his normal video series, such as “sultry Saturdays” and others. However, the first video he released had very positive feedback. The top comment being, “Cody is back? My day is already so much better.” That comment garnered over 2k likes, and nearly every top liked comment was extremely positive about Cody’s return. This response encouraged Cody to continue posting as he did regularly before the controversy. He brought back his normal series but still never addressed the issue. 

Although Cody’s platform is relatively positive as of now, his views have suffered a massive blow since the controversy. Before the Tana Mongeau situation came to light, Cody’s second channel was swarming in millions of views per video. However, after his hiatus, he came back and only started getting thousands of views. Although thousands is still a large number, his financial income from Youtube would be drastically different. 

So, besides financial income and views, what has changed about Cody Ko? 

Many frequent viewers noticed a lack of energy from him when he first started posting YouTube videos again after his leave of absence. This could be caused by the fear of the public reaction. But as time passed and he noticed positive feedback, he brought back the channel “inside jokes” in his videos, clearly growing more comfortable. He also stopped collaborating with creators like “Nut,” someone he created content with semi-frequently. Viewers speculate Nut no longer wants to associate with Cody. 

Cody also produced music on his main channel which has been unheard of since the controversy.