Transcript of the above video: 

Yet again I am talking about YouTubers, content creators and whatnot here in Thailand - be curious to see how burned I get in the comments on this particular video -but the question posed is, "is content creation work?" Well we have done the videos before we parsed out the legal definition of work in Thailand. I mean you could argue breathing is working in Thailand. I mean literally the definition as we read, it's like the exertion of any kind of effort in furtherance of anything could be deemed to be work. And again, remuneration is irrelevant. I state that again: compensation, remuneration whether or not you are being paid is irrelevant. As we have discussed in other videos they were even volunteers after the tsunami who were arrested for Work Permit violations for trying to come to Thailand and volunteering. Thais take their work authorization issues very, very seriously.

So the question posed is, is content creation work? It's a really good question. I think ultimately if you read the legal definition of work in Thailand, yeah it is, because anything could be deemed that way but I do get that there are some people who are out there creating content as just sort of a hobby and "is a hobby work?" I don't think so. Now again, don't get sort of a snarky trying to be, I don't know how to put it, trying to sort of slink around the rules or something, that's not a good idea. I think at the end of the day most people know what they are doing is work or not in their sort of heart of hearts, and again compensation is a major factor. I think anybody who has like monetized content creation, yeah you're going to have an issue trying to explain that away as not being at work. But if you just have like a hobby like you are a gardener or something and you have your own little garden and you are in Thailand and you're making videos or blog posts or something about your garden, is that considered work? I kind of doubt it but where is the line between those things? I don't know. Or maybe you are really into jet skiing; you like going down to the beach or parasailing every day and maybe you have somebody film you parasailing or you set up a tripod camera and film yourself parasailing and then you put that on YouTube because you just enjoy showing your friends what you do here. Again if it's a hobby, I think anybody is hard pressed to say that is work and I don't think the Labour Ministry or Immigration is going out with a task force looking for those people. But again, at the end of the day I think it's one of those in your heart of hearts you know whether or not what you are doing is work and at the end of the day, again anything really by a foreigner, could be deemed to be work.

So if you know in your heart of hearts what you are doing is work and you know that there is a very broad legal definition of what work constitutes in Thailand, it's probably a pretty good idea to get your work authorization issues in order, in order to continue that activity here in the community here in the Kingdom of Thailand.