Rise of the YouTube generation: how amateurs surpass professionals
Introduction
The rise of the web generation leads back to 1990s when the term ‘internet’ meant nothing more than just several sites on the World Wide Web. But even in those days nobody really could predict how fast it can become one of the main sources of information. Since then the internet has changed and has become one of the main sources of information, and led to formation of internet related issues as the issue on convergence of media and media technologies. However the technologies which run the Internet at that time were less advanced comparing to modern web technologies. The software language HTML actually was all about interface and not about content at all. That programming language allowed web developers only form interfaces of their websites by changing fonts, colours and sizes of all graphical elements. So, even by 2000 the most of the internet web developers could not really achieve sophisticated web content where one page can be linked to the other ones. Consequently, entire Internet resembled groups of websites separated and not interrelated between each other living of their own. The threshold point was in 2005 when Web 2.0, a new generation of web technologies, was announced which changed whole design and perception of the Internet. According to Leaderbeat in 1993 there were only 130 websites worldwide, but in mid-2007, after the Web 2.0 was launched, there were 135 million registered hostnames and 61 million active sites . Web 2.0 technologies allowed developing such popular websites as Myspace (2003), Facebook (2004), Twitter (2006), Wikipedia (2001) and YouTube (2005). This paper will focus on YouTube, one of the Web 2.0 by-products. It discusses YouTube related issues basing on academic and media texts. Looking at YouTube through the prism of new media it will search an answer for how it could become world’s number one video sharing site and what we can expect from it in future.
Formed by former PayPal employees Chad Hurley, Steven Chen and Jawed Karim in 2006, today YouTube is the world’s largest and fastest growing internet community . According to the Guardian Unlimited ten hours of video content is uploaded onto YouTube every minute. Figures show that Britons watch over 3.6bn videos online each month - a rise of 56% comparing to figures of last year. At present YouTube dominates internet market with 20 million viewers in Britain . It was bought by Google in 2006 for $1.65bn . According to Levy YouTube was born ‘out of a need for modern media culture’ . One of YouTube founders Chad Hurley states:
‘With easy and affordable access to cameras, editing software and computing power, the playing field has been truly levelled. This growth not only increase, whether on mobile devices, among our broadly expanding international audience, or anywhere that people enjoy an online video experience’
Before YouTube was found in 2006 viral videos were everywhere on the internet. However, in general terms, there was not any specific place where they could be uploaded and watched. By early 2000 it still was hard to upload or download a video on the Internet. Not everyone had high speed Internet and there wasn’t any website to share videos. The mobile and more interconnected world demanded people to share videos faster and quicker than ever and with as many people as possible. Initial idea of a video-sharing website comes from Jawed Karim. In Levy’s 15Minutes of Fame Karim tells that the idea came from two well-known events in 2004: the Indian Ocean tsunami and Janet Jackson’s half time show at Super Bowl. According to Karim, the Indian Ocean tsunami was a natural disaster first ever captured on cell phone video cameras which flooded the Internet later. Seeing this niche in the Internet Jawed Karim suggested his idea to Chad Hurley and Steve Chen and they came up with concept of a public, web-based, video sharing website. But the founder wanted their site to be popular as well so they ended up with an idea of new dating website where the site members could upload video instead of photos as it is usually done in many dating websites. The concept of the new website was initially based on another dating website called HOTorNOT.com where users could upload their pictures and also could rate pictures of others by 1 to 10 rating system. And thus very unpopular dating website Tune In-Hook Up was launched in April 23 2005. The site was hosted on a server rented for $100 a month . It had only a few videos uploaded in and was very unpopular among vast range of Internet users. After desperate attempts to keeps the site as dating website they gave up with this idea because there were hardly new videos on it. So the founders started uploading their own videos and any other random videos found on the Internet. Also the YouTube founders started to develop interface of the website. As Levy writes, Karim and Chen worked in Adobe flash development language to make videos stream on the website thus allowing viewers to watch videos on the website instead of downloading players. Hurley worked on the interface searching for a new system which would let users to share their video in the simplest way, tag them and rate them in certain way. He also developed the site’s new name and logo. Youtube founders also programmed new technology which would allow viewers to post YouTube videos to their own websites and blogs. After redesigning the Internet users found an advantage of the new site’s technology and began uploading their own videos. Thus modern concept of YouTube appeared in the Internet in June 2005. The idea of YouTube came from different backgrounds – from natural evolution of multimedia technologies and devices, from users’ eventual need to share their videos and natural evolution of viral video phenomenon on the Internet.
Chapter I. I Tube, You Tube, And Everyone Tubes
Although evolution of YouTube seems like an overnight sensation, there were several factors which led to its success. Firstly there were methodological and strategic initiatives of the site owners which fostered idea of online community and video sharing website. Frederick Levy states that in March 2006 YouTube was streaming 30 million videos and uploading 30 000 files daily. It had five million unique users by that time. By May 2006, YouTube owned 43 percent of all video searches on the Internet. This figure increased up to 160 percent in just three months time. Nielsen/Netratings state that in 2006 in general YouTube quadrupled its traffic. It also showed that the site was more likely towards male audience than before. Figures show that males were apparently more for 20 percent than women. People between the ages of 12 to 17 were one and half times more than before. In summer 2006 YouTube was the fastest growing website on the Internet. According to Levy, Alexa, a website that provides web traffic information, ranked YouTube as the fifth most popular website then. 100 million clips were watched daily on YouTube with additional 65 000 videos uploaded every day, states survey made on July 16 2006 . According to Nielsen/NetRatings, the site had 20 million visitors each month 44 percent of which were female, 56 percent male, and with 12-to-17-years-old age group dominant . It is predicted that in 2010 user-generated video sites such as YouTube will make roughly $850 million annually in revenue . Time magazine named YouTube ‘Invention of the Year’ for 2006. As Levy states, YouTube became so popular only because of its initial purpose – to meet needs of its users – and creators were firmly dedicated to their core ideas which was reflected on the site’s interface and design. As Levy states, YouTube’s friendly interface was the main cue to get viewers interested in the site. Making the interface easy to navigate and meeting the needs of wide spectrum of audience, YouTube appealed to widest possible audience. Slate columnist Paul Boutin states that YouTube’s interface design was one of the simples by that time. According to him YouTube handled technological components that were user friendly, also sign up was for free, the site doesn’t give any pop-ups, error messages, there was no need to download player or other plug-ins, no need to do any other adjustments . Except this advantage YouTube founders were constantly searching for new innovative technologies in order to make YouTube more public, more accessible and more popular. In May 2006, YouTube launched a new service which allowed users uploading clips from their multimedia devices, PDAs and cell phones . Branded channels for other media enterprises opened on YouTube and global language accessibility features widened YouTube’s audience bringing more worldwide popularity. During three years since it was launched it expanded quickly – by differentiating its services in such aspects as language and location - it is developing local focus keeping global impact. As Caroline Heldman states the popularity of YouTube can be explained by fusion of three current technical and social ‘revolutions’: relatively inexpensive video recording devices be handheld digital cameras or cell phone video cameras and accompanying softwares, popularity of internet virtual communities among internet users, and their desire for unfiltered, as opposed to ‘slick’, viral information .
Basing on these criterias YouTube makes enormous impact on people in many spheres be their social life, political views or cultural backgrounds. But to certain extent Youtube’s success had nothing common with YouTube’s planning or development strategy at all. Because, according to Levy, YouTube had only provided internet users with means . The rest was up to the Internet users. It was them who boosted YouTube’s success. According to Caroline Heldman YouTube is ‘the domain of Generation Y’ . She states that the Generation Y is also known as Baby Boom Echo generation, people born between 1977 and 1997. YouTube was just democratising the entertainment experience for its users bringing it up to a new level. Therefore Time magazine named ‘You’ its Person of the Year. Time’s Lev Grossman wrote:
Seriously, who actually sits down after a long day at work and says, I'm not going to watch Lost tonight. I'm going to turn on my computer and make a movie starring my pet iguana? I'm going to mash up 50 Cent's vocals with Queen's instrumentals? I'm going to blog about my state of mind or the state of the nation or the steak-frites at the new bistro down the street? Who has that time and that energy and that passion?
The answer is, you do. And for seizing the reins of the global media, for founding and framing the new digital democracy, for working for nothing and beating the pros at their own game, TIME's Person of the Year for 2006 is you.
At that time it was common to watch in YouTube people dressed up in chicken costumes and doing daring stunts, video ‘mash-ups’, homemade music videos, ‘how-to’ videos of different kinds and local tours. This natural evolution of homemade videos later became an art form which created structure and content of its own. These changes led to formation of such Internet phenomenon as YouTube diaries, vlogging (video blogging) and other forms of Internet user generated content. Many YouTubers started showing their creativeness through YouTube uploading their diaries, funny videos and sharing their creative ideas with the rest of the world.
When it comes to YouTube stars or celebrities it is difficult not to mention about some of the famous ones. Of course, there are many people uploading their videos and truly trying to get that fame which many YouTube stars got at the beginning of YouTube hype. One of the first YouTube celebrities who was suspected as fake was Lonelygirl15. Lonelygirl15 first appeared on YouTube in June 16 2006. She was a 16 years old Bree Bavery with innocent sense of humour and very religious parents. Lonelygirl15 started her YouTube performance in May 2006 with two homemade videos. Since June her viewership jumped from 200 000 to 600 000. However, then it was revealed that in real life there is no one such as Bree Bavery and it was just a performance. Bree Bavery wasn’t what is called bedroom broadcaster at all. According to Rushfield and Hoffman, Los-Angeles Times staff writers, Lonelygirl15 was produced and scripted series . Referring to fans they state that web address of Lonelygirl15 has been bought before the first video was uploaded and it was thoroughly done with efforts to cover the identity of the buyer. Fans had also revealed that the videos were far more better that normal amateur webcam videos, better edited, her room looked as if it was a film set, music on background was too obvious and her performance was just too much for 16 years old girl. Many claimed that Lonelygirl15 series was nothing more than just a cleverly done promotion of a new Hollywood produced horror film considering her as the next-generation Blair Witch Project which tried to trick audience and made them to think that it is true using interactive web technologies as it was in 1999 with the Blair Witch Project. Brian Flemming, independent film director and blogger, was involved into this story and was claimed as the one who is behind Lonelygirl15. Later in September 2006 it was revealed that Bree Bavery was 19-years-old actress named Jessica Rose. She graduated from New York Film academy in Universal City, California and found audition for Lonelygirl15 at craiglist.com. The show’s producers and scriptwriters were Ramesh Flinders and Miles Beckett . However, even it was fake the Lonelygirl15 series did not finish even after the investigations. It was ranked number fourth in the ‘Best Series’ at the YouTube Video Awards in 2007. Despite the fact that Lonelygirl15 series have finished it were watched 81million times. The actress behind Lonelygirl15 Jessica Rose starred with some well-known Hollywood actors and actresses in ABC Family’s new series Greek .
Lonelygirl15 was not the only one who became YouTube famous. There are other YouTube presenters with their shows and ideas they want to share with. Wide range of YouTube celebrities demonstrate not only thematic differences between them but also noticeable genre distinctions. For example, Lonelygirl15 was series of little look into teenager’s private life and personal thoughts, WhatTheBuck, YouTube user Michael Buckley’s show, is much like paparazzi and tabloid newspaper which transferred onto YouTube broadcasting the latest celebrity dirt. There is another YouTube product named Malroid, a virtual band of Ryan Divine which won the very first YouTube underground music contest. All these breakthrough achievements of YouTube amateur demonstrate natural evolution on new media as it is. But it is not secret that some academics such as Andrew Keen, author of Cult of the Amateur are sceptical about that progress. He state that today’s over exaggerated hype around amateur pulls down the true values of professionalism and brings distortion and disinformation into society . However it is obvious that YouTube is probably the best place for amateurs of any industry. Student projects, first short films of amateur filmmakers, first attempts of almost everyone creative are on YouTube. Does it mean that YouTube destroying our today’s economy and culture? Apparently, not. It is just providing tools for people to get connected to others and to advance in fields they’re interested in. It is gives opportunity for amateurs to step into professional world bringing them closer to professional and merging the boundaries between traditional and new media. The professionals themselves have great interest in YouTube as well which will be discussed in the next chapter.
Chapter II. The YouTubisation of traditional media
As it was mentioned above YouTube already contains certain elements which would make it an alternative media. It has its own channels, viewers and subscribers as other forms of traditional media. However, in the last years YouTube made some other breakthrough steps towards becoming influential online media. Firstly, some worldwide media corporations as BBC and CNN joined YouTube since it became popular video sharing website. As YouTube is a free video sharing website, Internet users upload different sorts of videos in it including copyrighted materials from BBC or CNN. Before YouTube made deals with major media companies it was common to watch videos from the BBC or other television channels in YouTube. In August 2006 YouTube launched ‘branded channels’ in order to stop users uploading illegal content . Those channels which belongs to certain media corporations started streaming professionally produced content with promotional and advertising materials included. The owners of the branded channels could control their video content on YouTube. According to Levy, it was a big step forward for YouTube and other media which were joining YouTube to reach a wider audience. As an example we can take BBC branded channels on YouTube. The BBC started negotiations with YouTube on branded channels in January 2007 . In March 2007 YouTube launched two BBC branded channels youtube.com/BBC and youtube.com/bbcworldwide which were supposed to show quality clips and exclusive content from the BBC and the BBC worldwide service. Both BBC News and BBC worldwide branded clips run with limited advertising though UK viewer were not able to watch adverts. Viewers are able to comment and rate BBC branded videos as they usually do for other YouTube videos. According to the Guardian Unlimited, later in 2007 the BBC has launched a few more channels on YouTube . The BBC launched six Global News channels on YouTube featuring clips in Russian, Portuguese, Spanish, Arabic, Persian and Urdu and added to the existing BBC World News Channel on YouTube. Patrick Walker, director of video partnership for YouTube Europe, Middle East and Africa states that ‘by bringing top quality news content to the YouTube community in many languages, the BBC is taking an innovative step to engage with this large and diverse audience’ . YouTube also has its BBC branded channels for Top Gear and East Enders. However the BBC was not the only media which joined YouTube. CNN, CBS and other world’s major media companies launched their channels seeing YouTube’s potential ability to reach vast range of viewers worldwide. There is also Reporter’s channel on YouTube as well which lets common people to be journalists – YouTube contributes to development of citizen journalism as well which shows YouTube’s impact on other media to reckon with solidifying itself as standalone new media.
YouTube’s own attempts in turning into new media are worth mentioning. Firstly, apart its main site, YouTube has also nine local versions in France, Spain, the Netherlands, Italy, Poland, Brazil, Japan, UK and Ireland. The amount of websites was originally supposed to be 140. However due to financial reasons it was cut to nine. These websites show videos in local language, they support YouTube’s original video content including agreements with France 24, the BBC, Antena 3 and Cuatro TV in Spain and RTP in Portugal . Also YouTube targets every mobile phone to get popular and widely accessible. As it was mentioned above, in May 2006 YouTube launched service which allowed streaming YouTube videos in mobile phones and other multimedia devices. But this is not the only advantage because other companies as the BBC with its iPlayer are also available to watch in mobile phones. The main point here is that many mobile phone operators have an agreement with YouTube which allows them to record and simultaneously stream live content on YouTube website. However this service is not available for all YouTube users because it needs certain types of phones, certain providers and certain payments. But technological evolution of mobile Internet will soon allow every user to record live content and stream it on YouTube.
In last year YouTube made several serious attempts to reach broadcasters level and to broadcast live shows. YouTube Live was announced on YouTube website in mid October 2008. However rumors about YouTube Live were spread a long before it actually took place. As David Smith, The Observer technology correspondent, says wrote:
YouTube, the popular video sharing website, is set to challenge established TV broadcasters by offering its own live channels. The plans would enable YouTube's millions of users to chat from their bedrooms, perform music or report on a breaking news story to a worldwide audience in real time. A birthday party or wedding could be broadcast live to family and friends who are unable to attend. The truly committed could start a 24-hour 'lifecast' of their daily activities reminiscent of television's Big Brother
Smith states that even if it is quite difficult to realise this idea with modern technologies, in the future YouTube with Google’s technology innovations will be able to broadcast live. In November 23 YouTube streamed its first live video concert in San Francisco featuring famous YouTube celebrities . YouTube also took part in broadcasting the 2008 Beijing Olympics. It was among licensed media representatives which were allowed to broadcast the opening ceremony of the Olympics. As the Guardian Unlimited writes, the opening ceremony was broadcast in more than 70 countries by YouTube . The Beijing Olympics organizers also launched specifically dedicated Olympics channel on YouTube in order to decrease the amount of illegal copying or viewing of the Olympics and to provide with a package of daily sports events which could be viewed even in such restricted territories as India, North Korea and Iraq.
Issues of copyright have always been a big problem for YouTube because of the illegal copying and uploading copyrighted material onto YouTube by users. Recently YouTube started negotiations with several Hollywood studios for streaming free full length films with limited advertising on the YouTube website in order to solve this problem. This action can be explained in the following points. Firstly, YouTube authorities do not want to be sued by film or music video studios on certain copyright infringements because it is not possible to control all users on YouTube. Second, it is true that the quality of video content on YouTube is poor comparing with such video sharing websites Vimeo or branded websites as iPlayer in behalf of the BBC or Hulu supported by NBC and Fox which take over YouTube in showing high definition videos . So streaming quality videos in both technical and thematic terms was a good step for YouTube to provide viewers with good content. Despite this fact, YouTube still has an advantage over those video websites because Hulu, dubbed as ‘the YouTube killer’ in many news items is available only in the US territory as well as iPlayer which BBC viewer can watch only in the UK while YouTube is available worldwide . But YouTube has already launched its own HD channel called the YouTube Screening Room in temptation to stream full length films on it but the major Hollywood studios still predicting financial aftermaths if they will join YouTube . YouTube looks forward to attract small indie studios to show their films on the YouTube Screening room. Despite disagreements on certain points between YouTube and the Hollywood studios, one studio – Metro Goldwyn Mayer – made deal with YouTube on showing its free full length films . According to Maggie Shiels, technology correspondent of the BBC News, showing films from the Metro Goldwyn Mayer archive will boost revenue for both YouTube and the Hollywood studio. The MGM channel is to be called Impact which will be exclusively dedicated for action films, TV shows and short clips. As Jim Parker states in the BBC’s article, the Impact channel will show such MGM classics as Rocky, Ronin, Legally Blonde, and the Magnificent seven. The channel is to start within next 18 months and at first time it will be available only for US users however the channel creators plan to expand it to worldwide audience. Alongside with MGM relationship, YouTube has already fostered cooperation with Lionsgate, an independent studio, and with CBS, which recently has started posting to YouTube its full-length series of older shows like Star Trek and Beverly Hills 90210 . YouTube also developed a system of VideoIDs which will allow video companies to track unauthorised content and prevent copyright breaches. Another Hollywood studio Universal is also set to start new video sharing website in cooperation with YouTube . The future website will stream music and short videos from Universal and will resemble advanced version of Hulu, online video website which belongs to Rupert Murdoch. Hulu shows selected clips and full-length videos from several major American media companies and Hollywood studios alongside with advertisements and promotional materials. Therefore it had only 6.3 million visits in September 2009 while YouTube reached 81 million visits in September alone . So it is a very tempting opportunity for Hollywood studios and YouTube to make money out of this traffic despite difficult situation with copyright situation.
In way to become a standalone online broadcaster YouTube has already kicked off another project named the YouTube Symphony Orchestra . It’s a competition designed to reveal names of new found classical music professionals. Dubbed as the online orchestra, the YouTube Symphony wants musician viewers to submit their works until 28 January 2008. The best 90 musicians from 30 countries were chosen among thousands of musicians which sent their variations of well-known Chinese composer Tan Dun’s works. On April 16 2009 the participants played in the Carnegie Hall – one of the most prestigious venues in the world – and the show was shown on YouTube as well as broadcast by other major media companies
The last three years history of YouTube as an online showcaster depicts its full potential to become standalone online media. There are other video sharing websites like Metacafe and Vimeo. But they are just prototypes of YouTube wrapped in different designs and interfaces. What YouTube brought to its users is an ability to ‘broadcast themselves’. Giving opportunity for amateurs to express themselves, YouTube merged amateurs and professionals. Its intensive steps in cooperating with professionals such as major worldwide TV channels, main Hollywood studios, attempts of streaming live content and other innovative projects demonstrates that YouTube is becoming a standalone independent online media which can serve as an alternative to other media forms. According to academics, one of the main reasons why it cannot stream live content is explained by Internet bandwidth. Live content needs wider bandwidth than normal video. Normal bandwidth today cannot provide enough space for thousands of people to stream live content on YouTube. However, what if it would become an alternative media in near future? What will change? What will it look like and what should we avoid? Because there are still downsides of YouTube which hasn’t been mentioned yet. The next chapter will focus on the dark side of YouTube and amateur hype.
Chapter III. Wiki-television
The previous chapter was like a defence for YouTube and represented it as a revolutionising product of digital world. However, there are some issues regarding YouTube’s legal actions. Firstly, it is copyrighted material of music studios uploaded onto YouTube. Several music studios sued YouTube over their copyrighted material being uploaded onto YouTube. The Performing Rights Society for Music has recently tried to make an agreement on their videos being shown on the website . According to agreements considerable amount of YouTube music videos have been pulled out of YouTube and have been banned for UK citizens. This case is similar to the case when Viacom sued YouTube over copyrighted material for $1bn in 2007 requesting to hand over all data of users who watched Viacom videos including usernames and IP addresses . So issues of privacy of all YouTube users were under threat.
There is another interesting point of view about music videos on YouTube. Media critic Andrew Keen in his The cult of the Amateur reveals some other interesting suggestions about music advertising in YouTube and Web 2.0 overall. He writes:
Given our mistrust of traditional commercials, the challenge for marketers in the Web 2.0 democratised media is to advertise without appearing to do so – by creating and placing commercial message that appear to be genuine content. The challenge, and the opportunity, is to do this while building ‘authenticity’ – authentic content, authentic brands, authentic commercial messages. But, of course, such content is utterly contrived
So, at the example of video named Tea Partay Keen describes how hidden advertising works on YouTube. Accroding to him Tea Partay was uploaded in August 2006. This is a short rap video parodies a lifestyle of New England preppies. The video at first glance looks like the first music video of new rising indie rap band . However, according to Keen, Tea Partay was not posted purely for entertainment. In fact it was a hidden commercial of a new mal tea called Raw Tea produced by Smirnoff. As Keen states, the advert was first ever example of viral advertising with production cost of $200 000, paid by Smirnoff to be promoted on YouTube. Since it was published, the video was watched 4,709,177 times to be precisely. As he states the main disconcerting thing with these sort of videos is that they appear to be purely entertainment but in fact they are not. Keen writes ‘YouTube is a long commercial break dressed up as democratised media’ . YouTube gives adverts not as adverts but as an entertainment. In YouTube adverts and entertainment can be merged creating something in between where viewers cannot be disrupted by annoying pop-up adverts or other product promotion played before the requested video as it is usually done in, say, Yahoo videos. But the problem is that YouTube’s paid-for adverts are no different from the rest of content and if so most of viewers do not distinguish difference between them. In August 2006 YouTube started selling so called PVA – participatory video ads . But according to Keen, there is one big difference between those two: PVA is a paid advertising video which is actually part of one’s business and specifically designed to raise interest and made for distinctive financial purposes while user generated content is much more like expression of art, creativity or information. This brings another question coming from privacy concerns: Who is watching us when we are watching YouTube?
As it was discussed above, YouTube was named as ‘the invention of year 2006’ by Time magazine. And ‘You’ was named as The Person of Year 2006 for ‘seizing the reigns of democracy’. As is known YouTube’s tagline is ‘broadcast yourself’. What if YouTube is destined to be the online standalone showcaster? Andrew Keen in his The Cult of the Amateur states that old media is facing extinction . According to Keen, the future of new media and partially old media depends not on major media corporations but on professionals of the Silicon Valley. They will control the most of the Internet including information sources, advertising revenues as well as video content allowing such popular websites like YouTube to prosper further. Therefore Rupert Murdoch, owner of several major media brands, bought MySpace in 2005 and Google bought YouTube in 2006. The age of ‘You’ started after these big deals between major media conglomerates. ‘You’ is the one who creates new blogs, he is the one who writes articles, rates news popularity on Yahoo Buzz, edits Wikipedia and upload his daily routine information onto YouTube. Consequently after so called conversion the amateur and professional technologies will merge breaking boundaries between each other. As Keen states, we will get what we pay for – free amateur content and disinformation. Disinformation is one of the main threats coming from amateur contents; this is the rewards which ordinary people get from digital democracy on the Internet. Amateurs are not professionals, they cannot tell certain things in depth and in details. Wikipedia, one of the main offspring of Web 2.0, has already demonstrated several examples of it when editor who was supposed to be so called professional was indeed just bored teenager who decided to become an expert. This is an obvious proof for the downside of the Web 2.0 technologies reflected on Wikipedia. However, Wikipedia is mostly all about more written and less visual information consequently it’s less persuasive while YouTube is definitely about video content which makes it even more persuasive. YouTube have already faced some incidents of misinformation and deliberate misleading. One of those incident happened in German version of YouTube in September 2006 . Professionally trained male news anchor seating at a wooden desk with a map of Europe behind him told news report about how German neo-Nazi NPD party had done well in recent local elections. This video created big trouble in German society because the show looked very similar to the most famous news show in Germany called Tagesschau. But the difference was only the logo. Instead of Tagesschau logo the show had the logo of a multi spoked sun that could be easily rearranged into three distinctive swastikas. But later experts defined the show as fraud. Allegedly made to look like a newscast this ‘news’ item was produced by members and fans of the extremist neo-Nazi NPD party for propaganda purposes to recruit members to join the party.
However, this is not the only incidents happened in YouTube. As is known the newly elected president of US Barack Obama intensively used the Internet and especially YouTube in his cybercampaign as a main way to encourage young electorate to vote for him. The promotional campaign video Yes We Can featuring singer Will.I.Am and Barack Obama’s concessional speech was put onto YouTube in February 2 2008. The video became popular in a few days anmd nearly 50 different versions were uploaded onto YouTube. The video was watched nearly 20 million times and had been awarded an Emmy for the Best New Approaches in Daytime entertainment . Search results for ‘Barack Obama’ in YouTube show this video amongst similar videos of him. However, there are several other videos on YouTube made by amateurs which are unhappy of Obama being the US president. It seems that those people who are behind those videos are unhappy because Barack Obama’s middle name is Hussein. For example one of the recently uploaded videos tagged Osama Obama . It’s a 30 second roughly edited video showing how Barack Obama is similar to Osama bin Laden. Surprisingly it is not the only one there. There are other videos tagged as ‘Obama with Osama’, ‘This is how people are stupid in the US’, ‘Barack Hussein Obama’ etc. The comments show the reaction of people who watched this video. For example, in the ‘Osama Obama’ video user named Lola1066 commented: ‘this is absolutely repulsive. I am shocked at your indiscretion, do have no morals at all? You disgust me, and i hope that you remove this video before youtube and will discover just how wrong this is’ for which user called horta85 writes the following:
‘Why because he points out similarities?
If the truth hurts you may want to do some self search so you can be at peace with this.
So they look a little alike.
Obama sounds like Osama
If that upsets you well then the truth is too much for you to handle.’
The point of these comments is the idea about the truth and the perception of reality from the viewers’ point. For these amateur users, the truth shown on television and told on radio is not the truth any more. For those people the idea is that if Obama sounds like Osama and his middle name is Hussein it lead them to ideas about terrorism and threat. This is the truth for them. This situation doesn’t demonstrate how Internet gets more powerful and influential but how the ‘traditional’ media fails in being more persuasive and in depicting truthful mediated reality. Distortion of reality is the final result of these types of amateur videos. Another video called ‘Obama with Osama’ is also interesting because it is very similar to German incident with neo-Nazis . ‘Obama with Osama’ video of only one second shows poorly photoshopped version of the CNN exclusive news release. The picture depicts Barack Obama sitting with Osama bin Laden with tagline ‘Your Next President Barack Hussein Obama’. The viewers’ comments are intriguing. For example user named josephyb33 writes: ‘1 sec. of truth’. Viewer named MrMattWebb writes: ‘This is awesome. I can’t wait for there to be a terrorist attack in the US while he is in office. There will be dozens of assassination attempts on him it will be historical’. Another user named dadada486 comments: ‘During his trip to Kenya, Obama apparently met with several top al qaeda leaders including Osama himself, who reportedly said that the one consonant that separate their names was by the divine will of Allah! Obama was promptly converted to Sunni Islam and founded the al qaeda off-shoot organisation, Kenyan Islamic Front for Jihad. He together with a number prominent operatives were responsible for numerous low-key attacks in East Africa and was even thought to be involved in Mogadishu, Somalia!’ to which user named tysonnnn1 replies: ‘i raped your daughters and your wife while you wrote this essay on youtube. sorry’. The viewers’ reactions show how viral videos can be really influential. But it also shows that if YouTube was would-be wiki-television it would be much more influential and pretty much controversial than others. It also shows how the idea of truth is widely misleading. These videos are one of the best examples of disinformation and misleading. Keen states that the main problem with Web 2.0 sub-product like YouTube is that its editor free nature allows almost everyone – neo-Nazis, propagandists, ideologists of different sorts and other wanna-be experts - to get involved and post deeply misleading, deceptive, manipulative and out-of-context videos . He also writes:
This is the future of politics in a Web 2.0 world. The supposed democratisation medium of user-generated content is creating a tabloid-style gotcha culture – where one thoughtless throwaway remark overshadows an entire platform, and lifelong political careers are destroyed by an off-the-cuff joke at the end of a long campaign day... When information on politics is so easily skewed or distorted, it’s us, the electorate, who lose...The YouTubification of politics is a threat to civic culture
Andrew Keen may sound pretty populist but his ideas are certainly worth considering. If YouTube is will-be future wiki-television, and if every propagandist ultra leftwing politician starts to buy YouTube channels for certain money and spread his extremist ideas into public, what will happen next? Andrew Keen suggests following:
The irony of a ‘democratized’ media is that content producers have more power than others. In a media without gatekeepers, where one’s real identity is often hidden or disguised, the truly empowered are the big companies with the huge advertising budgets. In theory, Web 2.0 gives amateurs a voice. But in reality it’s often those with the loudest, most convincing message and the most money to spread it, who are being heard .
Today Web 2.0 technologies which allowed millions of people worldwide to join amateur revolution to take over the Internet are still controlled by professionals. It means there are more than enough opportunities to change it and make it better for much better purposes clarifying it out of junk, useless and disrupting information. Wikipedia and YouTube are not the only by-products of the Web 2.0. Wikipedia’s achievements when it took over the Britannica encyclopaedia really show how amateur creativity can be very powerful. And YouTube taking over the BBC and any other sites providing video content brings warning about amateur content. Except YouTube with amateur content there is other websites such as Joost or Brightcove with much more interesting and professional content. According to Keen, these websites can be an example for YouTube in terms of professionalising its content. He states that these next generation platforms will offer the best of both enabling people to do, say, instant messaging while watching the television. At today’s media landscape we already can witness some elements of media convergence. The major old media companies like The Guardian has already transferred its website into much more sophisticated information portal with news, video and audio coverage of many events. Probably, if YouTube is going to change into something like this The Guardian can also be an alternative example for the first step.
Conclusion
The emergence of the Internet divided media into two parts calling them as ‘new’ and ‘old’ media. However, these two seemingly opposite forms of media doesn’t mean that the new media confronts the ‘old’ or ‘traditional’ media and tries to object everything which was gained by old media during its history. When the term ‘new media’ appeared many started to predict that it will bring the new era. Many thought it will be collision of two opposed media phenomenon: old will be displaced by new as if journalists will be displaced by bloggers. This is that some people then called as convergence of old and new media. But, the short history of internet as new media shows that convergence happens not rather by one displacing another but mostly by mutual collaboration between established media conglomerates and emerging new media institutions where one’s creative content can be usually displayed and expanded via many new media platforms the main example of which – YouTube – we have discussed in this research. YouTube appeared as a key site which combined old and new, professional and amateur, indie and mainstream creating a new participatory culture. Firstly, YouTube represents the meeting place of diverse and previously unknown media cultures which have been making indie and semi-professional content. In the beginning of the Internet era there was no common site for online videos like Star wars kid or Peanut Butter Jelly Time and they were scattered all over the World Wide Web. So YouTube assisted as a common place for these sorts of videos to be uploaded and watched. Secondly, YouTube operates as an archive where amateurs and professionals can scan media environment, search for meaningful piece of content and make it public. YouTube provides everyone with participatory and reactive environment for everyone starting with amateur deejays that mixes and remixes certain music uploading them onto YouTube and ending with the ones who were unhappy about the new US president and uploaded their angst driven video onto YouTube. The participation is described by fusion of three elements: production, selection and distribution. YouTube was the first which combined all three of them into one platform allowing everyone to manipulate with all those three actions. At last, YouTube functions in relation to other medias like social networks as Facebook, blogs as LiveJournal and other different websites. Existing as by-product of all Web 2.0 technologies including Facebook, MySpace and others, YouTube made tremendous evolution from unknown website to competitive, easy-sharing, user-friendly and very popular mainstream online source of information and advancing Internet technologies will make it one of influential online media in future.
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