Who puts the ‘You’ in YouTube?

WEEK 3: While discussing YouTube, José van Dijck argues that the site’s interface influences the popularity of videos through ranking tactics that promote popular favourites (Reader, page 94). How do ranking tactics impact on the formation online ‘communities’?

It’s YOU!

Attribution Some rights reserved by jonsson

Simply by using the Youtube webiste, you become a member of its online community, whether it is by actively contributing content in the form of videos and comments or by passively watching and increasing the views of the video. It is inevitable with any social community for a hierarchy to form; ranging from the most popular aspects to the less desirable or perhaps not as widely known about or accepted aspects, with YouTube being no exception. Whilst all YouTube Users are part of the greater online community, via the website, smaller groups form according to mutual interest and continue to flourish via related pages that are suggested. Yet YouTube’s homepage has obstructed this formation of online communities, by veering users toward certain content.

YouTube encourages you to freely “Broadcast Yourself”, promoting self expression and liberation, yet, as the theorist Van Dijick has forewarned, it could actually be that the creators and administrators of YouTube have a hidden agenda. On the homepage, there are ‘most viewed’ videos and ‘top favorite’ videos which naturally attract a larger proportion of viewers to watch videos simply out of curiosity. These ranking systems seen on the interface epitomize the concern Van Dijick has with YouTube’s supposed “participatory culture”. Users are automatically exposed to material that they otherwise may have never looked at or been interested in, subtly manipulating them to watch what is the most accessible. Whilst this does not necessarily negatively impact anyone, it can be seen as a way of changing the formation of that particular sub group, as people who may not have ever heard about a group or video are now involved in the group, just as I am now ever so fascinatedly watching “fail compliation March 2011” which appeared on the ‘most  viewed’ section of my YouTube homepage.

Another contributing factor to the impact of online communities is the ‘recommended for you’ section. as mine suggests I should watch ‘How to get Candle Wax out of your carpet?’ because yes, you guessed it, I recently spilt hot pink candle wax on my brand new carpet (which also happens to be my mother’s pride and joy). The very fact that my YouTube account can notify me of other fun and exciting candle wax removal ideas is testament to the fact that I have now joined the ever so dull sub-community of candle wax removalists, simply by viewing one of these delightful videos.

Ultimately, ‘ranking tactics’ inevitably create a domino effect on videos, where by the more popular become more readily viewed and increase their significance in search results, whilst those that don’t get as many views remain unnoticed. According to Van Dijck (2009), if we simply follow trends to feel included in an online community, then perhaps we aren’t really participating at all.
And just incase it ever happens to you, or if your mum can be just as terrifying as mine, here you go…

That video saves lives.

REFERENCES:

Van Dijck, José. ‘Users Like You? Theorizing Agency in User-Generated Content’, Media, Culture and Society 31 (2009): p41-58