Youtube and its Evolution

Back in 2007 when I was with my friend, enjoying random chatting,

Friend: “Hey I saw the video clip the other day, it was so funny.”

Me: “Ok, what is it about?”

“It was a song they made it funny.”

“Where did you watch that clip?”

“You know it’s very popular website.”

“um…Friendster?”

“nope. I can’t remember the site. But it’s very well-known.”

“You said it’s very popular, and yet you can’t remember?”

“HAHAHA, yea… what is it? C’mon. It’s at the tip of my tongue.”

“Well, how would I know?”

You would have guessed he can’t remember “Youtube”. How could a website of such a nonentity now influence the way people behave and interact these days?

This is what I venture to make a proposition of what the youtube website really is.

Youtube is a portal where each and everyone accessible to internet can upload their video clips. Or let’s say Youtube is Walmart. You have so many websites where you can upload your video clips and yet people flock to Youtube. Each one of the video clips on Youtube is their merchandise or contents on display literally. The idea that you can have everything in Walmart is what makes people go and shopping. The more merchandise on display, the more likely a customer purchase a product.

In a similar vein, the more video clips or contents that users upload in its portal, the more likely viewers will come to the venue. In Walmart, the profit is made when a customer buys a product. In Youtube, the profit is made when a viewer view the ad content. The very idea that a customer becomes aware of the product available out there is what makes Youtube constantly trying to achieve its goal – Products Awareness.

Upside vs Downside

I must admit that I benefitted a lot from Youtube in terms of knowledge, information, technical knowhow, and of course entertainment as well. I truly enjoy documentaries, interviews and talks. Charlie Rose came into mind when I talked about Interview. Mr. Rose is incisive in asking questions, and insightful on interviewee experiences. Granted, you always should check the opposite side of the coin as well. If you search anti-something in Youtube, you won’t be disappointed to find a clip. But that doesn’t mean your intuition or belief is right. If you search pro-something, Youtube won’t fail to cater to your need as well. To balance your view and interpret from the information given is a viewer discretion, I believe.

I. Evolution

Now I’m coming to the point where I found unsettling and irritating to watch or even repugnant to enjoy the show. It’s Prank and Reaction videos.

The question is why those videos come into existence in Youtube in the first place?

I guess it’s the driving force behind Youtube monetary incentive given to the youtuber. It’s not borne out of sincere curiosity or societal need. It’s borne out of pure monetary drive and constant “subscriber” and “view count” soliciting endeavors.

What I found puzzling and disconcerting is why those video clips make millions of views (and yet thumbs up), and yet they add nothing to our repertoire of knowledge whereas documentaries on the most crucial event in history or invention of microchips garner a paltry number of viewership. Where are we going with this social trend? Am I becoming too old to conceptualize the idea of younger generation keeping up with the internet or I’m just a skeptic?

II. Prank video clips

Mr. Darwin expounded the artificial selection of farmers on the same crop and now we have a number of choices: cabbage, cauliflower, broccoli and such. In line with this prank and that prank, the most ridiculous cheerleading viewership and such, I might as well put my neck on the line and ask “Are we selecting the best talented, thought provoking, well made video clips or are we just enjoying a mediocre youtuber pranking other people out of their lives?”

You can prank people until they really get pissed. Once they reached a point of no return, you just said “It’s prank. I’m recording for youtube.” and laughed.

What does that have to do with your genuine curiosity on people behavior?

What does that have to do with your increasing social activities around your friends?

It has nothing to do with social experiment. It’s everything to begin with “Monetary Advertisement”.

If a human being with such a talent can live well on that, we are artificially selecting the worst form of ourselves. [Yes, I put my neck on the line here. Of course it's a whisper.:)]

The same goes for reaction video as well. 

My Future Reaction Video

I've got an idea. It's a billion idea. I might as well do reaction videos on every scientific paper from pubmed and upload on youtube. I wonder who would come and thumb up my reaction on 

"In silico exploration of the fructose-6-phosphate phosphorylation step in glycolysis: genomic evidence of the coexistence of an atypical ATP-dependent along with a PPi-dependent phosphofructokinase in Propionibacterium freudenreichii subsp. shermanii". 

Would you watch my reaction video on that paper? If you do, let me know and I'll do one.