YouTube: Oh baby, it’s a wild world
While online video had existed previously, the inception of YouTube has made it commonplace, easily accessible, and has propelled user generated content into an entirely new sphere of delivery. This has provided people with a new means of communication that goes a long way to injecting a dynamic sense of human presence into a realm previously dominated by images and text. It is extraordinarily powerful and offers users a tremendous opportunity to reach out to others.
But having said that, there’s no doubt about it; YouTube can be harsh territory for content creators - especially new ones.
This stark reality seems to result from two key elements that serve to place YouTube in a quasi-reality where traditional norms are not as pronounced or adhered to. These are: an uninhibited crowd-mentality inspired by YouTube’s massive userbase, and the sense of virtual anonymity afforded by the Internet.
Factored together, these two elements seem to alter or empower individuals’ perceptions of themselves to the point where they behave differently than they would in more traditional social settings. This is visible both in the sorts of attention-seeking videos that are constantly being uploaded - be they confessional, provocative, or just plain odd - as well as some of the text comments left by viewers.
It’s the text comments that seem to be the harshest. A poorly produced video or bumbling speaker can find their videos inundated by toxic comments and low ratings.
While seasoned YouTube veterans may have developed a thicker skin through exposure over time, for new users these sorts of comments can be debilitating and even lead them to abandon the application all together. I’ve experienced this on two different occasions.
The first instance was as a new user and was a turning point in how I perceived YouTube and online video in general. I had initially turned to YouTube as an experiment to see how things worked. I’d uploaded some clips of myself playing guitar and singing, and surprisingly they had been met with fairly positive responses. I hadn’t set out to attract attention, and yet people still watched and in some cases exhibited a vested interest in the clips. It seemed very odd at the time.
Then I made the ill-fated mistake of doing an unscripted piece to camera and it got panned, badly. In hindsight the comment wasn’t that big of a deal - something along the lines of “I’ve watched your other clips and was quite impressed. This is crap.” - but at the time the criticism affected me deeply to the point where I removed the clip and didn’t upload anything new for nearly a year.
In my case this was a lesson that taught me the importance of preparation before hitting record, and it’s not something I’ve forgotten. In a twisted way I suppose I should be grateful to the person who left me the comment, because most likely I wouldn’t have come to that conclusion otherwise.
Significantly part of the preparation for me is recognising the underlying purposes or objectives for recording and uploading the clip in the first place. In other words, asking: “What is this meant to achieve? What purpose does it serve?”
Once your objectives are clear in mind you are much better equipped to ignore the negative comments that come through. The focus is on how best to achieve your objective; and ultimately assessing why this may or may not have happened. The good and the bad comments that arise outside of it are largely irrelevant.
The other important realisation I had about YouTube came over time, and that was not everybody is a dickhead. For every one harsh comment that comes through you tend to receive several nicer ones - or at least more politely worded. Even more than that though, often times a harsh comment will be knocked back or criticised by subsequent viewers to the extent that some of the really popular video clips will have lengthy threads and arguments between viewers. In that sense YouTube is developing into a sort of self-governing body in which Yin and Yang equalise over time.
In the context of my most recent contribution to my work-related YouTube account, the fact the only user feedback I’ve received has been negative is irrelevant. (To date there have been 2 negative comments and a 1-star rating).
My purpose was to answer Duncan Riley’s call for input on what to broadcast about, and I’ve done that to the best of my ability. The fact somebody payed more attention to the pile of laundry in the background than what I was saying was not nice to hear, but it is just one user’s opinion. The fact Duncan added the clip to his favourites on the other hand implies my message reached its intended recipient and in that sense served its purpose.
I know I’m not good on camera and in most cases am better served by presenting my thoughts in text, but in this case I had something I wanted to say through YouTube and that was motivation and justification enough.
As one of my uni professors was fond of saying: “Once you know what to think, you’ll know how to act.”
References:
- “RE: What to broadcast about?“, Mike Bogle, YouTube, 13 April 2008
Wednesday, April 16th, 2008