Youtube is a community where people can be heard. It’s a place for common people to post original content like skits, speeches or home videos.
Oh, and it’s a place that the mass media market has already taken over.
Eleven of the twenty most viewed videos ever on Youtube are by famous music artists.
For a website whose slogan is "Broadcast Yourself” they sure need to do a little explaining.
From Avril Lavigne (who has the most viewed video at 104,081,786 hits) to Madonna featuring Justin Timberlake (which is at a dismal 20th place 49,756,998 plays) the most viewed videos on Youtube looks more like Billboards Top 200.
However, if you select the top rated by users of all-time we find that only two mainstream artist is in the top 20 and rightfully so: Tenacious D and Pink Floyd. And even these videos are ranked 13th and 19th, respectively.
That stat in itself should mean something.
Youtube used to be a place for the common people, the middle-class. Now you can’t go past two videos without seeing a celebrity sponsored video or a promo for a movie.
Obviously ads are a must-have because let’s face it: people have to get paid. But the fact that music videos and mainstream artists haven taken over a website aimed to promote the creativity of people is disgusting.
Youtube has probably grown beyond anyone’s expectations and has even been the headliner of a new tech era, but for some reason the 11 out of 20 most viewed of all-time just flat out bugs me.
Of course celebrities and music videos should be allowed on Youtube, but take it out of the most viewed ever. Everyone has already heard of every one of those songs so why not give 11 less-famous but equally as popular online people a chance.
Let them shine and be known as the top 20 most popular user-based videos.
But face it, this is a country that no matter how hard they try will always see the richer and more popular float to the top.
As to not be a complete hater, Youtube has done a lot for the greater community and has constantly worked hard on original and special features as well as connecting to its community.
But now back to the hate.
If Youtube is about listening to its people then why is the “top rated” button so hard to get to. You have to select “more” and then not only that it’s at the bottom of the drop-down menu, while most viewed isn’t.
Weird.
Top-rated means the highest rated videos by the users, yes the users. It has nothing to do with how well you can promote your video or how popular you are. It is about how good of quality is this video – yet it’s on a dropdown menu.
Maybe it’s a mute point, but don’t pride yourself on something and not do it. That’s like going into Burger King and having them tell you that they are taking the mayonnaise and cheese off of your burger because you’re too fat.
It’s kind of like MTV killed the radio star, then MTV killed itself and now Youtube is the new, but old, MTV, got it?
In other words: make MTV more about music so Youtube can be more about its users.
Signed – The World
3 comments:
Sometimes the unintended humor that sneaks into columns just makes my day.
Take this, for example:
"Maybe it’s a mute point, but don’t pride yourself on something and not do it. "
A mute point? Perhaps made very quietly? (Sorry, perhaps my comment is moot...).
Beyond that flub, the writer does make some good points about something that really gripes him.
To make the column stronger, more verbiage might have been directed at what the writer thinks YouTube should be, and perhaps how that could possibly work in today's wide-open technomania when it comes to video sites.
In other words, specifics on policing and controlling content.
As a YouTube user and consumer, I found myself in a sympathy with many of the points raised, though I wasn't convinced that a drastic solution is needed.
At the end, I had problems mixing a Burger King analogy with MTV and somehow it would make for a better YouTube.
Maybe it would have worked better as a video.
I was sick this weekend and wrote this hooked on nyquil :/
I agree with you on this one. I really don't like all the "partner" or "sponsored" videos, because I can never really trust if they're getting popular because they're good, or because they're paying YouTube.
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