Youtube

You tube has become one of the most popular websites on the Internet, for the site lets users upload videos from all over the world at any time. YouTube has become so popular that it has started to rival television networks for viewers, as shown in the "YTR ProfAmateur" article, "The site is often characterized as a significant challenger to the dominance of traditional broadcasting and television services" (Page 89). Since its birth in 2005, you tube has become a cultural phenomenon and even for some, an addiction. It’s very significant to note that You Tube was bought by Google for a staggering 1.65 billion dollars in stock, and through the reading in "The YouTube Reader Intro" it is evident that the growth and improvement of the site led to the purchase, "For a while YouTube grew at an inconcievable rate of 75 percent a week, and by the summer of 2006 the site had 13 million unique visitors every day that watched more than a hundred million video clips" (page 10). The function that You Tube serves is that it allows users to interact with each other through uploaded videos: instead of written blogs, users can now blog through videos to one another. The impact it has on our daily lives is that in a way, as a society, we depend on You tube because it lets us watch what has happened in the world, whether it be recaps of games, replays, the news, movies, and TV shows. The users utilize you tube, for they are now able to share their voice with the world. Gone are the days that you had to be somebody important to get your views across the world, because you tube lets anyone with a web cam and an opinion to share their thoughts. You tube users use the site to create an identity for themselves in good ways, as well as bad. For example, the hit videos of lonelygirl15 portrayed this girl to be someone that she was not.

Although it has not proven to be fake yet, but the identity of coppercab seems to be a little shaky, for who wouldn’t want to watch an angry redhead talk about how gingers have souls.

It is all about fame, and with these users, the idea of negative publicity is good publicity has never been so evident. On the other hand, You Tube can help build social identities for users in good ways; for example Justin Bieber was discovered on You Tube and look at him now.

In my opinion, the amount of private life one shares on You Tube can be fun at first, but later become quite detrimental. I am all for posting videos about whatever and whomever, but one’s private life should stay private. I personally watch You Tube videos pretty frequently, but I would not say for hours, it is more like maybe an hour a day, if that. I also do not embed videos on You Tube because I have nothing to post, but my friends and I are still thinking of a video that we can make to become famous and make money, without looking like complete idiots. I don’t email videos to my friends, but I post videos on friends Facebook walls all the time. I do own an account to You Tube because through all of my subscriptions, I am always caught up in anything I am interested in. Overall, I think You Tube is not only entertaining, but definitely useful because it enables us to not see everything that is happening all over the world at just the click of the mouse.

Here are a couple of my favorite videos: