When Steve Chen and Chad Hurley founded YouTube there focus was on building a community of users by creating a library of short videos. When this site became a phenomenon in 2006, advertisers were rushing to get in on the success which eventually led to the selling . Although still unproven, Google was willing to spend $1.65 billion making these some of the richest 21 year olds to say the least. With its availability worldwide YouTube has changed the face of many industries, politics, the way advertising is being used, and our plain old everyday life. "YouTube is to video browsing what a Wal-Mart Supercenter is to shopping."
There are of course many controversies involved with the site. Copyright is probably its main problem, and is why it was a huge risk on Google's part to pay that much money for an unproven site constantly on the verge of being crushed by lawsuits from content creators. But of course with big risk comes big reward, and whats $1.65 billion anyways? Google though has one law on there side being that its only required to remove videos when copyright holders complain. They are though initiating agreements with media companies to legally show clips from their shows.
Forgetting about some of these problems for a second, advertising has reached this sort of revolution along with this YouTube boom. Anything from discovering a new garage band watching them extend their fan base with weekly/daily clips, to even lending opportunities to politicians to sell whatever it is their selling. People are logging on to watch and judge these clips, given the access to many different angles of a product that used to have few (visible ones). Politicians whether officially or through a middle man are taking advantage of this opportunity by attracting the i-don't-care-about-politics person, with some entertainment promoting themselves while bashing their counterpart. This person could very well be dragged into voting without any insights other than his YouTube experience of which video made him laugh harder. Whats so great about the site though is anyone with a camera and computer can create an act of their own views and scripts supplying the public with whatever it is they want. Of course thats not always a good thing!
2 comments:
Since YouTube is constantly used by young viewers, videos are posted in order to attract the young audience to important issues such as politics. Teenagers rarely tune into TV in order to watch presidential debates and listen to what the candidates have to say. Many videos, such as the one we watched in class, speak to the youth in a language that they understand. They explain the issues in a funny and interesting way so teenagers will want to watch it, resulting in their participation in the election.
Copywriting is becoming a big thing today; regarding items that are being posted on the You Tube site. Actors, Singers and Coperations are asking for their items be taken down. You Tube is co-operating very well. Copywriting is not as serious as people are making it seem. Yes, it takes money away from the prouders or the companies but it also gives recognition to the company and the ad, music, commerical and the company.
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