Dr. Michael Wesch
Within the video lecture entitled “An
Anthropological Introduction to YouTube” Anthropology Professor Michel Wesch discusses
issues of culture, identity, the use of digital text and the parameters of
social media in today’s society all within the specific online platform of
YouTube. He begins the lecture by
associating YouTube with something that may be more familiar to those who had
grown up in the very beginning of the digital age, and that is major TV networks
such as ABC Wesch ties in statistics to engage the listener and to help
listeners understand the rapid rate in which activity takes place online versus
other, less advanced, social media platforms. For example, Wesch says if
networking company ABC had programmed shows every hour of every day for 60
years, about 1.5 million hours of programming would be produced. He then goes
on to explain that YouTube has produced more in the six months previous to his
presentation. However these statistics are now outdated because Wesch presented
on this topic in 2008. Despite
this fact, these statistics open the eyes of digital immigrant and digital
natives alike, and help listeners to see that technological advances occur at
hyper speed.
Within this lecture, Wesch revisited
one of his previous YouTube videos entitled “ The Machine is Using Us.” Within
the previous YouTube posting Wesch goes into greater detail of what digital
text truly is and what it means for our generation. Within his introduction to
YouTube Wesch briefly explains that the format of digital text is centered on linking
people in ways that they may have never expected. He explains that contrary to
popular belief, media is not specifically the content in which users see online,
but rather the medium between human interactions and human relationships. Because
media is constantly changing, so are human relationships.
The level of human interaction in
which others are physically in the presence of another, and are interacting on
a intrapersonal level has drastically decreased due to developments in technology,
the relationships and how people interact with others has changed. According to
Wesch, this phenomenon is known as cultural inversion. As a whole, our culture strives to express
individualism, independence and commercialization through platforms of mass
media. However, when we do so, humans long for a sense of community, relationships
and authenticity. This is true within the YouTube community online, and other
social media sites as well.
One situation that involves this phenomenon
is the debate over whether or not Lonelygirl15 is a real vlogger, or someone
who is posing as someone else. YouTube users we lead to believe that Lonelygirl15
was a real person who shared her thoughts and feelings of everyday life and
activities. YouTube users began to identify themselves with Lonelygirl15, and
this brought a sense of community and authenticity to a group of people who
craved these things. When users were told of the fraudulence of Lonelygirl15,
many were outraged and responded in ways that appeared to want nothing to do with
dishonest users. For instance one exasperated user said “You tube is not for
fake stuff! It’s for real stuff!” However, in response to the publicity, the
creators of Lonelygirl15 said the following “ She is no more real or fictitious
than the portions of our personality that we chose to show (or hide) when we
interact with the people around us.” This is an important point to be made. The
identity in which users chose to show or hide from the world drastically
changes from person to person and situation to situation.
This introduction gives readers a
brief idea of the many ideas and aspects of YouTube that can be studied from an
anthropological viewpoint. I found this lecture to be very interesting, and eye
opening to me as a infrequent YouTube user. I will definitely look at YouTube
in a different light from now on, and I will most likely use YouTube more often
as a way to interact with other that I may not have been able to otherwise.
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