Databases and Curatorship: the rise of the Youtube music channel

Yasmine Sharaf
Nov 6 · 6 min read

In 2009 Robert Gehl proposed that “Youtube is an archive awaiting curators” (44). Ten years later, this can arguably be seen within subcultural communities. There are Youtube curators in every field imaginable but for the sake of time I am only examining online curatorship in the very niche realm of subcultural punk communities, which exist online in translocal relationships. That being, small local communities who are connected to similar concurrent communities around the world.

Lev Manovich argues that in the digital world everything is being collected, whether that’s culture or DNA patterns, everything is becoming codified and collated into global databases (40). Manovich defines databased as a “structured collection of data…which are organised for fast search and retrieval by a computer” (40). By that definition nearly everything online can be viewed as a database. Youtube is perhaps the most obvious example, it is a constantly growing database wherein you can search and retrieve nearly anything. Manovich goes on to make the distinction between databases and algorithms, arguing that they are different “forms of computer culture” (40). Written in 2007 only two years after Youtube was founded, it is easily forgivable that Manovich could not predict the interconnected relationship that algorithm and databases would have on the platform, I will come back to this later.

In the computer age, Manovich argues, data is always changing and expanding (44). As reality becomes media, which is quantified as data and fed into the database (44), the need for simplification is vital. Manovich states that the rise of the web “gave millions of people a new hobby or profession: data indexing” (44). I would argue, that data indexing could also be seen as a form of curatorship. Tarleton Gillepie argues that platforms such as Youtube are the new “primary keepers of the cultural discussion as it moves to the internet” (347). Therefore, Youtube channels have become a form of cultural curators; each dedicated to and specialist in their own niche department. Within the online punk community, there has been no shortage of avenues for cultural curatorship. From blogs like Mark Fisher’s K-Punk, to reviews like Weirdo Wasteland or live music photography on Tumblr. However, Youtube has offered a particularly unique form of curation — the Youtube music channel. Channels such as Harakiri Diat, or Anti (formerly known as Jimmy) have changed the way people interact with music. The democratising powers of the internet may have been over-exaggerated in many ways, but through Youtube anyone can upload, share and review music. For a Youtube user, or perhaps more aptly a Youtube listener in this case, Youtube channels offer a way of shifting through the database, and refining down the infinite possibilities. For the channels themselves, they are a way for modern tastemakers to identify, grow and influence their audience.

In an interview with Anti (Jimmy), Tim Scott wrote “the punkest way to discover and access new music in 2016 is through Youtube” (Noisey). Similarly, in 2019 Turn On The Tube in an article titled “7 Youtube Channels That Deserve Your Subscription”, wrote “everyone that follows me knows I believe in the power of Youtube punk. I steal all my shit from there. All my best friends are Youtube punks. If your music isn’t on the giant video platform, is it even really music?”(Turn On The Tube). Music curatorship is not anything new, Youtube channels could perhaps be seen as the digital version of programs such as Rage or MTV, or more aptly continuing on the lineage from radio shows. However, with the ease and convenience of the digital era. Youtube channels are always available, and are accessible to anyone. Crucially, they aid to simplify the endless stream of music available online. Anti (Jimmy) states that “I personally think Youtube’s the best platform to find new music these days. Blogs are dead and Bandcamp is plagued by a bunch of generic shit, so digging through either can easily prove to be a fruitless endeavour. Youtube on the other hand, is not only infinitely times easier to browse, but also serves as a means to weed out a lot of the mediocre material that you’d surely find on other music-oriented sites, since who would bother going through the (minimal) efforts needed to upload something shitty” (Noisey). The answer being almost anyone — which only further proves why Youtube channels are so crucial. Turn On The Tube states that “as a huge fan, I can click on any video and know I’m going to like it. If (Anti) Jimmy likes it, so will I”. This highlights how and why people are drawn to Youtube channels, you can rely on them as curators to consistently show you something new and something of quality, which is striking in a digital world which is more concerned with quantity.

So finally, how does the algorithm fit in to Youtube curatorship? Thomas Elsaesser examined Youtube’s interwoven relationship between database and algorithm in his chapter “Tales of Epiphany and Entropy: Around the Worlds in Eighty Clicks”. Elsaesser’s goal was to explore what kind of force connects and drives the interaction users have with data within Youtube (166). Elsaesser states “one must therefore start from the notion that linear sequencing, though quasi-universal, is not the only way to make connections of continuity and contiguity or to plot a trajectory and provide closure. It follows that if time’s arrow is only one of the axes on which to string data and access it. In the era of simultaneity, ubiquity and placeless places, other cultural forms are conceivable and do indeed exist” (167). Elsaesser examines what happens when the temporal succession is removed from the direction of humans (167). At first Elsaesser’s journey is free form, starting off with one search opens up other chain reactions to “wholly unexpected avenues…beckoning in all directions” (167). However he soon finds that the Youtube “user depends on the machine to generate the access points, by way of sort algorithms and tag clouds (whose internal logical generally escapes him/her) a new authority interposes itself, both stupid like chance and all-knowing like god” (181). Like the flaneur who was free to choose their own path, but inherently limited by the confines of the architecture of the arcades, the Youtube user is free to journey on their own but is always subtly manipulated by the algorithm. In an article about Youtube curation and the power of Youtube channels Jack Trigoning states that “YouTube has been updating its own curation system, incorporating record labels’ (channels) promotional priorities into its algorithm that suggests what viewers should watch next”. Although the inner workings of the algorithm seem steeped in mystery, it is plausible that Youtube actively favours channels and drives users towards them as much as they inherently seek them out.


For more information on Youtube, music and the algorithm I recommend reading Ingyu Oh and Hyo-Jung Lee’s article “Mass Media Technologies and Popular Music Genres: K-pop and Youtube.”

Elsaesser, Thomas. “Tales of Epiphany and Entropy: Around the Worlds in Eighty Clicks.” The Youtube Reader. Edited by Pelle Snickars and Patrick Vonderau, 2nd ed., National Library of Sweden, 2009, pp. 166–186.

Gehl, Robert. “Youtube As Archive: Who will curate this digital Wunderkammer.” International Journal of Cultural Studies, vol. 12, no. 1, 2009, pp. 43–60.

Gillespie, Tarleton. “The politics of ‘platforms’.” New Media & Society, vol.12, no.3, 2010, pp.347–364.

Manovich, Lev. “Database as Symbolic Form.” Database Aesthetics: Art in the Age of Information Overflow. Edited by Victoria Vesna, 8th ed., University of Minnesota Press, 2007, pp. 39–62.

Oh, Ingyu and Hyo-Jung Lee. “Mass Media Technologies and Popular Music Genres: K-pop and Youtube.” Korea Journal, vol.53, no.4, 2013, pp.34–58.

Scott, Tim. “Meet Jimmy, The Guy Behind the Punkest YouTube Channel of 2016.” Noisey, 08 Dec. 2016, https://www.vice.com/en_au/article/jpmd4y/meet-jimmy-the-guy-behind-the-punkest-you-tube-channel-of-2016.

Tregoning, Jack. “Youtube Curators Rise Offline: As dance music fans sift through streaming services to fin the latest sounds, new channel operators have emerged to help — and billions are watching.” 21 Jul. 2017, billboard.com.

“7 Punk Youtube Channels That Deserve Your Subscription.” Turn On The Tube, 30 Jan. 2019, https://turnonthetube.home.blog/tag/harakiri-diat/.

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