The impact of Video Sharing: YouTube
Brittany Spicer
Survey of MM
Prof. Maw
10/26/2014
The impact of Video Sharing: YouTube
Media has a huge role in reflecting and shaping its viewers. YouTube is a popular video hosting website that plays an important role in the way humans communicate with each other and the manner they communicate in. YouTube’s focus has always been Broadcast Yourself (YouTube.com). In today’s society, broadcasting yourself has become so mainstream that those who do not post videos on the Internet are often put out of social circles, like with many other media outlets and It is possible for a that a person can be made into an outsider when they do not participate in the video sharing community. Yet, the very reason why a person would lose touch with their community is exactly the reason why video sharing has become an important part of our society.
Back before we had most electronic ways of communicating it was much easier to connect with your community, one could say that the more society creates technology that is suppose to link us together, the more easy it is for us to fall apart. There are multiple ways in which a person can fall through the cracks and lose touch with those around them, causing a digital divide. According to John McMurria, a professor interested in the constructs of cultural citizenship in media institutions, “A glance at the top 100 rated, viewed and disused videos, and most subscribed channels reveals far less racial diversity than broadcast network television” (124). Meaning, there is a sort of monopoly on videos on YouTube by the wealthier, more educated, and the poor do not get their voice heard as much because not everyone is capable of posting on YouTube or viewing the videos.
Another down fall to YouTube is that those who cannot access these videos or those who chose not to, can cause negative ramifications in other areas of their lives. For instance, students often rely on the accessibility of information on social media specifically and the web in general to provide answers, which can result in a reduced focus on learning and retaining information. Also, private information is becoming increasingly more available online and the ambiguity the internet seems to provide has made students, in particular, forget the need to filter the information they post. Many colleges and potential employers investigate an applicant’s social networking profiles before granting acceptance or interviews. They not only view old Facebook posts, but they can also view the video’s posted and the videos a person has liked, which can taint the job applicator’s view of their future employer. Most students constantly check their status and view YouTube video’s when they are bored, but they do not often take time to evaluate the content that they are publishing or viewing online, which can bring about negative consequences months or years down the road. One video added online, with or without another person’s consent, can also have a negative ripple effect that can cause the person strife, ten to twenty years down the road.
Though YouTube has it’s many potential down falls, it has also been a great asset to society at large. For instance, YouTube videos can be very helpful for educational purposes. Khan Academy posts video’s that help students from all other the world, learn a new skill in an area of study that they have been finding difficult to understand. I have struggled in many areas in school that have left me feeling like I was never going to be able to understand the subject. In addition, teachers often have a preferred way of teaching, and if a visual learner receives a teacher that lectures more than any other type of educating, it can be hard to follow the lecture in a way that will be a lesson that they fully understand. Yet, the ability to both create and view video’s that can help a person learn in a different way than they have been taught before, like Khan Academy does, can be a helpful gift to a student in their learning process.
It is not just education for school that you can find help with on YouTube. You can also find new ways to organize, how to set up a TV, how to make dinner, and more tasks that you would previously only have instructions to use that might be difficult to read. With YouTube videos and other videos people share, it can make a seemingly difficult dream to accomplish become a much easier goal to score. It can also provide us with other forms of entertainment or news. YouTube videos also allow for people to see the news without actually have a television. Many times people post videos on YouTube that are firsthand accounts of certain events. These are both exciting and give people around the globe a firsthand glance into an event without hearing the commentators or analysts. You get to see many people’s points of view at the click of a mouse.
Overall, while YouTube does have some negatives, its positive benefits are greater. There is no other site where videos can help give many visual perspectives on events, education, and, day to day tasks, all while make millions of people laugh all within minutes. As the “digital divide” continues to decrease as well, the benefits of YouTube on society will grow. YouTube is an important part of our culture and will continue to benefit the world for the foreseeable future, people on the other hand, need to be aware of the possible negative outcomes of their actions on sites like YouTube and other places they are able to share videos.
