Comments on: Why are all the Youtube stars from LA?

By: Alex

Alex — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 07:03:32 +0000

You should edit Michael Buckley - WhatTheBuck - out of your post since he lives on the East Coast.

By: Erich Vieth

Erich Vieth — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 14:35:48 +0000

Brynn: I don’t watch any commercial TV either, and I watch maybe a couple hours of PBS per month. Yet I too know all kinds of things about TV stars–more than I know about many of my neighbors. I know these things because people talk about them on the street, but mostly, because have become a big part of our “news.” It didn’t used to be this way. We didn’t used to have a huge swaths of entertainment posing as news on a regular basis.

By: Erika Price

Erika Price — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 14:35:05 +0000

What are the odds of a video going viral? Slate’s Chris Wilson found that 66% of a random sample of new videos only received 50 or fewer views over the course of a month (see here. Only 3% of videos climbed past the 1,000 views mark. Another source (Rubber Republic) says the odds of climbing past 1,500 is “less than” 10%- but it’s based on older figures, and submissions are probably going up, if anything. (see here.

Maybe that’s ok? As long as the bulk of those staggering submissions are lovingly homemade, isn’t Youtube doing its ‘job’? I find it very difficult to separate the concepts of successful creative endeavor and massive popular interest- the internet marries the two so tightly.

But then look at the virals! “Charlie Bit Me”, “What What (in the Butt)”, “Sneezing Panda”? Does anyone creative really want to join that particular club of dimwitted entertainment?

By: Dan Klarmann

Dan Klarmann — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 13:12:36 +0000

The bulk of YouTube views of mass culture — either pirated or sponsored up-and-comers — pay for those few hundred views of which we occasional uploaders of personal videos can take advantage.

Videos that I upload to share with local and international friends are fun for our little in-group. I’m not courting stardom; just taking advantage of free storage and bandwidth. The hours it takes me to produce a minute or so of video are good exercise.

Every once in a while, someone uploads something silly or profound enough to go viral. I don’t expect that to happen to any of mine.

Here’s my “channel” if anyone is bored enough to want to see videos that generally garner only about a hundred views.

By: Brynn Jacobs

Brynn Jacobs — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 13:06:59 +0000

Erika-

Good points. I wonder to what extent LA simply mirrors the “unhealthy fixation with fame and celebrity” that exists in the broader culture? I don’t even watch TV, and yet somehow I know more about the lives of some people named John and Kate and their 8 kids than I know about most of my neighbors. I am assaulted at the grocery store with dozens of magazines at the checkout stand, all offering a take on the latest crisis with Jennifer Aniston or Brad and Angelina.

And so celebrity lifestyles have become common knowledge. I wish issues that really affected people’s lives could be granted the same status.