Wednesday, November 10, 2010

This is why I do it.

Sometimes I find myself in a conversation about something that I've already made a video (or written an essay or drawn a comic, etcetera, but this is my youtubes blog, so let's keep talking about videos), and as much as I just want to share what I've already done, I feel a little foolish responding with pre-created media.

I found myself in a twitversation about language use and the relevance of certain words (whether or not popular usage dictates what is correct and incorrect) with Sonja and I decided to share my video "That's Not A Verb." I, of course, cringed a little at the self promotion, but I thought it the best way to communicate my thoughts.



Anyhow, she posted an eloquent response, and I'd be remiss to not share it.

READ.

Sunday, November 7, 2010

Candy Exchange!!

I'd like to say that my International Candy Exchange has been a smashing success. Here's some of the results: (to be updated as I see them)








Thursday, August 26, 2010

Small Is Beautiful

This is way overdue, but I've been catching up lately an blogposts I've been meaning to.... post, and this is one of them. (Others can be found here, here, and here.)

I posted this video a while back with a discussion of the "Sub4Sub" practice. As a measure to prevent this, YouTube will not allow you to post a comment with this string of characters, so I ended up receiving some personal messages. I can only find two right now, but if I can uncover any others, I will of course share them below.




Hey Emily,

Thanks for another great video. In case you're wondering, the reason I'm giving my response via private message instead of through the comments section is because once I got about 360 words (or 2115 characters) into what became this email, I realized that my response was too long-winded to post without coming off like complete windbag (a fate I may yet fall to). So I figured I'd PM my thoughts to you instead. You can include them in the larger public discussion, if you want, because this message really is my equivalent of a video response - which is something I'm not quite ready (if ever) or able to do at the moment.

Yeah, I feel the same way as you. Quality is king... or queen, if you prefer. Sometimes the whole subscription model seems like a pissing contest to see who can make YouTube and its partners the most money. Aside from bragging rights, the whole numbers game is about generating revenue.

However, when it comes to the issue of Quantity vs. Quality on YouTube - and to lesser extent other similar types of sites - I kind of feel the inverse of what you're saying. Let me explain....

I'm a subscriber to many YouTube channels. And there are some that pump out new content almost every day (and I'm not talking about VEDA, either), but the overall quality of the content is limited and it doesn't get as good some of my favorite channels, like this one. Not all of the popular and prolific channels are like that. However, generally, a higher level of output tends to (though, not always) equate to a lower level of quality. Then, on top of that (though, again, not always), there's the interaction with the content producers and/or channel Admins themselves. Often times it is, at best, sporadic. These content producers rarely respond to their comments sections, so when a viewer throws in his or her opinion, that person can only hope that some other commentator offers a decent response.

What I'll call, "Author Replies," tend to make for more interesting conversations, and, depending on the author, foster more intelligent responses from their viewership. With some of the more popular channels, this level and quality of dialogue just isn't possible. And that's assuming that at least some of these "authors" even read any of their comments at all. The words of "superfluousness321" seems to echo this experience. To quote:

--start-quote-
"I am a nameless, faceless viewer. There is alot to view. Occassionally I throw a comment down the wires, but my use of this media is primarily one way."
--end-quote-

I'm not blaming the popular content creators, because they themselves are limited by the burden of their own success. They probably do it for a living and are constantly producing SOMETHING... ANYTHING. Not to mention having to actually READ the comments (okay, last time I use all caps, I promise). Have you ever read through the comments sections of some the more popular authors? This is a rhetorical question, though I would like to hear any thoughts you might have on it. Speaking for myself, I have done this. Not all the time, but every now and then. It's usually tedious as hell, especially when people start sharing the same idea or the same now-deader-than-disco joke over and over and over again. It must make the content producers that have to slog through this shit on a daily basis scream out to the vlogoverse: "People, please! For the love of all that is good, read some of the previous posts before sharing your 'unique and original insights'!" I mean, yeah, a person could probably better spend their time doing something other than going through pages of user comments, but if a would-be poster cares enough to produce a response, I believe that that person should at least read *some* of the things other people have said to see if maybe someone else might have had the same thought or made the same points already.

Anyway, pardon my rant, but your video brought to mind a few things that I've been somewhat overdue on expressing in writing. I might yet write an essay of some sort on this topic to get it out of my system, but for now there's just this email, so forgive me.

After seeing CodedLockFilms comments, I'm inclined to agree with, um, hir, as well. I too think the whole Viewer Count issue comes down to a fundamental flaw in the way YouTube is set up. CodedLockFilms nailed it: "it should about connections, not numbers." YouTube needs to be more like a social networking site that fosters more meaningful connections between the producers and consumers in the YouTube ecosystem. Out of all the socially oriented sites I use, I find myself spending an increasing amount of time "interacting" with people on YouTube than elsewhere. And that's because it engenders community through common interest (i.e. viewership). Other traditional social networking sites, like Facebook, feel much more insular as natural result of the way they were designed. On Facebook I only interact with people I know who also know (or knew) me, but on YouTube I've had great discussions with people who were previously total strangers.

In some ways, YouTube is stuck in the network TV mentality of drawing in large, primarily passive, viewers, but its the ability to connect, interact, and contribute that separates the quality of my YouTube viewing experience versus what I get from my TV or movie viewing experience.

If you made this far, I thank you for your time, and, once again, for another thought-provoking video.

-TheAnonymousUs3r


YT won't let me comment on Small is Beautiful
That's why you get the comment as a message:

Bookbinding: I loved it! I had a class in school, and we wrote stories and created our own books. I still have mine smewhere.
I've seen sub4sub logos on different youtube channels. I had no idea that there were facebook groups as well. I rather read comments & have a decent discussion in the comments or per video response. than no comments at all. I do weird stuff sometimes, only because I want others to participate in it, that's why I created Clive's Angels.

[Dome / hubertcumberdale2008]

Wednesday, August 25, 2010

818 Wrap-Up [re-post]

On Wednesday, August 18th occurred the first (to my knowledge) Albany YouTube gathering (organized by yours truly). While it wasn't a success by local gig standards (all of the local acts backed out), I'd say it was a huge success in terms of the number of people who traveled from out of town to be there. Over the past week or so, I've seen a lot of things posted about it, and it seemed appropriate that I sort of gather them here for you.

Here's a blogpost.

And some pictures:
WaterfallLizzie 818 Poster @ Valentine's

Ben Mike
Ben Amanda Karen Caitlin Lizzie Emily Erica Andy

A few vlogs:








And, of course, performance footage:










Friday, July 16, 2010

VidCon

It might seem like the thing to do here would be to make a video about VidCon, but I already put up an Apple store vlog, and I feel like my subscribers would begin to get annoyed. Also.... I don't know. I just really don't feel like doing that. So...VidCon.

Well, first off, I arrived in the LA area early on Wednesday. At the airport I blew right past my friend Eric as I made a beeline for the restrooms. Eric harassed me later saying that I hadn't seen him because he was standing near other Mexicans, but the reason that I didn't see him (and I had an eye out) was because he was shorter than I'd expected. I guess he'd told me his height before, but that was really just a number until I was walking beside him. This would prove to be one of the main things I'd notice during VidCon: expected heights versus actual heights.

As we were waiting for Peter to come pick us up from the airport, we found a place to sit on a bench outside. At one point Eric turned to me and asked: "are you feeling that?" to which I replied: "you mean, you're not rocking the bench?" No matter what he says, Eric was totally freaked out by said earthquake. He was ready to hop a plane back to Texas. (Though once it was over he kept saying he was sad it didn't last longer so he could enjoy it --- liar :P )

After Peter came and got us, we put our stuff in his apartment and went out for vietnamese sandwiches and poked around downtown Disney. (Signs said Nightastic!, Peter said that the only thing Nightastic about it was the name change) We stayed for the fireworks and I would later learn that some of our other favorite YouTubers were also at Disney for these same fireworks. Shame we didn't run into them.

Thursday we went out for Dim Sum (Peter insists that he eats non-asian food, but I'm starting to doubt the validity of this). Dim Sum would have been a scary experience if Peter wasn't there ordering for us. Thankfully he didn't make us get the chicken feet.

Some time in the afternoon Sharayah came and met us and we all drove to LA. As soon as we walked into the lobby of the hotel, we were greeted with hugs by Steve, Karen, Rohan, Paige, Lizzie, Ryan, and probably Laurel. Lizzie and Karen? Shorter than I'd expected. Ryan? Taller.

Many of us left and went out for some inexpensive sandwiches and ice cream....sandwiches. As we were walking out of the hotel we all pulled out our cameras to record URL turned IRL. I think that everyone presumed that the whole conference would be like this, but beyond this moment of ridiculousness, it really wasn't.

I've discussed this with a few people -- there were times when VidCon felt a little bit like high school. You see the popular kids mingling and you know who they are, of course you know who they are, but you feel that they're unapproachable.

I think the difference is, unlike high school, the unapproachableness was really more of an anxiety than anything. Though I mostly harassed Tay Zonday, I had a fine time chatting with Phil DeFranco, Craig, Michael Aranda, Todd, Hank seemed mostly stressed but I tried to encourage and praise him when I could, and who could neglect to mention the obligatory time spent at the bar with John Green?

There are also people that I've had some sort of an internet connection with but never had been able to spend extended periods of time with, and I found them to be lovelier than I could have hoped. Namely: Caitlin Hill.

I also found it interesting to watch YouTubers that I admire get excited about other YouTubers that I admire. It sort of broke down any walls or hierarchy, as I had obviously placed them all on the same unattainable plane, and they just didn't see it that way.

As is to be expected, hugs abounded at VidCon. When you spend so much time listening and talking to and interacting with people through pixels, you can't help but be excited about touching their flesh. I like to think of myself as a good hugger [insert joke here about my last name], but I'm pretty sure Tom has got me beat. My hugs are all arms, and maybe some picking up. Tom just sort of wraps himself around you and brings his chest close to yours. When I was in high school I gave the worst hugs. I was so terrible that my friend Sarah called me out / gave me a lesson in hugging. I used to sort of hunch forward so my hugs were all shoulders. I've come a long way, but apparently I haven't reached the pinnacle of good hugs yet:)

Hank said something about not defining VidCon as a conference or a convention so you could really make of it what you wanted. I'm glad I paid for the insider's track so that I really could feel like I was at a conference - which I went around telling people in the weeks prior. "I'm going to a convention in LA for people who make internet video."

When I first had looked at the schedule, I remember feeling conflicted: 'oh no, this insider track thing I want to go to falls at the same time as the DeFranco Nation meet-up." It didn't even take several hours of hanging around the hotel to decide that meet-ups weren't for me. Meet-ups were times to take pictures and get autographs, but I really just wanted friends. Apparently, Steve said something to this effect at some point, which was tweet-quoted by Erica, and retweeted by myself. While talking to John Green at the bar, he brought up the friends versus autographs thing. "I've seen your tweets, I'm totally on your team."

Speaking of twitter, I've never glanced at so many people's phone twitterfeeds before. I actually regretted not having a fancy tweet-able phone for a few days there. Whew! That takes doing.

So, then....Friday was really intense. There were lots of things that I wanted to do, and I went to nearly all of them. I remember sitting at the opening remarks and looking around the little section I sat in and just marveling at all the amazing people I was surrounded with. It continued to be this way. Friday ended up feeling like three days. Saturday felt like a normal day, and Sunday just felt like crap. I've discussed this with several separate parties who all agreed precisely. I mean, we DID watch the World Cup game with John and Tom doing commentary, but then no one scored for several hours and John kept the mic away from his mouth mostly, and then Spain scored and the game was over. (I saw nothing but Orange shirts in all the airports on my way home...sad...pero me encanta EspaƱa.)

I know a lot of people came home to VidCon withdrawal, but I had less than 24 hours at home before I headed to NYC to meet back up with some of the people I had been in LA with. It was fun to be bicoastal with Tom, Erica, Caitlin, and Karen, and I think that spending that time was a nice way to step back into my own little life. Especially because NYC is a place that is much more "home" to me than LA.

I don't know....I had a glorious time dancing and learning and hugging and eating and talking and cuddling with everyone.
Also, I have to admit that the vacancy left on my youtube crush list (by the boy who spent two months not-being-my-friend) has been totally filled by Tyler Oakley. That boy is fabulousness bottled.

Tuesday, June 15, 2010

Other Channels Box

A few months ago, YouTube gave everyone the previously partners-only feature of the "Other Channels" Box. I really liked this feature as a way to shout out some of one's favorite youtubers, and we were all really excited and implemented this feature right away.

It seems that this new feature was not entirely a boon, however. When you click the subscribe button on someone's channel who has this feature implemented, a secondary screen with usernames, check boxes, and an additional subscribe button pops up. I know some people who are new to YouTube and don't care to read everything may get flustered and click that second button, accidentally subscribing to some people they didn't intend to.

Accidentally subscribing to a couple extra channels probably won't be a big deal, it might result in some unsubscribing, but it may result in someone getting a chance to actually check out some youtubers he or she may really enjoy. Accidentally subscribing to 12 or more extra channels will probably result in some sort of anger, frustration, or maybe just someone who doesn't watch the videos in their subscription box.

Going on this, there are whole categories of people who don't watch the videos of the people they subscribe to. Some of these are "sub4sub"bers, and I discuss them a bit in my video Small Is Beautiful (YouTube has blocked the use of sub4sub in the comments and a few people PMed me comments for this video, I need to post them here, I'll get on that soon). These people usually remove themselves if you don't choose to subscribe back (and sometimes they don't even make videos, so really....what's the point?). The group that bothers me more is the iSubbers. These are people who subscribe to everyone in the hopes that some of these people will check out their channel and subscribe back. This has actually been a successful plan for some people. I could probably name you some YouTubers in the 6 digit range who did this.

Don't get me wrong here, this isn't a good plan. It's only good if you're spineless and have no integrity.

Oh, my point. So these iSubbers used to just go through and subscribe to everyone, I'm not quite sure how. Comments? Subscribers of other YouTubers with their subscribers shown? Some alphabetical list somewhere?

But now we've made subscribing to the masses really easy for them. It takes far less clicking, and now a far greater number of YouTubers with subscribers in the three digit range have an actual audience far smaller than their subscriber count. What's the point of subscribing if you don't ever want to watch?

I like when people have a smaller amount of people in their box, because, besides all of the negatives that I've mentioned thus far, I think it places more emphasis on the people named. I'm going to be decreasing the amount of people in my box, probably by the time you see this. Honestly, if I included all the guys on youtube that I love, it'd be at least 4 people longer. I mean, I didn't even include my YouTube crush(es) !:) (or did I? Ha. Whatever)
Also, there seems to be some drama inherent in the whole box thing, as ckXcore refers to it, MySpace Top-8-esque. If I'm NOT including some people that I love the most, I feel that no one can get upset. Right?

So, I'm not saying that however you do whatever you do is wrong, I'm just saying that I'm making some changes and I probably won't mention it in a video because I tend not to talk about my channel on my channel. It's how I do, not right or wrong, it is what it is.

Some people might stay in for longer, and there is reason for that.

You want a screen cap of my box before I changed it? Here ya go.

Wednesday, January 13, 2010

Umm BlogTV

I got a webcam and went on BlogTV tonight, just to check it out. A couple really patient friends came and hung out with me for a long time, and at some point, the discussion led to this.


I don't think the other picture is on the computer, I'll have to track it down the next time I'm at my mom's house (that's where I think it is).