Youtube videos are the perfect examples of the artist as a curator of culture. I’m sure some of you won’t agree with me, but hear me out.
Youtube preserves our culture because today our culture is ruled by technology. There’s no escaping it. Everyone says the Internet has radically changed our life and society, and since I’m not old enough to remember what it was like beforehand, I have to believe them. Besides, I can’t imagine life without it, which just shows how dependent and how important it is to our culture. I doubt any of you can imagine life without it, either.
Aside from the Internet, our culture is very much about freedom, individuality and self-expression. For example, Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, etc. are all about documenting and following an individual’s life. If you sat there and stalked someone’s facebook (as I’m sure we’ve all done), looked through all their pictures and videos, read their wallposts, etc., you would have a very clear picture of the type of person they are, who their friends are, and about their lives.
What better way to combine all four things (freedom, individuality, self-expression and Internet/technology) than through Youtube videos?
Youtube videos in general preserve ideas of our culture because of the four combined elements listed above. There are virtually no restrictions- anyone with a video camera can upload a video, and it can be about whatever they choose.
Since anyone is free to upload a video, youtube videos are so diverse. Anyone of any race, nationality, religion, citizenship, ect. can post a video, and everyone has an equal opportunity in representing themselves on the Internet. In this way many different cultural communities can be conserved- religious ones, racial ones, geographical ones, common interest ones, or any other you can think of.
If that wasn’t enough to convince you, think of the youtube videos that people post. They can post videos of whatever they want, and many people post videos of their daily lives- playing with their dog, showing off their baby, fooling around with friends, vlogging, etc. They can also post videos discussing their opinion or views on certain issues in the news and media or life in general. These youtube videos are similar to Facebook and other social media in that it documents parts of their lives and personalities, and puts it on the Internet for the public to view.
In that way they can be considered artists- a while back in class we spoke about how the artist puts themselves into their work and put themselves out there and make themselves vulnerable when making their work public. The same is true for youtube videos- when you post a youtube video, you make yourself vulnerable to the comments and judgments of others.
It’s not at all uncommon to see comments on youtube videos saying nasty comments like, “This sucks. Kill yourself,” or something along those lines. And getting negative comments can be hurtful which is why the artist as well as the vlogger make themselves vulnerable to criticism and rejection when publicizing their work.
All of the youtube videos together contribute to conserving our culture by representing the individual people who make up the population. When looked at together as a cohesive unit, it is a truthful representation of the population and culture that is present today, at this moment.
