No offense to Kodak (they were a sponsor), but I do think the term “a Kodak moment” is lost on this generation. So Kiddsock, the affable sock puppet, suggests “a YouTube moment.” That seems like a fair enough phrase… since YouTube probably has better name recognition than any camera manufacturer, and stands for amateur moments. It can also have broad application, even if most will think of… this than this.
Kiddsock also provides a nice perspective of YouTube’s community, which is lost on most. I’ve been using the “community” loosely to refer to maybe 20-100K people who really live and breath it (rather than narrowly referring to those who repeatedly attend physical gatherings, which is a small subsegment).
Here’s what would meet my definition as a member of the YouTube Community… they’d need to at least have the majority of these habits/abilities. Thoughts/revisions? Challenges welcome.
- They can name at least 10-30 video creators.
- They make videos, or comment at least 1 in 20 times.
- They watch at least 3-10 videos daily on average. Anything less and it’s just a grazer.
- They’re aware that YouTube people meetup.
- They could tell you what a “collab” means.
- They are frustrated when people refer to YouTube as simply a place for cat videos.
- They send more links than they receive.
- They’ve had a dream about someone they watch on YouTube.
- The reflexively visit YouTube to see what’s up.
- They feel some emotion if there’s a YouTube “drama.”
- They are nagged by someone for being a bit over invested in YouTube.
What’s your guess? Typically communities are much smaller, but when we use “YouTube community” we’re speaking broadly about the collective sub-communities (Shaytards, MythicalBeasts, Nerdfighters, and even Sock Heads). How many are there, and is it stretching the word “community” to speak about a large number like this?
I just think your ausome! You should make some more videos on youtube
I consider myself to be the town drunk of the community!
“the town drunk”? I’ve always thought of you as the “toothless fairy”. Nah, just messy with you.
People like you are the glue that makes this community happen.
I consider myself a community member, and have actually made a video in regards to the “community”. It was basically a video response to Urgo ” If I remember correctly”.
I really feel like the Community is dying off, but what does a small partner on YouTube like me know?
In your list of habits/abilities I found the bullet “They’ve had a dream about someone they watch on YouTube” very eye opening. I’ve had Dreams of youtubers before, and I find it very strange you would bring this up. Tell me Nalts, honestly who did you ever dream about?
I think watching YouTube videos and relating with so many different people really effects our brains. I don’t know about you guys, but I find myself telling my personal family or friends about these people, and they have no clue who i’m talking about. I know they are standing there just appeasing me, but in some awkward way I feel like i’m sharing much more.
I don’t know if you’ve ever heard of stephenpaultaylor of youtube, but I watched some of his daily vlog stuff one day and had a horrible dream about him being killed by Nazi soldiers, but after thinking about why this might of happened, I realized in his vlog he was ruffed up by some asshole skinheads.
Ok, I’m rambling and I will stop my very poor writing.
Sock-head for life!!
-Ace
p.s. are you going to be in Chicago on Thursday?
Thank you so much. Even with what happened last year, It still feels good to be able to share and watch so much on YouTube.
Thank you Uncle Nalts.
Sock you already know how I feel about ya…. Don’t worry dude everything’s gonna be alright!
When I first discovered you on youtube, I dreamed about you incessantly for more than a year. It was a very dark time in my life. I required psychiatric care and had to be heavily medicated. And carted around in one of those things they used for hannibal lecter.
I think in order to be a real youtuber you’ve had to have made a video or gone to the forum and complain about youtube.
so here I go: It’s a shame you tube doesn’t have something in the profile settings that allows users to list what your channel is about that connects directly to an index with a list of categories.
IOW – separate from your channel on Youtube’s front page is a link to a master list of all the users who agree to submit their channel that will provide information people could browse through.
I.E.
Genre: list of categories (click)
Topics: List of categories (click)
List: A-Z
Channel Name: A-Z
So you would click on say:
Genre: Vlogers (list of vlogers)
Topic: Politics (list of types of politics)
Add a search feature:
Subcategories: International, US, Local
Ages: adult
click on any subcatagory and a list of channels will pop up
this is all text based
You could Mouse over the channel name to see a little blurb about that person’s style.
Genre: LOL
Topic: Slapstick
Subcategories: farts, boob, damaged genitalia
Ages: 14 up
[mouse over (144 characters)] me and ma homies are crakin’ it up /w stuff that makes you silly LOL
Genre: Pets
Topic: Cats
Subcategories: furry, bald, kittens, ally
Ages: All
[mouse over] I raise and love calico and hairless cats
Genre: Variety
Topic: Various
Subcategories: cats, LOL, photography, colonics, vloging
Ages: 14 Up
[mouse over] life in general
How hard can this be?
the users will fill out the form all youtube has to do is provide a data base for it to fall into – they can also limited the topics and subcategories so no one uses inappropriate language.
something like this would do wonders for the community, bring a more human aspect rather than, it’s all about the money. Which would probably generate more income in the end. Word of mouth works wonder, but something like this could encourage others to make more videos even better videos and it would also allow the top users to bring new and interesting people to light.
I’d rather go and browse though categories then be spammed by sub4sub and hit and miss, cause that’s the only way you’ll get any viewers unless you’re lucky enough to get noticed or mentioned by a popular users.
It’s a proposal –
yes, no, maybe so?
We complain because we care. That’s why with Cosmic Panda, we need to Click on those Feedback Links and let YouTube know what we think.
Little Timmy:
I wish everything was going to be ok.