Sharayah Le Leux--
YouTube has come a long way since its start in 2005. YouTube is no longer just a website to host videos, but rather acts as a social networking site bringing people across the world closer together.
Users in Idaho can now interact and even make collaborative videos with another user in Australia. Users can upload videos about their daily lives, opinions, music, and anything they can possible come up with, but it does not stop there.
In more ways than one, YouTube has brought people together. Well-known YouTubers, such as the vlogbrothers, Hank and John Green, have established a community within a community known as NerdFighteria.
“NerdFighter is basically just the community that sprung up around our videos and basically we just try to get together and try to do awesome things and have a good time and fight against world suck.” Hank Green said in the video, “How To Be A Nerdfigher: A Vlogbrothers FAQ.” The Green brothers lead their community into making the world more awesome with their key acronym DFTBA (Don’t Forget To Be Awesome).
The Green brothers however, established their channel as a project between themselves. In January of 2007 they planned to go 365 days with textless communication between one another, and only post video blogs or, vlogs, to each other every weekday. If a Green brother failed to post a video on a weekday that brother would have to complete an outlined punishment. This brought Nerdfighteria to life as more and more people began watching. However, the Green brothers did not stop there, they continued vlogging, and this finally led to the idea of VidCon.
The idea of having ‘a real-life online video conference’ was discussed between the Green brothers in hopes to get the best in online video creating and their communities in one place. This became a reality in Dec. 2009, when Hank announced VidCon 2010 on their vlogbrothers channel.
The dates were announced for June 9 – 11 at the Hyatt Hotel in Los Angeles, Calif., and the hype began to circulate around VidCon. Youtubers everywhere started saving up and finding ways to get to LA to meet friends and famous YouTubers such as Shaycarl, CharlesTrippy, iJustine, and ShaneDawsonTV. Over the course of the months leading up to VidCon the tickets did sell out.
Around 1,500 video creators, musicians, and fans showed up on June 9, for VidCon. The weekend consisted of presentations of upcoming updates for the website from employees from YouTube, performances by YouTube musicians, Question and Answers with YouTubers, YouTuber Panels, Meet-Ups, time to play in the various Ball Pits, Dance Parties, and seminars for information on different aspects of YouTube.
Other nonscheduled events happened as well, such as a viewing of the World Cup with commentary from John Green and Tom Milsom, hexachordal and book and merchandise signings.
The communities on YouTube are growing fast, and it has made nothing, but improvements to help YouTubers get their content out there. The website is currently working on making YouTube accessible on TV, as well as improving the Partnership Program to invest more into creators, uploaders, and partners.
According to YouTube’s blog, “YouTube Partner Grants program that will invest five million dollars across select new and emerging YouTube partners.” They also want to improve the video and annotation features to have better quality.
YouTube is building virtual bridges that can connect the world. It is an opportunity to learn from about places and people that you ordinarily could not.
Users all over the world are watching videos and making videos in regards to someone they have never met, never seen, or talked to.
YouTube is much more than another social networking site. It is a place to make friends and together create something beautiful.
