Starting Point: YouTube search for “New Haven Step team”
Why: I read that a New Haven youth step team has won its national championship two years in a row.
Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to find videos of the local team, so modified my search to “step team” just to find a cool video instead. Many results came up, and all with generic titles, so I randomly clicked on one that mentioned Howard University, expecting a college performance to be higher quality than high school or middle school performances.
I wasn’t disappointed with my choice. These girls have insane energy.
[youtube]http://youtu.be/2DZvRptZZB4?t=44s[/youtube]
Which got me in the mood for some more music videos. A friend recently recommended the electronic band Purity Ring so I searched for them, clicking on the first YouTube result. (It wasn’t the most viewed video, nor the most recent, but it’s just easy to click on top results.)
[youtube]http://youtu.be/Xqw4wo8vdY8[/youtube]
The video didn’t appeal much to me, and I paused within a minute, but the two top comments caught my eye. They both spoke about frustration at other YouTube users whining about the video gaining so much popularity so quickly. Apparently Purity Ring used to be a niche band with a devoted following, and as is the case with many bands gaining popularity, the initial core fanbase felt swindled (i.e. “You’re not a real fan. I was there in the beginning.”)
Those feelings mean little to me in this scenario, but I wondered how video view counts affect a user’s perception of a video. Stumbling upon a great video with less than 1,000 view makes me feel cool for discovering something rare. Finding something great with 80,000,000 views makes me feel behind the curve.
I concluded with a simple music video to combat the melodrama of Purity Ring’s Fineshrine — Putty Boy Strut by Flying Lotus. The video doesn’t try to tell a grand story or be anything other than a YouTube video, which is exactly why I love it: a visual accompaniment instead of overambitious narrative.
[youtube]http://youtu.be/SuQGfk9Gmgo[/youtube]