YouTube: Online Video and Participatory Culture

Until someone writes the book, it sometimes does not occur to the rest of us that some small aspect of a broad topic is worthy of academic research. Jean Burgess and Joshua Green are to be commended for seeing the opportunity presented by YouTube. Considering how late in time it has emerged, there is already a substantial body of literature covering social media in general, and YouTube in particular. Much of this is focused on its instrumentality, typically exploring the implications of the specific purpose to which it has been put, or else offering a prescription for maximising the utility value of the medium. Relatively few, if any, explore YouTube as a socio‐technical phenomenon in its own right. Burgess and Green canvass a range of perspectives including comparisons between YouTube and the mainstream media, its role in popular culture, in social networks, and cultural politics; and they also discuss what they regard as its uncertain future.

Particularly interesting is the chapter on the swirling chaotic cultural politics that are associated with YouTube. While trying not to sit in judgement on the participants, the authors nevertheless refer to the ‘“haters' – negative and often personally offensive commenters” and note the outbreaks of flame wars, reminiscent to this reviewer of the worst excesses of the now almost moribund Usenet communities.

A valuable feature of this book is its ability to make the reader look at the YouTube phenomenon from previously unexplored perspectives. An example of this is the potential for YouTube to become a significant repository of ‘contemporary global popular culture’. Of course, for this be true, YouTube must either continue to exist, or else it must be archived in some way.

Diversity is a recurring theme in this book. This is manifest in YouTube's many user communities and the uses they make of it. The authors make the point that YouTube is an enabler of encounters with cultural difference, and they go on to suggest that it might encourage “political listening” across belief systems and identities. To others it may seem that the number of listeners is far exceeded by the number of talkers, many of who are too busy preparing their next post to care whether anyone viewed their last one.

This book provides a valuable service in provoking a thoughtful scrutiny of a facility that has more dimensions than may at first appear. It should have appeal to scholars and to anyone interested in dimensions of popular culture.