YouTube - the online Mecca for the "proteurs"

Along with the large increase in the accessibility of the Internet, the rapid growth of on-line communities and internet-related technologies has provided a new platform for the public to “self-produce”. With a bit of technical skills, people in this day can actually broadcast or distribute their own media texts through the Internet without putting tons of money. The public is no longer the passive audience of mass-media but has become a part of mass-media as “proteurs” who can instantaneously affect the real world, and YouTube is there for everyone. The online video file sharing in YouTube enables the web users to interact and enjoy together. I personally leant how to read guitar tabs from YouTube. I even watch some of my favorite foreign weekly TV programs on YouTube. But what’s more amazing with YouTube is that its high buffering speed with versatility works as a tool for the web users in a way of expressing their desires or talents in audio-visual texts. Since my purchase of a digital cam, I have started to upload my personal videos that I make with a video-editing tool called Sony Vegas on YouTube to share good memories with my friends and other YouTubers. Further more, it seems that YouTube has already established a new cultural trend, which can act so fast and strong among a vast number of people. Its social impact is so huge that the popularity of YouTube has led to create many internet celebrities such as Bree the “lonely girl” (although later revealed the video series were all fictional). The band OK GO has hugely benefited from You Tube for their 2007 Grammy Award winning music video “Here It Goes Again” which was highly praised for its innovative use of ‘running-machines’ as prop.
There are still many issues are going on about YouTube including its copyright infringements, and, as far as I am concerned, it is true the works done by proteurs may lower the quality of online media text and could result in false reality. However, one could say that YouTube has already gained its status of a new sub-genre of media itself allowing many proteurs to be formed.