Autor/es
Descripción
ver mas
Colaborador
Zukerfeld, Mariano
Materias
Idioma
spa
Extent
266 p.
Derechos
info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess
Atribución-NoComercial-SinDerivadas 2.0 Genérica (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
Formato
application/pdf
Identificador
Abstract
In recent years, audiovisual content producers from the most popular video platform worldwide -YouTube-, also known as “Youtubers”, have become relevant. This relevance is attributed to their ability to mobilize a large number of followers (or fans) and capture attention flows that are capitalized on by the company to generate profits. This growth has been accompanied by the spread of a rhetoric of professionalization (and profit maximization) of producers’ channels on YouTube and the establishment of a series of norms and conditions to regulate their activity. These changes have not only generated income sources for produces (the “YouTube Creators”) but also altered their experience of and representations about their activity, in which considering it as a hobby transformed into recognizing it as a job. However, in certain regions of the world, this phenomenon has not received enough attention in the scholarly. In Argentina, in particular, there are no empirical studies analyzing the representation held that stem from the production of audiovisual content for YouTube.
The aim of this thesis is to analyze how productive activities taking place on YouTube are represented by content producers, followers and the video platform. This analysis is structured around five dimensions: work, education, creativity, values and relations. Work refers to the content production on YouTube understood as work or labour, considering how it is defined by the actors, the time and money invested, the existence of remunerations, possible conflicts in profiting from leisure activities, and the characterization of producers as “entrepreneurs”. Education (or, training) covers the necessary knowledge and specific education (formal, non-formal and informal) required to produce videos for YouTube. Creativity refers to the way this idea is defined and applied by the platform, its users and content producers. Values inquiries into the existence of a rhetoric favorable to hedonism in the interviewees’ and YouTube discourse, the recognition expected by the producers, and the idea of the platform as a space for professional development. Finally, relations draws on
the relationships these actors establish between them, based on: their perception as a group, collaboration with others, participation in collective actions, and the construction of the notion “community” in YouTube discourse.
The methodological strategy combines a quantitative and qualitative approach, which builds on an analysis of primary and secondary sources for each of the actors and dimensions described above. Data collection relied on directed interviews with producers and followers, as well as a review of YouTube’s documents from the “Creators” section. In sum, 35 interviews with producers and 38 interviews with followers were conducted via the Limesurvey online platform. Additionally, we performed non-participant observation in YouTube and producers’ channels. Finally, we utilized other secondary sources (personal pages and other participants’ social networks, YouTube statistical sites, press releases,
among others) to gather relevant information for the analysis.
Findings suggest that producers and followers experience and conceive the activity that take place on YouTube in different ways. The platform discourses, as well, builds on a specific way in which this activity is understood and reproduced. To a significant extent, this activity is represented as work, even though is not always understood as such. Thus, this conceptualization is tied, first, to earning money from channel management, and second, to the time and effort invested. Moreover, the discourses about what it means to be creative on YouTube, pleasure, desire, fun, or authenticity, among others words that shape this rhetoric, is employed strategically by the platform and reproduced rather uncritically by many of the interviewees in the definition of their activity. This suggests that the commercial
strategies deployed by YouTube align well with the rationale of economic appropriation. Indeed, in correspondence with the entrepreneurial rhetoric, actors justify working long hours, taking care of all the tasks that producing content for YouTube entails, as well as precarious working conditions (with no contract, tied to their productivity levels, without any liability on behalf of YT, etc.) in terms of carrying out an activity in which they feel rewarded, having fun, and getting to do what they like.
The aim of this thesis is to analyze how productive activities taking place on YouTube are represented by content producers, followers and the video platform. This analysis is structured around five dimensions: work, education, creativity, values and relations. Work refers to the content production on YouTube understood as work or labour, considering how it is defined by the actors, the time and money invested, the existence of remunerations, possible conflicts in profiting from leisure activities, and the characterization of producers as “entrepreneurs”. Education (or, training) covers the necessary knowledge and specific education (formal, non-formal and informal) required to produce videos for YouTube. Creativity refers to the way this idea is defined and applied by the platform, its users and content producers. Values inquiries into the existence of a rhetoric favorable to hedonism in the interviewees’ and YouTube discourse, the recognition expected by the producers, and the idea of the platform as a space for professional development. Finally, relations draws on
the relationships these actors establish between them, based on: their perception as a group, collaboration with others, participation in collective actions, and the construction of the notion “community” in YouTube discourse.
The methodological strategy combines a quantitative and qualitative approach, which builds on an analysis of primary and secondary sources for each of the actors and dimensions described above. Data collection relied on directed interviews with producers and followers, as well as a review of YouTube’s documents from the “Creators” section. In sum, 35 interviews with producers and 38 interviews with followers were conducted via the Limesurvey online platform. Additionally, we performed non-participant observation in YouTube and producers’ channels. Finally, we utilized other secondary sources (personal pages and other participants’ social networks, YouTube statistical sites, press releases,
among others) to gather relevant information for the analysis.
Findings suggest that producers and followers experience and conceive the activity that take place on YouTube in different ways. The platform discourses, as well, builds on a specific way in which this activity is understood and reproduced. To a significant extent, this activity is represented as work, even though is not always understood as such. Thus, this conceptualization is tied, first, to earning money from channel management, and second, to the time and effort invested. Moreover, the discourses about what it means to be creative on YouTube, pleasure, desire, fun, or authenticity, among others words that shape this rhetoric, is employed strategically by the platform and reproduced rather uncritically by many of the interviewees in the definition of their activity. This suggests that the commercial
strategies deployed by YouTube align well with the rationale of economic appropriation. Indeed, in correspondence with the entrepreneurial rhetoric, actors justify working long hours, taking care of all the tasks that producing content for YouTube entails, as well as precarious working conditions (with no contract, tied to their productivity levels, without any liability on behalf of YT, etc.) in terms of carrying out an activity in which they feel rewarded, having fun, and getting to do what they like.
Título obtenido
Doctora de la Universidad de Buenos Aires en Ciencias Sociales
Institución otorgante
Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Sociales