Reader RESPONSES TO YOUTUBE EDITED BY GEERT LOVINK AND SABINE NIEDERER INC READER #4 R E The Video Vortex Reader is the first collection of critical texts to deal with R the rapidly emerging world of online video – from its explosive rise in 2005 with YouTube, to its future as a significant form of personal media. After years of talk about digital convergence and crossmedia platforms we now witness the merger of the Internet and television at a pace no-one predicted. These contributions from scholars, artists and curators evolved from the first SABINE NIEDE two Video Vortex conferences in Brussels and Amsterdam in 2007 which fo- AND cused on responses to YouTube, and address key issues around independent production and distribution of online video content. What does this new dis- tribution platform mean for artists and activists? What are the alternatives? T LOVINK Contributors: Tilman Baumgärtel, Jean Burgess, Dominick Chen, Sarah Cook, R Sean Cubitt, Stefaan Decostere, Thomas Elsaesser, David Garcia, Alexandra GEE Juhasz, Nelli Kambouri and Pavlos Hatzopoulos, Minke Kampman, Seth Keen, Sarah Késenne, Marsha Kinder, Patricia Lange, Elizabeth Losh, Geert Lovink, Andrew Lowenthal, Lev Manovich, Adrian Miles, Matthew Mitchem, Sabine DITED BY Niederer, Ana Peraica, Birgit Richard, Keith Sanborn, Florian Schneider, E Tom Sherman, Jan Simons, Thomas Thiel, Vera Tollmann, Andreas Treske, Peter Westenberg. Institute of Network Cultures, Amsterdam 2008 ISBN 978-90-78146-05-6 Reader 2 Reader RESPONSES TO YOUTUBE 3 Video Vortex Reader: Responses to YouTube Editors: Geert Lovink and Sabine Niederer Editorial Assistance: Marije van Eck and Margreet Riphagen Copy Editing: Darshana Jayemanne Design: Katja van Stiphout Cover image: Orpheu de Jong and Marco Sterk, Newsgroup Printer: Veenman Drukkers, Rotterdam Publisher: Institute of Network Cultures, Amsterdam 2008 Supported by: XS4ALL Nederland and the University of Applied Sciences, School of Design and Communication. ISBN: 978-90-78146-05-6 Contact Institute of Network Cultures phone: +3120 5951866 fax: +3120 5951840 email: [email protected] EDITED BY web: http://www.networkcultures.org GEERT LOVINK AND Order a copy of this book by sending an email to: SABINE NIEDERER INC READER #4 [email protected] A pdf of this publication can be downloaded freely at: http://www.networkcultures.org/publications Join the Video Vortex mailing list at: http://www.listcultures.org The Video Vortex conference was supported by: Mondriaan Foundation, Dutch Film Fund, Democracy and Media Foundation, Amsterdams Fonds voor de Kunst, RMIT University Australia, and the Institute of Interactive Media at the Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences. The Institute of Network Cultures organized the event in close collaboration with Argos Brussels and the Netherlands Media Art Institute in Amsterdam. Thanks to Emilie Randoe, director of the Institute of Interactive Media at the Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences, for supporting our research programme and activities. Thanks to Michael Jason Dieter for his help throughout the process of making this reader. A special thanks to all the authors, for their fantastic contributions and to Darshana Jayemanne for his careful copy-editing. This publication is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution Noncommercial No Derivative Works 2.5 Netherlands License. To view a copy of this license, visit: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.5/nl/deed.en. No article in this reader may be reproduced in any form by any electronic or mechanical means without permission in writing from the author. 4 Reader RESPONSES TO YOUTUBE 5 CONTENTS Geert Lovink The Art of Watching Databases: Introduction to the Video Vortex Reader 9 THEORY Thomas Elsaesser ‘Constructive Instability’, or: The Life of Things as the Cinema’s Afterlife? 13 Lev Manovich The Practice of Everyday (Media) Life 33 Sean Cubitt Codecs and Capability 45 Marsha Kinder The Conceptual Power of On-Line Video: 5 Easy Pieces 53 Dominick Chen Prochronist Manifestation 63 Sarah Késenne The INC reader series are derived from conference contributions and produced On Gig Flix 79 by the Institute of Network Cultures. They are available in print and pdf form. YOUTUBE STUDIES The Video Vortex Reader is the fourth publication in this series. Patricia Lange (Mis)Conceptions about YouTube 87 Previously published INC Readers: Jean Burgess INC Reader #3: Geert Lovink and Ned Rossiter (eds), ‘All Your Chocolate Rain Are Belong to Us’? 101 MyCreativity Reader: A Critique of Creative Industries, 2007. Elizabeth Losh This reader is a collection of critical research into the creative industries. The material Government YouTube 111 develops out of the MyCreativity convention on International Creative Industries Research Nelli Kambouri and Pavlos Hatzopoulos held in Amsterdam, November 2006. This two-day conference sought to bring the trends Making Violent Practices Public 125 and tendencies around the creative industries into critical question. Alexandra Juhasz Download a free pdf from www.networkcultures.org/mycreativity. Why Not (to) Teach on YouTube 133 INC Reader #2: Katrien Jacobs, Marije Janssen and Matteo Pasquinelli (eds), Birgit Richard C’LICK ME: A Netporn Studies Reader, 2007. Media Masters and Grassroots Art 2.0 on YouTube 141 This anthology collects the best material from two years of debate from ‘The Art and Minke Kampman Politics of Netporn’ 2005 conference to the 2007 ‘C’LICK ME’ festival. The C’LICK ME Flagging or Fagging: (Self-)Censorship of Gay Content on YouTube 153 reader opens the field of ‘internet pornology’, with contributions by academics, ART artists and activists. Tom Sherman Download a free pdf from www.networkcultures.org/netporn. Vernacular Video 161 INC Reader #1: Geert Lovink and Soenke Zehle (eds), Vera Tollmann YouTube Magic: Videos on the Net 169 Incommunicado Reader, 2005. The Incommunicado Reader brings together papers written for the June 2005 conference Sarah Cook ‘Incommunicado: Information Technology for Everybody Else’. The publication includes The Work of Art in the Age of Ubiquitous Narrowcasting? 173 a CD-ROM of interviews with speakers. Thomas Thiel Download a free pdf from www.networkcultures.org/incommunicado. Curator as Filter/ User as Curator 181 6 Reader RESPONSES TO YOUTUBE 7 Ana Peraica Chauvinist and Elitist Obstacles Around YouTube and Porntube 189 Keith Sanborn YouTube.world, or: Jeder Mann sein eigenes Avatar 195 Sabine Niederer The Future of Festivals: Interview with Arjon Dunnewind 203 Stefaan Decostere Far from Impact 207 TECHNOLOGY Andreas Treske Detailing and Pointing 215 Adrian Miles Programmatic Statements for a Facetted Videography 223 Seth Keen Videodefunct: Online Video is not Dead 231 Jan Simons Another Take on Tags? What Tags Tell 239 SOCIETY AND POLITICS Florian Schneider Imaginary Property: Frequently Asked Questions 255 Tilman Baumgärtel Media Piracy and Independent Cinema in Southeast Asia 259 Matthew Mitchem Video Social: Complex Parasitical Media 273 Peter Westenberg Affinity Video 283 David Garcia (Un)Real-Time Media: ‘Got Live if you Want It’ 293 Andrew Lowenthal ’ Pixelate or Perish 297 APPENDICES Video Vortex Conferences - Video Vortex I in Brussels 301 - Video Vortex II in Amsterdam 303 - Video Vortex III in Ankara 307 Author Biographies 309 8 Reader RESPONSES TO YOUTUBE 9 THE ART OF WATCHING DATABASES INTRODUCTION TO THE VIDEO VORTEX READER GEERT LOVINK Die Zeit: Do you concern yourself with new media and technology? Jean-Luc Godard: I try to keep up. But people make films on the Internet to show that they exist, not in order to look at things. If we’re all watching cats flushing toilets, what aren’t we reading? What great writer are we missing? What great story are we ignoring? This is societal, it’s cultural, I can’t change it. Like everybody else, I can burn an hour on YouTube or Perez Hilton without breaking a sweat. And what have I just not paid attention to that 10 years ago I would’ve just consumed? - Brian Williams This reader brings together recent critical research into the rapid-growing field of online video. Even though this technology was already there around 1997 with platforms such as RealVideo, it was only in 2006 that millions of users got familiar with the small video screens when YouTube reached a critical mass of short video clips. The video-sharing web- site YouTube, founded early 2005 as one of the many Web 2.0 start-ups, was sold to Google in late 2006. Soon after, the first students approached our Institute of Network Cultures with the request for titles of YouTube publications. We can have a laugh at such a naïve demand for instant theory, but the question seemed legitimate: is it possible to develop a critical theory of real-time developments? Can concepts be developed that go beyond the uncritical fan cul- ture, as promoted by Henry Jenkins, and question the corporate PR management rhetoric, without downplaying the creative-artistic and social-political use of online video? That’s what fascinated us when we initiated the Video Vortex project early 2007, resulting in a Brus- sels conference (October 2007), an exhibition in Amsterdam (Fall 2007, organized by The Netherlands Media Art Institute), and a two-day conference in Amsterdam (January 2008). The project is now about to travel the world and the seven seas, with Video Vortex 3 sched- uled in Ankara, Turkey, in October 2008. But before we turn global, it is good to present here the original ideas behind the event concept. The Database Turn We no longer watch films or TV; we watch databases. Instead of well-defined programmes, we search one list after another. We are no longer at the mercy of cranky reviewers and mono-cultural multiplexes. What we run up against is the limitations of our own mental capacity. Which search terms will yield the best fragments? What was that title again? Does anyone know that director’s name? What was that band called? What category was it under? 10 Reader RESPONSES TO YOUTUBE 11 Does he know someone else with interesting tastes? Was that reference blogged anywhere? running around the kitchen while the song plays in the background.