New Media M.A. Research Blog | Media Studies, University of Amsterdam

Copyright Infringements: Exploring Fair Use Policies on YouTube

Abstract Copyright infringement and fair use are critical issues for YouTube creators, especially ones who primarily work with content they do not own. This research investigates how copyright is understood and navigated by YouTube creators from the genre of...

By Marta Ceccarelli on 10/29/21 Comments Off

The Targeted Search for Screwing Around

Do you ever feel like there is just too much to read? Outsource the reading so you can watch someone's exasperated rant about an obscure rabbit hole you never would have heard about otherwise.

By on 10/04/21 Comments Off

Searching vs. Browsing on YouTube

Abstract: In Stephen Ramsay’s essay entitled “The Hermeneutics of Screwing Around; or What You Do with a Million Books” he expounds on the difference between searching and browsing when completing research while simultaneously arguing that browsing-only research can eventually...

By on 10/03/21 Comments Off

Deplatforming and the rise of the alt-tech video hosting platform BitChute in 2020.

Since YouTube is actively deplatforming creators whose content violates their community guidelines, these creators migrate to alternative platforms. Their harmful and hate speech filled content find a new home on the alt-tech platform BitChute. This essay explores the relationship...

By on 09/27/20 Comments Off

Cross media learning: from a book to an online tribe – Miracle Morning

How the book “Miracle Morning” can be the driver of a social movement on the web 2.0? Prosumers are combining traditional and new medias to foster innovative ways of learning. Welcome to our online tribe!

By on 09/22/19 Comments Off

Make-Up Metrics: The Downfall of the Beauty Community on Youtube?

Since its inception in 2005, YouTube has been host to an ever-expanding community of people looking to showcase their artistic and creative ideas on the platform. With over a billion hours of videos watched every day and with tools available...

By Erika Grimes on 09/23/18 Comments Off

IGTV: Instagram’s TV or Influencer’s TV?

On June 20, 2018, two major announcements were published on the Instagram Info Center. The first being that Instagram reached one billion users. The second was the launch of a new stand-alone application affiliated with Instagram: IGTV. IGTV:...

By Ouejdane Sabbah on 09/23/18 Comments Off

Is IGTV set to tilt our perception of online videos from horizontal to vertical?

IGTV is a new feature within the main Instagram app, as well as a new standalone app of its own, dedicated to the sharing of long-form vertical videos. What does this mean for online video-sharing platforms, like YouTube? Are...

By Lucas Prado Amaral on 09/23/18 Comments Off

A Streamlined Explanation: The Problem with Streaming Games on YouTube

Felix “PewDiePie” Kjellberg is one of the most popular video game streamers on YouTube with more than 57 million subscribers (Orland, 2017). Because of a racial slur uttered in one of his recent Let’s Play videos, PewDiePie faced a...

By Ayse B. Tosun on 10/25/17 Comments Off

Growing up on YouTube – How family vloggers are establishing their children’s digital footprints for them

The internet knows what you shared on Facebook last week. It sees what video you posted on YouTube. It even knows you’re reading this blog post right now. Every action you make online creates a trail of data or...

By Frederike Lichtenstein on 10/23/17 Comments Off

Is Vidme the ‘NewTube’? Why video creators are changing sides and how they feel about it

A few weeks ago on September 9, video platform Vidme’s own channel uploaded their weekly episode of ‘This Week @ Vidme’ titled ‘German INVASION’. The video refers to a sudden and significant increase of German led channels on Vidme:...

By Frederike Lichtenstein on 09/24/17 Comments Off

Advertiser-friendly vs. Youtuber-friendly: who does YouTube really care about?

In the Internet age, while some companies choose to be LGBT-friendly, eco-friendly or even vegan-friendly, YouTube is openly advertiser-friendly. The de facto standard video-hosting website of the western world has become a staple of our modern society – an...

By Pija Indriunaite on 09/20/16 Comments Off

UHD Format is Coming

The Seven Kingdoms Seven of the biggest IT companies are collaborating to createa new format for Ultra High Definition (UHD) video.This collaboration is called Alliance for Open Media and includes companies such as Google, Netflix and Microsoft. There’s also...

By Pepijn Bierhuizen on 09/14/15 Comments Off

YouTube | It’s gone 360º

YouTube – Home to viral sensations, talking cats, Charlie’s finger and not to mention irritating music videos – with some holding over two billion views! From its launch in May 2005, YouTube has developed, changed and re-formatted over...

By Max Cantellow on 09/14/15 Comments Off

Social Media and Sensitive Content

Since its inception, Twitter has considered itself a stalwart for free speech. It’s gotten them into some hot water in the past, including outcries over abusive Internet trolls, as well as the intricate balancing act of promoting open dialogue...

By Nora McLeese on 09/10/14 Comments Off

David Kraftsow, Justin Bieber, and the Evolution of Curatorial Practice

By: Maya Livio & Audrika Rakshit Brooklyn-based artist/programmer David Kraftsow creates works that re-contextualize and reinterpret popular culture. He is best known for his YooouuuTuuube project, an online platform that allows users to create psychedelic collages by breaking down YouTube videos into frame-by-frame grids....

By Maya Livio on 10/04/12 Comments Off

Mash-up trailers and YouTube: “birth” of a new media object

You have probably already seen them and maybe you have not even noticed them. Some people describe them as ‘trash’, as ‘gosh awful bad’, as ‘YouTube spam’, and others might describe them as ‘(amateur) art’. A more neutral way...

By Charly Landman on 09/13/12 2

The effect of new media in teaching music

A thirteen-year-old child walks into the music classroom and recommends the guitar teacher a song of an independent, French punk band. The teacher listens to the song on YouTube and concludes that it is a bit too fast. The...

By Jeroen Rademakers on 09/13/12 Comments Off

The Problem With Advertising-Driven Content

It’s been almost 20 years since the web made its grand entrance into the lives of average consumers. It was around that time the internet was also opened for business and companies started assessing it for its profitability. Initially...

By Richard Zimerman on 09/09/12 1

Gigapixel photography – a new vantage point

If you enjoy roaming the virtual streets of Google Maps’ Street View, take a deep breath and dive into the unique visual experience of “Gigapixel photography”. A gigapixel photograph is, mathematically speaking, an image that consists of one billion...

By Bozhan Chipev on 09/08/12 1

WappZapp; the revolution of interactive real-time television

The computational era we currently live in overwhelms us with the latest gadgetry, fidgets and means of communications. It is a tidal wave of new media micro-evolutions which we engulf ourselves in every day. Its innovational force moves so...

By Jeroen Rijskamp on 11/06/11 2

The end of television as we know it?

Will traditional television soon become obsolete? Probably not. But it does seem that corporate giant Google is making yet another move towards achieving this goal. As of last Friday it has been announced that YouTube (video-sharing website owned by...

By Laura Burlacu on 10/31/11 Comments Off

How do YouTube personalities change in response to fame

One social media website that has more or less gone under the radar since the 2008 Facebook boom is the now-classic YouTube. While social media research has recently focused its efforts predominantly on Facebook and Twitter, where personal identities...

By Laura Burlacu on 10/05/11 Comments Off

Social networks + SEO = Social SEO ?

Sometimes the results of a search on Google, Bing or Yahoo are not really satisfying. If you search for specific terms sometimes the search results are very limited. Often only the first three search results give usable information. The...

By Jesse Oyegbesan on 09/13/11 Comments Off