How does your small-scale work respond to your characteristics of online screen making?

The main characteristics of online media creation we were responding to with our YouTube playlist were the aspects of collaboration, as well as the modularity of new media, as outlined by Lev Manovich.

Online content creation opens up a lot of new avenues of collaboration, as we are no longer limited to physically being in the same place and time as our collaborators to create a piece of work, but can even operate from different countries with people we haven’t met.

By using the platform of YouTube playlists, our project allows anyone who stumbles upon our video from either our blogs, the individual videos or the playlist itself to collaborate with it and contribute their own ideas into the content, becoming a part of it in the process. This is a really powerful thing I believe as the most powerful element of the internet and creating content for the internet is the democratisation of the platform, where the viewer can so easily become a contributor, becoming on the same level as the original creator.

We also wanted to appeal to other media creators on the internet, and what inspires them, and explore what means to a vast array of people, not just people that we know and are in contact with, touching on this idea of experiences and how people from drastically different walks of life can be inspired by the music we had chosen and create something truly unique and wonderful.

The other main characteristic was this idea of modularity, which was something we focused a lot on with the conception of our ideas, and I believe is the crucial element that differentiates online content from more traditional, linear content. The idea of the YouTube playlist being a hub for the content means that while it is the central platform, all of the videos within it are seperate and can be viewed outside of the realm of the playlist and be understood. It was also important for us to repeat the criteria in each individual segment, in the playlist description, the seperate video descriptions, and in the blog post, so that the crucial information needed for the project can be found no matter how you get to it.

The main piece of information I took away from this process was this idea of modularity, of fragments within a whole that in itself are also a whole, as it is a concept that can only really be applied to online screen creations, and thinking critically about this concept is how we eventually came to this collaborative playlist idea, and is something I intend to explore deep into the future.

What did you learn about online screen characteristics and platforms through conducting your test?

The most surprising thing I learnt while making this project is really the lack of creativity and innovation around YouTube playlists, especially considering the size and influence of the site, as well as the amount of innovative media practitioners within YouTube, like Casey Neistat. It was such an easy process to set up this collaborative playlist which was another element that surprised me with why it is so rarely seen, as basically anyone can set one up, and the possibilities of the platform are endless.

How does this making expand upon what you learnt through your development posts?

The process of conceiving ideas in a relatively new medium like online screen production was really invigorating, and it is definitely the first time I had invested a lot more time into the platform and ideas of a project than of the actual content inside it. I know however that with larger projects this thinking needs to be more balanced, coming back to this idea of making meaningful content on the internet, which comes from not just having an interesting or innovative idea, but also to have content within that idea worth viewing, which, is actually an idea that I will think about in all forms of content creation, not just in the online space.

What questions remain for you in terms of thinking about and making online screen works?

The question I think we explored with the development of our project was what does it mean to truly make online media, and what is just traditional media being displayed within an online platform. We explored this in our original idea and it ultimately defeated us, but it is an idea that has still stuck with me, as I am still quite a traditionalist in terms of the media I consume, and so I am curious to find a way to successfully toe the line between these two worlds, while still successfully being able to inhabit both of them.

 

“Follow effective action with quiet reflection. From the quiet reflection will come even more effective action” – Peter Drucker.