I still remember the first Youtube video I ever saw: The Evolution of Dance. In this video, a man performs a dance that consists of a medley of different styles and music. Fast forward to today, where there are millions of videos on the website, ranging from music performances, to pranks, to full length pirated films. In his 2007 blogpost “Nine Propositions Towards a Cultural Theory of Youtube,” Henry Jenkins discusses nine ideas surrounding the popular website Youtube. Jenkins is a distinguished scholar and author in the field of communication and media. The idea that I will be addressing is that “YouTube’s value depends heavily upon its deployment via other social networking sites.” When the site was still gaining popularity, the way that people viewed its content was by physically logging onto the site. Today, however, we can embed videos and share them through Facebook, Myspace, e-mail, blogs, and much more. As Jenkins writes, this takes us away from “stickiness,” in which the success of a website depends on how many people actually visit it, and takes us toward a more spreadable internet.

It is because of this new spreadability that the most famous Youtube videos have become so successful. It is quite likely that without Facebook and other social networking sites, many of these videos would not have gained so many views. This year, the video Why I Hate Religion But Love Jesus made its way around Facebook and Twitter. Without knowing to search for it specifically on Youtube, the video is almost impossible to just stumble upon while browsing the site. In fact, in my opinion, Youtube is not a very browse-friendly site. We owe a lot to Youtube. It helps us to learn how to do things, it helps us beat boredom, and for some of us it serves as a stage for us to voice our opinions. Thanks to social media, a silly little fight on the MUNI has turned into a web sensation, and, of course, given us the BIEBS.