Remixing YouTube

When we talk about remix culture, we often talk about how remixes are created and shared, but we rarely talk about the media platforms upon which these remixes are produced and distributed. Programs such as Garageband, Final Cut Studio and Photoshop, as well as websites like MySpace, YouTube and Flickr allow users to create and share their remixes, yet we hardly ever consider the media we use to do so. You can go to a website like YouTube, which encourages users to create, upload, share and explore content, and see millions of instances of remixes. Although professionals also use YouTube to promote and share content, the majority of videos on YouTube are user-generated, from videos like stalking cat and David After Dentist, to Double Rainbow and Chat Roulette Piano Improv, most of the videos on YouTube are created and uploaded by everyday users. YouTube now hosts millions of user-generated videos, creating a network of content that I would argue constitutes a remix, because it brings content together in unexpected ways and allows users to make new and unintended connections between videos.

One YouTube user, kutiman, has made this remix more visible by actually remixing together user-generated music videos that he has come across on YouTube. His remix illustrates the variety of videos created by users and how we put them together in a cohesive narrative when we watch video after video on YouTube.



The website Yooouuutuuube.com also provides a remix of YouTube, but instead of remixing content, it remixes the website itself. You can go to http://yooouuutuuube.com/ and insert in any YouTube video URL, which allows you to manipulate the video by moving your mouse as you watch it.

I decided to remix Justin Bieber's "Baby" music video, which looked a little something like the picture to the right.

Yooouuutuuube.com allows users to interact with videos and YouTube as a media platform in new ways, creating a useful and valuable remix of YouTube, a popular platform used to produce and distribute different forms of remix.