Brad Rourke

Why Does YouTube Have Comments?

YouTube has, no question, revolutionized the way we interact online. It opened the door for video sharing and now when something new is going on in our lives, one of our first questions is: “Should I take a photo or a video?” It’s also a great avenue for getting ideas out there — the solo talk into the camera.

Yes, it’s a critical component of the new social media world, the world of user-generated content such as blog posts, photos, videos, podcasts, shared slideshows, and comments.

So why is YouTube’s comment system so broken and lame?

It’s actually not the system so much as it is the content of the comments. Anytime I post a video that has more than a handful of viewers, I get comments. Three out of four are off-topic, weird, or just plain mean.

In fact, this article was spurred by my most recent comment: “You got that earring on the wrong side.” Seriously? My earring is on the wrong side? Are we still in the 80’s?

But I digress. This got me thinking — why are YouTube comments so reliably poor, while in so many other avenues the comments are helpful and become part of the value of the original item?

I think it has to do with our mindset when we are consuming video.

I think that, when we are watching video, we are not in a good frame of mind to write and interact in text. We’re in a frame of mind to critique (either positive or negative) and the things that move us emotionally to make such comments are typically elements of the video that have little to do with the intent of the producer.

For instance, I may be watching a video and intending to stick all the way through. But there is something about the lighting that makes it almost invisible, or the sound is terrible, or the camera angle makes the speaker look hilarious. It bugs me. I want to vent.

So I leave a comment: “Yr lighting sux.”

I am not saying every comment I get on YouTube is unhelpful, just that the difference between YouTube comments and every other avenue where I allow comments is palpable. Maybe something else accounts for it.

What do you think?

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11 responses to “Why Does YouTube Have Comments?”

  1. Matthew Taylor

    Brad,

    I read an article today that touched on this theme, and I thought you’d find this paragraph interesting:
    “The comments on the clip’s YouTube page soon swamped my inbox…. Direct messages to me rolled in as well…. The responses were angry, expletive-laced, occasionally violent, and paranoid to the core. They were nasty even for YouTube, where commenters are notoriously unrestrained.”
    Its from here: http://www.slate.com/id/2297683/ 

  2. Tominer

    Depending on the video, I set the preferences so I approve the comments first – for the reasons you outlined.

  3. Tominer

    Depending on the video, I set the preferences so I approve the comments first – for the reasons you outlined.

  4. Angelique

    I think it’s funny that your videos attract people who care deeply about the location of your earring. I never would have guessed that. I suppose I can’t make too much fun of them, because I have never even NOTICED that you have an earring, which means they are watching more carefully that I am.

    Anyway, I see a huge difference in the quality of comments attached to belly-dance videos, horse videos, music videos, product review videos and videos of people behaving in a wacky manner.

    Belly-dance video comments are generally positive, with phrases like “I love this drum solo!” and “I took a workshop with her, she’s great!” and “Love that music; what is it?” The comments are often badly-spelled or filled with text-speak, but they are still on-point, and sometimes end up in conversations.

    I have NEVER seen a negative comment on a horse video.

    Alex is a huge user of product-review videos, so I’ve seen a lot of them lately. Comments are generally written clearly and have to do with the product itself, not the video production. Even if people have negative things to say about the product, I don’t remember seeing anything that was off-the-deep-end nasty. It’s mostly things like, “I think this product is a waste of money.”

    Music video comments can get into nasty-land, with commenters insulting each other.

    Wacky-people videos bring out the worst in people. You can get entire discussions about things like disciplining children and the mental health care system. Unfortunately these are not productive discussions because everyone seems to start in full attack mode and get angrier from there.

  5. Angelique

    I think it’s funny that your videos attract people who care deeply about the location of your earring. I never would have guessed that. I suppose I can’t make too much fun of them, because I have never even NOTICED that you have an earring, which means they are watching more carefully that I am.

    Anyway, I see a huge difference in the quality of comments attached to belly-dance videos, horse videos, music videos, product review videos and videos of people behaving in a wacky manner.

    Belly-dance video comments are generally positive, with phrases like “I love this drum solo!” and “I took a workshop with her, she’s great!” and “Love that music; what is it?” The comments are often badly-spelled or filled with text-speak, but they are still on-point, and sometimes end up in conversations.

    I have NEVER seen a negative comment on a horse video.

    Alex is a huge user of product-review videos, so I’ve seen a lot of them lately. Comments are generally written clearly and have to do with the product itself, not the video production. Even if people have negative things to say about the product, I don’t remember seeing anything that was off-the-deep-end nasty. It’s mostly things like, “I think this product is a waste of money.”

    Music video comments can get into nasty-land, with commenters insulting each other.

    Wacky-people videos bring out the worst in people. You can get entire discussions about things like disciplining children and the mental health care system. Unfortunately these are not productive discussions because everyone seems to start in full attack mode and get angrier from there.

  6. Brad Rourke

    Sutton, thanks, those are very helpful comments (the irony of saying this is not lost on me). Yes, I do recognize that there is idiocy and vitriol rampant throughout CNN / most daily news outlets where anonymous posting is allowed. Maybe that’s the problem, and not the whole video thing I am positing.

    (On your second thought, yes I think you hit the nail on the head. And I don’t think it is relegated to only Internet denizens. People instinctively know when something “isn’t right” when it comes to production values and if production values are out of sync with the norm of a medium, woe betide the maker.

  7. Brad Rourke

    Sutton, thanks, those are very helpful comments (the irony of saying this is not lost on me). Yes, I do recognize that there is idiocy and vitriol rampant throughout CNN / most daily news outlets where anonymous posting is allowed. Maybe that’s the problem, and not the whole video thing I am positing.

    (On your second thought, yes I think you hit the nail on the head. And I don’t think it is relegated to only Internet denizens. People instinctively know when something “isn’t right” when it comes to production values and if production values are out of sync with the norm of a medium, woe betide the maker.

  8. sutton

    Actually, here’s another, somewhat unrelated thought: as denizens of the media/digital age, I think a lot of us have very strong, instinctively applied standards about media products. For example, when listening to my local NPR station, I sometimes have to control the impulse to turn it off when it switches to the local, more “amateurish” programming, because it doesn’t “sound right,” and therefore causes some subconscious part of me to doubt its credibility/the intelligence of the people who produced it, etc. If the same example doesn’t exist where you are, think of when you’ve been traveling and seen, say, the local TV news. The relative lack of smoothness, compared to the national anchors, the poorer production values, the fact that the anchors aren’t as handsome and pretty (more accurately, they just don’t “look right”)–it all makes one cringe on their behalf, doesn’t it? Along the same lines, maybe any slightest flaw in a YouTube video, even resulting simply from the level of equipment being used, may hit some people the same way. Then, that subset of them that are vicious morons lash out, operating at essentially the same level as those birds who will allegedly peck to death a fellow species member if a scientist ties a ribbon to its leg or otherwise makes it look “different”….

  9. sutton

    Actually, here’s another, somewhat unrelated thought: as denizens of the media/digital age, I think a lot of us have very strong, instinctively applied standards about media products. For example, when listening to my local NPR station, I sometimes have to control the impulse to turn it off when it switches to the local, more “amateurish” programming, because it doesn’t “sound right,” and therefore causes some subconscious part of me to doubt its credibility/the intelligence of the people who produced it, etc. If the same example doesn’t exist where you are, think of when you’ve been traveling and seen, say, the local TV news. The relative lack of smoothness, compared to the national anchors, the poorer production values, the fact that the anchors aren’t as handsome and pretty (more accurately, they just don’t “look right”)–it all makes one cringe on their behalf, doesn’t it? Along the same lines, maybe any slightest flaw in a YouTube video, even resulting simply from the level of equipment being used, may hit some people the same way. Then, that subset of them that are vicious morons lash out, operating at essentially the same level as those birds who will allegedly peck to death a fellow species member if a scientist ties a ribbon to its leg or otherwise makes it look “different”….

  10. sutton

    My first reaction is that your experience of “comments [that] are helpful and become part of the value of the original item” is atypical in the extreme. Having followed your work in some of those places, I think I know what you mean, but then again isn’t it true that YouTube is the place where you are most likely to be seen by a more random cross section of the internet, as opposed to the already more interested audience likely to seek out your other venues? I mean, have you ever (tried to) read the comments on a CNN article? If not, take an anti-depressant before you do….

  11. sutton

    My first reaction is that your experience of “comments [that] are helpful and become part of the value of the original item” is atypical in the extreme. Having followed your work in some of those places, I think I know what you mean, but then again isn’t it true that YouTube is the place where you are most likely to be seen by a more random cross section of the internet, as opposed to the already more interested audience likely to seek out your other venues? I mean, have you ever (tried to) read the comments on a CNN article? If not, take an anti-depressant before you do….

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