Youtube rewind 20151/17/2024 It wants to present each passing year in some powerful, uplifting way, while also acknowledging social issues or global crises. Unfortunately, though, hand-holding, group dance circles and passing around a giant red button does nothing to combat exploitative infrastructures or give voice to those who are oppressed.Įssentially, YouTube wants to eat its cake and have it too. It waves in front of your face all of these deeply challenging social issues that are being fought over every day and then glazes over all of those problems with its signature tool: toxic positivity. The formula was really quite simple: bring together the most popular content creators that are white and family-friendly and then throw in enough people of color, people who identify as LGBTQ+ or international creators and call it a day. It seemed like, from YouTube’s perspective at least, that the primary mission was checking off all of the right boxes so that no one could get too upset. Instead, it is merely a preemptive exoneration from all claims of insensitivity or inequality. This rewind was symptomatic of a disease that would come to plague YouTube Rewind for the coming years, which is the peddling of empty virtue signaling that does nothing for the groups it pretends to be advocating for. From there, we watch a bunch of people randomly dancing and smiling to whatever pop songs were popular that year until we return to the same rainbow-painted wall with more people randomly dancing and smiling in front of it. The video opens up with Lily Singh - who wouldn’t come out as bisexual until 2019 - dancing along a wall painted in the colors of the rainbow Pride flag. This could only last so long, and 2015 was the year that YouTube went fully corporate and dove headfirst into the digestible, politically correct deep end. This heightened subjectivity would inevitably lead to hurt feelings, but you can see - for at least the first few years - YouTube did its best to hold it all together. When YouTube decided to move away from the simple, objective model of previous years, it adopted the burden of having to consciously choose what to include - and, more importantly, exclude, from its rewinds. A corporation as giant as YouTube could never reconcile its need to maintain its public image with the desires and interests of the people that actually use its app. Then, in 2012, the model started to change, and this is when things started to go downhill. In 2011, Rebecca Black hosted the rewind - something I mention only because her song “Friday” was potentially the first instance of someone going viral on the internet for making art that people hated - and it was essentially just a collage of the year’s most popular videos. It was simplistic and only highlighted the most viewed videos of the year. In its infant stage, it was much more like a Spotify Wrapped than the disaster we saw unfold in 2018. With that being said, YouTube Rewind used to be a lot better. The music was always boring, the dancing is uncomfortable to watch, the transitions are corny and there is always a late-night host or two to make you say, “what is he even doing here?” And the line between mainstream culture and YouTube culture are almost nonexistent.No one ever thought that YouTube Rewind was that great. "When I think about what Rewind this year represents to me, it's YouTube stars in particular, but YouTube culture had maybe its biggest crossover year we've had. In an article published by AdAge, Kevin Alloca, YouTube's head of culture and trends, spoke about the recent blurring the lines between mainstream culture and YouTube. The compilation, now in its fifth year, focuses this time on viral outlets, especially videos which were posted and reposted across the planet. Titled 'Now Watch Me 2015', it goes through a mashed up selection of songs, including this year's biggest hits, such as 'Where R U Now' by Jack U and Justin Bieber, Felix Jaehn's remix of 'Cheerleader', Major Lazer and Mø's 'Lean On', The Weeknd's 'Can't Feel My Face', and Silento's 'Nae Nae'. The best new music that was released over Christmas and New Year'sĪ highly popular concept that now reaches its fifth birthday, the Rewind video celebrates the year's most viral clips, most watched tracks, and features a wide variety of people, bloggers, presenters and musicians, including the likes of James Corden, T-Pain, Smosh, Dan and Phil, and Zoella.
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