Blogging
Blogs are websites that are much like diaries or journals in
which the blog owner regularly posts entries. Some blogs provide
commentary or news on a particular subject; others function as
places to share personal experiences. The blogger can personalise
the settings to filter what they want readers to access, and
readers can often filter the content by both author and topic. They
often combine text, images, and links to other blogs, web pages, or
online media.
Many also have the ability for readers to leave comments,
meaning that a post becomes a conversation. Groups can also be
created on many blogging platforms, so that many bloggers can post
to the same blog, and users can subscribe to a group and read
anything posted to that group. Strong social networks can form when
bloggers comment on each other's blogs, collaborate on content, and
support each other in creative or critical endeavours. Blogs can be
a way for writers in particular, but also artists and musicians, to
announce that they've completed a new work, and get feedback, be it
constructive criticism or just encouragement to continue.
While most blogs are primarily text based, there are emerging
trends toward photo-blogging, video-blogging (vlogs), and audio
(podcasting).
Micro-blogging is also gaining popularity, particularly with the
rise of Twitter. This involves blogs with very short posts (often
entered from mobile phones), often providing live feedback on
events. TV shows like Q and A may invite feedback by
promoting an official hashtag (a tag via which topics are searched
for and found) and publishing audience comments at the bottom of
the screen, creating a more interactive experience.
For an example, visit
the ReachOut.com Twitter
Feed, where ReachOut.com staff post and share
articles, stories and content about mental health that is of
interest to other young people.
Media sharing
Users can also post audio, video, photography and artwork to a
wide range of hosting sites. YouTube and Vimeo are video hosting
sites that are widely used. Flickr is an image hosting site
commonly used by photographers. DeviantArt is an example of an art
hosting site.
Themed hosting sites are often used in preference to a generic
image hosting site because of the community surrounding it, and the
ways users can search and review content. However, even on big
sites like YouTube, the use of tagging allows specific content to
be connected and found by theme. Tags are essentially descriptive
keywords (or metadata), which users assign to media, allowing it to
be categorised and browsed.
Young people have more access to recording and editing equipment
than ever before, and generating content for other people to
discover can be a popular pastime. As well as being rewarding for
the level of interest a work can generate, it can be a great way
for young people to learn and develop diverse skills, from
sketching to video-editing to website coding.
Remix and fan culture
Sometimes, the materials posted are not completely original but
are "remixed". The simplest method of this is macros, or image
captioning, where a picture is submitted with a humorous caption.
These are really low investment user generated content, but
individual images can become really popular or "go viral", as can
video with fake subtitles added. Images can also be "photoshopped"
or digitally manipulated, again, often for humour.
Fans of various media often create a wide range of multimedia
works, including fan art, vids, anime music videos, political
remixes, fan films, fan trailers, machinima, podfic, audiobooks and
others. These transformative works can become just as popular, if
not more so, than the original sources.