the pornographic portal of youtube

Had these vibes for quite some time. If you've perused my blog you might have picked up on my resentment toward Rupert Murdoch and his vast stranglehold on the channels of mass media. Maybe it's the naive idealist in me, but when it boils down to actively calling out names, I find myself caught in between a tentative intersection in my beliefs. I'm always hesitant to use specific rhetoric. War. Enemies. Weapons. To do so would simplify the complexities of our collective state. To those who understand me, you know that I am a man for simplicity. But, some circumstances are not so clear-cut. These circumstances we face are complex, and to polarize would only further fashion perpetuation. Is this a war? Are their enemies? A right and wrong?

To be sure, there are parties more responsible than others. But, we are all partners in this fault the same way we are all partners in the resolution, the redemption. There is no you or me, only us. Are these dangerous times in our existence? Yes. A war? Perhaps only in the mental sense. Ultimately, this is a struggle.

About a month ago, I spent a week in Albuquerque with friends. While there, we stumbled onto something on YouTube. Something that disturbed me on the most visceral level of comprehension. We were watching videos of live shows...Interpol...Rodrigo y Gabriela... While viewing, we switched to full-screen mode. Everyone is familiar that when a video ends on YouTube boxes of related videos pop up, uploads of other videos by the same or corresponding bands. But, in this moment, while in full-screen, that didn't happen. What happened was the entire screen transmorphed into a vast number of floating bubbles approximately thumbnail size. Most were related videos of the prior watched video. But, sprinkled among them were completely unrelated videos such as that infamous impostor Britney Spears YouTube video, Dave Matthews Band, and bubbles with images indiscernible. Keep in mind that these bubbles are thumbnail size, small. As you move the mouse, and say you skim a bubble, 20 more bubbles show up. Some related, but most becoming even less related to the video you began with. The interesting part is that the mouse arrow becomes less accurate in its motions. It begins going at a delayed, drunken speed.

As you skim past more and more bubbles, the amount expands, and the variety of videos becomes more abstracted. We see more bubbles with even less decipherable images until eventually nothing is related to the video you began with watching. As you continue navigating through, the thumbnail-sized bubbles keep multiplying and becoming less decipherable. Some look like amateur video logs, stupid videos of kids doing stunts, squirrels dancing, all the smut of the internet. But, as you continue skimming through them the indecipherable images increasingly become more sexually suggestive. The thing is that they are not indecipherable in the sense you have absolutely no idea what it is, but in the sense that they are built around the idea of suggestion. The bubbles are so small that you can't wholly make out what they are, but big enough for the image to suggest what it might be. Images that look like hot dogs that look like dicks, images that look like meatballs that look like scrotums, images that look like vaginas. When you click on them, they are not pornos in the traditional sense, but are closely sexual and explicit, fetishes, girl licking carrot, and most act as indirect filters to porno sites. If you keep on navigating, it eventually becomes that the universe of bubbles is entirely made up of smut, of the worst of the internet.

As it were, YouTube has created a software that has conceptually replicated the universe. Except, it has degraded it into a cheap game that always ends in perversion. There were a few things that carried significance to me on a strategic level, if I were in their shoes. Firstly, this feature only occurs when you go into full-screen mode, which is when you are most immersed in the site, in the world of YouTube. Secondly, if you have noticed, YouTube has regulated its upload time of videos. My friend's internet connection was high-speed broadband. Super-fast. At home, mine's the same. I remember only months ago that videos would completely upload in a matter of seconds. But now, if you realize, the red of the upload bar has a time-release mechanism controlling it. In addition, to enter this feature, you have to let the video play out. You can't just skip directly to the end. This is significant in a few ways. YouTube, like the Internet, is a portal, a universe in itself. Thus, if you are to control said universe, the ultimate method would be controlling Time. By slowing down the upload rate, this enables YouTube to dictate or at least extend your time on there. Thirdly, when I returned to LA and wanted to show my roommate, this application didn't show up. Thus, this may still be in its testing stages. Now, if it were me, I would test first in 'less-metropolitan' suburbs and cities because on a generalized level, the overall population are probably less keen to the such happenings. This is where I would work out kinks. I would also release it during specific time-slots, preferably during times when people are the least occupied, as to exploit boredom and maximize time-spent. Maybe during certain times in the middle of the night on weekends, or around lunch during workdays, etc. After this application was adequate, I would follow the same process upon expanding to larger cities. Or perhaps, not. Maybe simply target certain cities in certain regions of the world, as to not arouse suspicion. that's still a vastly significant demographic.

I believe that with the Internet we have created the new world, a new reality we were meant to create. This innovation is double-edged. In one aspect, it is a promising signification that existential understanding is mainstreaming. But, also, it scares me. It has conceptually replicated the Universe, and has completely turned it into a cheap game, an ends to perversion. You could lose hours, even minutes and seconds in this virtual trap, and as strong willed as you may think you are, those brief glimpses of smut will infiltrate you. Those Britney Spears impostor videos will find a place in some region of your mind. But, more concisely, it perpetuates the undercurrent of distrust between us, that everyone is stupid and ugly. Thus, our true mission and the greater struggle is making sure this world becomes a romance, and doesn't degrade into a porno.

Google is the cornerstone of the Internet, and Internet, as correlative with new technology, is the ultimate incarnation of hypercapitalism. It is the ultimate manifestation of this economic beast: machinic, unconscionable, devoid of emotion, and above all, inhumane. Is Google conspiring? Are they striving to enslave us all? Perhaps. Possible. But, as the Internet is the ultimate manifestation of capitalism and Google a part of it, the system is only acting as it was made to, without morality. It falls on us to point out and rectify such issues. To resist net neutrality, and fight to make this world a romantic universe, and not let it slip into a porno.

Epitomizing the irony of our existence, in the most fragile juncture in our existence, our greatest threat may also be our greatest, most redeeming ally.