Video-sharing Platform Research Articles

“Across Time and Space, I Am Together with Many, Many Others”: Digital Writing and Temporality on Chinese Social Media

Current scholarship tends to see temporality as a problem or challenge to be overcome in communication on social media (as in “context collapse” and “time collapse”). Drawing on in-depth interviews of Chinese users of a digital writing function (bullet comments) on a major video-sharing platform, we aim to expand current research and deepen understandings of temporality and digital writing. We offer a broader, more positive conceptualization of time on social media by highlighting an alternative set of time-related practices and experiences, mediated by bullet comments. Following recent studies of individuals’ making and experiencing of time in media-saturated societies, our article investigates Chinese social media users’ diverse time-sensitive practices and multi-dimensional temporal experiences. We outline their creative practices from the bottom up, which make use of the distinct technological design of bullet comments. Four interrelated themes in their temporal experiences are analyzed and the similarities and differences with the Deleuzian concept of “crystal of time” explained. Overall, we demonstrate the semiotic power of digital writing in facilitating new meaning-making practices, producing multi-layered mediated temporalities, and affording multisensory, enriching, bonding experiences. The significance and implications of this study for future studies are discussed, in view of the expansion of bullet comments to Chinese mainstream, commercial platforms.

우리나라 약사 개인 방송 현황 및 약사회 자율 규제에 대한 약사들의 인식

With the rapid penetration of internet-based communication into all industries, YouTube®, a video-sharing platform, has come to be widely used in the healthcare field. This study aims to investigate the current status of pharmacist-run personal broadcast (PRPB) in Korea and explore the underlying perceptions held by pharmacists. YouTube searches made from May to June 2020 and June 2022 were analyzed, followed by a cross-sectional questionnaire survey during July 2020. A 13-item questionnaire was distributed via social media channels to recruit pharmacists using the convenience sampling method. Currently, there are a total of 91 PRPB channels on YouTube, most of which were started after 2019. Of the total 1267 contents, health functional foods (32.4%) and over the counter products (29.3%) had the highest proportions. Among the 218 respondents of the questionnaire survey, 49.1% were working in community pharmacies, and only 2.8% had PRPB experience. They showed higher positive response (42.2%) than negative (33.5%) for the public's exposure to PRPB, and 77.5% of the respondents perceived that social influence of PRPB will grow bigger. Their concerns about PRPB were mainly disclosure of biased information and possibility to lead to product purchase (75.2%) and spreading unverified information (70.2%). In addition, 70.6% of the respondents agreed with the necessity of self-regulation of PRPB by the Korean Pharmaceutical Association and chose the operation of a civil petition counter to report the transmission of false or incorrect information on YouTube (62.8%) and composition of deliberation committee and periodic monitoring (53.2%) as regulatory methods. Perceived necessity of self-regulation was significantly higher in the above-50s age group than in the under-40s group (p<0.05). Pharmacists interested in PRPB should deliver accurate information as drug information providers and abide by professional ethics and public responsibility.

Global streamers: Placing the transnational at the heart of TV culture

As media globalization has progressed, transnational media have evolved, and this article contends that a new generation has emerged. The first that developed in the latter part of the twentieth century consists of cross-border TV networks and formats. The second is the rise of streaming platforms. During the first generation, the transnational remained a professional practice out of viewers’ reach. With the arrival of the second generation, the transnational has become an everyday mode of media consumption and interaction. Online entertainment services have altered the status of the transnational within TV culture, and what was once at the margins now sits at the core. This article theorizes the notion of the transnational before examining the first and second generations of cross-border media. Considering the advent of streaming, it divides the market into three spaces: subscription video on demand (SVoD), advertising video on demand (AVoD) and video sharing. This article demonstrates how transnational consumption makes SVoD platforms more cosmopolitan than cross-border TV networks. Turning to video-sharing platforms – YouTube in particular – it argues that in the history of TV culture this constitutes a shift in status of the transnational by turning a professional practice into a popular one performed by millions. Based on interviews, this article shows how international access lowers the threshold of economic viability for content creators, while users get involved in cross-border conversations through memetic videos and comments. It is no longer place but technology that determines the fate of stories and ideas, and internet delivery has loosened the ties between TV culture and national culture more than ever.

Taboo Language in Non-Professional Subtitling on Bilibili.com: A Corpus-Based Study

This qualitative and quantitative study examines how taboo language is rendered in non-professional subtitling (NPS), how viewers react to the renderings, and how the interactions between danmu and general comments’ contributors affect the translation activities and language changes. The study draws on a parallel corpus consisting of taboo language and its translations from 18 of the most-viewed and commented upon subtitled videos on the popular video-sharing platform, Bilibili.com. Danmu comments and general comments related to the renderings of taboo language are also collected and studied. When analyzing translation activities in an NPS setting, the study adopts and modifies some mainstream subtitling strategies and techniques proposed by. The study finds that various creative approaches are adopted, such as lexical recreation and substitution by euphemism. While the strength of the taboo language is reduced in more than half of the instances, in an unexpected 17.2% of cases the effects are enlarged. The study concludes that a virtuous, collaborative mechanism for potential translation problems and language learning is formed by providing positive, neutral, and critical feedback in the comments. In addition to linguistic knowledge and cultural background, viewers also share knowledge beyond the scope of translation.

An investigation of the reliability of YouTube videos on undescended testis

There are thousands of patient information videos published on YouTube, the most watched video sharing platform; however, most of these videos contain incomplete or incorrect information. Interestingly, some videos with incomplete or incorrect information have a higher view rate. This study aimed to evaluate the quality of patient information videos on 'undescended testis' published on YouTube. A search was conducted on YouTube using the keywords 'undescended testis' and 'cryptorchidism', and a total of 373 videos were found. Among these, 122 patient information videos presented in the English language were examined. Four different scoring systems were used to evaluate the quality of the videos: Patient Education Materials Assessment Tool for Audiovisual Materials, Global Quality Score, Journal of American Medical Association score, and modified DISCERN scoring system. Whether the videos contained accurate and sufficient information was evaluated using a scoring system developed based on the patient information booklet prepared by the European Association of Urology (EAU) on undescended testis. The median duration (sec), number of views and number of likes of the videos were 269 (11-2484), 589 (6-1.563561) and 7 (0-4.200), respectively. According to the EAU-patient information scoring (EAU-PIS), while 32 (26.2%) of the total 122 videos contained a good level of informativeness (score: 8-10), the view rate of these videos was only 4.1% among all videos. When the top 10 most watched videos were evaluated, their mean EAU-PIS was 5.9±2.81, and these videos contained a moderate level of informativeness. On the positive side, 90% of all the videos recommended surgery as a treatment option. Although YouTube is a widely used video-sharing platform, it is also a website where people or institutions can easily upload non-standardized videos due to the absence of regulations. Therefore, although it is an easily accessible source of information, it has many gaps in terms of reliability. As shown in our study, the rate of videos with accurate information was very low. It would be beneficial for viewers to be aware of this and accept YouTube as a source where they can have a general idea about a subject in which they are interested rather than using it as a reference information site. In future, YouTube can become a reference source in the medical field, especially with the standardization of medical videos through the collaboration of various organizations.

YouTube as a source of educational content in teenagers’ learning practices

YouTube is one of the most popular online social spaces nowadays combining features of both a huge repository of information and a social networking service. Millions of people use this video-sharing platform daily. Entertainment (sports, comedy, music, movie trailers), information seeking (missed news, product reviews, research on a specific topic), and educational purposes (how-to videos, learning math, or tactics for video games) were discussed as main motivational aspects for watching YouTube videos (Lagger et al. 2017). Usage of YouTube for educational purposes became particularly relevant for teenagers as a support for their home-schooling. Our goal is to find out what strategies teenagers use to find relevant educational content on the service and how important this content was for their everyday learning practices before and during the COVID pandemic. We analyzed online behavior of 34, 14 to 15-year old teenagers (47% male) who took part in a long-term adventure trip with digital media left aside. We gathered quantitative data seven months before the trip (March 2019), just before the trip (October 2019), on the last day of the trip (April 2020), and five months after the trip (September 2020). We also conducted in-depth interviews with nine teenagers, who named YouTube as their favourite online service. Our intention is now to conduct nine additional interviews with the same teenagers to see whether their everyday learning practices changed within the last year. Implications drawn from this study, further research perspectives, and limitations will be presented and discussed.

Making connections: vloggers in the age of social media

Social media has significantly changed our life and the increasing number of vlog sharing websites allow people to produce and share content. This research explores the question: ‘How do vloggers use content creation strategies to engage their audiences?’ Its purpose is to address the gap in the literature and explore the content creation strategies used in vlogs by examining PhD vlogs and interviewing PhD vloggers via three Chinese video-sharing platforms: Bilibili, Douyin and Ixigua. The study uses an interpretive framework and qualitative exploration to investigate social media content strategies. The researcher employs a qualitative content analysis to analyse 20 video samples of online PhD vlogs, and semi-structured in-depth interviews with 20 PhD vloggers about their vlogging experience. With the 20 video samples, the researcher used critical incident technique to select from a large data set, and videos were analysed using multimodal analysis. The subject in the thesis is Chinese PhD vloggers. They are not limited to students who are studying in China, but use their Chinese citizenship and native Mandarin language to express themselves in the platforms. This oral presentation focuses on the how Chinese PhD vloggers make connections through vlogs and build networks in the virtual community. Emotional change and interpersonal communication are important for vloggers. The results will contribute to further understanding of social media content strategies, visual and digital communication, user-generated online content and the relationship between content creators and followers.

Video-Sharing Platform Viewing Among Preschool-Aged Children: Differences by Child Characteristics and Contextual Factors.

Free video-sharing platforms such as YouTube are highly popular among young children but may contain low-quality and highly commercialized content. This study aimed to describe the prevalence, duration, and timing of objectively measured mobile YouTube viewing in preschool-aged children and test hypotheses about associations with child individual differences and contextual factors. We analyzed mobile sampling data from 349 English-speaking children aged 3-4.99 years whose parents completed surveys about child, parent, and household characteristics. We assessed whether the child ever viewed YouTube during the sampling week and calculated average daily duration in a subsample of 121 participants with their own mobile devices. We built multivariable logistic regression models to test correlates of mobile YouTube viewership and duration. Children were 3.82 years (SD 0.53), 74.6 percent white non-Hispanic; parents were mostly mothers (93.7 percent), 34.0 (SD 4.6) years, and 37.9 percent had less than a college degree. Mobile YouTube viewing (37.0 percent of children) was more likely in children who used Android devices, shared mobile devices with family members, were older, attended home-based childcare, or had parents with lower educational attainment. Median YouTube duration was 61.2 min/day, with longer durations in children whose parents had lower educational attainment. These results demonstrate that many young children use free video-sharing platforms on mobile devices for long durations, and this practice may be disproportionately higher in children from lower socioeconomic status. Longitudinal research is needed on video-sharing platform viewing and child outcomes.

An Exploration of Captioning Practices and Challenges of Individual Content Creators on YouTube for People with Hearing Impairments

Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing (DHH) audiences have long complained about caption qualities for many online videos created by individual content creators on video-sharing platforms (e.g., YouTube). However, there lack explorations of practices, challenges, and perceptions of online video captions from the perspectives of both individual content creators and DHH audiences. In this work, we first explore DHH audiences' feedback on and reactions to YouTube video captions through interviews with 13 DHH individuals, and uncover DHH audiences' experiences, challenges, and perceptions on watching videos created by individual content creators (e.g., manually added caption tags could create additional confidence and trust in caption qualities for DHH audiences). We then discover individual content creators' practices, challenges, and perceptions on captioning their videos (e.g., back-captioning problems) by conducting a YouTube video analysis with 189 captioning-related YouTube videos, followed by a survey with 62 individual content creators. Overall, our findings provide an in-depth understanding of captions generated by individual content creators and bridge the knowledge gap mutually between content creators and DHH audiences on captions.

Selected Aspects of the Implementation into Polish Law of the Amended Audiovisual Media Services Directive

Abstract The changes in the audiovisual media services market that have taken place in recent years have resulted in quite intensive work in the European Union (starting in 2015) on the revision of certain directives concerning this economic area. One of the pieces of EU law that was decided to be updated was the Audiovisual Media Services Directive. This is because it was pointed out that since the last amendment of this directive, there had been a significant and rapid development of the audiovisual media services market due to the progressive convergence of television and internet services. The advancement of technology has allowed the emergence of new types of services and new ways of using them. In addition, it has been stressed that viewing habits have changed considerably, especially among younger viewers. New types of messaging, such as short forms of video and user-generated content, have grown in importance, and new entrants, including video-on-demand providers and video-sharing platform providers, have already established their position. This media convergence has called for an updated legal framework in the EU to take account of market developments and to strike a balance in access to content in online services, as well as to ensure consumer protection and competitiveness. Directive 2018/1808 was to be implemented by the EU Member States by 19 September 2020 but Poland did not meet this deadline; it was not until 11 August 2021 that the relevant amendments to the Broadcasting Act and the Cinematography Act were enacted. Most of its provisions came into force on 1 November 2021, while others entered into force on 1 January 2022. Considering the way in which most of the provisions of Directive 2018/1808 have been implemented into Polish law, one can defend the view that it was done rationally from the perspective of Polish media service providers. The liberalisation of quantitative advertising limits may contribute to raising more funds in the advertising market by broadcasters. It has been pointed out that leaving the existing regulations unchanged would place broadcasters under Polish jurisdiction in an unfavourable competitive position in relation to broadcasters of programmes available in Poland who are under the jurisdiction of other EU Member States. The intention to put providers of on-demand media services on an equal footing with providers of video-sharing platforms also seems reasonable, as the main objective of Directive 2018/1808 is to ensure proper competition between different categories of entities competing in the electronic media sector.

TikTok Vs. Instagram: Algorithm Comparison

TikTok and Instagram are two of the most popular social media platforms on the market. They do, however, have one important distinguishing factor: TikTok is a video-sharing platform and Instagram is a photo-sharing platform. With fundamentally different functions, the algorithms are bound to be different. This study focuses on which algorithm between the two social media platforms does better at sending out content made to an interested audience. 
 To see which algorithm performs better, two accounts were created on TikTok and Instagram respectively, and there were ten posts made on each account, with each post on one account being focused on the same subject as a corresponding post on the other (ie. A video post of a flower on TikTok will have a corresponding photo post of the same flower on Instagram). A set of posts would be uploaded at the same time and any given set of posts' statistics would be recorded and reviewed after one week of being uploaded.
 Using a comparison of the results garnered from each post on both platforms, including individual views and total views, it is concluded that the algorithm TikTok uses is superior in regards to showing specifically tagged content to potentially interested users. The number of both individual views and total views of the TikTok posts were much higher than the ones for Instagram, with TikTok’s numbers reaching the hundreds and Instagram never breaking into double digits.

The Pervasive Presence of Chinese Government Content on Douyin Trending Videos

As audiences have moved to digital media, so too have governments around the world. While previous research has focused on how authoritarian regimes employ strategies such as the use of fabricated accounts and content to boost their reach, this paper reveals two different tactics the Chinese government uses on Douyin, the Chinese version of the video-sharing platform TikTok, to compete for audience attention. We use a multi-modal approach that combines analysis of video, text, and meta-data to examine a novel dataset of Douyin videos. We find that a large share of trending videos are produced by accounts affiliated with the Chinese government. These videos contain visual characteristics designed to maximize attention such as high levels of brightness and entropy and very short duration, and are more visually similar to content produced by celebrities and ordinary users than to content from non-official media accounts. We also find that the majority of videos produced by regime-affiliated accounts do not fit traditional definitions of propaganda but rather contain stories and topics unrelated to any aspect of the government, the Chinese Communist Party, policies, or politics.

Why Do People Return to Video Platforms? Millennials and Centennials on TikTok

While some social networks like Facebook are losing interest among digital influencers, TikTok continues to grow, capturing and impacting centennials and millennials alike. This situation highlights the new generations’ increasing interest in short video formats, which are also becoming a new window of communication between companies and consumers. TikTok allows users to create, share, and discover short, user-generated videos in hopes of attracting viewers. But it is necessary to understand the variables that attract and engage users of these particular social networks. This article analyses the variables of continuance motivation, video sharing behaviour, and video creation capabilities, which allow users to enjoy such networks, and service providers and companies to obtain results from them. The aim is to understand how these variables motivate social media users to return to and spend more time on this video-sharing platform. This is measured through the stickiness variable. In this context—and due to the particular relevance of the topic—the authors also aim to reveal any potential differences in the behaviour of centennials and millennials when using TikTok. Therefore, a cross-sectional study was conducted through a questionnaire answered by 2,301 millennials and centennials who use TikTok. The data were analysed through a structural equation model to measure the relevance of each of the variables to stickiness. The results provide guidelines for improving research on video social media platforms, as well as an opportunity to explore the importance of the selected variables to the stickiness variable across different user segments.

Quality of English-language videos available on YouTube as a source of information on osteoporosis.

SummaryOsteoporosis awareness is essential for preventing osteoporotic fractures. Social media platforms have enormous potential to both support and deter patients’ decisions on healthcare. The current study demonstrated that the majority of YouTube videos on osteoporosis provide useful information with sufficient quality.PurposeYouTube is the most popular video-sharing platform for patients seeking online information about their medical condition. However, there are concerns regarding the accuracy and quality of YouTube content. We aimed to analyze the quality of English-language YouTube videos on osteoporosis.MethodsA YouTube search was performed on April 21, 2021, using the keywords “osteoporosis,” “osteoporosis exercise,” “osteoporosis diet,” and “osteoporosis treatment.” The reviewers recorded the content, source, and detailed characteristics of the included videos. The reliability and quality of the videos were analyzed using the modified DISCERN score and Global Quality Scale (GQS) score by a rheumatologist and endocrinologist.ResultsOf the 400 videos screened, 238 were included in the study after applying the exclusion criteria. A total of 205 (86.1%) videos revealed useful information about osteoporosis whereas 33 (13.9%) were misleading. In terms of quality, 48% of the videos were of high quality, 34% were of moderate quality, and 18% were of low quality. The videos posted by universities and professional organizations had the highest modified DISCERN and GQS scores indicating high reliability and quality.ConclusionThis study demonstrated that the majority of YouTube videos on osteoporosis contained useful information with sufficient quality. However, physicians should be aware of misleading information and correct any misinformation during face-to-face meetings with patients. YouTube should consider creating partnerships with professional organizations in the field of osteoporosis to produce high-quality videos in line with their new health content policy.

Misleading political advertising fuels incivility online: A social network analysis of 2020 U.S. presidential election campaign video comments on YouTube

In the 2020 U.S. presidential election, increasing misinformation-based political advertisements have circulated on video-sharing platforms, such as YouTube and challenged healthy political communication. This study investigates the social contagion of political incivility stemming from a misinformation-based campaign video posted by former U.S. President Donald Trump. Specifically, using dynamic network analysis and exponential random graph modeling, we explore and test three mechanisms (imitation, intergroup interaction, and reciprocity) for their role in the contagion of online political incivility. Contrary to previous findings, we show that online political incivility is not a fleeting occurrence but recurrent and sustaining given YouTube's promotional algorithms. Reciprocity is the primary mechanism that predicts the formation of uncivil politically-based interactions in YouTube comments. The findings provide implications for YouTube's content moderation mechanism and underline the need to reconsider the potential harm of promoting misinformation-based political campaigns through this platform.

Within a Carnivalesque Space: The Textual Identity of Danmu and the Rise of Mass Writing

Danmu is the Chinese pinyin of 弹幕, which is often used to describe the interactive, on-screen commenting system featured by both sub-cultural bullet-screen platforms and dominant video-sharing platforms. While the transformation of the power relationship between the public and the official and between viewer and author has received considerable scholarly attention, less attention has been paid to how the danmu system has affected the textuality of contemporary online audiovisual texts. Based on the Bakhtinian carnival, this paper explores the textual structure and signifying mechanism of danmu. It argues that danmu has dual textual identity, the paratext of online videos and the textual component of bullet-screen videos respectively. Danmu allows viewers to not only make comments on online videos but also reconstruct them. Such interactive construction of online audiovisual texts represents the rise of mass writing.

Odgovornost operatora za povrede autorskog prava koje su počinili korisnici njegove platforme

The Court of Justice of the European Union has recently issued a judgment in the joined cases C-682/18 (YouTube) and C-683/18 (Cyando) relating to the operator's liability for copyright infringements committed by users of its platform within the meaning of Art. 3, paragraph 1 of Directive 2001/29 on the information society. In the cited cases of the Court of Luxembourg, there are two specific platforms being concerned: the popular video-sharing platform (YouTube) and the file hosting and sharing platform (Uploaded). The judgment was passed almost a year after the public defender's opinion had been published. In the meantime, exactly since June 7th 2021, a new liability regime for copyright infringement for certain internet platforms came into effect (Article 17 of Directive 2019/790 on copyright in the single digital market). Although the judgment was passed two weeks after Art. 17. Directive 2019/790 had entered into force, it was of great importance, especially considering the fact that on one hand, not all EU member states had implemented Art. 17 of Directive 2019/790, and on the other hand, the EU, through the Digital Services Act, was trying to modernize European regulations concerning the platforms regulation. In the paper, the author has, after referring to art. 17 of Directive 2019/790, analyzed the judgments in the combined cases of YouTube and Cyando, as well as the judgment of the Court of Justice of the EU regarding Poland's claim for annulment of Art. 17 of Directive 2019/790. The analysis of the judgment has shown that the regulations on copyright should establish a balance between the rights holders protection on one side, and exercising the basic rights such as freedom of speech on the other side.

Privacy-Phys: Facial Video-Based Physiological Modification for Privacy Protection

The invisible remote photoplethysmography (rPPG) signals in facial videos can reveal the cardiac rhythm and physiological status. Recent studies show that rPPG is a non-contact way for emotion recognition, disease detection, and biometric identification, which means there is a potential privacy problem about physiological information leakage from facial videos. Therefore, it is essential to process facial videos to prevent rPPG extraction in privacy-sensitive situations such as online video meetings. In this letter, we propose Privacy-Phys, a novel method based on a pre-trained 3D convolutional neural network, to modify rPPG in facial videos for privacy protection. Our experimental results show that our approach can modify rPPG signals in facial videos more effectively and efficiently than the previous baseline. Our method can be applied to process facial videos in online video meetings or video-sharing platforms to prevent rPPG from being captured maliciously.

Political Information Use and Its Relationship to Beliefs in Conspiracy Theories Among the German Public

This study investigates how exposure to different news sources, propensity to vote (PTV) for a party and demographics are related to belief in conspiracy theories drawing on three repeated cross-sectional surveys in Germany 2017–2019. Results show that frequent exposure to alternative news sites and video-sharing platforms increased conspiratorial beliefs. Frequency of exposure to the quality press, public service TV news, and news aggregators diminished beliefs in conspiracy theories. Exposure to TV news, legacy media online, tabloids, social media, and user comments was unrelated to such beliefs. PTV for far left and right parties increased conspiratorial beliefs, moderate party preference reduced them.

963. Antibiotic Talk on TikTok: An Opportunity for Patient Education?

BackgroundAntimicrobial resistance is increasing at an alarming rate. Patient education is a critical component of stewardship and many patients access resources online. TikTok is a video-sharing social media platform with 700 million monthly users and contains videos that discuss health information. The objective of this study was to evaluate antibiotic-themed TikTok videos for their validity and reliability. MethodsIn March 2021, a search on TikTok using the term “antibiotics” was performed and the top 300 consecutive videos were identified. Data collected included: number of likes, associated disease state, medications, educational aim, mention of COVID-19, and if performed by a healthcare professional (HCP). Non-English videos were excluded. The DISCERN score was used to evaluate all videos for reliability. ResultsThe first 300 consecutive videos were assessed using the DISCERN score. Of the 300 videos, most (n=224) were not created by HCPs (non-HCPs). The number of “likes” per video ranged from 1 like to 2 million likes with a mean of 34,949 ± 143,482. Videos produced by HCPs were significantly more valid and reliable (mean DISCERN score of 1.65 vs 1.17, p < .00001) than non-HCPs. They were found to be more relevant (p< .00001), have clearer aims (p< .00001), and were more balanced/unbiased (p=.00188). Videos created by HCPs were more likely to have an educational focus (p< .0001). There was no difference between groups in clarity of sources utilized or risk/benefits discussed of each treatment. Across all videos, the most common disease states mentioned were urinary tract infection, skin and soft tissue infection, and upper respiratory tract infection. Natural products, penicillins, and sulfa antibiotics were the most commonly discussed medications.ConclusionVideos created by HCPs were significantly more valid and reliable than those created by non-HCPs. The videos created by HCPs were also more likely to have clear aims and be more relevant. However, the majority of the videos evaluated were created by non-HCPs. It may be beneficial for HCPs to provide TikTok videos that are valid and reliable for patient education.Disclosures All Authors: No reported disclosures