So a couple days ago I stumbled upon a Fine Brothers "Youtubers React to" video. The topic of this particular installment was Vine; the new video networking site that I like to describe as the "mini Youtube." Now I was really excited to see how these YouTube celebs would respond to vine since a lot of people compare the success of popular Vine personalities to that of YouTube stars. The Youtubers seemed to have an overall positive reaction towards the actually vine video, the site however, received some skepticism. At the end of the episode, the Fine Brothers asks their guests whether they think the current Vine trend will last. A lot of group said they really had no idea, which is a reasonable answer; things like this are often hard to predict. However, some felt as though Vine is just a fad. Olga Kay stated, " I think it's going to be very successful for a year and a half, and then...it's going to go away." While Shane Dawson argued, " I don't think a social network can be huge, if it relies on people be creative." Um, what? What do you think YouTube is? I just thought these statements were weird because Vine is literally a spitting image a YouTube, so why can't it have success and longevity? For a while, I though these statements can from a place of jealously. After all, comedy YouTubers like Shane and Olga slave over scripts in hopes of creating popular videos while their Vine counter parts seem to spit out viral videos with ease.
But, honestly, I don't think Vine is really in the position to replace YouTube. While it does seem to surpass it in the comedy division, I have yet to see an attempt at a 6 second makeup tutorial or life vlog. However Vine is definitely something special; I feel like its a compilation of all the good parts of Youtube . You can follow people, you can write comments, and you can share videos. But what's Vines special appeal? The video are actually funny and are done in a manner that's short, sweet and to the point. Now, I know some of you are going start arguing on behave of high profile YouTube favorites like Smosh but after the disaster the was YouTube comedy week, I kind of have this theory that while some YouTubers are kind of funny, the bulk of their views and subscribers come from people who like them personally, not necessarily because they make them laugh. Because Vine is fairly new and there's no place to "get to know" Viners, the only way to become popular is to be funny. In fact, I recently noticed that while I used to turn to YouTube during bouts of boring, now I head over to Vine ; there's just a greater chance that I find something interesting and funny. But what lines in store for Vine? Will it spawn a new generation of internet celebrities? Will it eventually be over taken by sponsorship and ads? I guess we'll just have to wait and see!
-RCUJay
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