The personal fascination with video remixing began in the mid-2000’s, when I had first “discovered” YouTube (strange how it has become a known staple of media and entertainment, the joy of “discovering” the website was indescribable, and it is lamentable that the current generation will never get to feel that way). The first videos I had ever encountered on YouTube were remix videos. Aside from the bizarre, often surreal humor, what most interested me was the ways in which the source media had been completely repurposed. Later remixers from the early 2010’s amazed me with their editing style. The ways in which these filmmakers combined pre-existing video clips together through editing techniques blew me away; it was unlike form of media I had ever seen. It was surreal watching these sources I was familiar with be completely altered into new narratives. It wasn’t until recently I decided to reassert myself into the remixing scene. While I have experienced lengthy absences and numerous setbacks since then, I intend to continue on with my work and push through the many obstacles that have and will continue to present themselves. |
What’s the incentive to use social media? It’s uniform layouts and limited customization doesn’t allow its users to stand out. Even the original iteration of YouTube had the limited capability to customize profile pages with backgrounds and fonts, yet this is a distant memory now. Instead of fleshing out these features, they were completely done away with. What we are left with is demoralizing minimalism. Ironically, the coding involved to achieve these corporate minimalist designs is complex and filled with bloat to support advertisements and surveillance. This webpage's erratic design is a direct counter to minimalism. To this day it confuses me why the once proud population of Netizens allowed themselves to become data livestock for technocrats. We allowed this to become a social norm, as far as society is concerned if one doesn’t have a presence on the main social media publishers then they might as well not even exist. There’s an unjust stigma attached to those of us who wish to refrain from involving ourselves in this. Of course we realize that we have lived in an ever increasing surveillance state that is nearly inescapable, but what’s the harm in doing what we can to minimize its effect? I am a novice coder at best, my website is not perfect, but I much prefer learning the fundamentals of web design and having free reign over my domain then being at the whim of corporate interests that could terminate and silence me without warning. The World Wide Web is an endless frontier, the time is now to denounce mainstream social media and populate the fertile lands elsewhere.
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