Video Comments Part II: The Empire Strikes Back

Last week I posted a friendly comment on a video.  The video was about a World of Warcraft movie being made.  My comment simply stated that a World of Warcraft movie would be bad (which was also the opinion of the video) and then I asked what people thought would make a good movie.  I am disappointed in the results I received.  The comments were not what I hoped for.  I was hoping for a good discussion on what they could do to actually make a good World of Warcraft movie.  I got two comments on my comment which were constructive but the other eight comments stated things like, “They can make it better by not making it” or “No matter what they do they will $@&# it up”. 

As I reflect on the reason for this lack of constructive comments I begin to think about how often you here about how negative and mean spirited the people on the Internet can be.  I have always heard a reason for this can be anonymous that coincides with the Internet.  Yes, you have a screen name and an avatar but usually you do not have in person relationships with the people on the Internet.  I believe this is why people feel that they can curse, be negative, or at time mean spirited on what they post online.  They get to become a different person because no one knows who they really are.  If I compare how people post here to what I see on Facebook I see a big difference.  People on Facebook watch what they post more often.  They are friends, family members, or co-workers with the people they are friends with on Facebook.  On this site if you do not want to you never have to state who you ever are. 

This week I decided to join my fellow commenters and be a little more negative in my post.  One a review of the movie “The Avengers” I decided to post a comment say that I disagreed with the video poster and that I think “The Avengers” is a bad movie.  My comment I posted read, “Is this guy an idiot!?  The Avengers was horrible.  The cast was bad, the villain was lame, and Thor is a stupid super hero.”  I am hoping the get some good reaction comments on this post.  I will let you know next week what happens.

Video Comments

This week I really began to dive into the most basic part of the community.  This is the community that comments on the videos that are posted.  These comments are done very similar to those on YouTube.  There are strings of comments below each video.  Not only can you comment on the video but you can also comment on other member’s comments.  I also want to share that to comment on videos you have sign up and create a membership for the account.

Most of the comments on the videos either complement the maker of the video or giving them critical advice.  There are also many comments dedicated to furthering the discussion on the topic in the video.  For example one video I watched was about the new Aliens video game.  The reviewer did not give the game a good review.  The comments below discussed other strong and weak points to the game.  There are a few comments that will be rude or mean about something in the video, the reviewer, or another commenter. These people are attacked for being a “troll” and are ignored by the other members.  There is also a high trend of people to want to be the first one to comment on the video.  The first comment after most videos simply says “first”.  It seems that many members strive to be the first one to comment on the video.  I assume that they want this for two reasons.  One is to show their commitment to the site, the second is because the comments are put in order of posts so the first person will always be the first post, thus their name will be seen by everyone and may help is popularity in the community.  I also noted that there is a lot of cursing and sometimes crude language in the comments.  This may mean there are not monitored or that the site does not care.

I decided to make a simple comment after one of the videos hoping that I will get some replies to it.  The video was about video game movies and focused on the World of Warcraft movie that is in the works.  I commented “I think a World of Warcraft movie won’t be very good.  What would make the movie good?”  I am hoping that I will be able to get a few comments on this.  I will check back next week and I may even post a more controversial comment or may even try being a “troll” to see what kind of response I get.

Getting Started

I have chosen to become a community member of the site That Guy with the Glasses.  This site is a host for many video reviews done my different people who actually work for the site.  The reviews are done in a comedic fashion most of the time.  The subjects covered are music, video games, anime, movies, and other aspects of “nerd” culture.   This site has a community who posts comments on the videos, a lively and active forum, and even a place where many of the members post their own mature videos or write their own blogs.   As of now there are 102540 members to the site.

As I began becoming part of the community the first thing I did was get a sense of what interests the community.  I watched the videos that were posted today to see what they were about.  One of the reviews was about sci-fi toy figurines and reviews them.  This video did not have many comments.  The next one was about anime.  This video had many comments where people were going back and forth debating which anime series was good, and what were strong and weak points of a variety of anime series.  The final three videos were about movies, the newest being 2002.  The videos about movies had the most views as well as the most comments.  It seems that though this site covers a variety of things, movies seem like one of the biggest draws to the sites.

The forums are broken into many sub forums each on different topics and even have one for everyday life.  As I explored the forums I found that as of now the community seems to be very willing to help.  I see many people asking questions and opinions for things and members willing to share in a polite manner.

The blogs are very hard to navigate through and I tried to watch a few of the amateur videos but the quality was poor and the videos were long.  I had difficulty staying focused during them.  It also seems that even though many people post blogs not many people view them.  There are a few bloggers on the site who seem to get a lot of views and feedback.

Over the next several weeks I will be diving in deeper into this community and learning more about it.  I want to spend time in each realm of the site and partake in each aspect of the community.  It will be interesting and hopefully and enjoyable experience.