‘Care about whatever other people think, and you will always be their prisoner ’ – words attributed to the Chinese philosopher Lao Tzu taken from the Tao Te Ching. Tzu is said to have lived around 2,600 years ago, but the sentiment of his words proves that nothing changes.
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Tzu wasn’t writing about YouTube (or Instagram), but he may as well have been. It is entirely in our nature to desire our videos and photos to be shown and liked by as many people as possible; for many, maybe even the majority, the acceptance of our work by our peers is desirable. But this can be a trap; it is too easy to become a slave to our audience, creating work that will gain views, likes and comments. Even worse is creating work to ‘appeal’ to the much-maligned algorithm.
Being inspired, influenced, or simply jumping on a bandwagon is, of course, nothing new. However, in an age where everyone has the opportunity to publish their work to a massive global audience, YouTube has become a homogenous onslaught of the same videos, thumbnails, and concepts.
Casey Neistat’s guerrilla documentary storytelling transformed vlogging, with thousands of videos featuring the same generic low-fi Chill-Hop soundtrack, establishing drone shots, and hand-drawn titles. Still, most miss Casey’s incredible way of crafting a compelling story out of nothing. Soap operas leave out life’s boring bits; Casey Neistat’s videos often made those bits the entire point of the story.
Tech reviews, including camera reviews, went through a stage where everyone sat at a desk in the same generic-looking dim studio with either blue and/or pink neon backlights or a strategically placed warm, practical light. For now, it seems actual field test-type reviews are back in vogue. Trends are often cyclical.
If you follow a trend and constantly adapt, are you ever really being true to your own creativity? ‘Your vibe attracts your tribe ’is almost certainly not the words of Lao Tzu, but it is the perfect companion to his quote. If you create your own art, you will find other like-minded people. That is where the algorithm comes in.
The algorithm is there to work for you (and a billionaire in Silicon Valley) to find an audience for your creativity. It might not happen overnight, and that audience may be small and niche, but it is out there. If we appeal to an algorithm by being a pastiche of someone or something else, we are doing ourselves and the world a disservice by not creating anything new. We will simply be the prisoners Tzu talked about, constantly being forced to change and adapt to keep hitting a number on a digital counter.
The algorithm is there to work for you; you don’t work for the algorithm.
Related reading:
- Best vlogging camera for video and YouTube
- Best video editing software: free and paid-for tools
- How to make great videos for YouTube with your camera
The views expressed in this column are not necessarily those of Amateur Photographer magazine or Kelsey Media Limited. If you have an opinion you’d like to share on this topic, or any other photography related subject, email: ap.ed@kelsey.co.uk
