9. Youtube

Ahoy

For this assignment, I decided to consider excessive procrastination on youtube. I don't think this is one of the most problematic overuses of the internet, but it's one that probably does cause some problematic use of the internet. We often use youtube for things like procrastination when there's too much work to do. In fact, I think that youtube is more addicting than even facebook, although everyone has his or her own opinion.

Why is youtube more problematic than facebook? I think youtube functions almost like a support system in the model proposed by Walther and Boyd. It's similar to the way TV is more popular than hanging out with friends. Youtube is always there - it's your friend 24/7 and it never has prelims to study for or classes to wake up for or essays to write. In other words, it's very accessible, which is one of the characteristics of online support. Also, you can watch whatever you want comment on anything anonymously. And another significant fact about facebook is that it offers content on absolutely any subject for free, meaning that it scores higher in the social distance category.

Does this mean that youtube can be seen as a source as support for us when we're down? On those nights where nobody is around, or when you're feeling down cause you have way too much work to do (only making the situation worse, because you're going to procrastinate more on it), youtube feels like the only way we can relieve our stress. It's a sort of emotional support in my opinion, though not in the conventional sense.

And naturally, when we depend on something like youtube for emotional sustenance, there's always a chance that PIU develops as proposed by Caplan. The first time we use youtube, it's there to relieve our stress and we're grateful for it, and after a while we continue on our way. Then another night comes when we have a lot more work, and we depend on it a little more. Then before you know it, we regularly rely on youtube to distract us from our work.

How is this similar to Caplan's model? Well first, we have burdensome problems that we need to take care of (part 1). Then we go to some CMC source for relief (part 2). And then we find how useful and helpful this diversion can be, so we rely on it more (part 3). This leads to a cascade effect similar to the one proposed by Caplan. Our real-world problems cause greater emotional needs that we feed more and more through these reliable CMC sources.

And if we woke up the next morning and found that youtube wasn't there anymore, it would probably not cause a terrible psychological epidemic, but we would definitely find it harder to get through those long nights of work.

(Like tonight)

peace out.

ashish