Power in the YouTube Community
Recently Forbes has published the earnings of top online YouTube stars who have become multi-millionaires through posting videos. The rankings include Pew Die Pie, Smosh, Fine Brothers, Lindsey Stirling, Rheet & Link, KSI, Michelle Phan, Lily Singh, Roman Atwood, and Rosanna Pansino. The article goes on to describe how these individuals have risen to their stardom as central figures in the YouTube community and their estimated pre-tax revenues. With the highest, Pew Die Pie, earning $12 Million and the lowest, Rosanna Pansino, earning $2.5 million. A majority of the stars are comedians and all the YouTubers collaborate with one another in order to boost their views and expand their fan base to potentially new sources.
All these stars have in common one fact: they have social relations with a majority of YouTubers in their community and maintain a high level of power in regards to negotiating or striking deal when collaborating. Often new up and coming YouTubers seek well established YouTubers such as the above listed entities, to collaborate on a video and get the viewers of the established star to check out the new individual’s channel. The established YouTuber, has many options to collaborate with, whereas the newer YouTuber has a limited cache in which to collaborate with that can obtain large exposure for them. It was often in the past that the established YouTube star got to control the content of the video and who posted what on their channel, due to his or her fame and power. However, the YouTube network is growing exponentially, and options to collaborate are vast, so established stars do not dominate the negotiation relationship and in fact the split is becoming more equivocal, due to the increased competition. YouTube is a prime example where power in a social network comes to life, and demonstrates the negotiations that may occur and how they pan out as a result of power dynamics.
