Ethics and YouTube
Looks like Ethics and YouTube dont go together and given the nature of the website they can never go together.
For those of you illiterate people, YouTube is a Google owned video sharing website where users come and post their videos. The original purpose of the website was to share user made videos at a single place but the huge amount of traffic it receives has made it impossible to monitor videos so any kind of contenet can go in there now.
The video of a man dressed as Gandhi and resorting to violence, carrying an automatic rifle, gyrating to music and doing a pole dance was posted on the website. A few Indian news channels were quick enough to show the video during prime time and causing more damage to the reputation to the father of the nation.
Just filling timeslots with anything that can catch craze is not the way enws channels should operate. They should have atleast thought of not showing the video but just reporting the news. The very purpose of the Govt. fighting with Google about the video has been ruined becasue a lot more people have seen it on TV than those possibly could have seen it on YouTube. The Govt. has expressed its anger about the act of the TV channels IBN7 and Sahara.
If you want to have some reading about the topic find articles here
Recently a Brazilian court issued an order to block YouTube in the whole country when a top brazilian model Daniela Cicarelli filed a case against the site which hosted a sex clip of her and her boy friend.
Update:
After the video has led to an outrage in the country, the author of the video Gautham Prasad an NRI speaks to Indians and guess what he doenst apoligize but talks intelligently. Says that people should realise difference between parody and reality and that he was wearing a clown nose.
So anyone who wears a clown nose can dress like any character and do what ever he thinks is funny? Reports say the guy has made the video to use it as a marketing tool for his business as a performer.
Gautham is bangalore born, presently residing in USA teaches Yoga and performs standup comeody.
The guy doenst seem to be having any feelings for how objectionable the content was for the Indian population. Read what he is saying
"At this point I don't think pulling the video from YouTube would do much good. So many people have already seen it and many more people want to see it. I am still considering the matter. As an artist it is difficult to ascribe "reasons" to creativity. I thought of something effective and I performed it. Gandhi doing a pole dance is effective because Gandhi would NEVER DO a pole dance. The contrast creates the humor. The character I portray on stage is foolish enough to think this dance would be a good idea."
Find more here
The story has made it to the homepage on Digg, find more stories on the topic submitted to Digg here.
Digg is a website where users submit stories and other determine if the popularity of the story by digging it.
Labels: General