How does YouTube pushing stardom change the community?

YouTube has been becoming more corporate for years, but at the MTV movie awards YouTube launched a new initiative to change the way YouTube creators are seen by the world at large. Hank Green deftly explains this move to change in this blog post, but in general, YouTube want's their stars to become more "legitimate stars", recognized world wide, in order to appeal to advertisers. While it's good that this will bring more money to creators, it has wider implications to the community.

Here is the list Hank wrote in his post:

"More ad money means more competition from more institutionalized companies. Companies that operate efficiently and do market research and clever accounting and have VPs of business development and lawyers and other things that I find intensely tedious.

The barriers to entry on YouTube get higher…the gatekeepers re-take their posts. If YouTube stardom is “legit” stardom, the competition will increase. The people (or algorithms) who decide what content is getting featured, shared, and turned into TV ads will be the new gate keepers.

YouTube will be less cool. Not all of it, mind you, there will still be pockets of exciting, interesting, revolutionary weirdness, but YouTube’s broader culture will be more bland every year in order to appeal to broader audiences and advertising execs." (Green, 2014)

I would like to expand on some of these points and add my other ways the community at large might be changed. One of the things that has so far made the YouTube community unique is the relationship between creator and fan. Creators are much more accessible than 'traditional' stars, they interact with their fans directly, and fans feel more connected into them since YouTube often provides a much more intimate look into the creators life than media does for actors. YouTube culture is also entirely run by the fans, they aren't fed opinions on YouTube stars by tabloids or other stars. An until recently, what was popular on YouTube was a direct result of community sharing.

Already we see advertisements for YouTube channels as pre-rolls on videos instead of generic ads. Now it looks like we will start seeing those advertisements on other mediums, even on television. When YouTube stars begin to become put on the same level as TV and movie stars, that connection between them and their fans might start to disintegrate. They will no longer be as accessible. This will also likely discourage viewers from making the transition from just viewer to viewer and creator. YouTube has always been about letting the normal person take control of presenting and expressing themselves for the world to see. Will the community let YouTube culture be taken over by the corporations of that are catering to advertisers, or will we find a way to work around them?

Resources:

Green, H. (2014, April 16). YouTube at Large(r). - Hank's Tumblr. Retrieved April 17, 2014, from http://edwardspoonhands.com/post/82907720681/youtube-at-large-r