52 HAPPENING Video Vortex
similarity to a content ‘ocean’. In China, live streamers refer to each other as ‘water friend’. Looking at these metaphors is a way to gain insights, he said, surmising that the universally hydrographic language around online video was due to the ephemerality of the medium, the deep sense that it is not only infinitely malleable, but ultimately impermanent. A Japanese word for live streaming, Zhang said, is ‘nanahosu’, which means ‘raw cast’. Again, something not fully present in this world. It’s as if streaming is always on the way from somewhere or to somewhere, but definitely not something permanent. MUFFLED MEMORY Even obscure web video genres were given careful consideration at Video Vortex – although what’s obscure to the day-to-day linear world is huge hits online. Jake Wilson of the University of Warwick presented a paper on the ‘Playing From Another Room’ genre of online content. ‘From Another Room’ videos – which began ballooning as a meme in 2017 – generally present a popular song that has been subjected to audio filtering so it has the muffled, low frequency sound of music being played in another room. We’ve all experienced the effect – that distant thump-thump of music at a club when you’re in the toilets or the holiday songs on IN CHINA, LIVE STREAMERS REFER TO EACH OTHER AS ‘WATER FRIEND’
DESKTOP DRAMA Video Vortex lectures included a study of the “desktop film” genre, embodied by movies like Cam and Unfriended .
the radio downstairs when you’re in your bedroom wrapping presents. The genre seems to tap into something very primal, invariably evoking in listeners memories of parties long-past, fantasies of loneliness and separation, or moments of melancholic drama. The tracks are sometimes accompanied by nostalgic imagery, too – stock photos or archival American footage from the Cold War years appear to be popular. Wilson’s paper theorised that the power of the genre came from a sadness driven by “the possibility of human contact”. His thesis was that the success of the genre was reflective of a society trapped inside platform capitalism – where humans are entirely immersed in a fully connected environment (like a big, global, digital party), but are permanently separated from physical contact (like a person locked away in a digital bathroom listening to the fun outside).
One afternoon session was devoted to journalism and activism. In the panel, journalist and activist Donatella della Ratta presented ‘The Vanished Image: Who Owns The Archives of the Arab Uprisings?’. Telling the story of her friend who had entrusted her with footage from the revolution in Syria before his murder by state authorities, she explored the issues of censorship and media control that work against such vital video material getting to the general public. Media scholar Aishwarya Viswanathan presented her study ‘Staged Fear: Real and Imagined Audiences of Mob Lynching Videos in India’. India’s ascendant extreme right has taken to recording its attacks on the country’s Muslim population, creating videos that have a bizarre sense of ritual about them, almost as if they were ‘how to’ guides. Viswanathan queried who the audience for these videos really is. Are they for recruitment? Are they meant to instill terror? Are they trophy records? She also noted that not all the videos are real. In some, it is an actor playing the victim. In others it is a real murder being committed. She was also bemused that her video study of the phenomenon was rejected by YouTube’s algorithms while some of the original lynching videos remained online. SPINE-TINGLING For the experimentally inclined, Video Vortex held a breakout session on ASMR, which allowed people to experience and discuss the phenomenon that has become an online media sensation. ASMR stands for autonomous sensory meridian response and is a nervous system reaction
STREAMING OF THE FUTURE Writer and media thinker Geert Lovink started Video Vortex 15 years ago and was on hand to provide commentary and context.
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