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Articles

Vol. 14 No. 1 (2020): Audiences and Paratexts

Top 10 Everything: WatchMojo and the Monetization of Fan Culture on YouTube

DOI
https://doi.org/10.14288/cinephile.v14i1.198206
Submitted
May 13, 2023
Published
2020-03-01

Abstract

Remixes and bootleg aesthetics are not exclusively a fan or even a cinephile practice, nor are they synonymous with low-production values. Video artists such as Candice Breitz have introduced remix and bootleg aesthetics to the art gallery with pieces such as Her (1978-2008) which featured a compilation of actor Meryl Streep’s performances. Video essayists have built the special features commentary into a stand-alone genre, attracting interest from film festivals and cultural institutions (Lavik). Art galleries and film festivals are highbrow exhibition spaces, but, as a host for user-generated videos with little barriers to entry, YouTube exists outside these boundaries of good taste. Remix videos are part of a gift economy, where fans trade labour within a brand community for recognition from official and unofficial gatekeepers of the fandom (Jenkins et al. 62). Yet, not all remix videos are gifts. On YouTube, online video compilation makers such as ScreenRant (2014-), Looper (2015-), and Canada's WatchMojo (2007-) appropriate the bootleg aesthetics of fan viewing, yet comply with the interests of copyright holders, transforming a previously oppositional relationship into one of cooperation. WatchMojo's ubiquitous Top 10 videos have contributed to the consolidation of fan practices as dominant ways of viewing. Video content creators like WatchMojo have helped democratize the creative space of YouTube. However, by masking the interests of rightsholders as opportunities for cinephiles to share in fan viewing practices, WatchMojo ultimately undermines fan participation in a reciprocal gift economy and returns control of fan practices to media corporations who assert ownership of pop culture.