1. Comments on YouTube
Videos: Understanding
the Role of Anonymity
Laeeq Khan
Telecommunications, Information Studies, and Media
Michigan State University
AEJMC - 2012

2. YouTube
By far the most popular video sharing site by traffic in the
world
About 21% of visitors to the site come from the United
States (Alexa, 2012)
Content increasingly generated by users of a site (UGC)
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3. 3

4. Why study user-generated content (UGC)?
Readers’ comments, ratings, integral elements of user
generated content
Comments on a website create an impression of an active
audience and that the website is alive & credible
Kraut and Resnick (In press)
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5. Research Rationale
Individuals less inhibited online, reflected in a
higher level of self-disclosure (Aiken & Waller,
2009)
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6. Negative Content?
Expressing opinions may result in User Generated
Content (UGC), both negative and positive
Computer mediated communication (CMC) has the
potential to be more negative and offensive (Postmes &
Spears, 1998).
Desirable for these discussions to remain civic and within
acceptable societal norms of decency
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7. Flaming
Flaming defined as “displaying hostility by insulting,
swearing or using otherwise offensive language”
(Moor, Heuvelman, & Verleur, 2010, p. 1)
Moor et al. (2010) revealed that most participants viewed that
there was regular flaming on YouTube
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8. Data Collection
Data gathering for nine environmental group channels on
YouTube
25 random videos from each channel
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9. Environmental Groups Selected
1. Greenpeace International
2. Greenpeace USA
3. Greenpeace UK
4. WWF
5. WWF-USA
6. WWF-UK
7. National Wildlife Federation
8. Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC)
9. National Sierra Club
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10. Data Gathering
User comments downloaded and coded
Video Likes, Dislikes, Description, Views etc. also
obtained for each video
Total comments after data cleaning = 1384
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11. Comment Classifications
Appreciation – love, change, beautiful, brilliant, awesome, proud,
cool, fantastic, majestic, good, hope, respect, incredible, marvel, thumbs
up, favorite, use, great, touch, thank, nice, heart, amazing, wow, bravo
Criticism – dislike, against, evil, bad, ugly, hate, retard, not
Flaming – f…, fcuk, f**k, douchebag, p***, porn, wtf…..etc.
Spam – ___Eruhfeuhf+++++####*******
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12. Appreciative Comments
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13. Challenges
Categorization – Appreciative or flaming?
“Shut up!” – Criticism
“Shut down the coal plant” – Appreciative comment for a
video arguing in favor of closing down a coal plant.
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14. Theoretical Dimensions
Walther et al (2010) – Identifying with peers who are
visually anonymous, there is susceptibility to social
influence from that group
The Social Identity model of Deindividuation
Effects (SIDE) is a theory that helps understand the social
effects of CMC—effects of anonymity and identifiability on
the behavior of groups(Reicher, Spears, & Postmes,
1995)
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15. Theoretical Dimensions
Reicher, Spears and Postmes (1995) shed light on a
phenomenon in CMC in which extreme polarization was
noted in the comments
Such polarizations reflect in-group social identity
formations
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16. Anonymity
While citing Kiesler, Siegel, & Mcguire (1984), it was
argued that:
―anonymity and immersion in the medium, produce the classic
deindividuating conditions of reduced self-awareness and
disinhibition, leading to the expression of more extreme
arguments‖ (Reicher et al., 1995, p. 181)
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17. RQ-1
RQ1 – Do we observe excessive flaming behavior on
YouTube video comments (where users post
anonymously) ?
This research did show that appreciative comments
outnumbered flaming based comments which were only
7.1% of the total comments (98/1378).
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18. Flaming behavior
Most flames were unrelated to the topic of the video
More of an effort to derail any discussion and vent anger
Supported by previous research into flaming (Aiken &
Waller, 1999)
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19. Comments
1000
900 863
800
700
600
500
400
300 252
200 176
93
100
0
Appreciation Criticism Flaming Spam
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20. RQ-2
RQ2: Is flaming necessarily a phenomena emerging due
to anonymity.
If flaming is an issue arising out of anonymity, than is it true to
assume that appreciative comments mostly emerge from
users who are non-anonymous?
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21. Anonymity does play a major role in flaming
behavior on environmental content on YouTube
All flaming comments from anonymous
users, zero from non-anonymous users!
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22. Anonymity was dominant
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23. Other Interesting Observations
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24. Views & Likes
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25. Videos that attracted most comments
It all comes back to you! 51
These beluga whales face extinction 67
Pierce Brosnan Speaks Out Against Iceland's Illegal Whaling 69
40 years 141
The world is where we live 158
Astonish Me - a short film for WWF 62
Robert Redford: THANK YOU President Obama 384
Earth Hour 2011 Official video 169
VW Dark Side: Stormtroopers invade London 99
The Tuna Industry's Dirty Little Secret 164
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26. Videos that attracted most comments
Message involving politics
Videos having a wider appeal in the public (e.g. Earth
hour)
Active campaigning, compelling videos directly referring to
a company/institution
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27. Conclusion
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28. Designing for Anonymity
In the gaming world, for players of massively multiplayer online
role-playing games (MMORPGs) anonymity leads to a reduction
in self-awareness and this serves as a motivating factor in game
playing (Foo & Koivisto, 2004)
A study by Choi and Haque (2002) found anonymity to be a
motivating factor for Internet use
Anonymity afforded by the Internet promotes democratic
communication especially when participants are anonymous;
and motivates individuals to speak freely (Ryan, 1995)
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29. Promoting democratic
communication
Politics related videos attract greater comments in
comparison with environmental videos
Anonymity promotes an open discussion
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30. Thank You !
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