Video Gaming Culture and News Online?

Before the internet really started taking hold of news and newscasts that had to do with entertainment more specifically video games there were television shows that supported this culture. Those television shows are such as G4 which was recently shut down because of lack of viewers. Why was there a lack of viewers? It is simple really, it is just that the majority of viewers shifted to a more adaptable medium, the internet. Through the progression of technology and the availability of such outlets like YouTube.com. On YouTube other gaming news outlets really started to take hold and pull in viewers with examples shown above, Machinima and IGN. These are just 2 of a wide range of news outlets located on YouTube. This particular medium allows viewers to watch a more concise news clip or podcast without advertisements, commercials or interruptions. This was one of the huge turn-offs of watching these types of shows on local cable television. The question really was why wait a full thirty minutes to find out what you want to know when you can just watch a similar clip done by one of the above organizations in a matter of minutes and the answer is you don't hence why G4 went out of business.

So what do these two organizations have to offer us viewers when we make the switch over to internet TV from actual cable television? Actually they have a lot more than what G4 had to offer with the reason being that there are more possibilities with the internet. On the channel that I have linked above the give their fan base news shows, updates, video game trailers, tips and tricks, coverage on the whole video game genre broken down into sub channels, game-play footage from the game producers and game-play footage from the players themselves which turns out to be us the viewers. Some of the game-play footage is that of games like W.O.W (World of Warcraft) which is an MMOG (Massively Muliplayer Online Game) which is mentioned by T.L. Taylor in the book The New Media and Technocultures Reader. Taylor talks about how MMOG's bring together a social culture by the thousands in attempts to create and finish a common goal. Some of these on takings are easily uploaded to these channels in YouTube and are available to everyone to see where as for the television this is something that would not be possible under basic cable. Eventually our generation will have internet televisions that not just allow you to surf the web but it will be incorporated into the internet and the way we view television will be forever changed. Machinima and IGN have shown very prominently that online news and media channels can be as successful or even more successful than television shows. The cost to do these news casts as compared to the cost of airing a single television show is significantly less and thus seems to be a more viable option to air the news especially with the abundance of "smart" technology aka smart phones, tablets, etc. This type of news emergence needs to be embraced and adapted to because it is the future of "television shows".


http://www.youtube.com/user/IGNentertainment
http://www.youtube.com/user/machinima