Abstract
The objective of this study is to analyze the relationship between views (popularity) and social interaction generated by YouTuber videos in Spanish. A quali-quantitative analysis is conducted on a sample of 100 videos, 10 YouTube channels, 997 minutes of video, with 116,934,321 views, 12,297,021 likes/dislikes, and 1,041,191 comments on YT, 306,000 retweets/favorites on TW and 140,852 comments, shares, and reactions on FB. The existence of social media tools on YouTube does not in itself guarantee interaction by users who prefer to watch videos and adopt a passive attitude. In this analysis, we propose a social interaction indicator that takes into account the total number of social media reactions made on social networks (YT, TW, and FB) and the age of the video. Cultivating realistic conversation and interaction on platforms with audiences numbering in the millions represents a serious challenge for YouTubers.
Acknowledgements
Martin Boyd who provided the English translation. Metric Salad who provided data harvesting. Xhevrie Mamaqi who provided technical support.
Funding
The authors disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and publication of this article: This work was supported by the Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities of Spain (EU) [Grant Number CSO2016-74980-C2-2-R]. The translation was funded by the Department of Sociology II of Universidad de Alicante, Spain.
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