If I were John or Hank Green, I would tell you that this video blog is coming to you in three parts. If I were John or Hank Green I would probably also have male organs, more of a tendency for facial hair, and a ridiculous talent for writing young adult novels and/or writing songs about Helen Hunt. My trip to the bathroom about three minutes ago proved that unfortunately, I still posess none of these qualities. Thus an upriotus, ingenius and thought-provoking video blog will not follow.
Part One:
I don’t vlog. I enjoy watching my friend’s vlogs and the vlogging endeavours of Brotherhood 2.0, but I have yet to hop on the bandwagon and create my own 2.0 “inspired”, which in many cases is a thinly veiled method of saying “knock-off,” collaboration channel. I do not feel then need to show the youtube community exactly how nerdy, talented, awesome, funny or inspirational I am. This is the age of the rise of Youtube as a social networking tool and consequently, there is a sudden fervish need amongst vloggers to gain “youtube fame.” There are obvious exceptions, but there’s nothing more aggravating than watching a teenage girl trying so hard to be liked by youtube that she comes across as a false, attention-seeking product of the desperate desire for recognition.
Part Two:
While the vlogbrothers are to be commended for making “nerdfighting” cool, reading popular and generally decreasing world suck, the popularity of nerdfighting now makes it difficult to spot real nerdfighters from pretenders. (Pretenders being those youtubers that claim to be nerd-like because they really like the TV show “Heroes” or used to watch the History Channel a lot.) Pretend nerdfighters are also the ones who claim “OMG I loooove reading! Nerdfighters ftw!” by which they mean they really like reading CosmoGirl and the occasional Nicholas Sparks novel.
Part Three:
I now have to redeem myself for haitn’ on youtube. I love youtube. I love nerdfighters, challenges, question Tuesdays, punishments, rating, commenting, favoriting and subscribing. My nerdfighter heart just growls a little when I see those kids who used to tease nerdfighters in elementary school and throw mud on our library books and make fun of us for going to Harry Potter conventions, suddenly declare their “nerdiness” simply because it is now popular to do so.
It would be awesome to be John or Hank Green (or both! At the same time!) but I’m not and I won’t try to be.
My self-worth does not depend on how many subscribers I have.
In case you’re wondering, fiveawesomegirls is the only genuinely original, worthwhile youtube channel inspired by vlogbrothers. Check them out: www.youtube.com/fiveawesomegirls
