internethistoriananalysis

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The Transformed Public Sphere in Relation to ‘Internet Historian’

The Transformed Public Sphere

In the previous essay I argued that the public sphere had been transformed by the advent of the digital era, but that the change was for the negative. Despite there being significant technological improvements that would naturally bring about a healthier public sphere, the vertical relationships described by Habermas (1989) in the public sphere between corporation and consumer had persisted in the transition from old to new media. This is because ultimately corporations such as Alphabet Inc., which have a history of buying up small companies by the bucket load (Hartmans and Meisenzahl, 2020); still impose vague terms of service that allow for absolutely control over the website’s content and algorithms that appeal to the reptilian reward centre of the brain.

Recontextualisation for the Internet Historian

As with the posts on Goffman’s presentation of the self. It was important to fit the theory into the digital context so Harold and the Internet Historian can be best understood through the idea of the transformed public sphere. This is why he is only being mentioned now.

I discussed in a previous post that Harold is an anonymous figure. He consists entirely of what is best describes as an ‘online persona’, or social front. This means when looking at his place within the public sphere it is difficult to assign him a ‘class’ value, which has been key in determining the health and nature of the public sphere. He is an entertainer, and not in a real position of power as we might associate with the corporate directors and publishers of the 20th century. This indeterminate nature of his character and class status is interesting within the recontextualised ideas of Habermas’ public sphere as anonymity would typically signal that you don’t have much of a vested interest in the affairs of public concern.

Advertisement

Due to the advent of the ‘adpocalypse’ on YouTube (Alexander, 2019), many YouTube content creators have taken to making in-video sponsorships that do not require the approval of the YouTube monetisation system. This cuts out the middle man and allows creators to make more money without the fear of having their videos demonetised or a loss of revenue from a false copyright claim.

On the downside, in-video sponsorships are rather exclusive and are not available to creators with a small following in return for pocket change. This however, is not an issue for Harold as a very successful online persona with 2.74 million subscribers on his primary channel as of January 2021 and it is something that he makes use of in all of his videos.

Habermas describes advertisement as an example of the vertical relationship in the public sphere; the king talking to his subject. A dictation of what is, essentially. This is an easy relationship to establish with an example of traditional advertising, as seen below:

(Brylcreem, N.d.)

This piece of traditional advertising for the hair cream popular in the 1950′s is typical of advertisement from that time. This particular piece was likely found in a newspaper or magazine. It doesn’t use humour in any way, it contains a title, text and an image of a rather joyous man who is clearly a user of this product. The piece exists simply to preach to the quality of Brylcreem and extoll the many virtues of its users. The public sphere relationship is between the advertiser and the consumer; it is an absolute truth being dictated to the consumer and this is the vertical relationship that is not healthy for the public sphere’s benefit.

Unlike traditional advertisement, Internet Historian takes a radically different approach. Most interestingly, he takes the in-video advertisements and incorporates them into the style and humour of the video. For example, in the video below Harold is providing an advertisement for the wireless earphone company RayCon.

(Internet Historian, 2020:11min 48)

In the video advertisement, Harold creates a fictional character called ‘Ray Con Man’ and gives him a backstory about how his father was killed after being beheaded by wired earphones caught on a tree’s twig, (the joke lies in the fact Ray Con earphones are wireless) and that this spurred him on a mission to destroy all wires. 

There is a great difference between traditional advertisement and the form of advertisement seen here. "Critics have blamed advertising for for manipulating people, creating and instilling false needs and values, promoting materialism, perpetuating stereotypes, and presenting a world of consumption sheltered from social problems” (Sandikci, 2004). This could definitely be said about traditional advertising, but is it true of the advertisement within Harold’s videos?

The case isn’t very strong, on the contrary, the advertising seen in Harold’s videos is one that is laden with irony and it could be argued as being an attempt to humorously parody mainstream advertisement in a way that will fit in with the overall comedy of the video; the ultimate goal being to entertain his audience.

References

Alexander, J. (2019) The Golden Age of YouTube is Over. The Verge. [Online] [Accessed 4th January 2021] https://www.theverge.com/2019/4/5/18287318/youtube-logan-paul-pewdiepie-demonetization-adpocalypse-premium-influencers-creators#:~:text=The%20attention%20Kjellberg%20brought%20to,from%20halting%20their%20ad%20spending. 

Habermas, J. (1989)  The structural transformation of the public sphere : an inquiry into a category of bourgeois society. Cambridge: MIT Press

Hartmans, A. and Meisenzahl, M., (2020)  All the companies and divisions under Google's parent company, Alphabet, which just made yet another shake-up to its structure. Business Insider. [Online] [Accessed 5th January 2020] https://www.businessinsider.com/alphabet-google-company-list-2017-4?r=US&IR=T

Sandikci, O., (2004) ‘Advertising and the Public Sphere.’ Advances in Consumer Research, 31 pp. 174-175.

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Habermas’ Public Sphere and its Transformation in Relation to YouTube

The Public Sphere

German philosopher and devotee of liberalism, Jurgen Habermas conceptualised the ‘bourgeois public sphere’ through his historical analysis; arising from the establishment of a new liberal social order starting in the coffee houses of England in the early 18th-century before spreading across Europe to countries like Germany and France; necessitated by the increased trade which upped the need for more open discussion of matters of common concern (Habermas, 1989). He defines the bourgeois public sphere as “[being] conceived above all as the sphere of private people come together as a public; they soon claimed the public sphere regulated from above against the public authorities themselves, to engage them in a debate over the general rules governing relations in the basically privatized but publicly relevant sphere of commodity exchange and social labour” (Habermas, 1989:27).

Habermas’ theory of the public sphere is ingrained into the late-stage enlightenment philosophy of liberalism and its values. As such, Habermas defines a set of prerequisites that must be met in order for a space to be categorical of a public sphere. The space must be accessible to and inclusive of all citizens; there must be allowances for the formation of public opinion within a debated framework of rules and governing regulations wherein unrestricted debate may take place in accordance with the ideals of free association and expression (Habermas, 1989).

Transformation of the Public Sphere

YouTube, as a place that anyone can go, and a tool that anyone can use; could easily be called a ‘public sphere’. The question lays in if the prevalence of the digital era constitutes a transformational change for the public sphere as a whole.

Habermas argues that the ‘public sphere’ that came into existence in the 1830′s due to the advent of increased trade was a very open, rational, and freethinking arena. The relationships in this public sphere were horizontal, not vertical. In essence, this means that people interacted with people of a similar class or socioeconomic status to themselves, rather than any action between classes occurring (Habermas, 1989). The public sphere during this time was structurally classist in this regard, something that would persist later on, but for different reasons with the emergence of the corporatism of the 20th century, and the formation of the welfare state.

In the in the 20th century, classical liberalism sacrificed itself to avoid Marxism through the creation of the welfare state. Paralleling this was the merger of many large companies into corporations, particularly in the publishing and media industries where the narrative was thereon controlled by the stage-managed narratives of corporations that operate(d) on curated content that was unilaterally incentivised by a profit-motive sought to promote the interests of advertisers: other faceless corporate entities. According to Habermas this re-established the vertical nature of the public sphere seen in feudal times, as it was analogical to the nature of King talking to Subject. Instead in the modern era, the ‘King’ became the Media Corporation and the ‘Subject’; the Consumer.

Old versus New Media

YouTube, in some regard is similar to the traditional media organisation, yet on the same hand is also radically dissimilar. I would argue that the similarities are less prevalent, and that the differences are so radical in their nature that they outweigh any similarity between traditional media; it’s conventions, and itself by an order of magnitude.

One of the most notable similarities between these two ‘institutions’, for lack of a better term, is both YouTube and the traditional media are controlled by corporate entities. In the case of the former; Google. This means that YouTube is still controlled by the same kind of institution as the traditional media. It can be succinctly argued that this control has had a significant impact over the platforms evolution over the years. For example, there has been a marked shift from the platform promoting itself as a platform of independent creators, to a more traditional stage managed one, where the platform can be controlled. “YouTube is inevitably heading towards being like television, but they never told their creators this,” remarks Jamie Cohen a professor of new media at Molloy College speaking to USA Today in 2018 (Alexander, 2019).

It is undeniable that YouTube has fundamentally changed people’s expectations of media and the way in which they consume it. There is no doubt about the fact that traditional media is on the decline, especially in the certain antiquated domains such as the newspaper industry. CVM for newspapers; books and stationery has gone down from over £2.2bn in Q3 2000 versus £569mn today, Q3 2020 (Ruddock, 2020:Online).

So, has the Public Sphere been Transformed?

As I have explained above, it seems clear that the public sphere has been fundamentally transformed as the old corporate-controlled narratives of the past have subsisted in favour of independent rational thought and reasoning by a decentralised network of content creators on platforms such as YouTube and Twitter due to the lack of ‘stage management’. This would imply that the vertical relationships as described by Habermas have ceased to be. Unfortunately, this is not the case.

Targeted advertisement based on people’s personal data is now a societal norm. Curated content is so too, with the YouTube algorithm personalising content based on one’s viewing history. It has also been described as “one of the most powerful radicalizing instruments of the 21st century” (Tufekci, 2018). These divisive algorithms seek to divide society through further polarization of political thought. It is hard to see how this could improve the quality of the public sphere.

I mentioned above, when describing the similarities that YouTube was purchased by Google. What was ‘Google’ is now known as the parent company ‘Alphabet Inc.’ This is not a new behaviour, as media corporations did the same kind of mergers and buyouts in the 20th century when forming what became the corporate media that is now in decline, it is certain that the similar narratives are being promoted if the logic is Habermas is correct, except in different ways. Possible examples include incentivising self-censorship through revocation of monetization from videos when certain unfavourable key words are detected; algorithmic discrimination, and termination of accounts. The above explained algorithmic polarization often lead to amplified censorship within communities that are politically biased (Ashokkumar, et al. 2020).

Compared to the 19th century coffee houses of London, a place of free and rational debate. The public sphere in the digital era seems like a stone’s throw away from societal breakdown. The main driving force is algorithmic technology which has arisen from the profit-motives of large corporations such as Google, Facebook, Twitter and others. It is safe to say that the public sphere has been transformed, but it is difficult to argue that it has been transformed for the better.

References

Ashokkumar, A., Talaifar, S., Fraser, W. T., Landabur, R., Buhrmester M., Gomez, A., Borja, P., Swann, Jr., W., B. (2020) ‘Censoring political opposition online: Who does it and why’ J Exp Soc Psychol. 91(104031) DOI;  10.1016/j.jesp.2020.104031

Alexander, J. (2019) The Golden Age of YouTube is Over. The Verge. [Online] [Accessed 4th January 2021] https://www.theverge.com/2019/4/5/18287318/youtube-logan-paul-pewdiepie-demonetization-adpocalypse-premium-influencers-creators#:~:text=The%20attention%20Kjellberg%20brought%20to,from%20halting%20their%20ad%20spending.

Habermas, J. (1989)  The structural transformation of the public sphere : an inquiry into a category of bourgeois society. Cambridge: MIT Press

Ruddock, V. Office for National Statistics (2020) 09.5.2 Newspapers; books & stationery Newspapers & periodicals CVM NAYear NSA £m. Newport: Office for National Statistics.

Tufekci, Z. (2018) YouTube, the Great Radicalizer. New York Times. [Online] [Accessed 4th January 2021] 

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Goffman’s, ‘The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life’ in relation to Internet Historian

Recontextualisation for the Digital Era

In the previous post, I discussed Erving Goffman’s dramaturgical analysis of human social interaction and theory of Impression Management from ‘The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life’ (1956) and re-contextualised his theoretical approach for digital social interaction as opposed to generic human social interaction.

The most important of these differences being firstly the lack of any physical presence, which negates certain mannerisms and bodily expressions; arguably degrading one’s ability to infer context in certain situations; and secondly the ability to easily anonymise or pseudonymise ones self through projecting an online identity or digital persona: a ‘front’ within the broader context of Goffman’s theory; which has mixed outcomes in terms of social good.

The Internet Historian through Goffman

In the closing words of that previous piece, I drew parallels between a video by Internet Historian (2018) and a recontextualised version Goffman’s idea of the ‘social actor’ and how structure and agency are mutually limiting. This is something I wish to expand upon further in this blog; paying more specific attention to the intricacies of Harold’s social action and how it relates with the idea of digital identity through Goffman. To achieve this, I shall be segmenting and analysing his content across platforms (Twitter, YouTube, etc.), but also across time; as chronology is most definitely the best marker of evolution in a more general sense, therefore it should be the case herein in terms of changes to Harold’s sense of digital self and his presentation of that self through his content.

Internet Historian on Twitter

According to Goffman’s theory, self-presentation is essentially transmitting information about oneself, or the image of the self, i.e. the ‘front’. 

Figure 1: a screenshot of a tweet by @NetHistorian (Internet Historian, 2020)

While Harold usually assumes the role of a narrator; telling a story through unbiased means to a passive audience: here he can be seen doing something different; the spending of social capital. According to Bourdieu (1983:248-9), “Social capital is the aggregate of the actual or potential resources which are linked to possession of a durable network of more or less institutionalized relationships of mutual acquaintance and recognition-or in other words, to membership in a group which provides each of its members with the backing of the collectively-owned capital, a “credential” which entitles them to credit in the various senses of the word.” 

Bourdieu’s interpretation of ‘the group’, would be the fans of Internet Historian, in this sense, and as the obvious ‘leader’ of this group he would naturally have the highest social capital within it.

This fits in well with Goffman’s ideas about self-presentation. Firstly, this would imply that Harold’s is cognizant of the fact that his audience is large and far-reaching and that is reflected in his self-image. Secondly he is attempting to use a form of flattery; a method of increasing social attractiveness to fulfil the second form of self-presentation: the expectations and preferences of the audience.

Of course, it would be disingenuous to not mention that there is a stark sarcasm, what many would misterm as ‘irony’, to this tweet. The humorous aspects are manifold. For example, the description of his fans as “greedy possums fighting over an unlidded trashcan”, and the self-revealing tactical humour of “Aim low, Toyota, etc aren’t gonna fall for it”. These comments would not fly without the obvious humorous veneer that is present.

However, that is not to say that this tweet can’t be well analysed under the perspective of Goffman’s impression management theory. The humour in of itself is there to match the expectations of the audience who in return, signified their approval through interaction on the tweet.

Internet Historian out of character

As I’ve explained before in this blog. The character that is ‘Dr. Harold’ is the narrator of the Internet Historian videos. He is considered to be a character who avoid giving personal opinions in order to tell a story in an unbiased manner. However, a recent clipping from one of Harold’s late-night livestreams shows him break that character due to discontent with the videogame, ‘Last of Us 2′.

At six minutes thirty-five in the video, Harold says, “it’s five in the morning, I’ve let the mask slip”. A very poignant quote in relation to the dramaturgical analysis we’ve been discussing. Harold follows this by playing some incredibly up-beat music paired with an eccentric voiceover about how much is allegedly loving the game.

This is a similar comedic effect to the one seen in his tweets; effectually and whether Harold put much conscious thought into this, or not (it appears likely he did not given the context), the humour is very grounded in the theory of self-presentation and self-image. It is effectually a parody of this, even if it is self-implicating, it is largely harmless and as with the previous item we analysed, is self-supporting in that despite being what can most accurately be described as a humorous parody of self-presentation; aids with Harold’s own self-presentation by appealing the sense of humour (requirements) of his audience.

References

Bourdieu, P (1983). 'The Forms of Capital.' Handbook of Theory and Research for the Sociology of Education. pp. 241-258.

Goffman, E. (1956) The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life., Edinburgh: University of Edinburgh.

Internet Historian (2020) November 18. Available at https://twitter.com/NetHistorian [Accessed 18th December 2020].

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Goffman’s, ‘The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life’ in Relation to the Digital Sphere

All the world’s a stage

According to the theory proposed by Canadian born sociologist, psychologist and writer Erving Goffman in his 1959 work, the most accurate way of depicting human action is by viewing humans as actors on a ‘social stage’ wherein we establish a ‘front’ or ‘social identity’ which is effectively the way in which we desire to be perceived according to certain norms or expectations.

These ‘fronts’ are malleable and can be switched out in different contexts and adjusted to fit the roles we are expected to take in relation to fellow members of the group. It universally requires us to project a contextually idealised image of ourselves that would be the most efficient at achieving social goals. His theory has come to be known as the dramaturgical analysis due to his usage of theatrical imagery to explain his ideas of impression management. (Goffman, 1959).

In the traditional non-digital, or ‘analogue’ context (if you will), the ways in which these social fronts would manifest in our behaviour are rather self-explanatory. They manifest in how we dress ourselves; items of clothing or other personal artefacts to which social concepts can be applied like particular brands of mobile phone or a stylish watch that may hope to convey messaging. They also manifest in our speech and mannerism; how we conduct ourselves in social situations.

Social interaction in the digital sphere

Although written much before the advent of the digital era, Goffman’s self-presentation theory has a striking utility in attempting to understand social action in the online sphere. 

Before considering the nature of social action within the digital sphere, it is important to understand it’s intricacies. Due to the past assumptions of scientists viewing the internet as a place devoid of face-to-face interaction and body language the online sphere is considered at best a separate, if not lesser domain than the real world. Green and Brock (1998) drawing a contrast between genuine social interaction and substitute or ‘ersatz’ social activities whereby interaction is done by proxy through the medium of characters. As pointed out by Zimmerman (2012), this analysis does have some grounding in truth, but he notes that so-called ‘ersatz’ social interaction “can indeed seem very real to the individuals who are engaged in it”, as he noted the existence of clear cut norms and rules of social interaction within the online 3D life simulation game called ‘Second Life’.

Anonymity: the engine of eccentricity

It is clear from the proposed argument in Zimmerman’s thesis that there exist highly nuanced and varied sets of social norms on the internet that parallel those which we see in the analogue. However, it begs the question as to what limitations or quirks exist, and how these may affect an analysis through the lens of Goffman’s theory of self-presentation. 

To assess this, we must first note the key differences between social action or interaction in online spheres as opposed the same within the analogue. One of the most observable differences is the ability to become anonymised or disguised by a persona that does not reveal too much -if any- personal detail. 

These anonymous digital identities can be crafted in moments, and also disposed of in similar time. This is great for concerns over privacy, but it can also lead to cyberdisinhibition; behaviours which contrast from the normative in favour of the less favourable, with greater displays of aggression due to a lack of groundedness: you cannot simply ‘log out’ of real life (more than once, at least) (Zimmerman, 2012). It’s clear that the anonymity and semipermanence of online identities encourages malicious behaviour as there is no social repercussion for the perpetrator.

This would suggest that even the most superfluous of Twitter handles that exist only to jab at and make a mockery of other’s are still acting in accordance with Goffman’s notion of self-presentation. The ‘Troll’ seeks to provoke a reaction, and the fellow spectator is his audience, and through the entertainment he has provided to those spectators, he has gained a sense of agency and perceives that he has influences the behaviour and thoughts of fellow social actors. 

Dr. Harold’s Front

Not all anonymous digital identities are created equal. Certain identities may be more accountable for their actions. This could be for manifold reasons; the size of their fanbase or whether they are financially dependent on sponsorships by advertisers, who, given enough controversy, could withdraw their support.

How does all of this information link into the key influencer of this blog? Internet Historian, and the associated persona; ‘Dr. Harold’ act as a great example of a digital identity which is more grounded and accountable due to having an incredibly large audience and a dependence on their favour as well as in-video sponsorships.

Harold, while essentially being a digital construct is a character which exists for the purpose of narration, but his actions do also reflect genuine sympathies and opinions, perhaps more so on his livestreams, tweets, or videos from the ‘in the field’ series, where the content is not informed by a thought-out script.

Let us take for example, one of Harold’s videos from this series ‘In the Field’ (Internet Historian: Incognito Mode, 2018). In the video, Harold and EmpLemon take on the role of commentators, which is the ‘front’ in this instance, and make unscripted remarks on various videos in the ‘YTP’ genre for comedic effect.

Both Harold and EmpLemon are the ‘actors’ under Goffman’s theory and their stage and props are combined into one; the videos being watched and the videos imposed during editing of the video. They act in accordance with the structure (the videos being watched), but use their agency (the commentary) to entertain and entice the audience (the viewers of their video). 

References

Goffman, E. (1956) The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life., Edinburgh: University of Edinburgh

Green, M. C., & Brock, T. C. (1998). Trust, mood, and outcomes of friendship determine preferences for real versus ersatz social capital. Political Psychology, 19(3), 527- 544. doi:10.1111/0162-895X.00116.

Internet Historian: Incognito Mode. (2018)  A Lesson in YTP | In The Field [Feat. EmpLemon] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xh6rc-t47rQ

Zimmerman, A, G. (2012) Online Aggression: The Influences of Anonymity and Social Modelling. UNF Graduate Theses and Dissertations. 403. [Online] [Accessed 15th December 2020] https://digitalcommons.unf.edu/etd/403/

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Introduction

Who is the Internet Historian?

'Internet Historian’, who also goes by the pseudonym of ‘Dr. Harold’ is a New Zealand YouTuber currently residing in Australia according to “evidence found on his second channel” (Wikitubia, 2020). Harold (as he will be referred to henceforth for the sake of brevity) is most notable for being a documentarian of ‘internet history’. His first video entitled ‘GameStop’s Battle with Toads’ (Internet Historian, 2017) recounts the cult phenomenon of the 1991 ‘beat ‘em up’ platformer ‘Battletoads’ and a series of prank calls associated with the anonymous imageboard 4chan whereby posters to the site would ring up video game outlets and ask if they had copies of ‘Battletoads’ in stock, despite it being an antiquated release at the time, evoking varied responses from chagrin to cheek by workers at the stores.

His early videos saw quick an immediate success, owing to his unique style of production and concise format that place a clear emphasis on not wasting the viewers’ time as he realised that potential viewers have what is, in effect, an infinite content library at their disposal already (The Creator Generation, 2019). Pairing this with an unparalleled dedication to persistent production, where he would often put seventy to eighty hours of work in per week resulted in the amassing of a large following of over 2.6 million subscribers on his primary YouTube channel and a further 1.1 million on his second channel, ‘Internet Historian: Incognito Mode’, which combine for a total viewership of 377 million views.

Eponymous yet Anonymous

One of the most distinctive features of ‘Dr. Harold’ is that he is anonymous yet eponymous; there is a persona attached to the brand that is ‘Internet Historian’. A persona which constitutes more than just the name ‘Dr. Harold’, but a voice and face too.

The face of Harold’s persona is taken from a retired Hungarian electrical engineer named András Arató, who worked on the side as a model for the stock photo company Dreamstime. The images of Arató came to be known as ‘Hide the Pain Harold’ within online circles due to what was perceived as hidden pain behind his face (KnowYourMeme, 2014). The name ‘Harold’ also provided a name for Internet Historian’s persona.

In interviews, Harold himself notes that he has a distinctive voice that compliments his presentation style, and that he is frequently imagined as an older man, an illusion which is “shattered” once met in person (The Creator Generation, 2019). In the same interview Harold mentions that it was his intention from the get-go to establish a false persona or character to present his videos as he views anonymity as especially important.

Metamorphosis

It is undeniable that in the three and a half years since Harold released his first video on ‘Battletoads’ in 2017, that there has been a significant metamorphosis of not only his production quality, but also of his online persona. Here are a few of the ways in which his content and persona have evolved.

In Harold’s early uploads there is generally little editing outside of moving text and images with a narrative overlay. This is something that has developed as his skills have progressed. In an interview he gave, he stated that he didn’t wish to learn to use ‘Adobe: After Effects’ (a digital effects and compositing software), due to the steep learning curve, preferring to stick with the limitations of Premiere Pro (The Creator Generation, 2019). One might see this as being a handicap to allow further progression of his skills as an editor, but instead this has played into his hand in what has resulted in a unique and niche video aesthetic that emphasises 2D visual effects and animations with frequent stock-images inclusive of branded watermarks used for copyright protection.

Much of this innovation has been spurred on by the experimental content posted on his second channel, ‘Internet Historian: Incognito Mode’. This channel has allowed him to see what kind of content is enjoyed, without disengaging his core viewership.

As a trend, Harold’s videos have become longer and less frequent. This is likely due to him being able to get away with this as a larger content creator, without falling into the trap of algorithmic irrelevancy as there is a core viewership at his disposal who identify with the brand that is ‘Internet Historian’.

The aims of this blog

This blog aims to offer an academic analysis of Dr. Harold and how his video content and use of other social media platforms allows him to gain traction and expand upon his following within online spheres. 

In terms of the actual content that will be analysed; this will include Internet Historian’s video content across his three YouTube channels. His primary channel, ‘Internet Historian’; secondary channel called ‘Internet Historian: Incognito Mode’, and the VoD (video on demand) uploads taken from livestreams on Twitch.tv and uploaded to a tertiary channel; ‘Internet Historian: Live’. There will also be comments passed on his use of Twitter and any other VoD clips that are only available on his Twitch.tv channel.

I aim to parse this information through the main theoretical works relating to digital communications, social media and ideas of the self. I will be focusing firstly on Goffman’s theory of the presentation of the self (1956), and Habermas’ theory of the transformation of the public sphere (1989).

References

Goffman, E. (1956) The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life., Edinburgh: University of Edinburgh

Habermas, J. (1989)  The structural transformation of the public sphere : an inquiry into a category of bourgeois society. Cambridge: MIT Press

Internet Historian (2017) Gamestop’s Battle with Toads. [Online video] [Accessed on 13th December 2020] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yYmVdzgfhCY

KnowYourMeme (2014) Hide the Pain Harold [Online] [Accessed on 13th December 2020] https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/hide-the-pain-harold

The Creator Generation (2019) The INTERNET HISTORIAN // YouTuber Interview [Online video] [Accessed on 13th December 2020] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gi8k2KKcMEg

Wikitubia (2020) Internet Historian [Online] [Accessed on 13th December 2020] https://youtube.fandom.com/wiki/Internet_Historian