Conversation with MasterSitsu

Here's a conversation with high-profile YTMND user "MasterSitsu," drawn from a series of in-system "Private Messages." It's been edited only for format, as it took place over several message.

Jeff E.: How has user behavior in commenting, voting, and site creation changed since you first joined YTMND? Not so much in if it's become better or worse, but what behaviors have changed, and how?

MasterSitsu: since i registered September 05, the biggest change in voting are that a lot more people simply vote 1 or 5 instead of the full gamut of choice, which in the case of more well made/populist sites has inflated site ratings overall. it used to be only a dozen or so sites had ratings over 4 stars, but now there's a 4.4 or higher rated site almost every day. Its not necessarily due to quality in material - the younger the average ytmnd audience gets the more they are pleased with just about anything, and because of a specific change to the main page sites can now hold higher ratings. the front page used to have a 'top rated' section only, and if you had more than 10 votes and among the highest rated sites you'd be on it, and people would quickly downvote you because they didnt want some new site or site that wasnt among the best ever, on top rated. that is now gone, and we now have 'up and coming' which up to 300 votes allows sites to gain honest votes, sometimes votes based a curve vs. other sites made that day. so most new sites have more exposure and a better chance to be seen in the short term. in the long term there are new problems that make high rated sites 'disappear' but thats another story.


JE: How do you think the ability to vote on a site has effected the content of sites?

MS: the ability to vote and the existance of the top 15 on the main page is usually a big drive for many people. for some that makes people dumb down or overuse fads to appeal to the majority, for others it causes them to be more creative. it also causes the best material on the site to be posted around 10 pm or later for hopes of gaining enough views around our refresh period to get on top viewed. getting a high rated site or top rated or top viewed, etc. is more a motivational tool for newer users. the first couple times you get such recognition it seems like a big deal, but if it happens enough times its not


JE: How do you think the ability to comment on a site has effected the content of sites?

MS: most people comment to suck up, and only the jaded, the pretentious and the really dumb users tend to openly downvote on sites because a LOT of people are scared of revenge downvoting. but commenting (and voting) openly is important because it gets your name out there. if you dont vote or comment at all, even if you have a lot of high rated sites you may go unnoticed as a community member. the only other group who openly downvote comment are those with no sites, who can't be revenged, and who many times are alternate accounts of people who are too scared to leave negative comments under their real account.


JE: How have site sponsorships effected the content of sites? How did moving those sponsored sites up on the front page effect them?

MS: I dont think anything of sponsorships. you can't predict what will or won't be sponsored unless someone is trying to put together an event, and it has had minimal influence on content. the only time a sponsorship i really know has effected content was when I put up a contest for dewarmy.ytmnd.com - it was sponsored and as a result many knew of it and around 600 entries were made, far surpassing all user made contests before it. wiki.ytmnd.com/Dew_Army

so other than that, sponsorship is a way to force your taste on the front page. if you sponsor your own site regardless of its quality many people tend to get upset with it.


JE: How has the direct interaction between users changed?

MS: the YTMND forums used to have an influence on the main page when users like inkdrinker were around, forcing memes like Gay Fuel and Asiancopter into the lexicon. For a long time now they have had very little influence on the main page, even though I'm sure a couple people there would resent that notion (it is very true though). from there IRC was big on YTMND for a while when we had "YTMND Radio" a shoutcast where people would be on IRC all night talking to the DJs making requests/interacting. that was my first real jump into 'community' - from there the Ventrilo live talk community started up last year and for a while it was very big and very influential on the main page with the "Shoe on Head' fad being a big deal for example. It is now less so and even though many are still on it, they care less of main page issues and the direction of the site. Other forums in the past of YTMND users included AlmightyLOL and SavedbytheLOL. A forum of users who make noise sites called the "Forgot Poland Army" has become influential in both positive and negative ways on the site. And for a while stickam became popular amongst Ventrilo users. so really people shift back and forth with whatever technology is available. in some cases thats made groups cliquey which each have a couple hardliners that are dickheads.


JE: I have a partner lurking about the forums, and he tells me it's largely focused on complaining that no one posts in the forums and that they need a new NEDM. Is this creation of memes (fads) common discourse, or does this represent a small group of members trying to exploit the community's tendency to praise and "upvote" some fads?

MS: In my opinion the forums have always been lame, and are usually populated by eithe rpeople who want to be big fishes in a small pond, or by those who are too lazy to find the othe rYTMND communities. But each group can still be hive minded. The forums tried to make a 'new gay fuel' a while back called Jew Brew and it didnt take, for example. But every group occasionally does a forced meme to confuse front page users, whenever people have to come together to 'create' a fad it is usually a one day forced fad. There's only been a couple cases where a forced meme somehow caught on.


JE: What's the deal with upvoting and downvoting?

MS: If you upvote everything people will like you even if you suck. If you downvote everything people will hate you even if your sites are great. If its obvious to people you are downvoting with an alternate account (or accounts), you will be especially hated, even famous. People often make gimmick accounts to try and be famous on this site without actually doing anything. sometimes it works but there are so many now that they're simply a problem that has not been solved. everyone downvotes, most who complain about downvoters in general are hypocrites, but when people usually talk about 'downvoters' they mostly mean gimmicks and trolls, and most people can relate to that complaint.


JE: So you make it sound like just about everyone here orients their usage around each other's scores. Is that the case?

MS: not everyone. a large amount of people dont care or have no interest in YTMND as a community. its just a place for them to post gifs they found on forums that everyones seen a thousand times.


JE:So, they treat YTMND like 4chan? [4chan is a BBS community largely used to share and discuss found or original images. -Jeff] Do you think these people come from 4chan, or just every corner of the internet? And what could they think when they see blanks for zooming text and music?

MS: many ytmnders dont know how to make gifs or photoshops, but really want to make sites, so they steal images from 4chan and b3ta and other forums and dont bother checking if they've already been on YTMND. they usually dont cite. one or two real community members dont cite for some reason (like Kassius) and I dont know why.

these types of casual ytmnders will often vote 5 on stolen material or uncited material that comes from other places (such as rapistsearch.ytmnd.com = among the sites i hate most for this reason) becasue they simply dont knwo better or dont care about what this says about the community, and they also tend to not even read site thread comments to ever find out of something is stolen.