[wampus]

Sometimes I think of Youtube as a modern Library of Alexandria[1], a repository of knowledge that could only exist through patronage and containing a sizable amount of resources that are valuable in their uniqueness. A failed YouTube would represent a loss of equally epic and/or mythical proportions.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Library_of_Alexandria

[Zirro]

> A failed YouTube would represent a loss of equally epic and/or mythical proportions.

Indeed. While most people may not realize until it is too late, my hope is that there are people out there working on plans to rescue large amounts of data from companies that may fail. Whether they be the government, wealthy individuals or organizations such as the Internet Archive, it would be a tragedy if all of this history was lost simply due to the financial failure of the company hosting the service.

[task_queue]

An internet soapbox for anyone with a camera is hardly comparable to the concentration of written knowledge, skill and talent that is any library ever.

[kamakazizuru]

I think you're mixing up what YouTube does and what Wikipedia does..

[Zirro]

YouTube holds a lot of unique content, documenting current times and events as they were happening. Given YouTubes relatively short existence, this is not obvious to everyone yet, but given just ten more years it will already start to provide an interesting glimpse into the lives of the people of the past. Imagine if we would have had the same insight about the people living in earlier centuries. Instead of us having to read about them in books, they could show it to us themselves.

I believe the Internet Archive (https://www.archive.org) along with sources such as YouTube, provided they survive, will be considered the most important to get insights into the lives of the common people for future generations.