I have my own particular way of using YouTube. Mostly I relate to historical documentation; popular, highly viewed postings usually fade quickly from my view, and thoughts. Lately, I have been completely over taken by classic outtakes of Bob Dylan—remarkable moments captured and now posted to “live forever” on YouTube. The following selections are my favorites, and I watch them in heavy rotation for inspiration.

In a 2009 article for The Art Newspaper, titled “With Newspapers in Terminal Decline, What Future for Arts Journalism?” András Szántó argued that museums are creating alternative and innovative media infrastructure similar to news organizations, with the result that “arts groups are getting better at telling their own stories and directly engaging their constituents.”

The acronym GIF (Graphic Interchange Format) is today mostly used to describe small annoying, blinking animations on amateur Web pages. However, it's important to remember that the file format specification is 21 years old, older than the Web itself. The first browsers didn't support GIFs, but in March 1996, with the release of Netscape 2.0, it became possible—and the face of the Internet changed within a few months. Early Web users, hungry for multimedia, were soon animating everything, from headers, backgrounds, and navigation to lists and "under construction" signs. Software tools to create these files became available for free.

Lena is a caveman, into food, fucking, & self-defense. Things are simple here. Persona is a club, the world is the offending animal.

In the following post, writer Maria Fusco presents a speculative first-person narrative in which an unnamed transcriber reflects on the necessity for attention, skill, and detail in his work, which ultimately serves as an analogy to the online experience and the transition away from outmoded technologies.