Quality & Quantity

, Volume 52, Issue 3, pp 1057–1068 | Cite as

YouTubers’ networking activities during the 2016 South Korea earthquake

Article
First Online:

Abstract

While YouTube has become an important social networking platform for risk and crisis communications, research into its role and use during environmental disasters has not been conducted. The present study investigates how Korean YouTubers reacted during the 2016 Gyeongju earthquakes. Two kinds of data were collected from the most popular YouTube clips on the earthquake (from AfreecaTV and YonHap news): the most frequently used words in the replies to the comments and the networked forums among YouTubers. Findings suggest that YouTube has become a channel for quickly increasing public awareness of crises and for promoting safety strategies. InDegree Centralization is higher in professional videos. Hierarchy measure’s value is one, which means the reply-to network is not two-way. There is sparse close-knittedness in amateur videos. Community clusters emerge in amateur videos over time. The results also reveal that YouTubers on AfreecaTV are more likely to express emotional opinions than their counterparts on YonHap news are.

Keywords

YouTube Earthquake Korea Gyeongju Disaster Environment communication Social network analysis Webometrics 
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Notes

Acknowledgements

The corresponding author is grateful for the Yeungnam University’s colleagues and research assistants (Hyo-Chan Park in particular) who have been invaluable.

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Copyright information

© Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2017

Authors and Affiliations

  1. 1.Deptartment of Media and Communication, Interdisciplinary Program of Digital Convergence Business, Cyber Emotions Research InstituteYeungNam UniversityGyeongsan-SiSouth Korea

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