On 17th August, 2013, YouTube invited us to the 5th Summer it the City event which was held in Alexandra Palace this year. If you’re over the age of 22 (and that’s being generous), you probably haven’t heard of SitC, or the speakers at SitC, or understand why it even exits. I’m here to break it down for you.
It’s been mentioned before, but guys, YouTube stars are a really big deal – seriously. This event is essentially the vlogger (video blogger) version of a Comi-Con, or Trekkie Convention. Various YouTube stars and industry partners for these vloggers come together to do talks, performances and meet & greets. To give you an insight into the target demographic for this event – the schedule and most details could only be found on Tumblr.
A few key take outs from the event:
Fangirls
What was once reserved for boybands and teenage heartthrobs from your favourite tween show, has now been directed at YouTube stars like twins Jack & Finn of JacksGap, Charlie McDonnell of charlieissocoollike, and Dan of danisnotonfire.
Actual.Tweet.
I MET DAN OMGOMGOMGOMG #danisnotonfire #youtube #danandphil #dan #youtuber #omg #ahhhh #SitC2013 #sitc
We definitely saw a few girls in tears from excitement of meeting their favourite star, and the queues for the meet and greets wrapped around the halls of Ally Pally like a game of Snake. If you’re looking to get a message across to this audience, these YouTubers are the way to go.
Music
In all fairness, YouTube has been the road to fame for artists such as Justin Bieber, Soulja Boy, Charice and the UK’s own Alex Day. However the more pressing point is that more and more of this demographic are consuming music from YouTubers. For instance, have you ever heard of The Vamps? These guys have:
Obligatory everyone-with-a-smart-phone-at-a-concert pic
Hair Dye
I’m a bit ashamed that we missed the memo on this one. I thought I would fit in just a bit for having multiple multi-coloured wristbands from festivals and such, which did work a bit (never mind that I’m also way on the wrong side of 15 years old in comparison to the rest of the crowd!). The style and overall fashion from the event had so much colour and life wrapped into as many layers of hair dye as possible, it was truly amazing. The event brochure even had a treasure hunt style check-list to find as many hair colours on attendees as we could.
Nailed it!
Overall it was a really nice event, and many thanks to YouTube for the invite. It was a great opportunity to do a bit of real-life market research on a demographic I wouldn’t normally be around. And now I’ll leave you with someone that I have been fangirling over a bit since I saw some of her videos during YouTube’s Geek Week. The 15 year old me absolutely loves this song, and I’m super jealous of her fuchsia hair!