14 DAY TRIAL // A Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University contest hosted by YouTube was suspended because the recent shootings affected the recordings. The contest demanded users to record clips that describe the university and upload them on Google's online video sharing service to present them to the entire world. According to WDBJ7.com, the university's authorities are afraid that most of the upcoming videos will concern the massacre, which will surely affect the image of the institution.
"Obviously everything has changed, so we've decided to suspend that for now. We had a number of entries and had some recent inquiries but we're going to look at that again in the fall and decide what is appropriate to look at those entries and hopefully get that contest going again," said Chris Clough, a Virginia Tech spokesperson according to the same source.
In the recent period, YouTube hosted a lot of contests that are especially meant to encourage users to upload their homemade content. In the past, there were several cases reported when YouTube's members managed to boost the service's number of visitors. The first time when the parent company Google praised the user-generated content was just after the Viacom removal when the MTV owner required the search giant to remove almost 100.000 clips from the page. Then, Google hosted the 2006 YouTube Awards, a special event used to honor the most popular creations uploaded by the users of the service.
However, more and more registered members are uploading their clips with a different goal than the one presented by Google. For example, several police officers published surveillance videos on YouTube to require the users' help in identifying the attackers. After the viewers posted important comments, the authorities managed to find and arrest the suspects.