The YouTube Video Awards - Nov 3rd 2013

On Sunday, November 3, the first ever YouTube Music Awards will be held and will stream online LIVE in New York City. The voting will be done by the public, and it begins today!

The YouTube Music Awards is a show where your votes do make a difference, unlike other awards shows. However, the whole concept is that it’s a popularity contest, and the most popular artists/videos will be the ones to win the awards, whether or not you, personally, might also be someone who likes a particular artist/video.

Categories for the YouTube Music Awards include Innovation of the Year, YouTube Phenomenon, Response of the Year, Breakthrough Artist of the Year, Artist of the Year and Video of the Year.
The YouTube Phenomenon and Response of the Year award are based on videos that fans create. The latter of these awards will go to the best fan parody, remix, or response video to a video of a music artist. The YouTube Phenomenon award is one given to trends that were pretty much unavoidable, and which generated the most overall fan videos, like “Gangnam Style,” “Harlem Shake” and “Diamonds.”

The Innovation of the Year award will go to the most outstanding creative/innovative video created the past year. The nominations for this award came from an international panel of YouTubers, musicians, and creative types, in general.

The Breakthrough Artist of the Year award is packed with a lot of very talented musician and singers, all who have experience a lot of growth in subscribers and views this past year. Nominees are Macklemore & Ryan Lewis, Kendrick Lamar, Rudimental, Naughty Boy and Passenger.

The Artist of the Year award goes to the most shared, subscribed, liked, and watched artist/video of the year. Perhaps the biggest award of the YouTube Music Awards will be the one for Video of the Year. The nominees represent the most loved, shared, and watched videos of the year.

Phenomenon of the year nominees include:

• Diamonds by Rihanna,
• Harlem Shake by Original Army Edition,
• Thrift Shop by Macklemore & Ryan Lewis,
• Gangnam Styleby PSY
• I Knew You Were trouble by Taylor Swift.

Response of the year nominees include:

• Jayesslee performing “Gangnam Style''
• Boyce Avenue, with Fifth Harmony in their unique version of “Mirrors,”
• Walk Off the Earth with KRNFX singing their rendition of “I Knew You Were Trouble,
• “Titanium/Pavane,” as performed by ThePianoGuys
• “Radioactive,” by Lindsey Stirling and Pentatonix.  

Innovation of the year nominees include:

• “Endless Fantasy” by Anamanaguchi,
• Toro Y Moi’s “Say That,”
• “Lilies” by Bat For Lashes,
• DeStorm’s “See Me Standing,” and
• “Ingenue” by Atoms For Peace.

Artist of the year nominees include:

• PSY,
• Katy Perry,
• Justin Bieber,
• Eminem,
• Taylor Swift,
• Nicki Minaj,
• Macklemore & Ryan Lewis,
• One Direction,
•  Rihanna and the Epic Rap Battles of History.

Video of the year nominees include:

• Demi Lovato’s “Heart Attack,”
• “Same Love” by Macklemore and Lewis featuring Mary Lambert,
• “I Got a Boy” by Girls’ Generation, “Applause” by Lady Gaga,
• Justin Bieber’s “Beauty and a Beat” (which also features Nicki Monaj),
• “Gentlemen” by PSY,
• “Come and Get It” by Selena Gomez,
• “We Can’t Stop” by Miley Cyrus and
• “Best Song Ever” by One Direction.

 The YouTube Music Awards is basically a celebration of music videos, and which artists are the most watched and most liked in each category. Like the MTV VMAs, not everyone will enjoy watching the YouTube Music Award show, but for a different reason — not because viewers of the videos might be offended, but because the videos play to a relatively mainstream audience.


Culled from Guardian!