When Tony Wilson opened The Hacienda in 1982, I doubt he and his cohorts would have known the kind of change they made on music culture beyond the creation of Factory Records. Some might say it was just a night club but it was much more than that. It was the birth place for Rave culture. Hundreds of kids doing drugs, dancing and enjoying the music they moved to. I could speak on the importance of all those involved and the music of Manchester for Proustian lengths but I will make my point quickly. Rave culture made the DJ just as important as the artists on the records they were spinning. In some cases more so. From that point in time forward, a DJ was as much of a star as the artists. They were applauded and cheered just as if they had written the very songs they hit play on. There is still some debate as to the validity of the DJ as an artist but I concede to it being an art form. I’m actually a fan of certain DJ’s myself.

What does this have to do with the internet? The internet has resurged the idea that the medium is just as important as the author. Lets begin with a simple youtube example. Here is a video with about 800 thousand views of Liam Lynch’s song the United States of Whatever.

Liam is nothing short of a creative genius and does a lot of work in the TV and Music industry. Lets move on to another video by Brookers. A youtube starlett, her “cover” of the song in great youtube fashion has a little over 1.5 Million views.

Granted Liam’s work has been seen in other venues and he is probably more “famous” than Brookers, she did have a brush with fame signing a development deal with Carson Daly but little came of that. Nonetheless in the venue of youtube, Brookers seems to be just as important as Liam if not more so. Moreover the idea of authorship begins to blur as the internet allows for you to find one thing but maybe not the other. Some people may never know of Liam or his work despite having watched and enjoyed the Brookers Video.

Lets move on to social news giant Digg.com. Every day people submit content to the site but in this strange place sometimes the submitter becomes as famous as some of the things they submit. It wasn’t that long ago that Jason Calacanas wanted to pay Top Digg submitters to work for Netscape in their Digg ripoff. Are the people who scour the internet to find good content the new DJ. These people are essentially “pushing play” on other authors work. The internet has created a new place for people to congregate and someone who can keep a crowd pleased earns them similar respect of a DJ. It may take a decade before this becomes mainstream but I think the concept is there.

The internet has provided the frame work for a new type of rave culture, and social networking sites have created the venue for content submitters to be just as important as the content itself.