When I first started drafting the plan for Mineapalooza, I made a list of the scope of topics and subjects that should be spotlighted with the event. All of which are derivatives of the phenomenon which is Minecraft. These would be the focus of attention in regards to panels, exhibitions, contest, and generally the theme of the event. The list included gaming, game development, educational use, inspiring more girls to code, Minecrafting, art, music, and YouTube. It is the last item on this list that I feel needs to be expounded upon in this article. Primarily, in the ways it influences, educates, and entertains us.

In the past BYT (before YouTube), most of us would get our information from media such as magazine, radio, and television. This meant that we were basically basing ideas and developing thoughts on information that was filtered and biased as it was released by whatever source distributed it. Populations of people having to turn to and rely on a select supply. This sort of thing is still prevalent today with the various news and entertainment networks. However with the inclusion of YouTube as being a vehicle for information and entertainment, the origins of such material have become much more diverse as well as removing the possibilities of data becoming diluted or refined. This concept of “Allowing us to watch what we want to watch, when we want to watch it”, has strengthened the appeal of YouTube as a source of such content. A result from this media migration has been the development of ways for individuals and companies to reach followers and procure new ones. An approach Mojang AB, the creators of Minecraft, have wisely used by allowing individuals to use Minecraft assets and gameplay without the need to obtain permission.

Early on in the planning stages of Mineapalooza, I would scout YouTube for talent in the form of Minecraft content from Australian producers for the purpose of inviting to join the event as panelist, exhibitors, etc. With Minecraft’s popularity, a number of these Minecraft themed channels existed- some poorly directed and some exceptionally produced. I found some channels with over 100,000 subscribers and millions of views and other smaller channels with fewer subscribers but definitely the potential for larger gains in viewership. Being amazed at how normal people, not associated with huge media conglomerates, became in a sense celebrities purely through doing things what they love to do and allowing others who share the same appreciation to view it. I wanted to know more about how these individuals from ,both small channels (less than 5000 subscribers) and larger ones (200,000) got involved with such a concept, I reached out to the Australian Minecraft YouTubers to ask some questions.

One such channel I contacted was TwoAwesomeGamers a channel with nearly 200,000subscribers and whose videos have almost 50 million views. TwoAwesomeGamers was created by two friends, Jeremy Hearn and Alex Delfrate, who get together and play a range of Minecraft derived mini-games and tutorials. The following is an excerpt from our dialogue:

How did you two meet originally?

Alex: It started when we had Year 12 English class together, and the teacher forced us to sit together because of a seating plan. It took us a while to start talking, but once we did we hit it off. I remember the first time we ever hung outside of school, we had played Modern Warfare 2 and owned at it together.

What got you interested in starting a YouTube channel in the first place?

Jeremy: It was just something that seemed interesting and was worth trying.

Alex: Yeah, we had watched a lot of Machinima, with all their commentaries and game plays, and we just thought to ourselves, “Hey, we could do this too!”

Jeremy: So we started to record it as well and see if anyone would watch it. We started with Minecraft because not a lot of people were doing it, even though we played other games such as Call of Duty a lot more of the time. It was really just seeing if we could make anything of it. From there Minecraft fans kept coming to the channel so we just started to do more and more Minecraft until it was pretty much all we were doing.

Tell me about the best experience you’ve had as a result of your channel’s success.

TwoAwesomeGamers (TAG): The main experience we have had so far out of Youtube and minecraft was being able to attend the VidInc event that was held in Sydney 2013. We got to fly up for a couple days, hang out with some cool people from both Australia and Internationally as well as giving us our first taste of some PR stuff, doing a bit of media and press for the event before it began, including being on national television which was really cool and surreal. It was something that I really don’t think would have happened or could have imagined happening from just gaming and enjoying a hobby like gaming but was not something we were going to pass up.

What do you enjoy most about producing content for you channel?

TAG: We enjoy making the videos as well as providing something that fans like. Its not so much about us doing it because it’s a job or anything, we both have work we do anyway, its something we do when we have time because we like to create content and work a bit creatively now and then and provide people with something they like. If there wasn’t a demand for us to do it we wouldn’t.

How did you manage to become famous? What kind of steps did you take to reach that sort of publicity?

Alex: It was so weird how much publicity we received for our fail series. I just woke up one morning, and we had thousands of views on our videos. People loved it. At the time, not many people were posting videos for Minecraft, so it wasn’t too difficult to be found on YouTube. At the beginning, we had gathered a couple of thousand subscribers, which we thought was incredible. Unfortunately, after a while we kind of lost interest and we had lost a lot of subscribers because we never posted. Once we decided to get into it again, we spent a lot of time and effort talking to fans, finding out exactly what they wanted and posting it on Reddit. It was after we got CaptainSparklez custom Skyblock map that we reached the height of our publicity.

TAG: We also really enjoy the aspect of meeting new people and talking to fans. We have learned a lot from this experience and as a result made some good friends via YouTube as well as our fan community, some of whom we actively play with fairly often.

In the end, it was interesting to gain a little insight into the world of a YouTube channel. How, because of technology and the shift in the way we get our information and enjoyment from media, individuals are able to reach and find an audience that previously was not possible. This is the type of content and substance I am pursuing to fill the panels at Mineapalooza. I thoroughly believe via the disbursement of how those now are doing it, the next generation will follow and improve; promising a continuance in the change in both impartial information circulation and discovery.