Users have been drawn to YouTube and other web 2.0 platforms in the name of community. According to Howard Rheingold, "Virtual communities are social aggregations that emerge from the Net when enough people carry on those public discussions long enough, with sufficient human feeling, to form webs of personal relationships in cyberspace."[cit]

The consolidation of corporate ownership of the media, and its effects on democracy, are much discussed by academics, journalists, and citizens: "What if you woke up tomorrow to find that Yosemite National Park had been turned over to Chevron? Or that the Everglades were now under the watchful eye of DuPont? Most people would agree: Giving corporations nearly unlimited control over a precious public resource is unacceptable. But that's exactly what we've done with our airwaves and media—delivered them into corporate hands.[cit]

In The Googlization of Everything, Siva Vaidhyanathan asks: "What does the world look like through the lens of Google? How is Google's ubiquity affecting the production and dissemination of knowledge? And how has the corporation altered the rules and practices that govern other companies, institutions, and states?"[cit]