Building better conservation media for primates and people: A case study of orangutan rescue and rehabilitation YouTube videos

1. Conservation organizations rely on social/internet media platforms to raise awareness and fundraise. Social media is a double-edged sword: it can be a wide-reaching and effective tool for education and fundraising, but can also have counter-productive impacts on public views toward wildlife and understanding of wildlife conservation.

2. For example, depicting humans interacting with wildlife in media may increase video popularity, but animals shown in anthropogenic contexts are also viewed as appealing pets. We are interested in understanding whether this is true for social media posts (YouTube videos) by orangutan rescue and rehabilitation organizations, which rely on social media for fundraising and awareness-raising. Our goal is to provide data and recommendations to guide these organizations in building media with positive conservation impact while minimizing potential negative effects.

3. Using YouTube analytics and sentiment analysis of comments on 118 videos, we ask how ...