Self-regulation on YouTube an extension of reality TV?

Although I framed my title this way, I don't believe that models of self-regulation on YouTube are directly an extension of the models of governance covered by McCarthy's article. Nevertheless, I do think that YouTube, and in particular, lifestyle vlogs, fall into the same "neoliberal cultural logics of privatization" (17). While not overtly about the failures of a society's governance, many lifestyle vlogs are focused on a sense of self-improvement. Put simply, they show "average" people living in particular ways that then become almost like genre conventions. These "average" people also stock up on social capital and oftentimes become idealized for their adherence to these aesthetic genre conventions.

Some of them also reflect and comment on how their lives are being constructed by these conventions and that their sense of "to-be-looked-at-ness" is heightened whenever engaging in lifestyle practices they have learned from other vlogs. Rather than being construed as a negative thing, however, some vloggers have found a sense of purpose, satisfaction, and order from these conventions. In this way, these conventions become the ideal self-management tools, representing a way in which self-governance might actually work. Whereas reality TV seems to purport neoliberal ideals through failures and trauma, which the camera (and the production crew) is meant as a healing process,  lifestyle vlogs demonstrate how turning the camera onto oneself can uphold self-governance in a positive way (by positive, I'm not arguing that the effects of this governance is good, but that these vlogs show a positive image of life and not failure).

I've often thought about whether lifestyle vlogs would work as a format for reality TV. Although there are self-improvement shows not focused on people in "need", they often feature a guru of some sort helping others, which adheres to what McCarthy describes as finding oneself in helping others. Whether the more proactive self-help shown in lifestyle vlogs can cross over to TV is a mystery, but I do think that they find similarities with the neoliberal ideals of reality TV.