An interactive data story about YouTube's professionalization: how channels evolved, how creators built monetization infrastructure, and how sponsorship relates to engagement.
We joined YouNiverse video/channel metadata with crowdsourced SponsorBlock annotations, then turned the analysis into a navigable story with interactive charts, category comparisons, and a recurring cast of pixel-art characters.
The story follows three questions:
- How did channels evolve from indie publishing toward professional practices?
- What distinguished creators who adopted those practices?
- How did professionalism and sponsorship relate to audience engagement?
These are observational analyses. SponsorBlock coverage is crowdsourced; correlations should not be read as causal effects or as a complete census of sponsorship.
| Part | Location |
|---|---|
| Narrative, navigation, and interactive story | src/components/Index.svelte |
| Story copy and original team byline | src/data/copy.json |
| Interactive visualization components | src/components/ |
| Data and visualization assets | static/data/ · static/assets/ |
| Static site configuration | svelte.config.js |
Built with Svelte 5 / SvelteKit, with D3, ECharts, and Chart.js visualization components. Source data context and dataset limitations are explained inside the live story.
npm ci
npm run devUse the local URL printed by Vite. To inspect the production build:
npm run build
npm run previewThe static build uses the /ADA-website base path. The checked-in docs/ directory contains the published site snapshot; building locally does not update the live site.
Built by Veronika Wannack with teammates Jan Juraszek, Danael Robert-Nicoud, Ender Sari, and Kalan Walmsley. Veronika and Jan worked on the website and story; the other teammates developed the three analysis sections, as credited in the site.
The website builds on The Pudding's Svelte starter; its original documentation and attribution are preserved in TEMPLATE.md. Dataset credit belongs to YouNiverse and SponsorBlock, as described in the story.