Class of 2029 Filmmaking student Dylan Bates loves movies and television and grew up with YouTube, watching videos and, later, making videos for the platform, but his ambitions aren’t limited to becoming a “YouTuber.”
“I just got fascinated by the idea of YouTube as an art form,” he said. “And I’m not saying I make anything sophisticated, deep or with complex moral questions, but I do like to think that, to some extent in the 21st century, online video creation is going to be the art form.”
Bates is so in love with the art form that, when he heard about the World Stinging Nettle Eating Championships while on a family vacation in England, he just had to compete.
It didn’t matter he knew nothing about the competition or whether the plant was edible. It didn’t matter that the event was taking place the next day and Bates had not prepared. Bates wanted to compete because it was an opportunity to make a video.
“I thought it would be funny, and truthfully, just making other people laugh and to be entertaining, is all I need,” he said.
Read more about Dylan and the Rutgers University Class of 2029 on Rutgers Today—and find out if he became a Stinging Nettle World Champ.
Image: Photo by Nick Romanenko for Rutgers Today