Flaming refers to the use of offensive language such as swearing, insulting and providing hateful comments through an online medium. In this study, the act of flaming will be explored in the context of social media, particularly YouTube. The research aims to discover the types of comments that are found on Malaysian themed YouTube videos and classify them accordingly. The Uses and Gratification theory was used as a base to explain the satisfaction obtained through YouTube as a platform to express via comments; hence obtain satisfaction through negativity. The methodology employed to carry out the study was through a content analysis. One video from the top 5 YouTube category namely entertainment, film and animation, news and politics, comedy and people and blogs were chosen with at least 100,000 views and a minimum of 100 comments. Top 100 flames were then sorted out for each video and analyzed using the thematic analysis approach. The results of this study show that the two most frequent types of comments found on Malaysian videos are political attack and racial attack. Other subcategories that are also driving the two categories mentioned above are stereotypes, speculation, comparison, degrading comments, slander/defame, sedition, sarcasm, threaten, challenge, criticism, name-calling, and sexual harassments. Through this study, the severity of the issue of flaming on account of YouTube comments has been identified; enabling the concerning party to take proper action including the use of artificial intelligence against cyber-bullying.

Objective: The purpose of this paper is to investigate what motivates people to provide malicious comments on YouTube in Malaysia. This study will also question the differences between how flaming is constructed in each video classification and how are flaming comments categorized. Methodology: This study uses qualitative methods. Literature review has been summarized to contextualize the research problem. Findings: The paper offers rich theoretical insights to understand the practical issue of ridiculous comments by internet users on YouTube. Implications: Flaming or making ridiculous comments on social media has been a serious issue in Malaysia and other countries with high internet usage. Findings of the study will help understand the views of YouTube community in Malaysia on flaming. The study may further help understand the issue of flaming on other social media sites.

<p><em>The term flaming refers to offensive language such as swearing, insults and hating comments. Anonymity renders an environment that encourages irresponsible acts by people to display offensive behaviors. The aim of this study is to examine the role of anonymity in the flaming activity in Malaysia. The Uses and gratification Theory was proposed in order to explain flaming and its relation to anonymity. In-depth interview was conducted with 10 flamers of YouTube and the data was analyzed thematically. The results concludes that most of the flamers kept their identity anonymous due privacy concerns and for the freedom of speech. The rest of the flamers used their real name as a form of publicity, identity defining and to boost their self-confidence. This study contributes practically in the enrichment of the data on flaming for the concerning parties such as Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission, and Cyber Security Malaysia.</em></p>