The kid who stole Mark Bao’s laptop made two mistakes beyond “Mac-larceny.” He recorded himself dancing on the stolen laptop’s webcam, and failed to realize that the victim, Mark, had installed recovery software on the machine. So Mark, an 18-year-old student at the University of Massachusetts, connected remotely to his Macbook Air laptop, retrieved this…
If I was Ray William Johnson or Sxephil, I might keep this coveted “fountain of delicious video” to myself… featuring them on my own videos, with perhaps a brief credit to the creator but not the source. Alas, I lack the good sense of my big brothers on YouTube, having been cursed by an impulse…
Bet you didn’t know there are a mess of YouTube accounts by YouTube. Click to see “On the Rise,” designed to spawn more creators with 100K subscribers, and see “other YouTube channels” (on left) for an assortment of channels created by YouTube employees.
Who is Ray William Johnson, and why might YouTube need to change its name to RayWilliamJohnsonTube.com? How is YouTube, perhaps, moving the wrong way along the longtail, providing typical viewers (grazers not bingers) with an increasingly homogeneous experience? If you’re not familiar with the term “longtail,” it was popularized by Chris Anderson (Wired) in 2004….
Here’s a top “viral” video that is indeed viral, and indeed an ad (2nd Generation Intel® Core™ i5 processor). While it hasn’t met the strict definition I use (4 million within 24-48 characteristic of that Golden Voice homeless man), the Intel “Chase Scene” is past 813,000 views, and I believe it will continue to grow….
It took hours, but I’ve compiled the definitive Twitter list of those hungry for web-tv and online video. In once click, you can follow reporters, CEOs, new-media gurus, events, groups, authors, techies, potentially some annoying vendors, select creators, speakers, experts… and, well, even me. It is, dear reader and confident, “The Coalition of the Willing”…
Our friends at ReelSEO revealed the Pew data showing viewer’s surprising willingness to pay for online-video content. Until recently, I’ve been nervous about the notion of any subscription or pay-per-view model because it’s likely a “deal killer” for most viewers watching amateur creators. Sure I’ll pay to license/buy The Guild or Dr. Horrible, but less so for…
There are loads of social media events, and many YouTube “community gatherings,” meetups and online video events. But the “South By Southwest” of online-video and YouTube is indisputably VidCon. Organized by Hank and John Green (vlogbrothers), the event in 2010 drew hundreds of community members, top “YouTube Stars,” and Nerdfighters (the active people who rally to reduce…
It’s hard for stars to hide from cheesy pre-fame television commercials when there’s YouTube, right? Let’s enjoy a few of their early advertisements, which I’ve spent most of New Year’s Eve compiling for you (winner that I am) Jack Black doing Pitfall! (best ever) Lindsay Lohan in a Jello commercial in around 1996 Keanu Reeves…
“YouTube’s future is being held back is the typical innovator’s dilemma, or rather, billionaire’s dilemma,” writesAshkan Karbasfrooshan is CEO of WatchMojo.com. I included some of Karbashfrooshan’s pieces in Beyond Viral, and he’s one of the authoritative writers about the online-video industry and media monetization. Indeed YouTube is but a toy kiosk in the Google “Mall…