LISA YAMADA
Staff Writer
It started with a homing pigeon in Athens followed by running messengers in Egypt. Since then, civilization has sought new and quicker modes of communication, from heliographs to horse and buggies to electric telegraphs to the increasingly irrelevant snail mail.
Today, e-mail changes the time of transmitting messages from days to seconds. But it is YouTube, a Web site where users upload and view videos, that is revolutionizing the way in which the world speaks.
With more than 34 million monthly viewers and 65,000 new videos posted every day on YouTube, communication is clearly going video. From originally composed music to politically-charged rants, from user-written-and-produced sketch comedy to celebrity-supporting tirades (most famously, Britney Spears’ super-fan Chris Crocker), YouTube provides an online forum for a sharing of ideas and personalities like never before.
The ease with which users can click from video to video allows YouTube to hold viewers captive, as junior Ashley Cheda knows all too well.
“Watching YouTube is not a daily thing, but when I’m on, it’s for at least a couple of hours,” Cheda said.
Freshman Cassidy Walton also finds herself caught in YouTube’s hypnotic effect.
“When I’m bored, I’ll go on a lot. It’s like you get sucked in.”
YouTube has amassed such a large online community that it is impossible to ignore the thrust of the Web giant and its ability to launch ordinary people into superstardom. When Esmee Denters, an 18-year-old who posted videos of herself singing cover songs of famous artists, received millions of hits on her uploads, Justin Timberlake immediately signed the YouTube phenom to his new record label, Tennman Records.
Whether it’s musical, comedic, graphic or acrobatic, YouTube has become the place for talent scouting. Derrick Comedy, a sketch comedy group from New York, earned more than 30 million video views to date. Their Web following was so large that they were featured on Late Night with Conan O’Brien.
Like Denters, singer and songwriter Terra Naomi also found success on YouTube, with her hit song “Say It’s Possible,” which garnered more than 2.5 million views and prompted hundreds of video response copycats, including renditions in Italian, Spanish, Chinese and even one by a sock puppet. Naomi also asked subscribing YouTubers to send in videos that answered the question, “What would you do/want if anything were possible?” which she then compiled into the music video for “Say It’s Possible.”
That seems to be the beauty of YouTube. It allows instant feedback. Within days a video can be viewed thousands of times – within months, millions. It provides musicians, comedians and even expert gamers a world’s stage to showcase their talents. “TGM Holic,” the best Tetris player in the world, is glad to finally be able to show off his button-pushing skills to an audience fully appreciative of his master technique.
“YouTube is a conversation piece,” says junior Lindsey Banister. “It’s fascinating because it’s everyday stuff people can relate to and there’s a good chance you’ll have something in common with someone else.”
But in all foolishness, it’s frivolous videos that are the most impossible to resist and spawn the greatest talk – videos like a history in the evolution of dance, urban ninja and Harry Potter puppets. Videos showcasing zits being popped and skateboarders eating cement are the ones that tickle users most. And who can forget “Charlie the Unicorn.
“Have you seen it?” remarks freshman Conrad Wozniack to classmate Isaiah White. “I totally have to show it to you.”
Nineteen million viewers and counting.
01-17-2008
