Tonight's recommendation features one of those aforementioned popular commercials - the ones that aren't masquerading as fan-made videos. The ones that are just funny.
Not surprisingly, it's pretty sexy. YouTube is a great venue for all those "banned" commercials to go viral as they were intended to do. Good news for all those advertisers who I imagine were conscientiously bating the censors; the hard-won "too-hot-for-TV" label no longer just means the occasional, paradoxical TV special.
What is surprising, though, or least noteworthy, is that YouTube recommended a commercial that's entirely in Spanish: title, description, user, and the commercial itself. Unfortunately, I can't understand any of it.
I Google-translated the two captions. Apparently, this is about "friends having a desire for you," and I'm gathering a secret desire at that, while Sprite represents "things as they are." But without the benefit of the voice-over, I can't quite connect all the dots.
This was recommended because a friend recently reminded me of that hilarious (American) Sprite commercial in which a fictitious soda mascot, a smiling sun, leaps off its bottle to terrorize a family. It was in the same campaign as the 'Splode bungee explosion and the combustible acne cream - some of my favorite commercials of all time. I watched all those that I could find.
The point here is, despite not understanding a word of this recommendation, I'm actually glad to see YouTube recommending international videos. I think YouTube provides a great forum for global communication for obvious reasons, and I think keeping the recommendations section country-specific would be lazy and narrow. Lord knows other countries have been familiar with what's streaming on American TV forever.
So, I'll consider this recommendation a prod in a productive direction. Maybe I'll learn Spanish one day, YouTube, and that's a message I can comprehend.
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Monday, November 9, 2009
A Pretentious Interlude
YouTube has been great for my appreciation of classical music. Being able to see performances really helps me to distinguish among and remember them in ways that just listening to them doesn't. Perhaps it's because I can instantly visually connect with a specific performer, whereas it takes me multiple hearings to differentiate subtly unique versions of the same song.
True, the "video snacking" habit promulgated by YouTube isn't ideal for works with multiple movements, and perhaps I'm consuming Concertos and Etudes like bite-sized pieces of decontextualized candy, but for me that's better than nothing, and anyway YouTube makes concessions for longer works. Just check out Karajan conducting Beethoven.
Without further ado:
Those hands! That face! What more could you ask for from a performance of Rachmaninoff's "Little Red Riding Hood" than a woman who could herself be straight out of a fairy tale?
I have watched a few of Valentina Lisitsa's videos before; the first was when I sought out different versions of Chopin's "Ocean" Etude, Op 25 No. 12. Hers wasn't my favorite because of its choices in emphasis, but she was a compelling person to watch, and I discovered that she has a whole channel of herself playing songs to empty auditoriums.
To be clear: she is a professional concert pianist - she just also uploads these very intimate, very electrifying recordings that are almost terrifying in their intensity. I love them.
And no, I hadn't watched this particular one. I hadn't watched any of her videos in quite a while. This was almost certainly recommended because I was recently watching Evgeny Kissin perform Rachmaninoff through the years.
But I'm glad for this recommendation. One of my secret life goals is to look as brilliant and crazed doing anything as Ms. Lisitsa looks playing "Little Red Hiding Hood." One of Ms. Lisistsa's life goals is to record all 32 of Beethoven's Piano Sonatas. Here's to both of our success.
True, the "video snacking" habit promulgated by YouTube isn't ideal for works with multiple movements, and perhaps I'm consuming Concertos and Etudes like bite-sized pieces of decontextualized candy, but for me that's better than nothing, and anyway YouTube makes concessions for longer works. Just check out Karajan conducting Beethoven.
Without further ado:
Those hands! That face! What more could you ask for from a performance of Rachmaninoff's "Little Red Riding Hood" than a woman who could herself be straight out of a fairy tale?
I have watched a few of Valentina Lisitsa's videos before; the first was when I sought out different versions of Chopin's "Ocean" Etude, Op 25 No. 12. Hers wasn't my favorite because of its choices in emphasis, but she was a compelling person to watch, and I discovered that she has a whole channel of herself playing songs to empty auditoriums.
To be clear: she is a professional concert pianist - she just also uploads these very intimate, very electrifying recordings that are almost terrifying in their intensity. I love them.
And no, I hadn't watched this particular one. I hadn't watched any of her videos in quite a while. This was almost certainly recommended because I was recently watching Evgeny Kissin perform Rachmaninoff through the years.
But I'm glad for this recommendation. One of my secret life goals is to look as brilliant and crazed doing anything as Ms. Lisitsa looks playing "Little Red Hiding Hood." One of Ms. Lisistsa's life goals is to record all 32 of Beethoven's Piano Sonatas. Here's to both of our success.
Friday, November 6, 2009
A Community of Blood
I was thrilled to see this in my recommendations tonight, misspelled though its title may be. The reason? I assist in editing this wonderful book series at Penguin. Now approaching the fourth book (Eleventh Grade Burns), the series is really taking off, and as you can see here, it's partly because young readers identify with the loner main character who is bullied and hiding a secret.
I'm guessing this was recommended because I watched a video from the author's own YouTube channel, which she forwarded as a way of saying Happy Halloween. That's a pretty oblique connection, though, since she's only uploaded that one video and it has nothing to do with Vlad Tod. Maybe it's because I've been listening to songs from the New Moon soundtrack, and YouTube figured (as readers sometimes do) that one vampire equals another.
As for my thoughts on the video...well, it's just a wee bit campy. The voice-over voice is hilarious, the punch that never connects is to die for, and the "epic" running through the halls rewards slow-mo replays ad infinitum. If you're wondering why that boy throws down his hostess cupcake in disgust, it's because he stole it from Vlad, who sneaks blood capsules into his sack lunches to avoid going hungry at school.
But I'm being a little unfair. This is a school project, after all, and when you consider how video editing has progressed since when I was in high school, it's relatively impressive. I like to imagine that the maker of this video is himself a loner - maybe he's bullied at school, and maybe he wishes he were a vampire. Well, that's not likely to happen, but at least he has the books for support, and at least now thirteen hundred people have watched his school video project thanks to a diverse internet community.
The cold-hearted editor in me is glad to see that other kids commented to tell him where he got the plot details wrong. Probably not the supportive reception he was looking for, but again, this video is about progress, not perfection.
I'm guessing this was recommended because I watched a video from the author's own YouTube channel, which she forwarded as a way of saying Happy Halloween. That's a pretty oblique connection, though, since she's only uploaded that one video and it has nothing to do with Vlad Tod. Maybe it's because I've been listening to songs from the New Moon soundtrack, and YouTube figured (as readers sometimes do) that one vampire equals another.
As for my thoughts on the video...well, it's just a wee bit campy. The voice-over voice is hilarious, the punch that never connects is to die for, and the "epic" running through the halls rewards slow-mo replays ad infinitum. If you're wondering why that boy throws down his hostess cupcake in disgust, it's because he stole it from Vlad, who sneaks blood capsules into his sack lunches to avoid going hungry at school.
But I'm being a little unfair. This is a school project, after all, and when you consider how video editing has progressed since when I was in high school, it's relatively impressive. I like to imagine that the maker of this video is himself a loner - maybe he's bullied at school, and maybe he wishes he were a vampire. Well, that's not likely to happen, but at least he has the books for support, and at least now thirteen hundred people have watched his school video project thanks to a diverse internet community.
The cold-hearted editor in me is glad to see that other kids commented to tell him where he got the plot details wrong. Probably not the supportive reception he was looking for, but again, this video is about progress, not perfection.
Tuesday, November 3, 2009
The Nervous Kid
Thanks to the popularity of meta-humor in shows like the aforementioned Family Guy, I think our culture is more conversant in and opinionated on the rules of comedy than we were before. Yes, that's a glittering generality, but the point is it seems like everyone in our generation feels comfortable asserting that a joke has gone on too long, that it is too soon, or that the delivery was just a touch off for it to be funny.
I have no idea why this was recommended. I guess sometimes I watch Memes when I hear of them, or when they appear in my recommendations, but I can only stand so many. Simply knowing that whatever slice of life I'm about to watch has gone viral is usually enough to make me wary. Does that make me a YouTube snob?
Anyway, this not-quite-Meme is cute enough, I suppose. It treads that very delicate line between too repetitive and just repetitive enough, and it even has a punchline ending as the kid slips and curses...But is it just me, or does this all feel totally contrived? I feel like this is some little adult or else a very precocious child, who, rather than actually being nervous about saying Happy Birthday Rosanne, read (and reread) the rules for a funny delivery and followed them to a "T."
Always he gets closer to saying the line we all know is coming, and the increasingly urgent refrain "Now?" adds tension. The trail-off/stutter is very well executed, and like I said, the punchline is right on time.
So I give this kid a B for effort, and YouTube a C minus. This recommendation just feels like a tired attempt at a video that I'll find funny, like when your grandmother recommends a Meme a year after it's gotten old. Thanks, but the verdict is too long, too soon, and just a touch off.
I have no idea why this was recommended. I guess sometimes I watch Memes when I hear of them, or when they appear in my recommendations, but I can only stand so many. Simply knowing that whatever slice of life I'm about to watch has gone viral is usually enough to make me wary. Does that make me a YouTube snob?
Anyway, this not-quite-Meme is cute enough, I suppose. It treads that very delicate line between too repetitive and just repetitive enough, and it even has a punchline ending as the kid slips and curses...But is it just me, or does this all feel totally contrived? I feel like this is some little adult or else a very precocious child, who, rather than actually being nervous about saying Happy Birthday Rosanne, read (and reread) the rules for a funny delivery and followed them to a "T."
Always he gets closer to saying the line we all know is coming, and the increasingly urgent refrain "Now?" adds tension. The trail-off/stutter is very well executed, and like I said, the punchline is right on time.
So I give this kid a B for effort, and YouTube a C minus. This recommendation just feels like a tired attempt at a video that I'll find funny, like when your grandmother recommends a Meme a year after it's gotten old. Thanks, but the verdict is too long, too soon, and just a touch off.
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