Head Tale

Last Friday, I wrote about Chat Roulette Love Song which was the extremely successful proof of a guy’s Masters thesis on viral video.

Speaking of Friday, another recent viral video that blew up even bigger than Chat Roulette Love Song is the video for “Friday” by Rebecca Black which has gained over 30 million (!) views in about two weeks!

This one was a product of Ark Records, a company in Southern California which allows parents with a couple grand burning a hole in their pockets to have a song and video professionally produced for their child.  (Is that anything like my parents buying me a magnet with my name on it when I was a kid? ;-))

Originally coming into the spotlight via the web site of Comedy Central’s Tosh.O who labeled it as “the worst song ever” (and currently with 20 000 likes and nearly 200 000 dislikes on YouTube), it spread like wildfire across the Net with people debating its “merits” – is it cheesy or just good fun?  Lyrically vapid or no worse than any other pop song?  Auto-tuned to the extreme to cover an untalented singer or just reflecting modern pop sensibilities?

Beyond the enormous number of views, it’s had some other success – entering the Top 20 singles on iTunes, gaining some time on some morning talk shows and even helping provide justification for Ms. Black to make contact with the original tweener YouTube star, Justin Bieber (although the love wasn’t apparently reciprocated.)

(head over to MetaFilter to catch up on all the ins and outs)