Luminol:

Bossa Supernova:

The only thing that’s rivaled Wikipedia’s knowledge base is the desire to fuck around with the articles. Anyone on the internet who says they haven’t thought about editing an article on George Tush or offering their own take on the legalization of Marijuana article is lying. Robots have taken most of the mass editing fun out of the process, but the wiggle room of vocabulary and diction in any writing setting still exists on Wikipedia.

To take a case in point, consider the Tiny Mix Tapes Wikipedia article. The section about jokes used to be entitled “Jokes Well Played,” detailing the now infamous Neutral Milk Hotel scandal. I noticed a few weeks ago that the title had been changed to the less fun “Jokes.” So I changed it to  “Masterful and Ironic Humor.”

Now, I’m not taking any poetic credit on this one, but the fact that my heading still exists just makes me so happy. Even on bigger entries, these little bits of personality flourish. You can read about P Diddy’s girlfriend who is prominently described as “on-again, off-again.” Or you can read about the health issues of eating pizza:

“Some pizzas can be very high in salt and fat and concerns have been raised about the negative effect these pizzas can have on people’s health.”

No robot is gonna mess with that.

Viral videos have snuck in the cracks of my life for years. I find myself clicking “stumble” almost compulsively between trying to do more “legitimate” work. As a schmaltzy printellectual, I find myself trying to break down what makes a video go and stay viral on the web. And I really don’t believe it’s the same thing that makes a video succeed on TV.

Last year, I did a 65 percent serious lecture on Lolcats, trying to pinpoint the juice. (I’ll up my powerpoint later). For now, let’s consider the number two stumble as of 5/13 on YouTube.

What we’ve got here is a well done if not slightly cheesy medley of Zelda music, always a favorite on the internet. Dude is good looking, even looks a bit like Link himself. He’s got nice threads, and knows his way around Final Cut or iMovie. The music is well produced (unplugged but with plenty of compression and reverb), and is under three minutes long total.

To me this video is a good example of the central cognitive dissonance that makes so many YouTube videos popular. Maybe we should call it the hi-tech/lo-tech paradox. This guy (I purposely refuse to find his real name) has created a video using technology without the apparent use of electricity. His smarts and musical skills take a few electronic and non-electronic phenomena — music videos, Zelda video games, and homemade instruments — and pit them against eachother.

Is this the formula for success? Well, it’s at least one of them. I still have trouble putting my finger on why this video could really only do so well on YouTube. Maybe it’s just that sparkling Christmas hat.