Merton the Chatroulette Piano Guy Speaks
Posted By Ben Goulding, 24 March, 2010 | permalink
(Youtube Link)
In an exclusive interview, Mashable talks to Merton the Chatroulette piano player via Skype to find out more about the man behind the glasses and the hoodie.
Comments Off | Posted in: Internet
Ben Folds is Chatroulette Piano Player?
Posted By Ben Goulding, 22 March, 2010 | permalink
By now I’m sure you’ve seen “Merton”, the piano playing guy on Chatroulette who has become an internet sensation for his freestyling on the the webcam-chat site.
Well, there has been much speculation that the mystery man might be Ben Folds due to his uncanny facial and voice resemblance. To clear things up, during one of his concerts in Charlotte, North Carolina, the real Ben Folds flipped open a laptop on the piano and started playing on Chatroulette.
(Youtube Link)
So now we know who the hooded piano player is. Actually, we don’t. “Merton” has since said “Not Ben Folds. Seriously. Ben is a much better pianist, and listen to the voice on the “Man in the Dark” part – totally not his voice at all. Besides, wouldn’t Ben cover more of his face to disguise his identity?”.
My brain is frazzled.
Oh, and here’s the original just in case you haven’t seen it yet.
(Youtube Link)
Eduard Trololo Khil Wants You To Write The Lyrics
Posted By Ben Goulding, 16 March, 2010 | permalink
(Youtube Link)
Eduard Khil, who has become a worldwide superstar overnight for his ‘Trololo’ performance, wants to sing the song again, but this time with lyrics – and he want you to write them.
Comments Off | Posted in: Entertainment | InternetTrololo Guy Comes To Terms With His Newly Found Fame
Posted By Ben Goulding, 12 March, 2010 | permalink
(Youtube Link)
Eduard Khil, the man who has recently gained worldwide fame from his performance, which quickly became known as “Trololololololololololo”, reacts to parodies on YouTube with the media.
This is what he said to “Life News“:
I haven’t heard anything about it. It’s nice, of course!
Thereby hangs a tale about this song. Lyrics were written for it, but they were poor. I mean, they were good, but one couldn’t publish them at that time. They contained words like these: “I’m riding my stallion, so-and-so mustang, and my beloved Mary is thousand miles away knitting a stocking for me”. Of course, we failed to publish it at that time, and we, Arkady Ostrovsky and I, decided to make it a vocalise. But the essence remained in the title. Yes, it’s a little prankish – it has no lyrics, so we had to make up something for people would listen to it, and so there was an interesting arrangement.
Haven’t seen “Trololololololololololo” yet? Watch it here.
2 Comments | Posted in: Entertainment | InternetYouTube Closes Down
Posted By Ben Goulding, 9 March, 2010 | permalink
(Youtube Link)
This will probably make more sense to those of you who are familiar with British television, when the BBC hands over to Ceefax during the night (when nobody’s watching). For those of you who don’t know much about Ceefax, it’s the BBC’s teletext information service transmitted via the analogue signal, which began in 1974 and is set to run until 2012.
Created by Eddie Robson, from a genius original idea by Mal Franks, this is ‘YouTube closes down for the night’. (View in full screen mode).
1 Comment | Posted in: Internet | TelevisionT-Shirt War
Posted By Ben Goulding, 15 February, 2010 | permalink
(Youtube Link)
T-Shirt War is a very impressive concept Rhett McLaughlin and Link Neal. It’s a stop-motion film, using 222 t-shirts that follows a very humorous story line.
Comments Off | Posted in: EntertainmentThe Only Existing Film Footage Of Anne Frank
Posted By Ben Goulding, 5 October, 2009 | permalink
(Youtube Link)
July 22 1941. The girl next door is getting married. Anne Frank is leaning out of the window of her house in Amsterdam to get a good look at the bride and groom. It is the only time Anne Frank has ever been captured on film. At the time of her wedding, the bride lived on the second floor at Merwedeplein 39. The Frank family lived at number 37, also on the second floor. The Anne Frank House can offer you this film footage thanks to the cooperation of the couple.
Comments Off | Posted in: Internet | TelevisionWorld’s Biggest Online Choir
Posted By Ben Goulding, 29 September, 2009 | permalink
(Youtube Link)
This is the world’s biggest online choir. Interested in joining? Check out amplichoir.com for more details on how to submit your song.
I’d like to see this group become huge. A bit more work on the syncing and it could be great.
Comments Off | Posted in: Internet100 Greatest Youtube Hits In 4 Minutes
Posted By Ben Goulding, 29 September, 2009 | permalink
(Youtube Link)
I’ve literally seen 90% of those videos. I spend way too much time surfing – the net, that is. How many do you recognize?
Comments Off | Posted in: Entertainment | Internet“Did you know?” – Some Crazy Technology Facts You Probably Didn’t Know [VIDEO]
Posted By Ben Goulding, 28 September, 2009 | permalink
(Youtube Link)
This Did You Know video focuses on the changing media landscape, including convergence and technology.
Comments Off | Posted in: Internet | LifestyleF18 Hornet Extremely Low Flyby
Posted By Ben Goulding, 9 September, 2009 | permalink
Take a look at this video which shows a man in uniform, standing completely still, with his hands on his hips as a fighter jet races through the sky, just a few feet above his head.
(Youtube Link)
The jet can reach speeds of up to 1,600mph. That guy’s got nerves of steel.
1 Comment | Posted in: Entertainment | InternetThe First Video Ever Uploaded To YouTube
Posted By Ben Goulding, 28 August, 2009 | permalink
(Youtube Link)
This is the first video ever on YouTube, uploaded at 8:27PM on Saturday April 23rd, 2005. The video was shot by Yakov Lapitsky at the San Diego Zoo. Who would have thought then, that YouTube would go on to become one of the biggest and most popular sites on the net?
3 Comments | Posted in: InternetDr. Conrad Murray Speaks Out
Posted By Ben Goulding, 18 August, 2009 | permalink
(Youtube Link)
Kid Uses Apple Store As Music Studio
Posted By Ben Goulding, 17 August, 2009 | permalink
Youtube user nicholifavs has charisma, confidence and loves using Apple Store Macs to make and upload videos to his channel. But, that’s what they’re there for, right?
He’s made over 70 videos from Apple Stores and is becoming a rising Youtube star. Fantastic ingenuity. Keep up the great work!
Check out Nicholi lip-syncing to ‘Boom Boom Pow’ by the Black Eyed Peas.
(Youtube Link)
Social Media Banned from College Stadiums
Posted By Ben Goulding, 17 August, 2009 | permalink
Adam Ostrow just posted this on Mashable. The Southeastern Conference is proposing a ban on social media at college games. Is this really possible?
“Today, the Southeastern Conference (SEC) is expected to release a final version of its new media policy. For the sake of sports fans everywhere, let’s hope it has some significant changes from the current version, because at the moment, it can best be described as a ban on all social media usage at SEC games.
Earlier this month, the conference informed its schools of the new policy, which reads: “Ticketed fans can’t “produce or disseminate (or aid in producing or disseminating) any material or information about the Event, including, but not limited to, any account, description, picture, video, audio, reproduction or other information concerning the Event.”
Translated, that means no Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, TwitPic, or any other service that could in any way compete with authorized media coverage of the event. In the case of the SEC, authorized media coverage rights belong to CBS, who has a $3 billion deal with the conference over the next 15 years according to The St Petersburg Times.”
Good luck with that guys!
Comments Off | Posted in: Internet | NewsJK Divorce Entrance Dance
Posted By Ben Goulding, 6 August, 2009 | permalink
We’ve all seen the “JK Wedding Entrance Dance” which has been a huge Youtube hit with over 17 million views and counting, but we knew it was all coming…here’s the divorce spoof.
(Youtube Link)
The parody was created by Indigo Productions, a professional audio & lighting production company, and was performed by Broadway actors.
Love it/hate it? Is it as good as the original? You decide.
1 Comment | Posted in: Entertainment | Internet | LifestyleYoutube To Sponsor Formula 1 Racing Team
Posted By Ben Goulding, 6 August, 2009 | permalink
Video sharing website, Youtube, is set to sponsor the new U.S. Formula 1 team USGPE (formerly US F1), which will join F1 in 2010.
YouTube co-founder Chad Hurley has had meetings with the USGPE team and Youtube is likely to sponsor the car.
Although there has been speculation about this for a while now, it appears that everything has been finalized now and Youtube will be a major sponsor in Formula 1 next season.
When it happens, it will be the first time that an internet-based company will be represented on the F1 track.
Comments Off | Posted in: Business | Internet | SportGoogle Debunks Youtube Myths
Posted By Ben Goulding, 21 July, 2009 | permalink
With pessimism surrounding Youtube’s performance, Youtube’s owner, Google, set out to prove it’s critics wrong. On the YouTube Biz Blog Google writes “we can debunk the top five myths about YouTube we repeatedly see.”
Myth 1: YouTube is limited to short-form user-generated content.
Google’s rebuttal: “The world premiere of Joy Luck Club director Wayne Wang’s film, “The Princess of Nebraska,” was viewed 165,000+ times during the first 48 hours — the equivalent of landing the 15th spot on Hollywood box office charts.”
Myth 2: YouTube videos are grainy and of poor quality.
Google’s rebuttal: “We already have more HD videos than any other video site.”
Myth 3: Traffic, growth, and uploads are bad for YouTube’s bottom line.
Google’s rebuttal: “With revenue estimates ranging from $120 million to $500 million, and costs on an equally large spectrum, it seems people can pick any number to fit any theory they have about our business. The truth is that all our infrastructure is built from scratch, which means models that use standard industry pricing are too high when it comes to bandwidth and similar costs. We are at a point where growth is definitely good for our bottom line, not bad.”
Myth 4: Advertisers are afraid of YouTube.
Google’s rebuttal: “Over 70% of Ad Age Top 100 marketers ran campaigns on YouTube in 2008. Advertisers just want control, so we’re continuing to develop tools and targeting products that give advertisers more control over where their ads appear on the site.”
Myth 5: YouTube is only monetizing 3-5% of the site.
Google’s rebuttal: “This oft-cited statistic is old and wrong, and continues to raise much speculation. Monetized views have more than tripled in the past year, as we’re adding partner content very quickly and doing a better job of promoting their videos across the site.”
It seems Google had a lot of steam to let out and it sure did that. Has this stopped the critics in their tracks though? I think not.
1 Comment | Posted in: Business | InternetYoutube Videos In 3D
Posted By Ben Goulding, 20 July, 2009 | permalink
It appears that Youtube has began experimenting with 3D videos. An employee named Pete is playing around with the 3D viewing feature in his 20% free time, reports Seroundtable.
They noticed a thread at the Youtube help forum, where the engineer said that he’s working on the stereoscopic player as a 20% project.
Testing 3D Videos. Image: seroundtable
I’m the developer working on the stereoscopic player as a 20% project. It’s currently very early, hence the silly bugs like swapping the eyes for the anaglyph modes. A fix for this is in the works.
The current tags are provisional and may change or expand. They are:
yt3d:enable=true Enables the view mode. (obviously you’ve already discovered this)
yt3d:aspect=3:4 Sets the aspect of the encoded video.
yt3d:swap=true Swaps the left and right sources. You may need to add this to videos when the player with fixed anaglyph modes ships. Apologies for the inconvineince.Your feedback and suggestions are welcome, but as this isn’t my primary project I can’t promise a speedy turnaround with improvements.
Here’s a link to an example video if you’d like to see it in use. (Youtube Video)
This sounds like a pretty neat feature for the future…although pointless without anaglyph glasses. What are your thoughts?
Comments Off | Posted in: Entertainment | Sci/Tech