1. Car Crash Nation, er, Planet

At least once a day, I visit YouTube to see which videos are the most viewed, discussed and shared. On Sunday the entire front page of view rankings was populated with:

a) Videos of Arsenal striker Eduardo Da Silva breaking his leg in a Saturday game against Birmingham City. The injury was too graphic for Sky Sports to rebroadcast it.

b) Videos of Big Brother Season 9 contestant Amanda Hansen passing out due to low blood sugar.

I’ve watching my share of Formula One and ski jump crashes on YouTube over the years. I’m no innocent. But sometimes, when a “Most Viewed” index holds ONLY injury, disaster or downfall, it makes me wonder. Especially following the noxious preoccupation with 2 Girls One Cup last autumn. Boo humanity! Boo!

2. Giveth, then Taketh Away? Stilleth?

Everybody has “go-to” online content that immediately cheers them up. For me, it’s LOLCats (Emily Wu posting unsolicited on my FB Wall to wish me happy birthday was a major highlight this past weekend), and a few key videos. Namely, Charlie the Unicorn, Paintball Kid and a recent addition: “Child Clowns” from Tim and Eric Awesome Show Great Job!

What? That last link doesn’t go anywhere? That’s because Time Warner/Cartoon Network yanked the Adult Swim show’s content from the site. Time Warner’s volatile relationship with YouTube is well known, but this was one of those great examples that illustrates the cost of stubborn and stodgy corporate policy. I wanted to share the video, in person, with a group of friends. Sure I searched other sites, but at the time, I only found badly optimized, shorter versions. Nothing as majestic as the one I’d been watching every day on YouTube for three weeks. Note: This version on FunnyOrDie is pretty good, though. Anyhow, the experience left me pissed off and unable to share my excitement with my friends. To use an awkward dating metaphor, I got content blocked. Compare this to the Sarah Silverman/Matt Damon affair, which ABC got OUT THERE. I even tuned into Jimmy Kimmel Live, a show I never watch, to see the response video. Anyhow, I know this is an old story…but that doesn’t change the fact that it’s still happening.

3. Everybody loves Magic. That’s why they call it Magic. (sorry, following the awesomeness of the Redbelt trailer, I had to channel Mamet.)

I don’t believe you can cultivate “magic”, it just happens. And yet, right now, this little girl is tearing up YouTube.

OK, I guess she’s cute and all. And yes, I’ll probably get some boos for nay saying the clip but I thought the editing of this video, by the dad, left it feeling completely contrived and bereft of magic. I’ve nothing against parents capturing their kids doing funny stuff and posting it on YouTube, but this video (and the father defends himself in the comments) really feels like it was shot FOR YouTube. Regardless of intent, the finished product didn’t feel organic to me. I went “eh” instead of “aww”. And that’s a bummah.

Look for a more substantive post on the potential convergence of Online Advertising and New Marketing Research Technologies in the AM.

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We definitely saw this one coming.

Scrabulous, the highly successful (over 600,000 daily users) Facebook app that allows you to play a game that is exactly the same as Scrabble with your friends, is facing extinction thanks to Hasbro and Mattel, who have asked Facebook to disable and remove the app.

Hasbro and Mattel jointly own Scrabble, and (rightly) claim that Scrabulous violates their intellectual property.

But are they handling this the right way? No way.

They’ve got 500,000 people every day playing Scrabble on Facebook. It’s just not their Scrabble. But it could be. Why not just throw a bit ‘o money at the two chaps that built the app and claim it as their own? Why reinvent the wheel? Why create malcontents out of passionate players? These should be your best customers. Instead, they are leaving angry messages on the Hasbro and Mattel message boards, and are starting “Save Scrabulous” groups on Facebook.

Hasbro and Mattel are right to be protective of their intellectual property. But they are wrong for dragging their loyal players into their legal battles.

More on this at BBC News. And more blogger opinions here, here, here, and here.

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All over my neighborhood here in NYC (Union Square/Chelsea) are these ads, usually above subways, touting the opening of this Dell Direct Gift Store, a pop-up store, near Union Square at 813 Broadway.

So I think to myself, “That seems interesting. I wonder if they carry the new Nokia N810 Internet Tablet in there.” When one has a question, one typically turns to the Internet for an answer.

Of course, I go straight to Google and type in, “Dell Direct Gift Store”. Search. Nothing.

Then, “Dell Direct Gift Store” “813 Broadway”. Search. Still nothing.

Actually, I do get something. This link to what apparently is the only coverage of this store even existing.

The next thing I do is head over to Dell.com for some help in determining what the store’s contents are, contact information, anything.

Again, nothing.

The point I’m getting at is that if a company that relies so heavily upon the web for transactions goes through the trouble of opening a pop-up store, at least do it right and provide some information about it on the web, wouldja?

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In a world where social media is opening up the floodgates of communication, why turn comments off on a YouTube homepage video buy?

(click on each image to see in greater detail)

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