Victoria's Secret Fashion Show 2011.

Yesterday night was the Victoria's Secret Fashion show. I have never been big on watching fashion shows or pageants, etc. I wasn't able to watch the show last night, but I was surprised to see that my Facebook exploded with status updates on excitement to watch the show. I didn't realize how big of a deal the VS show was. Some of my friends had made traditions of watching it with their girlfriends and were waiting in anticipation to see which artists would be performing [If I was told correctly I believe Kanye, Jay-Z, Nicki Minaj, and Adam LeVine all performed].
Because I was curious I did some research on the show and was able to see how good publicity, famous celebrities that attend, entertainment, and of course, beautiful women made the show into a hit. Although I don't plan on watching next year, I'll keep up with the Internet reaction! I saw responses to the show not only on Facebook but Yahoo! and Tumblr as well.

And just for kicks...

Click RIGHT HERE to watch the entire show!

School Spirit.

This past Thanksgiving, the third oldest college football rivalry came to an end. A&M and UT played each other for the last time for a while after 117 years of glorious tradition. I will keep my thoughts on how sad I am that this rivalry is coming to an end due to money to myself. I would like to note how completely floored I am that we won. I was at the game on Thursday instead of being at home with my family [due to the fact that I am in band and we traveled to College Station to support the team.]  I'm pretty sure my break would have been tinged with depression if we had lost.
This game had brought around the reemergence of the popular video meme of Hitler. Although it hasn't gone completely viral, I saw multiple of my Facebook friends share the link. I personally thought the video was funny. The situation of the game was so fitting how Hitler was speaking to his officers. By using this meme that has been around for a while and the game, the video has gotten over 33,000 views. Surprisingly, there isn't a war between Longhorns and Aggies in the comments.
Click HERE HERE HERE to watch the video!

Hook 'em!

My Little Brony.

Three of my closest friends from high school went to A&M College Station. They are all guys, and would probably be classified as the nerdier, video game loving type. As they are part of my circle of friends that I try very hard to keep in touch with, I make sure to check up on their Facebook pages at least once a week.
Something I have noticed is that they consistently post photos of a parody show of the "My Little Pony" series, known as "My Little Brony." This actually didn't surprise me at all. These guys had all gone through the "Bro" phrase. ["Dude that's so brotastic. Hannah Brotanna, etc.]
Curious, I looked up "My Little Brony" online and was led to multiple episodes, shirts, and iterations of the meme. What I found to be effective of this meme was that there were versions of it that were iterations of other memes. For example, IDGAF, Derp, Over 9000, and much more. One of my friends, had even been creating his own versions of this meme by photoshopping his own inside jokes onto photos from the show.
I believe this is a prime example of how a meme can stay alive for an extended amount of time on the Internet. Because "My Little Brony" has so many episodes online and are pumping out more, fans have the ability to create more and more versions of the meme online, prolonging it's life.
In my opinion, "My Little Brony" is not humorous at all, but to my three good friends, it's a show where they anxiously wait for new episodes. This supports how target audience is also key to a meme's survival.

Angry Birds!

Something I have noticed on a variety of websites is the mentioning of the iPhone application in the form of a puzzle video game called Angry Birds. I have multiple friends with iPhones and when we are waiting around, they whip out their phones and begin to play. I do not own an iPhone and thus I have no idea what the game consists of. I think this is a prime example of target audience. iPhone users have this exclusive understanding of the game whereas others do not "get" the jokes that may surround it.
For example, as last weekend was Halloweekend, I went out with my friends in costume. I saw multiple people in Angry Birds costumes and didn't really see any humor in it. However, my friends with iPhones thought these costumes were extremely clever and funny.
I have not only seen Angry Birds as popular Halloween costumes, but have also seen them turned into popularly blogged artwork on Tumblr, and even nail tutorials on YouTube.
I think it is interesting how an iPhone app can turn into such a variety of forms on the Internet.

Keep Calm & Carry On.

A meme that has been popular for the past month or so are the alterations of the "Keep Calm and Carry On" poster originally produced by the British government during WWII to raise the morale of the British public. This poster was rediscovered recently and now has been manipulated and used by thousands of netizens. Here is a photo of the original:

I have seen hundreds of versions of this poster from "Keep Calm and Party On" to "Keep Calm and Make Tea." People have been changing the poster to match who they are as people. I think this is a great example of a meme that has a tendency to evolve as it spends more time on the Internet. The poster has been on the web for a while and is still going strong. The fact that people can alter the poster gives the meme no restrictions and a wide range of ability to be creative.

Here is an alteration:

The above poster shows that maybe the people are ready for this meme to die...

The Power of Words.

One night while I was on Tumblr, I stumbled across on a two part GIF that was on the 1000 absolute best posts. The top part of the GIF showed what appeared to be a blind homeless man with a sign "I'm blind, please help." The second portion showed the sign now altered to say "It's a beautiful day and I can't see it." The user that had blogged the post provided a link to YouTube to the entire short film. Usually I don't look further into Tumblr posts, but curiosity got the best of me. The helplessness and vulnerability of the old man just really got to me and a part of me wanted to know if he was alright [Even though I was almost positive that this was a film and thus he was an actor.] I was led to a video with more than 10 million views entitled "The Power of Words." The clip is only 1 minute and 48 seconds long but by the end of it I was crying! I don't want to ruin the video for everyone so I will link it HERE-I PROMISE YOU WON'T BE DISAPPOINTED.

In my opinion, this video is a prime example of pathos. The entire clip pulled on my sympathies and brought forth my emotions. Through pathos, the makers of the film were able to further convince me on their claim of how important words are and how influential they can be. In a way, I was able to feel this old man's pain and suffering imaginatively.

Another interesting fact about this video is the fact that it is a remake. The original short film was made in Spanish and has less views on YouTube. The original and remake have only slight differences, but I think that these differences are what make the remake more popular. The remake illustrates a stronger contrast in between the homeless blind man and the powerful business character.

All in all, I think everyone should watch this in that it really shows how powerful words can be and how the saying "Sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me" should be rethought.

Kids REACT!

I'm a huge YouTuber. I check YouTube multiple times a day and am subscribed to over 20 channels that I keep up with regularly. One channel I discovered only recently has completely has a video series that has completely grabbed my attention. Kids React is a video series by the FineBrothers that is entertaining to watch. The FineBrothers create videos with a variety of kids, ages ranging from 3 to 14 reacting to memes, viral videos, other YouTubers, and famous people. It is surprising how clever and blunt the kids can be in their reactions. The FineBrothers upload a new Kids React every Sunday and I look forward to watching each week. One of my favorite Kids React videos is the one over Rebecca Black. Even the kids are mortified of her MV.

Click HERE to see what I'm talking about.

...Friday, Friday...