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THE 12th ANNUAL WEBBY AWARDS NAMES
12 MOST INFLUENTIAL ONLINE VIDEOS OF ALL TIME
“lonelygirl15”, Burger King’s “Subservient Chicken” Ad, and SNL’s “Lazy Sunday”
Among Web’s Top Video Milestones
www.webbyawards.com/top12videos
New York (November 27, 2007)- An enigmatic teenager, a deferential rooster, and two cupcake-obsessed rappers rank among the twelve most influential online videos of all time, according to a list unveiled today by The Webby Awards.
Hailed as the “OSCARS® of the Internet” by the New York Times, The Webby Awards is the leading international award honoring excellence on the Internet, including Websites, online film and video, interactive advertising, and mobile content. The deadline for entering The 12th Annual Webby Awards is December 14, 2007. To enter, visit www.webbyawards.com
From the groundbreaking “lonelygirl15” series to Burger King’s “Subservient Chicken” ad to Saturday Night Live’s “Lazy Sunday (Narnia Rap)”, the list encompasses an eclectic mix of memorable Web moments that reshaped everything from popular culture to politics.
Other videos making the list include Senator George Allen’s infamous “Macaca” gaffe, the pioneering “Jennicam.com”, and OK Go’s treadmill-dance sensation “Here We Go”. On a more serious note, The Webby Awards cited personal videos of the 2006 Israel-Hezbollah conflict as a milestone in how the world sees and experiences war. (See full list of The Webby Awards’ 12 Most Influential Online Videos below and online at www.webbyawards.com/top12videos
“Although many of the videos on our list are no more than a few minutes long, their impact will be felt for years to come in everything from entertainment to advertising to politics,” said David-Michel Davies, executive director of The Webby Awards. “Each video sparked a trend or set a benchmark that changed the craft, business and culture of the moving image.””
Davies also noted that many of the videos on the list premiered in 2006, a milestone year for online video.
“2006 was a turning point for online video,” said Davies. “The massive popularity of sites like YouTube and the explosive growth of digital video cameras combined to make it a powerful new medium.”
The Webby Awards’ 12 Most Influential Online Videos of All Time:
Jennicam (1996)
Jennifer Ringley redefined privacy and entertainment for the Internet era by posting a few Webcams around her college dorm room and inviting the world to view and debate the most mundane moments of her daily life.
All Your Base Are Belong to Us (2000)
The phrase, from a muddled translation of a Japanese video game, was the ultimate insider reference among gaming geeks; but when a flash animation set to a catchy dance tune hit the pre-iTunes, pre-YouTube Internet, it became the first “mash-up” to take pop culture by storm.
BMW Film Series – “The Hire” (2001)
With a star-studded line-up of actors and directors that included Clive Owen, Madonna, Don Cheadle, Ang Lee, Ridley Scott, and John Woo, The Hire set the standard for branded content and proved that millions of people will tune in online to view original, high-quality films.
Star Wars Kid (2002)
While online video is riddled with aspiring actors and singers, Ghyslain Raza learned unintentionally that it can be a powerful star-making tool. While millions delighted at the golf-stick wielding Jedi – even remixing and reediting the original – Raza’s rise to fame was a reminder for many to “destroy the tape.”
JibJab – “This Land” (2004)
“This Land,” an animation featuring a John Kerry/George W. Bush duet, became the medium’s first hugely popular political parody – enjoying three times the combined traffic of the actual candidates’ sites and paving the way for campaign-defining political clips like the “1984” Hillary Clinton ad and the camp “Obama Girl” video.
Lazy Sunday (Narnia Rap) (2005)
Saturday Night Live was in a ratings funk when this skit originally aired, but by the next morning the white-guy rap was burning through YouTube. NBC, which immediately posted the skit on its own site, became one of the first major entertainment companies to recognize online video’s power.
Subservient Chicken (2005)
The garter-belted chicken that obeyed viewers’ commands racked up a million hits in its first 24 hours, thanks to its pitch-perfect appeal to Burger King’s young male target audience. It paved the way for other Web marketing phenomena from Trevor the Mento’s Intern to Diesel’s Heidies.
Israel-Hezbollah War (2006)
From 9/11 to the 2004 tsunami, the Web has become the place where people turn first to share first-hand accounts and follow unfolding news events; but it wasn’t until the 2006 Israel-Hezbollah conflict that personal videos became a powerful witness to war and conflict. Many call it the first “YouTube War.”
“lonelygirl15” (2006)
The wildly popular video diary of a teenaged girl – famously outed by the Financial Times as fictional -made Jessica Rose, its Webby Award-winning star, one of the first actors to gain credibility on the Web, and proved that fans could be as loyal to an online video series as a weekly TV show.
OK Go – “Here We Go Again” (2006)
The band OK Go had been toiling in relative obscurity for eight years when they jumped onto a set of treadmills and danced their way into music video history. The elaborately-choreographed video reeled in millions of new fans, garnered a Grammy award, and helped topple the hegemony of MTV.
Senator George Allen’s “Macaca” Incident (2006)
With the help of a camera and YouTube, Senator George Allen’s political gaffe became a media sensation and is widely credited with helping the Democrats take control of the U.S. Congress in 2006. It proved a powerful cautionary tale for misbehaving politicians and celebrities everywhere.
Zidane Headbutt (2006)
Thanks to the Internet, no one missed this infamous World Cup moment that gave rise to countless video parodies, interactive games, and a world-wide hit song that originally premiered online.
About The Webby Awards:
Hailed as the “OSCARS® of the Internet” by the New York Times, The Webby Awards is the leading international award honoring excellence on the Internet, including Web sites, interactive advertising, online film and video, and mobile web sites. Established in 1996, the 11th Annual Webby Awards received a record 8,000 entries from all 50 states and over 60 countries worldwide. The Webby Awards is presented by The International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences. Sponsors and Partners of The Webby Awards include: Adobe; The Creative Group; Level3; Getty Images; dotMobi; The Barbarian Group; CondéNast|CondéNet ; Adweek; Fortune; Reuters; Variety; Wired; IDG: Brightcove; PricewaterhouseCoopers; 2advanced.Net; KobeMail and Museum of the Moving Image.
OSCAR® is a federally registered trademark of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. The Webby Awards and the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences are in no way affiliated with or sponsored by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences or OSCAR®.
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