Top 5 Most Unexpected Viral Videos of ‘08

Viral video doesn’t always simply mean millions of views. Sometimes a video manages to inspire YouTubers to actually turn on their cameras and respond to, or parody, what they’ve just seen instead of being a passive viewer. Some of these videos even manage to do this while remaining underground. Here, I’m going spotlight videos which unexpectedly spread like wild fire through the YouTube community, eliciting dozens of video responses and parodies, despite not being featured on YouTube’s front page.

1. TOOT TOOT!!! - A sort of introductory video by jabazzy tops our list as the #1 most unexpected viral video of 2008. The video simply features YouTuber jabazzy introducing herself and telling us a few of her likes and dislikes over an upbeat polka track. The video was responded to and re-made by dozens of YouTubers, including BenRobot, speedyconkiwi, K80blog, dinzla and many, many others for a total of a couple hundred thousand tootin’ views!

2. The Naked Vlog Campaign. - Maybe not totally unexpected (who doesn’t love a little nudity?), the naked vlog tag game spread as quickly as, if not quicker than, nerimon’s five facts tag game from ‘07. The Naked Vlog Campaign was also the last successful tag game/meme spread on YouTube. Most Tubers got burnt out on getting tagged after this one (anyone remember Truth or Dare? Yeah, kinda?).

3. I’m Voting Republican by SyntheticHuman Pictures, while not technically part of the YouTube community, received a huge response from the community wanting to share their own thoughts about our current state of politics.

4. My Morning Hurr. - A quickie from chris3ff asking viewers to record themselves first thing in the morning, showing him their morning hair. The video got dozens of vloggers to turn on their cameras before getting all prettied up, an accomplishment in itself. Like the others on this list, “My Morning Hurr” inspired many responses and parodies.

5. My Message How could I not include one of my own videos on this list? “My Message” was a super serious video about communicating with others via this new online medium. It inspired a few laughs, and a few responses from Tubers Toddly00, BenRobot, justinmazing, and others.

Honorable Mention: That Shark Can Kiss My Ass from the always lovely achampag. Calling for vloggers to get back to being real, for the “corporate American bullshit” to find it’s home elsewhere, this video received a number of strong video responses from thediamondfactory, thebdonski, andymcgaffigan and others.

Keep in mind, this is just my list. I didn’t look at view counts or response counts to create this list, had I, this list would look much different.

Do you have a video that engaged your subscribers? A video that others made responses to and talked about long after the first 48 hours after it was uploaded? Share it with me in the comments section below. I’d love to check it out.

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