So, did you remember to get YouTube a gift for its 10th birthday? If you didn’t, that’s OK—it turns out that video platforms don’t celebrate in the same way as we humans, being corporate entities based around conceptual ideas. Anyway, WIRED editrix Angela Watercutter said everything that needed to be said on NPR. [Eds. Note: Oh, hi!] While Google’s all-encompassing video portal gets a couple of entries in this week’s roundup, it’s more a week for Twitter to shine, with Norm MacDonald’s SNL reminiscences, Jessica Williams taking on those looking to cast her as a victim, and Sesame Street restoring an important piece of our childhoods. Here, as ever, is what’s been popping on those tubes we call Internet over the last seven days.
Thanks for the Meme-ries
What Happened: What better way to celebrate 10 years of YouTube than with a YouTube supercut of all those videos you saw years ago?
Where It Blew Up: YouTube, blogs, media think pieces
What Really Happened: Hey, YouTube is 10 years old! The Daily Conversation celebrated that fact with a compilation of 101 of the most-viewed videos on the service during that time, and it’s something that will fill you with a strange amount of nostalgia for people you don’t know.
The Takeaway: If nothing else, it’s worth it for the screaming sheep (11:17), right? Although following that up with “Gangam Style” just feels like a cruel, cruel joke. Psy, no offense, but we could’ve gone without seeing you again for quite some time.
Lean Back
What Happened: Jessica Williams says she’s not going to host The Daily Show. Certain people aren’t happy with that decision. Hilarity ensues. No, wait, what’s the opposite of hilarity again?
Where It Blew Up: Twitter, media think pieces
What Really Happened: Since Jon Stewart announced he’d be stepping down as Daily Show host later this year, there’s been a groundswell of support for current correspondent Jessica Williams to take on the gig. (Full disclosure: We’re part of that groundswell.) Turns out, though, Williams doesn’t want it, as she explained on Twitter last weekend:
This honesty didn’t sit well with one writer, who wrote a piece declaring that Williams was “the latest high-profile victim of imposter syndrome.” (“Jessica Williams, respectfully, I reject your humility,” it read. “All Williams needs is a pep talk.”)
Williams again took to Twitter to respond to the piece:
…A response that led to Time running a story that claimed that the comedian was “firing back at fans.” After Williams again had to take to Twitter to clarify what had actually happened, the piece was edited into something far more benign. Nonetheless, the exchanges launched a dizzying amount of think pieces on a number of topics, from the state of journalism and the value of knowing your limits to the ways in which women’s self-opinions are constantly open to scrutiny and disbelief.
Williams, meanwhile, has unsurprisingly been quiet on Twitter since this whole thing happened.
The Takeaway: First off, for her patience and willingness to take on this kind of thing, we can all agree that Jessica Williams wins everything, right? (Hopefully, part of that everything includes not having to deal with people overanalyzing, misunderstanding or outright hijacking what she’s saying for their own agendas.) Secondly, she might not be ready to host The Daily Show, but there’s no denying that this mess has made Williams a more vital figure in popular culture than ever before and, ironically, raised her profile to a place where she really does feel like she’d be the frontrunner for the gig otherwise…
The Fault in Our Attributions
What Happened: YA author and social media motivational guru John Green realized that an inspirational quote from one of his books—something so inspirational, he sells merchandise based on it—isn’t actually anything he wrote after all.
Where It Blew Up: YouTube, Twitter, blogs, media think pieces
What Really Happened: Really, Green explains the backstory pretty well in the video below.
His confession prompted a lot of media coverage, which went from straight reportage to quizzes where you guess whether or not the John Green quotes are real, lists of other misattributed quotes and a swift dissertation about the ways in which Tumblr makes it easy to make such mistakes. Surprisingly, no one has written an in-depth profile of Melody Truong, the teenager who did come up with the quote, but it’s surely only a matter of time.
The Takeaway: Depending on your feelings on Green, either: “Good for him for owning up to his mistake and donating the proceeds to the girl who actually came up with the quote!” or “Seriously, shouldn’t he have someone who actually checks that you wrote things before you try and make money off them in the first place?” For those of us agnostic enough to not have an opinion on him either way, both can be true.
Transatlantic Drawl
What Happened: A California teen found herself being accused of murder by fans of a British soap opera. As you do.
Where It Blew Up: Twitter, blogs
What Really Happened: British soap Eastenders ended a long-running storyline this week by revealing—spoilers, people who are following the show and somehow don’t already know this—that 11-year-old Bobby Beale was responsible for the death of his sister Lucy. The revelation immediately led to social media mockery, including some people tweeting at @bobbiebeale to condemn him for his fictional actions. The only problem: @bobbiebeale is actually a California teenager who has never seen the show.
Talking to BuzzFeed about the mix-up, the real-life Beale said that she was “definitely confused,” in part because Lucy is actually the name of her dog. “I thought it was a real-life thing and I thought Bobby Beale killed someone and I was like, ‘it’s not me.'”
The British press is loving the mix up, as you can see, and the BBC itself stepped in to reassure viewers:
As for the real, non-murderous Bobbie Beale? She’s still trying to convince people that she’s not male, not a murderer, and also not fictional:
The Takeaway: Apparently, some people on Twitter don’t recognize the difference between fact and fiction. Or geography. Or how people’s names are spelled. Maybe we should be glad that Twitter didn’t exist back when J.R. Ewing got shot in Dallas.
I Am Sitting in the Morning At the Diner On The
What Happened: As an educational tool about what gets lost when music gets made into MP3s, someone created a track made up only of the sounds that disappeared when the Suzanne Vega song “Tom’s Diner” got compressed into an MP3. It kind of sounded great.
Where It Blew Up: Twitter, blogs
What Really Happened: Although Ryan Maguire’s video is actually a few months old, it gained a new lease on life this past week when Death and Taxes posted it, leading to many other sites picking it up as well. It’s a fascinating glimpse at what we don’t hear when we listen to our favorite music in our favorite music format.
(If you’re wondering why Maguire chose this particular song, it’s because “Tom’s Diner” is the song used during the creation of the MP3 compression method.)
The Takeaway: Cue all the “Suzanne Vega never sounded so good” jokes. More importantly, though: When are we going to upgrade from MP3 to a better format already? (And, no, we don’t mean U2’s reported upgrade, thank you very much.)
Sesame Street Wins Twitter
What Happened: Big Bird used Twitter to resurrect a piece of Sesame Street lore this week, and it was kind of genius.
Where It Blew Up: Twitter, blogs
What Really Happened: To explain this properly, we need to go back into Sesame Street history a bit. Starting in 1971, Big Bird had a friend on the show called Mr. Snuffleupagus. Thing was, no one else ever saw Snuffy aside from Big Bird, which led everyone else to assume that he was Big Bird’s imaginary friend—a running joke that lasted until 1985, when he was revealed to the rest of the cast after concerns that the joke might make kids worried that adults wouldn’t believe them on certain topics.
This week, Big Bird posted this tweet:
It was one of a number of tweets he sent to that account, which just so happens to be a private account with one follower—@BigBird, unsurprisingly. In other words, only Big Bird can see what @MrSnuffleupagus is saying. An exchange between Big Bird and Billy Eichner made the joke clear for everyone:
Twitter was suitably amused:
The Takeaway: It’s a simple joke, but a smart one, and—for those who watched Sesame Street back when Snuffy was still a secret—something that warms the heart. Whoever came up with this one, well done.
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