AP Names Top YouTube Videos of '06

[DeepModem Mom]

Editor&Publisher/AP: AP Names Top YouTube Videos of '06
Published: December 14, 2006

2006 was the year YouTube became culturally ubiquitous. Declared the invention of the year by Time magazine, the video sharing website had Ohio judges posting their weekly sentencing hearings and spawned countless explosive experiments involving Diet Coke and Mentos candies.

YouTube provides a list of the most viewed videos, which remains the gauge upon which all clips are judged. Here, though, are the most significant YouTube videos of the year:

1. The face of YouTube -- The cute, bedroom confessions of Lonelygirl15 remain the site's quintessential expression. Of course, the pretty high schooler named Bree was eventually revealed to be 19-year-old actress Jessica Lee Rose, who was acting out a scripted plot with two behind-the-scenes producers. But that strange mutated duality of what's real and what's fiction, what's amateur and what's professional, remains the heart and soul of YouTube, where everybody and nobody is a star.

2. Network wake-up call -- "Saturday Night Live's" "Lazy Sunday" mock-rap sketch was, in some ways, what started the revolution. The video was seen by more than five million viewers before NBC asked YouTube to remove it in February. Chris Parnell and Andy Samberg's rhymes boosted the hipness of "SNL," but more importantly, it was the first time networks were alerted to their new competition. NBC reacted fearfully, and later opted to built up its own websites with online video. The networks continue to experiment with YouTube. Recently, CBS has claimed its late shows have increased in ratings after posting clips from "The Late Show with David Letterman" and "The Late Late Show" on YouTube.

3. Political fallout -- YouTube, like the Internet in general, has made it a specialty to reveal the gaffes and mistakes of the establishment. Of course, few would say Virginia Sen. George Allen didn't deserve his fate after a video of him calling a rival campaign staffer "macaca" drew constant clicks on YouTube. Allen went on to lose an extremely close election -- a race that YouTube could well have turned. On the other end of the spectrum, Michael J. Fox's tremulous campaign ads for various Democratic candidates who support stem cell research proved powerfully effective and were seen by millions more than would have otherwise caught them on TV....

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