Written by Jess Ardrey
The clock in the corner of your screen displays an ungodly hour in the morning.You have more work to do than my good friend Will Reno on Twitter during the Oscars. The coffee-to-blood ratio in your system is unsettling. You could not be more focused on the different phases of the bio-whatsits in your science something notes.
Your roommate and suitemate come barreling in, who have no reason for being awake except for fun. (Er … Fun? Can you use it in a sentence?)You try your hardest to ignore them and hope they’ll get the hint when you put in your headphones and turn up your angsty determination music.Of course they don’t, but in between Linkin Park songs, you hear your suitemate say, “Stay on yo’ side! Don’t try tuh hit me! See I’m tryin’ a put on my lipstick!”You also hear your roommate question the reference with a confused tone.You tear off your headphones, spin around and stare at your roommate incredulously.”You. Haven’t seen. That video?!”You spin back around, pull up YouTube and bask in the glory of exposing them to some high-quality comedic culture.Before you know it, it’s two hours later and you’re watching SNL Sean Connery Jeopardy skits.That, bros and bettys, is the magic of the YouTube.It is a source of knowledge when you need to know extremely important things. For example, sometimes a friend will send you an origami Millennium Falcon in the mail, calling you his Padawan, and you have to show him who the real Jedi master is by making an origami Yoda. Four hours well spent.But sometimes its powers are used for good. Many a time have I seen a friend post a YouTube video on someone’s Facebook wall just to make him or her feel better. That video often features a spunky little girl with blond ringlets (aptly named Jessica) giving her reflection the pep talk of the century, inches away from the mirror.On the other end of the fun scale are YouTube pranks. These include getting Rick Roll’d, where a video is not what it says it is, accompanied with a sparkling rendition of “Never Gonna Give You Up.”Personally, I prefer to tell friends they need to see this funny video of such-and-such and instead send them to the Russian Trololo singer, whose voice is smooth and heavenly like buttered angels. Trust me.You can literally find anything you’re looking for on YouTube, including friends. Yes, I have seen that episode of “Dateline.” Yes, I know the dangers of online predators.But I’m talking about pure, unadulterated community. Take the Vlog Brothers. Their YouTube presence started as a challenge for two brothers, who live on different sides of the country, to use no textual conversation for a year, uploading videos every weekday.Five years later and they’ve accumulated over 120 million views and a fictional land called Nerdfighteria, wherein they and their viewers battle world suck on a very real level.Probably the most fun part of the Tube is uploading your own videos. Now, I may or may not have uploaded a lot of stupid videos lip-synching with my RA freshman year. And I may or may not have done a song about chapel. And Nate Copeland mayormaynotbeafan.Either way, it’s a good way to see and be seen. If you’re not a YouTuber, you’ll soon find out what I mean.We all find what we want on the Tube, be it a heartwarming story of a bus driver’s birthday or the hilarity of a pseudo-reporter at a Lakers parade.Just make sure your checklist includes a zombie-faced boy at a carnival with an affinity for a certain reptile.
