Justin and Jill's Drunk History

Title:Justin and Jill's Drunk History
Starring: Justin and Jill and their amazing friends
Category: Category

Drunk people are funny. How it hasn't been mined properly before this is a mystery. Comedy Central has done so but only in a roundabout way. Sure Tosh.0 featured tons of drunks found on YouTube. AtMidnight capitalised on it further. But this was someone else's material. Comedy Central did funny drunks like second-hand smoke.
Until Drunk History. Take a piece of history that in itself is really interesting and have it told by someone who is piss drunk. Then have A-Listers re-enact / act out the narration, complete with outakes and burps. This became a huge phenomena that it seems it is going to run out of material soon. Until people took the concept and made it their own.  Enter Justin and Jill.

They took their history of them meeting up and made it into a drunk history video. It is so good that it is virtually indistinguishable from the real thing. Helps that both are in the entertainment business.
To top it off, their next video, their wedding dance video is also equally amazing.

Update on The Man with the Golden Voice: Two Years on

I came back across an old post about Ted Williams, the Man with the Golden Voice as I was browsing some older posts. After watching the YouTube video which launched his story, I wondered what happened to him. I remembered that as time passed, more information about Ted came out. It was a sad story with so many sides. A real life story. Not the ones you see on news shows that try to sugar-coat or simplify a person's life. Problems with his estranged children. His distance with his mother, whom he later reunited with. 

Well here is the update. The best part of this story is that it is not a fairy tale. It's still real life fraught with real challenges. 

From the Google Plus Stream: Humor of all kinds

Did you know that MyWatchlist has a Google Plus page? It's where I quickly share links or other posts related to what I am watching. Sometimes there is a link to videos,too. There is also a Wandering YouTube G+ page which is dedicated to what I find on YouTube. If you are into watching YouTube a lot, this will point to some videos I found or watching that may be not so mainstream. Just subscribe to the MyWatchlist Google Plus by clicking the G+ button on the side of this site.

These are some of the posts on my G+ stream that I found downright hilarious.

50 Shades of Hey. A play on the famous book of the similar name. Either the video is a examples of the various usage of the word "hey" or an indictment of how overused the word "hey" has become.

A follow-up to the post on the funny YouTube videos of Birdbox Studio. It's a series ads that they made for vodka company.  The post shows how 3 cowboys settle on how to enjoy their drinks. The video will the show other ads made at the end of the video. Click on those to see more. Some are ok but some are really funny.

And finally some reality-based humor. It's either a bizarre sense of entitlement or rugged individualism running amok in all the wrong directions. Either way, it's hilarious when a someone call 9-11 to complain about a fast-food joint's new menu. The complaint is that it's healthier and the person wants the old menu back. Funnier when animated.

Belting Your Heart Out on YouTube

Starring: You
Category: YouTube
I don't understand why but I actually like listening to karaoke. Good karaoke that is. Probably because I appreciate live music. With karaoke, of course, it's the singing that's live. The singers try to follow the stylings of the original song. That makes it familiar. Then there are singers who try something different. That makes it fun. Some of these efforts work out, some fall flat. Finally, you stumble upon talent. 
And there are tons of karaoke on YouTube. The more popular ones are those that graduate into live performance and become YouTube stars. Check out this playlist of live music on YouTube. I made it over a year ago and most if it is Boyce Avenue but check out also whom they are collaborating with. It's been a blast to watch the growth from posting up karaoke clip, to singing on YouTube to these full blown music video production by first-time artists. 
Which brings me back to something I first saw just over 4 years ago. 
I love this guy's rendition of Second Chance by .38 Special. For a time, it was the only version I could listen on YouTube because the video of the group's version were being brought down due to copyright problems. I have to say, the guy has both talent and passion for singing this song. I really, really, hope the song doesn't have any connection to him :) ! Listen to it to end and catch the comments buy the other patrons nearby. Funny and inspiring at the same time.

Leave a comment at the YouTube page. He'll appreciate it.
Now, some of those people that were belting it out on YouTube or their local karaoke bars have now a new outlet for their talent: Reality Singing Shows. You name it, American Idol, X Factor, the Voice. That is what they are, an opportunity for these singers-at heart to sing in front of a larger audience.



That is what they are, an opportunity for these singers-at heart to sing in front of a larger audience.

Sketchy Animated Hilarity (or Funny Cartoons for the rest of us)

YouTube has brought a renaissance of short animated clips. I am not talking about the shorts like Pixar's great shorts that run before their movies. I am not talking about clips that used to be made by some studios on the side and later find themselves as bonus material on DVDs. Not those same short that later find themselves on the Internet being forwarded through millions of clogged dial-up links before reaching overstuffed e-mail in-boxes and becoming the source of headaches for numerous IT admins everywhere. While these later found the safe haven of YouTube, some do find themselves removed by their studio creators.
I am talking about really short animated clips that could have been done on a budget small enough for a month lunches but with a personality and a sense of wit worthy of notable authors. Well, now YouTube has moved beyond a place of refuge to a place where these clips debut or even live beyond their initial run.

A recentcomer is Birdbox Studios, a outfit in London who noble goal is to create short movies that are "talked about, remembered and enjoyed by everyone." Their first work I came across is this


The hilarity of the situation appealed to everybody and I found it popular to whomever I played it too. I didn't give it much thought until I came across their other works which were differently drawn but contained the same style of wit and flair for the impossible. Then came their best piece of work yet.

Watch an IOS jailbreak done properly

How do you jailbreak IOS devices like your iPhone or iPad? Fed up with the useless Android applications installed on your Samsung Galaxy phone but cannot be removed? Well, you need to root your Android phone to remove it. What if you want to try the latest Android OS but your phone's manufacturer does not want to support the latest version?
The TWiT.TV network's new show, Know How, helps users perform various tasks that seem difficult at first but it is actually easy. Ayaz Akhtar and Leo Laporte each week choose a task that at first seems a little complicated. But armed with some reference and information easily available on-line, they demonstrate how to do it right live on-screen.



This time around they show an easy way to jailbreak an IOS device with Ayaz's iPod Touch. After that, they root Leo's Kindle Fire. Both methods provide the owner with more functionality than the original device settings. For example, iPad and iPhones that have been jailbroken can use third-party apps. This may seem strange at first but there are other app markets for IOS devices other than iTunes. Also, this is the only way you can run a custom app that has not been vetted by Apple. An Android device that has been rooted will be able to do things that wasn't possible before, like delete apps that were previously not erasable. With more effort, and provided you can find the right ROM that supports your device, you can try out the latest version of Android.

Roosterteeth + Trials Evolution Multiplayer = Mayhem + Comedy

Warning: Possible Not Safe for Work. 

Maybe with headphones, you could get away with it.

Trials Evolution is video game for the Xbox 360. It is a motocross racing game set in a variety of tracks. The game is played from a third person perspective and is really fun to watch. The variety of tracks is tremendous and the developers have released a track editor that is so flexible, players have made other games like a Missile Command and a third person shooter. Although they are several intros and trailers to the game, I like this from RoosterTeeth because it gets directly to the gameplay and the game itself. Most others are just loud for being loud's sake and have intros of their own that take up almost half the time of the video. 

It also has multi-player and the guys at RoosterTeeth take a crack at it. The result is possibly the funniest video by the guys at RoosterTeeth. Just a bunch of guys having fun. It's like you are a friend in the same room watching. Obscenities abound. 

A friend of mine laughed so hard, he had to leave and ask for the link to watch later. 

DayZ and Walking with the Dead

Category: Game

Why just watch a zombie movie when you can experience it yourself? The cool guys at RoosterTeeth reviewed DayZ, a mod for ArmA 2 for the PC. It creates a world in the aftermath of a zombie apocalypse with a high degree of realism. In this world, the player and other survivors have to .... survive. The other players are all other players on the same server. Non-player characters are zombies of several kinds. This is not a game where you shoot anything that moves. In fact, you should really think about how not to shoot because the noise attracts zombies. And you should worry about dying because there is no respawning. You come back as someone else and whatever you had is gone. So basicaly, re-living the world of The Walking Dead. In this clip, Burnie from RoosterTeeth provides a comprehensive introduction to the game/world.

There are so many cool feature is this game which takes it to the next level. Health management effects gameplay and game experience directly. If you are shot and bleeding, your character is shaking. And when you are shaking, you can't shoot straight. You have to bandage yourself and take something to calm your nerves down. Worse is that resource management is critical as provisions are few. You may not have that injection, only bandages.

One of the unique aspects of this game is taking action (or not) living with the consequences. Since players cannot re-spawn and dying means starting fresh, the approach to gameplay changes significantly. The game world is huge, slightly over 100 square miles and the main transportation is your own two feet. What strikes me is how just walking in the game resembles the posters for the Walking Dead TV series. It is not uncommon to walk around and find the remains of other players. Remember to loot. 

There are problems. Mostly communications. Communications is limited at the moment because players are not individually recognizable. There are no identifiers on the players nor and there is a limited way you change how you look. Communication within a game server covers all the players so you can basically see other people talking to each other even though you cannot see them. Nor can you be sure the person you are chatting with is actually the person in front of you.

Boyce Avenue provides a little bit Heaven

This popped up on my YouTube stream and I just had to listen. This is a Bryan Adams classic and like most of his songs, it is best enjoyed live. Well, acoustic is a close second

Check out one of two official music videos for this song starring a young Lysette Anthony. This video was unique for it's time because it part of a series of music videos that told a story. Watch Summer of 69, this and Run to You.

Watch More:

Acoustic Goodness with Boyce Avenue

More new talent on YouTube

Watching Games the next movie experience?

I am not a gamer. I stink at games. Puzzles? OK. Point and click adventure? If I have the time. Shoot-em-up? My last real one was the original Doom and Doom2. Even that was mostly played in co-op mode. Yep, it was over a network, something very rare back in the day. But I digress.
Games now are so much like mini movies. They have that cinematic quality to them. Everything is on a big scale. Most game budgets dwarf movie budgets now. It's no longer just during the cut-scenes. Some games used to be so bad, it consisted mostly of cut-scenes. You just basically play for a while until it reaches a point where it plays another cut-scene. 
Great games make you feel like you are living a movie. Wished you were Indiana Jones? Wish no more and be a Lego version of him. 

Games tie-ins have been around for a long time. But it's fairly recent that gameplay has come close to make you feel like being part of a movie. This brings up a problem. So what if you don't play games? Not just don't play them. Can't play games. Even if your life depended on it.
Do the next best thing: Watch someone else play! 
Walkthrus or Walkthroughs are videos of people playing games. People do this to show how it is played or the best way to play through a game. Walkthrus used to be long text files that describe the mundane and trivial. Reading a walkthru before playing a game will most likely tick you off and discourage you from playing it. The opposite is true with current walkthrus which are recordings made while someone else plays the game. YouTube is full of them and they come in a variety of styles. Some have witty commentary to explain what to do and why. Others just have the player make occasional remarks while allowing the viewer to listen to the game itself.
Basically, walkthrus are to help other gamers who are stuck in the middle of a game. It shows what to do and does it and shows what to expect when you do it. It's also like watching over someone's shoulder while they are playing the game. This is cool because 

1. You don't have to actually stand around. 
2. You get to pause and rewind what's happening
3. That person you watching doesn't get annoyed.

If you're not sure about a game, I recommend starting with an intro of a game to see whether they are worth watching. Some games have trailers and are as useful as movie trailers.. which isn't. RoosterTeeth have their YouTube channel that showcases some games under the This is ... playlist. This series show off a few minutes of gameplay.




Once you like a game, go ahead watch a walkthru. Some games are more cinematic and lend themselves to the viewing experience. For example, Alan Wake's American Nightmare is a game that borrows heavily from movies and movie making which makes it a good watch. It also has a rich back-story that is told through radio broadcasts and short clips that appear on TV.  The atmosphere is very "Twilight Zone"-ish and the cheesy voice-over harks back to TV-land of yesteryear. 






Your mileage may vary. Some games a best enjoyed in short clips which shows off key actions sequences. I'd like to hear some of the walkthrus you've watched and what do you recommend. 

Americans May Love Cars But The Kings Are Still In England. TopGear still rules

Update to this post on the great motoring show TopGear: A lot of big stars are now making Top Gear their stop and taking a drive around the test track. If it's good enough for Tom Cruise, it's good enough for everyone else. He even led the leaderboard.

This is because the BBC relaxed it's rule on promotions on the show. Previously, they weren't allowed to promoted anything directly (below is the hilarious Ferrari Enzo segment where they bend this rule to the breaking point). Recently, they are becoming more popular to the point the series is now franchised worldwide with Top Gear USA being the latest.
Now, you can head over to their YouTube channel for archives of their old shows.
Here is the original article.

Who knew what fun a socialist government funded program can produce?

Acoustic Goodness with Boyce Avenue

Boyce Avenue has been covered here before. But they are such as talented force, I felt compelled to write about them again. Mainly because I've kept listening to them. They excel in what ever song they attempt but are especially so with acoustic versions of other artists. Some songs like Take That's Back for Good are good acoustically but don't really add or expand from the song's original sound. Here is where Boyce Avenue are geniuses. They understand how a song should sound acoustically and how to arrange and sing them, even if it means changing the sound of the original song. They do this and the song sounds even better. Take One Direction's What Makes You Beautiful. They distill the song to it's essence and made it sound rich and deep.

Now if you tried to listen to the original after that... well, you just can't. I felt robbed. So many people were deprived of a great song.

So turn down the lights, turn up the volume, snuggle up, put on the Boyce Avenue Acoustic Covers playlist and press shuffle. Over 5 hours of smooth sounds and songs that you remember and love. Sometimes even better.

I Flinged My PhoneArena Review!

I haven't bought a new phone in ages and it was time to get a new one. My sputtering Nokia was hardy and built to last. But I was longing for an Android phone but wasn't sure which one. On the net there were tons of reviews from god know where. Everybody has an opinion but what I was looking for was the proof. Anyone can say is a phone is crap so I wanted to see for myself. I wanted to see it in action.
I found a such a site in PhoneArena, specifically it's YouTube channel. It provides a good write-up. But the proof is in the pudding. So I found the phone I was interested in and watched the reviewer put the phone through it's paces.

They even have side by side comparisons so that you can take a look at two similar phones

I recommended to a friend the website. We wanted to see the video review but the netbook I had with me made the video a bit smaller. In fact, the size of the phones in the demo were smaller than the actual size.
Then I remembered that the WDTV box I had came with flingo. Flingo is a content service provider that offers content from other content providers. Some of them are great (Revision3, CrunchRoll) while others just rehashing trailers and PSAs (FOX, WB). But it also offers a service to "fling" videos from the PC to TV.
Just go to www.flingo.org and save the button there to your bookmarks toolbar. Then go to a video streaming site, like YouTube and drag to video to the bookmark.
However, normal content restrictions still apply. You could see a video on the PC but the moment you flung it to the TV, don't be surprised if it can't play because the content owners said no.

More new talent on YouTube

To my surprise, my previous post on new talent on YouTube was quite popular. I don't go looking for new videos but browsing around, something on the right side of the screen would catch my eye and down that rabbit hole I would go. I find myself listening more and more to covers by these new talent. Not because they come out with a good imitation but rather because they have put in their own spin on these songs. More often than not, they put their heart and soul in these songs.
Most of these songs are also acoustic which is quite pleasing. I am tired of the whole auto-tuning scene and producers bent on trying to fill in every second of the song with music. So these are some of the new talent I have been listening to on YouTube.

Boyce Avenue consists of Daniel, Alejandro and Fabian. They are quite successful in their own right and are touring. They have studio songs out on iTunes but their strengths is in acoustic renditions of popular songs. I especially like their cover of Back For Good by Take That and How to Save a life by the Fray.

Barely in her teens, Maddi Jane is blessed with a strong voice that projects well without breaking. Yet it's her heartful rendition of Adele's Rolling in the Deep with her nuances in her delivery that stands out. I like Adele (she reminds me of Alison Moyet) but She also does well with songs that are not known to be played acoustic. Maddi sings and ends Price Tag by Jesse J. with her own flair and style.

The new talent is on YouTube

I enjoy music like most everybody else. I like the old stuff but I also like to hear new acts and talents. Most of them sing covers. Depending on the song, they can sing them like the actual singers do or do their own version. I like watching American Idol for that. I skip the first half of the season, where to go around and do auditions. All sorts of people come to these auditions. And the producers probably let them on to make good TV. But it's not about the music so I skip that part. Even then, the contestants on American Idol have been not so good the past few seasons. There was Crystal Bowersox but she was the odd one out.
Another place for new talent is of course, YouTube. Not a month passes by without YouTube making someone famous. Rebecca Black is one but for the wrong reasons. The song is irritatingly catchy. She is an OK singer but with coaching she could be another possible contestant on American Idol. Which she doesn't have to be now that Simon Cowell wants to see her. So can you see how YouTube is making American Idol redundant. While American Idol has to cater for pop music, there are so many other types of acts on YouTube.
One of my favorite YouTube stories is about Arnel Pineda. He was picked by Neil Schon to become the lead singer for Journey after Neil saw him on the YouTube. You can literally follow his story on YouTube. There are videos of him singing before Journey and interviews with Ellen and Oprah afterwards.

But for every Arnel there are those on YouTube who enjoy a little less success. I thoroughly enjoy listening to delawellsoulmusic. The guy can play the guitar really good. He even has an album out now.

After watching one of his videos, there came a link to KellyIsMusical. Kelly is still a teenager but can she play. Checkout her licks on Kelly's 25 best guitar riffs. Any guitar player will start with covering other people's work. But Kelly shows potential in coming out with her own riffs. Kelly is part the group Say Chance and they have original music out. These girls have talent. All they need now is a bit of luck.

NextNewNetworks is now YouTube Next

, youtubeIf you have read my recent post on the great WDTV, I wrote about the Internet media experience with services like MediaFly and Flingo. I also mentioned that a part of this was the high quality content on NextNewNetworks (delivered by both MediaFly and Flingo). Apparently someone else also agrees because now they are part of YouTube as YouTube Next.
You can read the gory details here. Will the Internet/YouTube eventually break the big 3?

I love my WDTV

(Update 21 Sept 2015 - scroll down) Some while ago I bought a Western Digital WDTV Live. Its a box that I bought to connect to the TV to play movies files, show pictures and play MP3s. What I didn't expect was an Internet media experience. When I had bought it, I saw reviews praising it for it's ability to access YouTube. It does what it says on the tin but with a few exceptions. YouTube, in it's efforts to appease media publishers, added an attribute to videos that it streams to limit where it can be played. So, a few media publishers who allow YouTube to stream their content have limited them to be played only on the computer. Which means some content on your YouTube playlists may not be playable on the TV. I understand the existing concept of charging separately for content that is broad-casted on TV. The model is that a media publisher, usually movie studios and primetime TV networks, make money on distribution or syndication. The more times they can sell a show to show on TV, the more money they make. The Internet throws a spanner in this machine, especially YouTube. The media publishers haven't figured out what to do with them yet. They saw what happened to the music industry and don't relish the same fate. So in this mess, the result is that you can watch a video on YouTube on the PC but not when you connect it to a TV. I have been thinking about this for some time now and I think I'll get back to it later in another post.
Like I said earlier, the WDTV Live provides a rich Internet media experience. At least it is one half of the puzzle. I also just got a high speed Internet access, running in multi-megabits per second. This made other Internet services that came with the WDTV came alive, most notably Mediafly and Flingo.
Mediafly is a site that allow you to find and manage podcasts, both video and audio. It provides a way to build a list of favorite podcasts so that you don't have to wade through a huge list every time you want to listen or watch your favorite show. The site divides the list of podcasts into categories to make them easier to find. However, this does not make finding one that you tune in regularly to easier to find because the list shows the most recent show first. So the playlist feature is useful. It also provides community interaction so that you can recommend your favorite podcasts to others. There are lists for this like Most Recommended by categories. The kicker is that I can "link" my WDTV to my account on Mediafly and have the same lists appear on the box. Which is like making up your own channel. With the high speed Internet link, the wait is almost nil and almost no buffering. Point to show and it comes on. - Updated: Unfortunately, MediaFly is no longer available.
Another surprise is Flingo. While it also organises podcasts, the content available is now expanded in to other media publishers, including Internet-focused on like nextnewnetworks.com and Revision3. I do know that those are also available via podcasts and directly on the browser. But to have it on the big screen TV is a lot of work. It means hooking up the laptop to the TV (cable tangle alert). I even have a MythTV project completed and later abandoned. In short, compared to the standard TV experience, it is a chore. The WDTV reduces the entire process to a. crash on couch and b. click the remote. Flingo behaves more like a cable or satellite service. The channels are set by them, you can't create a playlist. But you can set up your favorite channels. To make up for this, you can 'fling' videos or links to the WDTV when it is on 'Flingo-mode' from the PC. It's like the thing they do on NCIS LA.

Behind the Scenes of TV : The Paley Center for Media

Previously known as the Museum of Television and Radio, Paley Center for Media regularly hosts events that focuses on the creative process of great TV shows and movies. I found their interviews / panel events fascinating. Most entertainment shows focus on the celebrity of the show or the shows happenings. The stories are most of the time are engineered to entice the audience to watch the show. The events at the Paley Center however, involve the creative sources which provide the words and stories behind the movies and TV shows as well as it's stars, who provide the voice and acting. Short clips can be found at center's screening room. The good stuff is at their YouTube channel.

The most important thing is that the center treats TV shows with respect.

Homeless man with Golden Voice:Ted Williams

I first saw this on a news item at a news website. I can't remember which. But like most people, I was surprised to say the least when Ted Williams started to speak. A friend of mine thought it was a hoax. But after listening to the interview afterwards, we were convinced it was real, it was his voice. I hard people talking about it over lunch. Someone even saw it on the TV news.

The original story was from traditional media. The videographer from the Columbus Dispatch first reported it. I'll gve them their due. Follow the story here. The someone called ritchey uploaded it to youtube. It attracted a lot of attention. From there other news sites reported it and linked to that video and it exploded. It not only went viral but it was also spread via TV news and the classic word-of-mouth. The within days he was on radio and later TV morning shows. Ted later helped opened the Today show on NBC and was interviewed on his past and was up for him in the near future.

Truly a heartwarming story of how life can be changed at a moment's notice. It resonated with a lot of people because they could hear his sincerity when interviewed later in the segment. America is place for second chances. It is a belief that people want to practice by giving Ted a helping hand, a second chance. Some people thought that it was incredulous that a person with that natural ability could be out on the street. But there are many reasons why people become homeless. Ted has his and given the amount of publicity he is generating, there will be a TV movie about it soon.
There are two points about the story that I'd like to point out.