How to be famous on the web? Be TERRIBLE

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unknown_user0032

I Love YTtalk
It's true. I'm not entirely sure when it became cool to like badly made things, but it has become something of a trend. Bad things go viral. Let's use some examples:

Rebecca Black - Friday
Awful song. I mean you couldn't even pretend that this song means anything, or that it's a half-decent piece of songwriting. But at the time of writing it's heading towards 49 million views. People claim to hate it, but they just can't stop watching it.

Troll 2
If you go onto YouTube and type in 'oh my goooooood', you'll get the worst piece of acting in history. Yet people LOVE this movie. Why? Because it's genuinely terrible. So terrible, you can't help but be slightly endeared by it. Because it doesn't try to be terrible, it just is.

Other Bad 80s Movies
I love 80s movies. But I like masterpieces like John Hughes movies, Labyrinth, Goonies. What I don't like are terrible movies like the aforementioned Troll 2 or that monstrosity called Critters I remember watching a while back. Or Leprechaun. Oh god. Leprechaun.

Even films like Child's Play are now extremely loved by a cult following. But the movie is awful! Corny lines, bad special effects, if you pitched any of those films now with no history of the old movies you'd get laughed out of the film studio. But again, people love it!

Is the tackiness of these movies the reason they are so popular? There were many masterful movies made in the 70s, 80s and 90s but the internet folk only ever seem to focus on the ones that were lacking in any kind of talent.

Even the big YouTube videos are terrible.

Charlie bit my finger? Boring and tedious.
Harlem Shake? You kidding me?
That mothertrucking tampon video? That woman has thousands of FANS worldwide. And they all hate her.

Of course there are popular things that are popular because they're amazing but many things online these days are popular because they're so terrible they make you want to burn every part of your body that's subjected to it.

So be terrible folks, have fun with it. Oh and don't take this too seriously ;)
 
it's because people go round telling people how bad the stuff is and share it all over facebook like "lol dafuq did I just watch?!"
 
Pavilion Plays said:
it's because people go round telling people how bad the stuff is and share it all over facebook like "lol dafuq did I just watch?!"
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Yep. When really they should be letting it sink into oblivion and plugging the good stuff, but for some reason people aren't as interested in sharing stuff that is actually decent.
 
Frankie Turner said:
Yep. When really they should be letting it sink into oblivion and plugging the good stuff, but for some reason people aren't as interested in sharing stuff that is actually decent.
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yer they just watch the good stuff and are like "well that was cool.. omg look a duck in the suggested videos!"
like all these stupid cup songs and stuff getting thousands of likes on facebook.. omg it's so annoying! sometimes I wish good videos would get posted on my facebook and twitter feeds :/
 
Although I agree with you on many points, I have a different perspective on films. It does indeed seem to be true that in order to get noticed on the internet, aka "Viral"; the substance of the video appears to have the requirement of being extreamly superficial, ridiculous, and ultimately embarrassing. I agree it's sad that this has become the case in this day and age. Even really well produced material can get noticed and develop a following, but to a noticeable smaller degree than say 'Tampon girl' (a video btw I refuse to even give the time of day).
However when it comes to films, and what may be considered "Terrible" or a "Masterpiece" is an area I feel is a bit more difficult to define. I understand where you are coming from, and can honestly agree that so far as production values go, and how much thought went into a film some are definitely better than others. However I personally find camp immensely enjoyable despite the fact that I know I'm watching a less than masterful final product. I like Troll 2 and Child's play. In fact I only just posted my review of the Child's Play film a few hours ago which makes me wonder if this particular reference was purposeful or purely coincidental. But my views of cinema has always been different than the average persons. I've always tended to like the movies most people hate and hate the movies most people like. For instance I can't stand The lord of the rings, or Harry Potter b******t! I never did like that wizards and dragons crap, but is that to mean I think they are terrible movies? Not at all, it's just not my thing. But I also don't think they are masterpieces either.
The difference I think is like you mentioned in your post, those "bad" or "terrible" movies had a certain charm to them because they were sincerely trying to make a good flick, they just fell short, where as a modern day viral video isn't trying to be good at all. They're specifically trying to be bad enough to get noticed. And that's where my disagreement comes into this discussion. At least those "bad" movies of the 70's and 80's were actually trying to accomplish something, even if they failed, they at least tried.
 
Hey Frankie, ........... Flight of the Navigator, The Last StarFighter, Turner and Hooch......... Ring any bells?
 
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