I just spent half an hour watching this video and loved it. For liberal arts nerds like me, a talk tying together McLuhan, YouTube and our emergent culture of public privacy is candy.

An alternate title of the video could have been, “A brief history of whatever and the origin of ‘meh.’”

It holds gems like, “Over 20,000 videos on YouTube start out addressed to ‘the community,’ every day.” and “‘Cause when I think of myself I guess I don’t really think of myself the way I appear to other people.”

It also reminds me that one of a key lessons great storytellers have learned — that the present is mostly memory.

Anyone who needs to understand YouTube and connected culture should watch this video.

Google has done what seems to be a DIY ad campaign for Gmail in 4 acts.

Often in these situations I have a conflicted internal discussion. Something like this: The Optimist says:

• Cool. This validates DIY ads.
• This Kai (sp?) guy seems like the real deal. He tells us he’s an engineer. He seems like an engineer.
• It feels like they had a lot of fun making this. The script is simple and clear and the puppet theatre is ingeniously office-supply chic.
• I hope the engineers came up with this idea and ran with it before getting the all clear from the communications handlers. I hope.

The Pessimist says:

• Market cap of roughly a bazillion and this is what they come up with? They can’t throw any cheddar to an agency or two? Agencies: the ones paying them a lot of that cheddar in the first place.
• Since it’s on YouTube, this must be officially sanctioned, which makes it kinda pseudo-DIY. Done by the grassroots but with the official blessing. Feels conflicted.
• Now the script feels rehearsed and not written by Kai. A whiff of imitated authenticity floats in the air.
• Now I wonder if Kai really works at Google?
• I hope the engineers came up with this idea and ran with it before getting the all clear from the communications handlers. I hope.

A balanced response usually results. But hey, that’s all just one jackass’ opinion. Et vous, mes amis? What’s the scuttlebutt? Thanks to Nomi for the pointer.