Our favorite viral videos of 2009

If we’re to judge viral videos by page views alone, then 2009’s clear winner is the music video for Beyonce Knowles’ Single Ladies (Put A Ring On It), a movement that has spawned a massive subculture of professional and amateur performers who have/are trying to learn the choreography. Our picks for the best viral videos that whipped around the web in ’09 are based on a highly-refined algorithm that considers influence, gravitas, bravado, and page views.

Not to mention – in the case of Stewart v. C(K)ramer – the ability for a video to mirror an entire society’s pent-up rage over the financial crisis. John Stewart, again, we salute you. Here are our picks for 2009. Let’s go feel-good first. The good people at Volkswagen put together one of those advertising campaigns this year – the Piano Stairs – that caught fire with people due to its combination of creativity, public serviceness, and fun factor. By simply asking “Can we get more people to choose the stairs by making it fun to do?” the company put civic planners to shame while promoting a more active lifestyle by placing working, oversized piano keys on a set of stairs. The company also is promoting a web site that aims to “change people’s behavior for the better.” View count: 9.3 million and counting, since October of this year.

From feel-good to feel gross: Rod Blagojevich, the more-than-disgraced and impeached former governer of Illinois, experienced one of the most graceless exits from politics in recent memory. Despite an intense PR campaign in early 2009 to attempt to clear his name after his removal from state office, Blago’s decline, fuelled by corruptive urges and a burning desire for the spotlight, was encapsulated in this video of him singing an Elvis Presley song at a Chicago block party. The video hasn’t counted too many views, but we’re including it because it’s just so damn awful.

From the popular culture desk comes some more intentional comedy. Lady Gaga recently placed third in Billboard’s Female Artist of Year category, riding the popularity of her hit tune, Poker Face. But over this past Hallowe’en, incomparable renaissance man/actor Christopher Walken took to the BBC airwaves and did a ‘reading’ of the chanteuse’s disco smash. View count: 3.5 million + on various YouTube channels.

From the department of prodigies comes this five-year old who plays a mean ukelele. In this video, seen over six million times since December, he impressively covers Jason Mraz’ “I’m Yours,” faking his way through most of the lyrics, but making most of the chord changes. On a ukelele, no less! At 5!

Barack Obama made news in all sorts of ways this year, but two incidents gave him perhaps unwanted attention. In the first, now viewed 1.6 million times on YouTube, the Prez, during an off-the-air-but-the-cameras-still-rolling moment in an interview with ABC News reporter Terry Moran, called Kayne West a “jackass” after West had interrupted Taylor Swift’s acceptance speech at the VMAs. In the other, the President and French Prime Minister appear to be ogling a young lady’s finer assets, but on closer inspection, it turns out Obama was simply being the gentlemen that he is. Sarkozy, on the other hand…

Jackass

Obama/Sarkozy

The current financial mess can be blamed on a number of factors, not the least of which is a lack of regulation. But in March of this year, the Daily Show and its host, Jon Stewart, took dead aim at the financial journalists who had contributed to the sense that the stock market would never fail, pointing his sharpened barbs at one host in particular, Jim Cramer of CNBC’s Mad Money. Stewart’s takedown of Cramer (login required) has become classic, incorporating a nation’s rage into one five-minute attack clip.

From the “can… he… make… it… to… the… counter” desk, we would like to share with you the drunkest man ever. Four minutes of cringe-inducing bliss. Enjoy (as have 4 million others.)

Disney queen Miley Cyrus went against the grain this past October, turning her back on Twitter and closing her account. And how did the princess announce this? Through a YouTube rap, naturally. Choice lyrics include: “And the reasons are simple/I started Tweeting about pimples/I stopped living for moments/I start living for people”; “Yeah you write what you’re doing/but who really cares/if I’m playing with Noah/or just doing my hair” and “No more emo quotes/and fake feuds with Demi/yeah, I’m done with all that/and the truth is I’m too busy.” God, I can’t believe I just typed those out, but 7-million plus fans might disagree.

Viral videos often make their way up the cultural chain, and if we look at NBC’s comedy The Office as being close to the top of said food chain, then the JK Wedding Entrance video has done its job. Logging 33-million plus since July of this year, Jill and Kevin rewrote the rules about how to walk down the aisle at your wedding – no more “Here Comes The Bride,” now it’s “Forever” by Chris Brown. The Office’s season finale offered a sweet and funny homage to the original; Jill and Kevin have taken their YouTube success to turn people’s attention to domestic violence through donations to the Sheila Wellstone Institute.

The clear victor this year, by far, has to be the phenomenon that is Susan Boyle (pictured at top). The Scotland-born Boyle wowed watchers of the show Britain’s Got Talent in the early part of this year with her dramatic take on “I Dreamed A Dream,” and the subsequent video posting has garnered 81 million views as of April of this year on YouTube (with a collected total for all her videos above 250-million.) Boyle has since gone on to release a record that has been at the top of the music charts around the world. But as reported in May, the video also gained notoriety as being the least-capitalized-on video in YouTube’s short history, with the New York Times reporting that FremantleMedia has ‘lost’ millions of dollars by not having an advertising agreement in place. To every silver lining, there is a cloud, I suppose.