YouTube Stars!

Once upon a time, there was a teenaged girl named Bree who was very lonely. She only had one good friend, a boy named Daniel. Bree was homeschooled and was very smart; she loved to read. Her parents were strict and they kept her away from other kids, sometimes even from Daniel. Bree and her parents were members of some religion which she believed in but was reluctant to talk about.

That is the story that was presented to the world through a series of YouTube videos over the last three months. The lonelygirl15 channel on YouTube has become the most subscribed channel of all-time. Let's go back and have a look at some of the most interesting and entertaining videos in this series.

My Parents Suck...

Lonelygirl15's first hugely successful video was the "My Parents Suck..." video. I started a thread about LG15 and this video in particular, over at YouTubeTalk.com. That thread became large and unwieldy, so the admin broke it up into three pieces, each of which are among the most read threads on the site. Here's what I wrote about this video:

Yesterday was Independence Day in the USA. Many people were spending the day off with their friends and family, grilling meat and trying to beat the heat. Still, there were many people on YouTube and it seemed to me that most of them were looking at one video in particular!

Bree (lonelygirl15), a 16 year old homeschooled girl, made a video called "My Parents Suck...". It hasn't even been up for 2 days and the view count is approaching 200 thousand! To summarize the vid: Bree is sad because her parents prevented her from going on an afternoon hike with a male friend (Daniel) by saying that they would be disappointed in her if she did. A fitting video for "Independence" Day!

The comments for the video became a giant chat room, as everyone who saw the video seemed to have something to say about it. That is not surprising because this video has just about every hot-button issue known to mankind in it! Parents vs children, freedom vs control, dogma vs pragmatism, conservative vs liberalism, power vs powerless, submission vs rebellion, and on and on. Every topic that your college Sociology textbook covers can be found in this video and its resulting comment storm.

There is one dichotomy that you won't find in that Soc. textbook, and that is "real vs fake"! There has been debate as to whether Bree and Daniel are "real" or if they are playing characters. I tend to think in terms of probabilities, and I'd say there's an 80% chance that they are real and 20% fake. We'll just have to wait and see if this is another EmoKid21Ohio/Emogirl21 situation.

If you can't see the video above, watch it at YouTube.

Boy Problems...

Bree is a 16-year-old girl and Daniel is an 18-year-old boy. Are they "just friends" or do they have feelings for each other? What will her parents say when Bree begins to go on dates? In this video, we see that there is something developing between Bree and Daniel.


If you can't see the video above, watch it at YouTube.

A Change In My Life

Bree talks about a religious ceremony that she has been chosen to play a big part in. She still will not say what her religion is, because she says that some people will leave disrespectful comments on her videos (Child alert! There are plenty already). However, there is a website about Bree and Daniel, lonelygirl15.com, which has the word Thelema written in Greek in the lower-righthand corner of the page, and a unicursal hexagram above the i in the blue header picture. Thelema is a "philosophical, mystical and religious system." There is speculation in the YouTube community that the ceremony that Bree speaks of may be a "Crowleymas"; a celebration of the birthday of Aleister Crowley, which is October 12th.


If you can't see the video above, watch it at YouTube.

My First Kiss

Bree went to a party with Daniel, and he kissed her! She talks about it in this video, but she is very embarrassed. It was her first kiss. Bree is a study in contrast. On one hand, she seems very innocent and sheltered. On the other hand, she seems to be involved in a religion which has occult practices. Is lonelygirl15 a devil or an angel? Only time will tell!


If you can't see the video above, watch it at YouTube.

Lonely girl fake speach

You may have seen coverage of lonelygirl15 on the NBC nightly news or on the Jay Leno show. You may have read about her in the New York Times or the L.A. Times or in this wikipedia article. Why all the media attention lately? Bree and Daniel are actors playing parts in a new form of Alternative Reality Game. Many people had thought that Bree was a "real" girl. Here is the story of one such girl:


If you can't see the video above, watch it at YouTube.

posted by KennyCrane at 9/20/2006 12:45:00 AM