Viral videos of the week: an honest Facebook film, a test for liars and Panti’s noble call

9 Feb 2014

We take a look at some of the most-viewed and most-shared videos on the web. This week features a Facebook ‘Look Back’ video that’s actually worth a watch and a stirring speech from Ireland’s favourite drag queen.

About 100 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every minute, 500 years of video watched on Facebook every day, and more than 700 YouTube videos shared on Twitter each minute, ensuring there is always video trending on the web.

With so much video available for viewing, we take a look at some of the viral videos that have caught our eye this week.

An honest Facebook movie

Facebook turned 10 years old this week and, to celebrate, offered users the chance to ‘Look Back’ on their finest moments on the social network with a personalised video. Any Facebook user will have seen a myriad of these videos crop up on their news feed over the past few days, but you won’t have seen any quite as honest as this one.

 

Uploaded: 6 February 2014

The Walking Dead zombies prank NYC

Fans of the The Walking Dead waiting in eager anticipation for the series’ return tonight might enjoy this little prank. AMC, the network behind the show, hid some very convincing-looking ‘walkers’ under the streets of New York City in order to terrfiy passers-by. Needless to say, it worked!

 

Uploaded: 5 February 2014

Are you a good liar?

While the son above is clearly a good liar, how do you rate your own skills of deceit? Well, you can find out in five seconds with this simple test from Richard Wiseman, Professor of the Public Understanding of Psychology at the University of Hertfordshire in the United Kingdom. Then you can try it on friends (and foes), to learn a little something about them.

 

Uploaded: 29 January 2014

Charity Man

We’ve all seen them on the streets of our cities, decked out in high-vis jackets, a clipboard in hand, crying out for your bank details to help the cause. Mostly, their vain attempts to gain our attention get ignored – but at what cost?

 

Uploaded: 2 February 2014

Panti’s noble call at the Abbey Theatre

Ireland’s most famous drag queen Panti Bliss took to the stage at Dublin’s Abbey Theatre for a post-show oration on the topic of homophobia in Ireland, and how that term has been defined in recent debate. Panti’s empassioned and starkly honest speech follows up on the comments made by Rory O’Neill (the man behind the drag) on RTÉ’s The Saturday Night Show, which were censored by the national broadcaster and resulted in payment of €85,000 in compensation by the national broadcaster to journalists John Waters and Breda O’Brien, and Catholic lobby group the Iona Institute.

Panti’s ‘Noble Call’ has been taken up by Irish celebrities Dara Ó Briain and Graham Norton, who shared the video on Twitter along with English actor Stephen Fry and US drag queen Ru Paul. The video has also gained attention from the international news media and has since been translated into a number of languages.

 

Uploaded: 2 February 2014

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Elaine Burke is the host of For Tech’s Sake, a co-production from Silicon Republic and The HeadStuff Podcast Network. She was previously the editor of Silicon Republic.

editorial@siliconrepublic.com