Shared context is everything.
Another big hit for a higher ed video?
Yesterday before calling it a day, I stumbled upon a tweet mentioning a new YouTube video from the University of Waterloo. The tweet was posted on the #pseweb hashtag that I follow since I attended the Canadian conference in Vancouver last June. This tweet set some expectations, because of the hashtag and the word “joke”:
I watched the video posted by the University of Waterloo — and found it just fantastic. It went from 300 views yesterday to more 7,000 today at 6AM when I wrote this post.
Do me a favor, watch it now
So, what do you think?
Need some context?
I bet you will have a totally different reaction to the video whether or not you were at the #PSEWEB conference (or follow very closely news about social media and viral videos).
The video is a parody of a previous tongue-in-cheek video from BodyForm, a feminine product, Todd Sanders told me about in Vancouver.
It wasn’t a personal recommendation (but, hey, didn’t you wonder for a minute? ;-). Todd mentioned this video in the keynote he gave at the #PSEWEB conference.
If you haven’t yet, go ahead and watch the BodyForm video:
Context makes a huge difference
Once you’ve seen the BodyForm video, you automatically know the video from the University of Waterloo is just meant as a joke, right?
You might not like the joke, but it is not a big deal.
If you’ve worked in higher education for some time, you know that it is VERY difficult for *some* alums, students, parents or faculty to have a sense of humor when it comes to their institution. Their alma mater is part of their personal identity, so they tend to take anything it does or publishes… very personally.
And, I saw a reminder of this point when I checked back the comments about the video on the YouTube video page and on the Facebook Page of the University of Waterloo.
Without context, many commenters didn’t get the video was meant as a joke and didn’t know how to react, so they ended up posting negative comments.
I’m going to be honest and admit that I didn’t expect either this kind of reactions when I first saw the UW video yesterday. I just thought it was brilliant (a bit long, but really great).
It reminded me of the smart Old Spice parody BYU Library did 3 years ago. I had forgotten about the golden rule of context.
I’m sure the video will make news today.
What do YOU think?
I’m not seeing the UW video as a joke so much as a clever retort to a flip comment made by a celebrity currently enjoying a lot of attention. I think it was a stroke of genius to put it out there and it’s similarity to the BodyForm video is so tenuous that it hardly adds anything to it. I had not previously seen the BodyForm video, but I can’t see how any UW stakeholders could find any flaw with their video. Is it just the idea that it could somehow be associated with BodyForm? I just don’t see anything so distinctive about the videos that would tie them together that closely. Maybe I need to be Canadian to get it? ;-)
The perfume spritz’ing the Viewbooks and Pearl’s introduction both got me. Great find, Karine.
I didn’t see the BodyForm video before I saw the UW one. Unfortunately, I still think it was a poor move on UW to post that video. They can’t assume everyone who sees their video has seen the BodyForm one they’re parodying.
It seems like they’re upset they didn’t get Elon Musk as one of their alumni and are making fun of the reason he chose another institution over theirs.
Overall, I get what they’re trying to say, but it doesn’t come across the way it was meant to. Not in my opinion anyway.
I thought the UW video was great and didn’t need the context. It stands alone as a tongue-in-cheek comment on women in engineering. Seems that highered come a long way since the 80s.
@Anthony
Most negative comments I read don’t make the link between both videos, they fit into a few categories – I’m paraphrasing the ones that I remember:
1) this lady is too passive aggressive
2) this is really not fair to get back at Elon Musk for something he almost said off-the-record
3) what is UW trying to prove with this video?
4) the video doesn’t show the reality, but try to present a rosy-er state of the situation.
@Eric
Thanks, it is a great video – indeed :-)
@Karl
I don’t think they expected people to see the BodyForm video, but operated within the context set by this video – very tongue-in-cheek.
@Matthew
I didn’t think people needed context either at first, but when I spent some time reading the comments – well, it looks like they do :-) On YouTube the thumbs down outweigh the thumbs up by a factor of more than 5. YouTube feedback isn’t gospel, but it shows that some people definitely don’t get it.
On the way in this morning, I heard a related story on the MarketPlace Tech podcast about Google changing the commenting policy on YouTube:
http://www.marketplace.org/shows/marketplace-tech-report/marketplace-tech-wednesday-september-25-2013
Perhaps the comments on this post is a sign of the issue they are trying to resolve.
More details on Google’s changes here:
http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-57604431-93/youtube-gets-the-yuck-out-in-comments-cleanup/
-Dan
Yes, I’ve seen the news earlier today too, Dan.
And, you’re right this is definitely going to be a game changer for YouTube comments :-)