When I first saw the full set of Google Search Stories back late last year, I couldn’t help but completely appreciate the concept. Surprising to me, most people didn’t actually see the Parisian Love Google Search Story until it aired during the SuperBowl this year when Google had a long campaign in November about their Google Search Stories.

Today, while checking out some FailBlog.org YouTube channel videos, I discovered, “Parisian Lust” with a thumbnail that resembled “Parisian Love” – This video is NSF haha, well in a contextual… context I just couldn’t resist sharing it. enjoy.

We Are The World, originally written by Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie in 1985 has been remade by YouTube artists. Today, I discovered this new video of 57 popular YouTube artists singing this version of We Are The World 25 for Haiti. YouTube covers is probably one of, if not, the most viewed type of videos online today. Music. Some of my favourite YouTube artists are in this video (Melissa Polinar ,DavidChoi, Airto). I expect this video to spread like wild fire.

Here’s the complete artist list:

Troye Sivan – http://www.youtube.com/troyesivan18
Melissa Polinar – http://www.youtube.com/Mpolinar
Ben Sharkey – http://www.youtube.com/Bensharkey
Iann Guérin – http://www.youtube.com/iann72
Bruce & Daniel – http://www.youtube.com/Dcfan4life
Mishal Moore – http://www.youtube.com/MishalmooreMusic
Ahmir – http://www.youtube.com/Ahmirtv
Blair Perkins – http://www.youtube.com/blairperkinstv
Lyne Sullivan – http://www.youtube.com/LyneSullivan
Lois Mahalia – http://www.youtube.com/LoisMahalia
Chris Cendana – http://www.youtube.com/Ccendana
Jumoke – http://www.youtube.com/JumokeTv
JRice – http://www.youtube.com/Jriceproductions
Luna Mae – http://www.youtube.com/luuntjemae
SamDaSinga – http://www.youtube.com/SamdaSinga
Anhayla – http://www.youtube.com/Anhaylarene
Maria Zouroudis – http://www.youtube.com/MariaZouroudis
Lisa Lavie – http://www.youtube.com/LisaLavie
David Choi – http://www.youtube.com/DavidChoiMusic
Richard Rick Rose – http://www.youtube.com/rickmusiq06
Nick Pitera – http://www.youtube.com/Goonieman86
Aj Rafael – http://www.youtube.com/ilajil
Lucas Teague – http://www.youtube.com/LucasTeague
Jessica Sanchez – http://www.youtube.com/Jsanchezfan
Thia Megia – http://www.youtube.com/Thiamegia
Shan Malaika – http://www.youtube.com/Shanmalaika1
Airto – http://www.youtube.com/Airto
Emmanuelle Auger – http://www.youtube.com/Emmanuelleda
Laura Broad – http://www.youtube.com/blawah2000
BeeKay – http://www.youtube.com/BeeKay86
Sheena Melwani – http://www.youtube.com/SheenaMelwani
Dan Talevski – http://www.youtube.com/Danjt87
Frank Bell – http://www.youtube.com/Faure45
Orlando Dixon – http://www.youtube.com/museman18
Iman Crosson – http://www.youtube.com/alphacat
JR Aquino – http://www.youtube.com/JRAquinoMusic
Eric Arceneaux – http://www.youtube.com/EricArceneaux
Stacy Dudero – http://www.youtube.com/jstizzel03
Meghan Tonjes – http://www.youtube.com/tonjesml
James Dupre – http://www.youtube.com/JamesDupreMusic
Heidi Jutras – http://www.youtube.com/Dididole
Anna Moya – http://www.youtube.com/user/AnnaMoyaM…
Laura Son – http://www.youtube.com/Lis1127
Renee Thomas – http://www.youtube.com/ReneeThomasMusic
Jon McSingee – http://www.youtube.com/Jonmcsingee
Laurence – http://www.youtube.com/Laurence0802
Nick Gardner – http://www.youtube.com/nrhgardner
Jon Cahlander – http://www.youtube.com/JonCahlandermusic
Julie Corrigan – http://www.youtube.com/JulieCorrigan2

So, HD has been around for a while. Microsoft launched their WMV HD Video site 5 years ago called, Atom Films – http://www.atom.com. At the time, it wasn’t much to look at in terms of the user interface compared to video sharing sites today. But, it has evolved to sick looking site, cool interface and is home to a loyal user base.

Maybe because its Microsoft that kinda left it in the past. Maybe because YouTube took off a lot faster and left Atom in the shadows – I’ve actually never heard anyone speak of “Atom” to this date.

Beyond Atom, there is today a large number of Video sharing platforms out there that do exactly what YouTube does except isnt under the billion dollar Google umbrella. For instance, Break.com, CollegeHumor.com, Myspace Video and AOL Video.

Last November 2008, YouTube altered their video players to fit the wider 16:9 video formats. If you have ever embeded or seen embeded YouTube video on blog or other website, you would have noticed that some of the related videos that scroll over the video frame are in wide format and some are not. That is because some people have been uploading their videos in 16:9 format, its just that YouTube and the other Video Sharing websites didn’t create the facility to display them in the wider format.

My only guess would be that more than 50% of the videos uploaded to YouTube were in 16:9 and that people are looking to other places to upload and watch their HD videos such as…

VIMEO.com
- that’s “video” with a “m”

I do have a profile setup, but because I havent bought my new Canon HG20 HD Hard Disk Camcorder yet, its empty – Who cares haha!

Why should you use Vimeo?

- You can actually embed your 16:9 videos without configuring code like with YouTube
- Embed your HD Videos on your website ($59/year)
- The videos you’ll see are sick!
- You have the option to view videos in HD mode or with HD off
- Vimeo has been around for about a year now

Wanna see some kick ass HD Video?

Here’s a music video a former collegue at Rare Method Ian Flaig did:
http://vimeo.com/1813140

I believe he used a $6,000 Panasonic HD camcorder for the job; and it is wicked.

The Canon HG20 HD Hard Drive Camcorder I want to buy costs anywhere from $800 to $1000. Sure a pretty penny, but if you’re looking to get some HD video online without spending $6000, the videos look pretty great:

Check out this video of some wall climbers: http://vimeo.com/2264768

* This was originally a Facebook note I wrote on November 28, 2008

Google Search Stories. Yeah, its no secret, there’s a search engine war. Microsoft launches Bing and sure, there’s lift in Microsoft’s search engine market share, but seriously, when you watch Google’s new Search Stories videos, it makes me kinda wonder if selling Internet users on the experience is better than doing the same thing as the next guy. I vote sell them on the experience.

Its not about doing the same thing as the best guy; I mean heck, I can build a blog, but so can my girlfriend (that, I’m working on at the moment, so please be patient; by that I mean I’m still single *sigh* lol). But anyway, enough of my ranting and let me get on with completely appreciating Google’s Search Stories campaign.

In my opinion, they’ve done something wonderful. In the Parisian Love video, there’s no people in the video, just the Google brand and search field in front of you watching someone (you, I wonder?) researching and planning their dream to study abroad; eventually a rendez-vous avec… avec.. avec, mais bien sur, avec votre amour! oh paris, je t’aime LOL

Experience people, its all about the experience. Google has dont just that with these videos. Tres, tres bien!

I started noticing these ads over the weekend, not just on YouTube, but even on my leaderboard, medium rectangle adsense placements on my blogs. I eventually clicked the ad I saw on YouTube, and the Parisian Love video just put me in the driver’s seat, et voila:

Im not one to click on ads on YouTube. But depending on how critical I am with the quality of the ads, I may just pay attention to them and click to see whats on the other side. I mean, I’m sure you’ve all seen those babies on the Evian ads, or even the Samsung ads promoting the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics – those Olympic ads are quite a teaser I must say.

I’m glad I clicked a Google Search Stories ad.

Make you a famous SYTYCD (So You Think You Can Dance) dancer hey? I just watched this video of employees at the Microsoft Store in Mission Viejo, California line dancing to “I Gotta Feeling” by The Black Eyed Peas for 4 minutes. Dancing in a store? maybe not that unique, well then again its Microsoft (what? don’t tell me Bing doesn’t look like Ask), but dancing for the entire song is (kudos!) – It kinda makes me wonder what Apple employees are doing right now, hmmm LOL

All I know is, this video is being circulated around the blog-sphere and its pretty good viral / social media marketing. Do you want to know what my first thought was as after 5 seconds of watching this video? “I didn’t know Microsoft had their own stores”.

Peace!

Have you been to a Microsoft Store? Does it look like an Apple Store but with Zunes and Windows 7 titles on the shelves?