Feb 28th, 2011
MediaShift: How an Atlanta Ice Skater Made a Viral Video Go Worldwide
You never know when just an act of fun can turn into a social media frenzy.
The article titled “How an Atlanta Ice Skater Made a Viral Video Go Worldwide“, byTerri Thorton, is an amazing example of how an innocent video placed on a social media outlet can go a long way in the world.
The article talks about how the city of Atlanta, GA got hit with a few inches of snow that then got topped off with a sheet of ice back on Sunday January the 9th of this year. At about 2 a.m. on Tuesday morning videographer and web developer Brian Danin and his wife spotted a skater skating on Peachtree Street. While Danin didn’t have his normal equipment, he shot the footage of the skater with his Droid X smartphone.
“It was one of those ironic moments, ” Danin said.
Danin then uploaded the video to YouTube. Andrew Nendel, the skater, had handed his pocket video recorder to a security guard and uploaded the result to Facebook, Vimeo and CNN iReport.
Neither Danin nor Nendel knew how popular this video was going to become. Not only did the video become widespread and an instant hit, but it also had an effect on the city of Atlanta’s snow removal system.
“The video became emblematic of the pressure on the city and the state to clear the roads and get things back to normal.”
I thought this was a really interesting article because it showed how the social media tool of YouTube was not only able to create an incredibly popular video and story, but also helped in fixing a problem with the city of Atlanta’s lack of proper snow removal measures.
