5 lessons from YouTube’s most-hated video ever
The video platform’s annual roundup has drawn 9.7 million ‘dislikes.’ YouTube shrugs that it’s fine with that. What are the lessons for communicators who aren’t trying to irk their audiences?
The Independent’s headline on 2018’s biggest YouTube story says it all: “SITE’S OWN RECAP VIDEO BECOMES THE LEAST POPULAR EVER.”
In under a week, the video goliath’s “YouTube Rewind 2018” has overtaken a Justin Bieber video to earn the distinction of the most unpopular video ever uploaded, with just over 9 million thumbs down.
You know your effort has gone awry when the U.K.’s Telegraph headlines a story, “How YouTube’s 2018 PR stunt became even more hated than Justin Bieber.”
At this rate, Rewind 2018’s “dislikes” will soon overtake the falsetto phenom’s “Baby,” about which the Telegraph reported, “Bieber’s exasperated warbling has racked up 9.7 million dislikes in eight years.”
Subtract “Baby’s” millions of “likes,” and the 2018 YouTube roundup becomes the least popular. (And in fairness, Bieber was just a teen at the time.)
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