1.
YouTube
–
YouTube is an American video-sharing website headquartered in San Bruno, California. The service was created by three former PayPal employees—Chad Hurley, Steve Chen, and Jawed Karim—in February 2005, Google bought the site in November 2006 for US$1.65 billion, YouTube now operates as one of Googles subsidiaries. Unregistered users can watch videos on the site, while registered users are permitted to upload an unlimited number of videos. Videos deemed potentially offensive are available only to registered users affirming themselves to be at least 18 years old, YouTube earns advertising revenue from Google AdSense, a program which targets ads according to site content and audience. YouTube was founded by Chad Hurley, Steve Chen, and Jawed Karim, Hurley had studied design at Indiana University of Pennsylvania, and Chen and Karim studied computer science together at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Karim could not easily find video clips of either event online, Hurley and Chen said that the original idea for YouTube was a video version of an online dating service, and had been influenced by the website Hot or Not. YouTube began as a venture capital-funded technology startup, primarily from an $11.5 million investment by Sequoia Capital between November 2005 and April 2006, YouTubes early headquarters were situated above a pizzeria and Japanese restaurant in San Mateo, California. The domain name www. youtube. com was activated on February 14,2005, the first YouTube video, titled Me at the zoo, shows co-founder Jawed Karim at the San Diego Zoo. The video was uploaded on April 23,2005, and can still be viewed on the site, YouTube offered the public a beta test of the site in May 2005. The first video to reach one million views was a Nike advertisement featuring Ronaldinho in November 2005. Following a $3.5 million investment from Sequoia Capital in November, the site grew rapidly, and in July 2006 the company announced that more than 65,000 new videos were being uploaded every day, and that the site was receiving 100 million video views per day. The site has 800 million unique users a month and it is estimated that in 2007 YouTube consumed as much bandwidth as the entire Internet in 2000. The choice of the name www. youtube. com led to problems for a similarly named website, the sites owner, Universal Tube & Rollform Equipment, filed a lawsuit against YouTube in November 2006 after being regularly overloaded by people looking for YouTube. Universal Tube has since changed the name of its website to www. utubeonline. com, in October 2006, Google Inc. announced that it had acquired YouTube for $1.65 billion in Google stock, and the deal was finalized on November 13,2006. In March 2010, YouTube began free streaming of certain content, according to YouTube, this was the first worldwide free online broadcast of a major sporting event. On March 31,2010, the YouTube website launched a new design, with the aim of simplifying the interface, Google product manager Shiva Rajaraman commented, We really felt like we needed to step back and remove the clutter. In May 2010, YouTube videos were watched more than two times per day. This increased to three billion in May 2011, and four billion in January 2012, in February 2017, one billion hours of YouTube was watched every day
2.
The Hollywood Reporter
–
Headquartered in Los Angeles, THR is part of the Hollywood Reporter-Billboard Media Group, a group of properties that includes Billboard and SpinMedia. It is owned by Eldridge Industries, a company owned by an executive of its previous owner. Under Janice Min, a faltering THR was relaunched in 2010 as a weekly print magazine with a revamped, continuously updated website, as well as mobile. THR was founded in 1930 by William R, billy Wilkerson as Hollywoods first daily entertainment trade newspaper. The first edition appeared on September 3,1930, and featured Wilkersons front-page Tradeviews column, the newspaper appeared Monday to Saturday for the first 10 years, except for a brief period, then Monday to Friday from 1940. Wilkerson ran the THR until his death in September 1962, although his final column appeared 18 months prior, from the late 1930s, Wilkerson used THR to push the view that the industry was a communist stronghold. In particular, he opposed the screenplay writers trade union, the Screen Writers Guild, in 1946 the Guild considered creating an American Authors Authority to hold copyright for writers, instead of ownership passing to the studios. Wilkerson devoted his Tradeviews column to the issue on July 29,1946 and he went to confession before publishing it, knowing the damage it would cause, but was apparently encouraged by the priest to go ahead with it. The column contained the first industry names, including Dalton Trumbo and Howard Koch, on became the Hollywood blacklist. Eight of the 11 people Wilkerson named were among the Hollywood Ten who were blacklisted after hearings in 1947 by the House Un-American Activities Committee. In 1997 THR reporter David Robb wrote a story about the newspapers involvement, for the blacklists 65th anniversary in 2012, the THR published a lengthy investigative piece about Wilkersons role, by reporters Gary Baum and Daniel Miller. The same edition carried an apology from Wilkersons son, W. R. Wilkerson III and he wrote that his father had been motivated by revenge for his thwarted ambition to own a studio. Wilkersons wife, Tichi Wilkerson Kassel, took over as publisher and she sold the paper on April 11,1988, to Affiliated Publications, parent company of Billboard Publications, for $26.7 million. Robert J. Dowling became THR president in 1988 and editor-in-chief, Dowling brought in Alex Ben Block as editor in 1990, and editorial quality of both news and specials steadily improved. Block and Teri Ritzer dampened much of the coverage and cronyism that had infected the paper under Wilkerson. After Block left, former editor at Variety, Anita Busch, was brought in as editor between 1999 and 2001. Busch was credited with making the paper competitive with Variety, tony Uphoff assumed the publisher position in November 2005. Uphoff was replaced in October 2006 by John Kilcullen, the publisher of Billboard, Kilcullen was a defendant in Billboards infamous dildo lawsuit, in which he was accused of race discrimination and sexual harassment
3.
Adult Swim
–
Adult Swim is a programming block of the American cable network Cartoon Network that operates at night from 8,00 p. m. to 6,00 a. m. It is programmed by Williams Street Productions, a subsidiary of Turner, the name comes from a phrase used by public swimming pools in the United States to label designated times when children are restricted from using the facilities in favor of adults. Much of Adult Swims general content is known for its risqué, unorthodox, the network was granted its own Nielsen ratings report from Cartoon Network due to targeting a separate demographic. In the United States, Adult Swim has frequently aired adult animation features, anime, mockumentaries, sketch comedy, live-action, shows may have sexual themes, frank sexual discussion, nudity, strong language, and graphic violence. While the network features comedies and dramas of all types, many of its programs are aesthetically experimental, transgressive, improvised, Adult Swim has contracted with various studios known for their productions in absurd and shock comedy. In February 2015, Adult Swim was available to approximately 96,390,000 pay-television households in the United States, Cartoon Networks original head programmer Mike Lazzo conceived Adult Swim. The network grew out of Cartoon Networks previous attempts at airing content appropriate for teenagers, the network began experimenting with its late night programming by airing anthology shows like ToonHeads and Late Night Black and White, both of which presented uncensored classic cartoon shorts. Space Ghost Coast to Coast, one of Cartoon Networks first forays into original programming, was created in 1994 specifically for late night audiences. The series was created by Mike Lazzos Ghost Planet Industries, which eventually became Williams Street Studios, during early mornings in December 2000, several new Williams Street series made unannounced stealth premieres. Sealab 2021, Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law, Aqua Teen Hunger Force and The Brak Show all premiered unannounced, the official schedules listed the shows as Special Programming. Adult Swim launched on September 2,2001 with the airing of the Home Movies episode Directors Cut. The first anime broadcast on Adult Swim also aired on the night of its launch, the block initially aired on Sunday nights, with a repeat of the same block on Thursday nights. On March 28,2005, Atlanta-based Turner Broadcasting System began recording Adult Swim Nielsen ratings separately from Cartoon Network for demographic purposes, promotions for Adult Swim are targeted towards the college age and those in their twenties and thirties, constituting the majority of their viewers. Adult Swim also had a direct and important role in the revival of two animated series, the aforementioned Family Guy and Futurama. On March 29,2004, less one year later, Fox announced it would be renewing Family Guy for a fourth season. Futurama was also revived in 2007 by Comedy Central for similar reasons, Adult Swim obtained Futuramas exclusive cable syndication rights in March 2002 for a reported $10 million, and the series first aired on the network in January 2002. These devices were in part of a guerrilla marketing advertising campaign. The next day, Boston authorities arrested two men involved with the incident, on February 5, Turner Broadcasting and marketer Interference, Inc. announced that they would pay $2 million in amends, one million to the city of Boston, and one million in goodwill funds
4.
The A.V. Club
–
Club was initially created in 1993 as a supplemental part of The Onion and had a minimal presence on The Onion’s website in its early years. However, a 2005 website redesign placed The A. V, Club in a more prominent position, allowing its online identity to grow. Unlike its parent publication, The A. V, the publication’s name is a reference to school audiovisual clubs, composed of a bunch of geeks who actually knew how to run the film strip and film projectors. In 1993, five years after the founding of The Onion at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, UWM student Stephen Thompson launched an entertainment section, Club, as part of the newspapers 1995 redesign. Both The Onion and The A. V, Club made their Internet debut in 1996. Club acquired its own Internet domain name in December 1999, in December 2004, Stephen Thompson left his position as founding editor of The A. V. Club website was redesigned in 2005 to incorporate blogs and reader comments, in 2006, concurrent with another redesign, the website shifted its model to begin adding content on a daily, rather than weekly, basis. According to Sean Mills, then-president of The Onion, the A. V, Club website received more than 1 million unique visitors for the first time in October 2007. In late 2009, the website was reported as receiving over 1.4 million unique visitors and 75,000 comments per month, the offending review was removed from The A. V. Club, and then-editor Keith Phipps posted an apology on the website, leonard Pierce, the author of the review, was terminated from his freelance role with the website. At its peak, the print version of The A. V, Club was available in 17 different cities. Localized sections of the website were also maintained, with reviews and news relevant to specific cities, the print version and localized websites were gradually discontinued alongside the print version of The Onion, and in December 2013, publication ceased in the final three markets. On 13 December,2012, long-time writer and editor Keith Phipps and he stated, Onion, Inc. and I have come to a mutual parting of the ways. On 2 April,2013, longtime editor and critic Scott Tobias stepped down from his role as film editor of The A. V. Club stating via Twitter, After 15 great years @theavclub, I step down as Film Editor next Friday. In the comments section of the announcing the departures, writer Noel Murray announced he would also be joining their project. On 30 May,2013, it was announced that the six writers would be a part of the staff of The Dissolve. In April and June 2014, senior staff writers Kyle Ryan, Sonia Saraiya and Todd VanDerWerff left the website for positions at Entertainment Weekly, Salon and Vox Media, in 2015, Ryan returned to Onion, Inc. for a position in development
5.
Wonder Showzen
–
Wonder Showzen is an American sketch comedy television series that aired between 2005 and 2006 on MTV2. It was created by John Lee and Vernon Chatman of PFFR, the shows format is that of educational PBS childrens television shows such as Sesame Street and The Electric Company, parodying the format with adult-oriented content. In addition to general controversial comedy, it satirizes politics, religion, war, sex, every episode begins with a disclaimer, which reads, Wonder Showzen contains offensive, despicable content that is too controversial and too awesome for actual children. The stark, ugly and profound truths Wonder Showzen exposes may be soul-crushing to the weak of spirit, if you allow a child to watch this show, you are a bad parent or guardian. However, Viacom was re-branding MTV2 and made Wonder Showzen part of its new programming lineup and it aired as part of Sic Em Fridays, along with Dirty Sanchez and Wildboyz. The pilot was named simply Kids Show, the Wonder Showzen theme song is still Kids Show. Reruns of the show air on MTV and Comedy Central. MTV released the first season of Wonder Showzen on DVD March 28,2006, the second season of Wonder Showzen premiered on March 31,2006 and had its season-two finale starring Clarence on May 19,2006 on MTV2. This season was released on DVD October 10,2006, with an egg that featured an animation contest. The grand prize was announced as the winners animation appearing on the next DVD, but the creators later said a third season was unlikely, a return is even more unlikely as the creators of Wonder Showzen went on to produce the animated series Xavier, Renegade Angel. Vernon Chatman John Lee Alyson Levy Jim Tozzi Evan Seligman Taylor Bedlivy P. J, Flavor Flav – As himself in episode 101, The full Storytime with Flavor Flav was cut from the broadcast version of the episode. It still appears however on the Season One DVD, dick Gregory – As Mr. Sun in episode 103. Amy Sedaris – As Miss Amy in episode 106, christopher Meloni – As the Cooties Spokesman in episode 107. Judah Friedlander – As Crickey in episodes 203 and 207, Jon Glaser – As Dr. Rawstein in episodes 203 and 207. Darlene Violette – As Bettsy Beth Bethanie in episodes 203 and 207, Amy Poehler – As Miss Mary in episodes 203 and 206. John Oates – As himself, singing in the song, War doesnt solve anything in episode 206, devendra Banhart – As himself, singing in the song, War doesnt solve anything in episode 206. Rick Springfield – As himself, singing in the song, War doesnt solve anything in episode 206, corin Tucker – As herself, singing in the song, War doesnt solve anything in episode 206. Todd Barry – As Barold Q, zach Galifianakis – As Uncle Daddy in episode 207
6.
Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job!
–
The program featured a wide range of actors, spanning from stars such as Will Ferrell, John C. The creators of the show have described it as the version of television. The show, which expands the genre of the material featured in Heidecker and Wareheims previous show, Tom Goes to the Mayor, consists of sketches, songs. The show featured a variety of celebrity cameos from actors, comedians, Reilly, Paul Reubens, Daphne Rosen, Paul Rudd, William Sanderson, Steve Schirripa, Michael Q. Schmidt, Palmer Scott, Tony Siragusa, Tom Skerritt, Paul St. with Dr. Steve Brule. Halfway through the broadcasting of the first season, Adult Swim picked up Tim and Eric Awesome Show, the second season began airing on November 18,2007. Season one was released on DVD in April,2008, the third season began on July 27,2008 and ended on September 28,2008. Eric posted a MySpace bulletin Oct 1,2008, announcing that as a surprise season four would be airing in January 2009. The show was renewed for a fifth season. One of Tim and Erics first live performances incorporating characters from Awesome Show was Muscles for Bones and this was performed at Troubadour nightclub in West Hollywood, California. Major portions of live performance were incorporated into season three, episode 8 Muscles for Bones. An extended version of this show can be found as an extra on the Season 3 DVD, the extended version features performances not seen on the original TV episode, from performers such as Pierre and Michael Q. Prior to the beginning of two and three, Tim and Eric combined Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job. The second of these, listed as season 3 episode 0, speaking with Vanity Fair in July 2009, Wareheim said that season five would represent a very dark side of the Awesome Show series. I think people are going to be scared and very disturbed by it. He also noted that the pair draw equal humor from the awkwardness of The Office as they do from the awkwardness of David Lynchs films, the fifth season premiered on February 28,2010. The series finale aired on May 2,2010, on May 16,2010 the spin-off Check it Out. Tim and Eric acquired funding to shoot and air a special that aired on December 5,2010, called The Tim and Eric Awesome Show
7.
The Federalist (website)
–
The Federalist is an English-language online magazine that covers politics, policy, culture, and religion. The site was co-founded by Ben Domenech and Sean Davis and launched in September 2013, Domenech serves as publisher of The Federalist. According to Domenech, the site is dedicated to discussing the philosophical underpinnings of the debate instead of focusing on what he calls the horserace or the personalities. The Federalist has been described as influential in conservative and libertarian circles, the Federalist also publishes The Transom, a newsletter aimed at political insiders. The Federalist was co-founded by Ben Domenech and Sean Davis, senior editors include David Harsanyi, in late 2014, The Federalist attracted media coverage when it published articles saying that Neil deGrasse Tyson misquoted George W. Bush in some of his public appearances. Conservative writers cited the story to criticize Tyson over the misquotes, writer and former Obama administration spokesman Reid Cherlin describes The Federalist as seek to go deep on the issues and sway the conversation in Washington. Matt K. David Weigel from Bloomberg Politics said that Rand Paul and Mike Lee gave the site news-making looks at their agendas for foreign policy and Congress, respectively
