If there were a contest for dramatic Web 2.0 stories, these two bloggers would be neck and neck for the winner this week. While their anecdotes demonstrate the effectiveness of a little buzz, the social media snowball effect has had them bouncing around a little more than they wanted – well, it worked out for one of them in the end.
Beth Ann Bovino was surprised there was so much interest in renting her apartment. Craigslist proved a right effective lead generator. The only problem was, Beth’s place wasn’t for rent, and she hadn’t posted anything.
Interested leasers were directed to contact Ann Bovino at Annbovino.com. But Beth Ann didn’t have an email address like that. A little detective work led her 3,000 miles away, via email, to a deaf, mute schoolteacher of deaf, mute kids teaching in California who needed to rent that apartment right away.
See, deaf and mute solves the problem of a phone conversation. Overnighting a check solves the problem of an empty bank account, too.
Do yourself a favor and check out Beth Ann’s account of the Deaf-Mute-Nigerian-Craigslist-Scammer at 3QuarksDaily.
And then there’s Andrew Struther’s tale about how tossing his “little ‘Spider’ on the web, and it went insane.” It was all YouTube’s fault.
We’ve all seen the photos of spider webs made by weekend bender hippie spiders tripping out on LSD, hash, pot, and cocaine, right? If not, check out Cannabis.net’s “Nets Made By Spiders Fed On Drug-Dosed Flies.” The acid-web is trippy as can be, but the caffeine web may cure you of too much coffee.
Anyway, Struthers made a short video spoofing those experiments called “Spiders On Drugs.” After years of shopping the video around at film festivals, and after Comedy Central forgetting about him completely, Struthers posted the video on YouTube.
A million views, countless copycatters, a dozen dodged phone calls, a gazillion emails, and one flame war with a potty-mouthed Irishman piggybacking off Struthers’ unexpected Internet hit, Andrew finally regains control of his video and a ton of recognition for his skill at the spoof.
For a good time, read My Wild Million-Hit Ride on YouTube.
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