Following the sad news yesterday evening that Steve Jobs had passed away searches, views, and uploads related to the Apple co-founder began to spike. For example, Jobs' Stanford commencement speech from 2005, which is already the most-viewed graduation address on YouTube, is drawing hundreds of thousands of views last night into today.
By noon today, roughly 3,000 videos were uploaded with the keywords "Steve Jobs" in the previous 24 hours alone. Specifically, numerous mash-up tribute videos are popping up as are personal vlog reflections on the news, with many creators acknowledging that they're using the products he developed:
(Use the arrows to navigate between videos or watch them all here.)
Most of the videos so far have a sober tone, and recollect how the technology that Jobs created has affected their lives. We expect to see more of these through the rest of the week, with so many filmmakers and video producers fans counted among Apple's fans.
Demonstrations tied to the Occupy Wall Street movement continued this weekend, most notably in a protest that played out on the Brookyln Bridge, where over 700 people were reportedly arrested in a dramatic scene. (Videos from last weekend here.) Below is a collection of videos of the situation on the bridge via YouTube's CitizenTube:
(Use the arrows to navigate between videos or watch them all here.)
There is some dispute over the exact circumstance of the arrests. The NYPD posted some videos of the situation as well to their official channel, including video of an officer appearing to warn protesters of potential arrest:
Another video coming out of the Occupy Wall Street demonstrations was a clip of MSNBC host Dylan Ratigan addressing protesters sometime over the weekend.
But New York is certainly not the only city seeing fervent demonstration right now. In Iceland, members of Parliament were pelted with eggs at the opening of a new session in Reykjavik this weekend. Iceland's First Lady participated in the overall demonstration.
Meanwhile, Greek students in Thessaloniki reportedly clashed with riot police today during a walk-out protest over delayed production of textbooks.
80 people were reportedly arrested over the weekend during Wall Street protests in which demonstrators occasionally got into physical altercations with police offers who were on the scene.
A search for videos tagged "wall street" in the past seven days will deliver thousands of results and some of the most-viewed and -shared clips of the weekend were footage shot on the street in New York City Saturday. We've collected a handful of those videos in this playlist below:
(Use the arrows to navigate between videos or watch them all here.)
YouTube user AreYouSuprised has been posting videos since April, but his account first drew real attention when he posted a video of U.S. Air Force Staff Sgt. Angie Johnson and "Sidewinder" of the U.S. Air Forces Central Command Band performing Adele's "Rolling in the Deep," a cover that was posted on August 8th and has now been seen upwards of 1.5 million times:
AreYouSuprised was described as "anonymous" in the press when the video was being circulated as all of his other videos were vlogs about his self-described experiences being gay in the military. Nearly all the videos are shot from the neck down, and here AreYouSuprised openly discusses his thoughts about hiding his identity.
Today marked the official end of the military's "Don't Ask Don't Tell" policy, and AreYouSuprised posted a video he recorded calling his father to reveal his sexuality.
The video, which was filmed early this morning Germany-time, became one of today's top Trending Videos and is quickly drawing tens of thousands of views.
Update: The video has drawn over 1 million views in 24 hours and was the most-viewed video in the U.S. last evening into this morning.
For the second weekend in less than a month, airshow tragedies dominated news headlines. The top rising search over the past few days on YouTube in the United States was "reno air crash" and a few videos surfaced showing the scene of the accident that now have hundreds of thousands of views. That incident resulted in the deaths of ten people.
Below, a bystander video shows the moment of the crash. The video was one of the most viewed in the past week. VIEW AT YOUR OWN DISCRETION. (Some adult language.)
A video of the aftermath was also posted and drew significant attention:
Then on Saturday, a second crash occurred, this time in Martinsburg, West Virginia. Video posted of that incident shows the moments just before and after the tragedy:
Among the most-viewed videos in Australia today is footage from a industrial fire in Canberra that ignited Friday. The blaze, which filled the air above the suburb of Mitchell with dark black smoke, was ignited at a chemical factory, a 10km area surrounding had to be evacuated do to concerns of toxins in the air.
A number of bystanders and journalists captured on-the-scene video of the flames and smoke. We've pulled together a number of those clips in the playlist below:
(Use the arrows to navigate between videos or watch them all here.)
The 10th anniversary of the September 11th terrorist attacks was the biggest topic on YouTube this weekend and videos tied to the anniversary remain very popular today. 9/11-related terms were the top rising searches of the weekend and the most-viewed and most-shared videos this morning in the United States were all related clips.
In particular, our top trending video of the anniversary was an spot created by StateFarm, directed by Spike Lee, and featuring 150 school children singing "Empire State of Mind." It's been seen roughly half a million times in the past 24 hours or so:
There were a number of other very popular tribute videos that drew a lot of of attention, including the StoryCorps video we spotted trending on Friday. That video was also seen over 500,000 times over the weekend.
You can track the most-viewed and most-shared videos in New York City with our Trends Dashboard.
Video has surfaced on YouTube purportedly from the aftermath from a deadly plane crash in Russia Wednesday in which 43 people were killed. The entire roster of the Yaroslavl Lokomotiv hockey team, which plays in Russia's elite KHL, was reportedly on board.
The video appears to show fiery wreckage and debris on a riverbank.
Update: Here is some additional footage said to have been shot in the moments after the crash:
A huge wildfire in Texas has reportedly destroyed nearly 500 homes this week in Bastrop county, which lies just outside Austin. Residents in the area of the fire have been uploading videos from the scene of the fire over the past day that depict large smoke clouds, helicopter water drops, and the blaze making its way across major highways.
(Use the arrows to navigate between videos or watch them all here.)
Two major natural events affecting much of the United States East Coast occured last week, causing big spikes in searches for on-the-scene and news footage on YouTube. In fact, "Hurricane Irene" was the top rising search on YouTube in the United States over the past seven days.
Below you can see searches for "earthquake" (blue) and "hurricane" (red) over recent weeks:
The last major U.S. spike we saw around the word "hurricane" was back in September of 2008, when Hurricane Ike caused severe damage to the coast of Texas on the Gulf of Mexico.
The east coast earthquake also caused a smaller spike in searches last week, but it was still the third largest we've seen for the word "earthquake" since 2008. The largest spike ever came earlier this year following the earthquake and tsunami in Japan. Second was the 2010 earthquake in Haiti.
(Mouse over the spikes to view the correlating earthquake.)
One of the top spiking search terms on YouTube Sunday night was "vermont flooding irene" as footage began to surface of significant rises in water levels in Vermont in the wake of Hurricane Irene. Other, related video searches that were on the rise included Bennington and Brattleboro, VT, Shelburne falls, MA, and Yonkers, NY.
Spreading Sunday night were dramatic videos of two Vermont covered bridges being destroyed, the Bartonsville Bridge and the Quechee Bridge, respectively embedded below.
(Alternate footage of the Quechee Bridge flooding, which was also a rising search, can be seen here.) Update: Footage of another wrecked bridge in Jamaica, VT has also been posted.
Here's a UPDATEDplaylist of 15 videos of the major flooding Sunday in New England, beginning with this clip of a car floating by in a powerful current:
As we've already outlined, there was an large reaction to yesterday's east coast earthquake that immediately played out on YouTube in the form of a spike in search interest and an influx of reaction and caught-on-camera videos. Today, more footage accidentally capturing the quake is spreading around the northeast United States.
We examined the most-viewed and most-shared videos in the major cities affected by the earthquake and collected a few more videos of it by people and production crews that just happen to have their cameras rolling when it struck.
Several more videos plus other reactions are available here.
So far, the most popular video to come out of the event was this clip -- which was in our post yesterday -- from a parking lot in Tyson's Corner, Virginia depicting what appears to be one of the few reported instances of major damage from the quake. It's been seen over 250,000 times so far and is among the most-shared and most-viewed videos nationally.
We're seeing a big spike in searches this afternoon related to the earthquake that struck the east coast. Most of the searches are tied to the regions that felt the tremors including, D.C., Virginia, and New York. Carole King's "I Feel the Earth Move" is near the top of rising searches as well and is currently the fast rising music search.
As of 6pmET, nearly 2,300 videos tagged with "earthquake" have been uploaded past the previous 24 hours, though it's unclear how many are directly tied to this event. Many of these are reaction videos from people who wanted to share their experience and thoughts immediately following the quake:
We're also seeing a bunch of videos posted from people who happened to have their cameras running for one reason or another when the earthquake hit. Here's a playlist of a few:
Some feel a little less genuine than others. In fact, there are quite a few videos that are being posted poking fun at the "hysteria" around the relatively minor, though very unexpected earthquake.
There are many news videos and reports regarding the quake also hitting YouTube quickly, not all of them professional...
As reports of a rebel takeover of Tripoli begin to quickly emerge from Libya, so do videos of the scenes on the street in many of the country's most populated areas.
Many of the clips appear to be celebratory, though this playlist below just a small sample of what's been posted and described as being from Libya today and last night. We will update with more as it becomes available and as the situation develops.
(Use the arrows to navigate between videos or watch them all here.)
In the four years of YouTube search data we poured through, this summer has had the two largest spikes in search interest for the word "riot" we've ever seen.
This week, "london riots" has been the relative #1 rising search overall globally on YouTube, creating the big jump depicted in the chart below, which shows relative interest dating back to January 2008. The smaller, but still substantial jump earlier in the summer is from the post-Stanley Cup riot in Vancouver, which also spurred significant interest from YouTube viewers.
More dramatic user-generated footage from the riots:
Rioting in London has reportedly subdued midweek, but violence and destruction have made their way to other areas of the UK. Many videos are still coming in from the unfolding events on the streets of London and other areas as interest in first hand accounts continues to rise on YouTube.
All of the most viewed videos today in the United Kingdom are clips from the riots. The most-viewed video in the UK the past few days with over 1.5 million views is this clip of a Malaysian student -- later identified as Mohd Asyraf Haziq -- being helped up then mugged by some rioters. The BBC reports Haziq is currently recovering in a hospital. (Some adult language.)
Two of the other most popular clips include the volunteer cleanup effort and footage of a Sky News reporter questioning looters, both of which were said to be shot in the Clapham district of London.
Meanwhile, rioting continued in some areas yesterday, including in Manchester where a few of the videos below were reportedly shot. Below is a playlist of dramatic video from August 9th.
(Use the arrows to navigate between videos or watch them all here.)
On Saturday, demonstrations in Tottentam, reportedly in response to the death of a young man earlier in the week, turned to riots in the northern London town that spread to other parts of the region during the course of the weekend. A reported 160 people were arrested.
Some have taken an artistic approach, like this time-lapse set to music of the fires overnight in the area:
The majority of the clips are raw footage of the riots themselves and its aftermath. The clips below show the scene Saturday and Sunday in Tottenham as well as Brixton and other locations:
(Use the arrows to navigate between videos or watch them all here.)
Numerous videos were posted to YouTube over the weekend said to depict the violence in Hama ahead of the Ramadan observance, which some anticipate becoming a tipping point for protestors in the country. Reports of over 100 citizens killed in the city came in after security forces were said to have opened fire on protestors in a crackdown Sunday, inciting worldwide outrage.
Here is a selection of that footage, some of which contains mild violence:
(Use the arrows to navigate between videos or watch them all here.)
In the evening, large demonstrations in response to the violence were held in cities like Lattakia, Homs, Aleppo, and Horan. And a boisterous solidarity protest took place in Damascus as well. Here is some footage from those locations:
(Use the arrows to navigate between videos or watch them all here.)
We will update with any new footage of events on the ground as the story develops.
At least 32 people were reportedly killed Wednesday in South Korea, when major flooding and a landslide hit Seoul. We've begun to receive an influx of video from the streets of the city depicting the conditions there and collected a number of them in the playlist below.
Norway was hit by two tragic attacks earlier today - the first, a bomb explosion in the capital city of Oslo, near the government headquarters, which killed at least seven people. Just hours later, a gunman opened fire on the island of Utoya, where many more were shot dead.
Eyewitnesses documented the aftermath of the bombing in Oslo.
(Use the arrows to navigate between videos or watch them all here.)
This man records his reaction to the blast live, expressing shock that this type of attack could happen in Oslo.
