Making a video go viral is not an easy task to accomplish, for it requires gaining the viewers undivided attention (for he can go to a different webpage in milliseconds), accessing his emotions, and still somehow being different from the hundred million other videos out there. Or, you can simply post a video of a sexy supermodel like Heidi Klum playing Guitar Hero and dancing around half-naked.
The key to a viral video is in its spark – the essential character of the video that instantly grabs the viewer’s attention and makes him say, “I’m sticking with this ‘till the end.” When it comes to skateboarding videos, this “spark” is usually crazy slams. Typically, the video is just a 5 second slam played at full speed, replayed at half speed, and one last time at quarter speed, hence stretching a 5 second video to 20 seconds. The most famous and viral slam on the web is Jake Brown’s Mega Ramp slam at the X-Games. When Jake hit the ground from over 20 feet in the air and lost his shoes, viewers went through a roller-coaster of emotion, starting from “Wow that was wild!”, and ending with “Oh shit is he dead?” To top it all off, Jake got up and walked away, instantly gaining the reputation of being able to walk away from anything.

In the skateboarding industry, however, we don’t promote slams. I’ve personally slammed plenty of times, and although the rest of the world thinks it’s funny, it’s not. We just prefer to see some insane skating. My point is, the slam videos shouldn’t be popular – the ones that show truly insane skating should. Two examples of non-slam viral skating videos are Lakai’s fully flared, with the insane slow mo explosions at the beginning, and Girl’s yea right with the invisible board. Both videos are a huge success because of the approach that was taken in producing them.
Both of these videos have spark, they access your emotions, have some effects, and most importantly have insane skating. Some other videos that went viral were Danny Way’s Great Wall of China Jump, the helicopter drop, and the drop in off of the guitar at the hard rock. Also, the Rodney vs. Daewon series had tricks of the highest caliber. These are the kinds of videos that should be going viral, and I’m glad they have.