A lawsuit filed in the Manhattan federal court last week by the New York Times claims that the defendants—Microsoft and OpenAI—have used millions of its articles to train and create its large language models (LLMs) and other products. The Times is seeking damages in realms of billions of dollars, though it doesn't give a specific number.
How a toilet-themed YouTube series became the biggest thing online
16.12.2023 - 14:21 / stuff.co.nz
The biggest online phenomenon of the year is an animated video series that primarily appeals to children, filled with obscure internet and gaming references that most adults wouldn't understand, and with a name that all but screams scatological humour.
Its existence has sparked concern among adults, but is in fact a natural outgrowth of a video world created in part by parents who've made a habit of handing their iPads to their children to watch harmless entertainment such as Cocomelon. The success of the series also shows the first point of tension between Gen Z and Gen Alpha.
Called Skibidi Toilet, the YouTube series was created by an animator named Alexey Gerasimov for his YouTube channel DaFuq!?Boom! The series tells the story of Skibidi Toilets (toilets with human heads) engaged in a war with people who have CCTV cameras, speakers and televisions for heads amid a dark and dystopian landscape. They battle each other across an expanding industrial world that includes New York City landmarks, with the Skibidi Toilets acting on behest of their leader, G-Man, to destroy humanity and transform more people into Skibidi Toilets.
"Skibidi" videos have been viewed more than 65 billion times this year on YouTube alone, making it one of the biggest trends on the platform. On TikTok, videos with the hashtag "Skibidi Toilet" have been viewed more than 15.3 million times, and they've appeared in countless memes and videos on Instagram. DaFuq!?Boom! also has surpassed 36 million subscribers on YouTube, becoming one of the fastest-growing channels on the platform, at times outpacing MrBeast, YouTube's biggest star.
Maddy Buxton, culture and trends manager at YouTube, said Skibidi Toilet is a phenomenon unlike any other the platform has seen before.
"It's become one of the year's biggest cultural moments," she said. "I've never quite seen anything blow up like this. It started as a meme but it's evolved into this very complex storyline with a lot of hidden meaning that people are very eager to break down and try to understand."
Skibidi Toilet may seem easy to write off as an internet fad, but its ascendance reveals what the future of entertainment might look like across major social platforms. It is the first narrative series to be told entirely through short-form video (60 seconds or less), and it's the first major mainstream meme that has arisen from Generation Alpha (kids roughly age 10 and younger).
"This is one of the first memes that we've seen take off with Gen Alpha and it's one of the first Gen Alpha trends we've seen on YouTube," Buxton said by phone.
With so much focus on TikTok as a culture driver over the past few years, Skibidi Toilet is also a testament to the enduring power of YouTube. In one
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