Internet Culture

Nationality: Mexican, Jewish
Age: 16
Occupation: Student
Residence: Bonsall, CA
Performance Date: April 21, 2008
Primary Language: English

(Romanian words. Doesn’t actually mean anything in Romanian, just works with the    music. Original Song by O-zone.)

Maya Hi, Maya Hu, Maya Ha

Maya Haha, Maya Hi, Maya Hu,

Maya Ha, Maya Haha

Ross Chris Newman – Famous Numa Numa Dance

In 2004, Gary Brolsma never thought that a video that he created in his bedroom would become a national internet phenomenon. Let alone a video not even in English and the performance merely being a glorified lip sync. The video popped up on a site named www.newgrounds.com. After only a few months of being online, the video recorded over a million hits. And after 6 months the video had been viewed tens of millions of times world-wide with many “Numa Numa” impersonations popping up everywhere trying to copy the original. While none were quite as good as Gary’s, they were valiant efforts.

After a year went by Gary Brolsma was featured on a CNN broadcast and on the Today Show, the shows asked him questions about his influence in making the video and also toured his home. The craze for the “Numa Numa” guy was so intense that he eventually created a new Numa video and posted that online as well. He named his new video, “New Numa, the Return of Gary Brolsma.” It was evident that Gary put much more post-filming effort into this video because unlike the first one, there were special effects and video editing. The response to this video was equally as insane as the first. In the first week of its lifetime online, it had already succeeded in reaching over one million hits; a feat normally not possible in prior internet culture and unheard of as early as five years ago.

With the advent of his New Numa video, Gary also created his own website commercializing his name and his Numa dances. The website is called www.newnuma.com. He decided that he was not going to be the only unknown to receive internet attention. Because of his great success in becoming an internet icon, he prepared a Numa Numa song/dance contest. Where the winners would receive $50,000 in prize money and have the chance for internet stardom. It is nice knowing that there are people such as Gary Brolsma who choose to give a chance to other unknown internet surfers to possibly have their chance to be an e-lebrity.

This new internet cultural phenomenon is being seen all over the world with hundreds of people deciding to put their own personal antics online and wait to see what other people say about their performances. Perhaps this will be the new method that humor is transferred because of the fact that it allows normal people around the world to express their comedic talents and have millions of people be able to view it. If they are lucky enough, they might even have the chance to become an icon just like Gary Brolsma.

Annotation:

Newspaper Article:

Los Angeles Times Los Angeles, California: Dec 3, 2006 pg. E.4

Original video can be found at the following website. http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/206373

Other sites where this video is located are at the following.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=60og9gwKh1o

New Numa Video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3gg5LOd_Zus&feature=related

Numa Three

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qGXiN-_BCts&feature=user

Numa Numa Spoofs

http://youtube.com/watch?v=L7si10ipel0 (3 million views)

http://youtube.com/watch?v=N6j475XI1Xg (7.5 million views)

Original Song by O-Zone. (Dragostea din tei)

http://youtube.com/watch?v=BgU_m3SuYPE