Venice Beach has become quite popular with “run and gun” YouTube content creators these days, the crowded boardwalk an easy place for them to find random people to “interact” with.
Vitaly Zdorovetskiy, the “brains” behind the viral (over 20 million views) “Miami Zombie Attack Prank!” video, recently visited Venice for his “Stealing Skateboards Prank!”:
In the video, Zdorovetskiy befriends skaters near Ocean Front Walk before running off with their boards. If anything, the video reveals just how much “lag time” exists between when a thief steals something and when a victim processes what is happening. Wisely, Zdorovetskiy did not appear to try his prank at the skate park “proper”.
(A warning before watching the videos linked to below: as a Maker Studios employee once told me at a party: “The videos are for 12-15 year olds, crass gets hits.”)
Zdorovetskiy and the guys from “Simple Pickup” also partnered to create both the “Embarrassing Pick Up Lines” video and “Extremely Offensive Pick Up Lines: Get Her Number!” videos while here in Venice. The two video channels have a combined 177 million video “views” between them.
Other professional YouTube content creators that frequently use Venice Beach include comedian Kassem G (341 million channel views) who interviews passerby on the boardwalk:
Comedians “Theater of Life” (10 million channel views) who comment on the appearance of people on the boardwalk:
And the most viewed of them all: the video blogging ShayTards (564 million channel views), a family that documents much of their existence with video (including trips to Venice Beach):
Next time you see a video camera on the boardwalk, it may be one of them!
