vlog

A short street-level clip of Joe Ades, the New York pitchman who sold vegetable peelers to crowds on the sidewalk. It shows his patter, showmanship and crowd handling in action.

Patrick Stewart on the BBC's Parkinson talk show talks humorously about going bald, how it affected his career and relationships, and how he came to accept it.

Nardwuar interviews Pharrell and Shay of N.E.R.D. in Vancouver, using his trademark deep research and gifts. The extended version runs about ten minutes.

A Nike commercial in which Michael Jordan lists the shots he missed and games he lost, saying that repeated failure is the reason he succeeds.

In Top Gear's second part, racing driver Sabine Schmitz tries to lap the Nurburgring in a Ford Transit van in under ten minutes. She finishes just over the mark.

A one-minute clip of Slavoj Zizek showing what he calls the official geographical limit between the Balkans and Central Europe, standing at a river in Ljubljana. It is a short, absurd and funny piece of cultural geography.

A Hitachi promotional cartoon in the style of Schoolhouse Rock explaining perpendicular magnetic recording for hard drives.

A one-minute Sesame Street animation of a counting pinball game focused on the number 12, set to Pointer Sisters music.

Lin-Manuel Miranda performs an early version of the Hamilton idea, then called "The Hamilton Mixtape", at the White House poetry and spoken word evening in May 2009. He is accompanied by Alex Lacamoire and the audience laughs along at the premise of a hip-hop song about Alexander Hamilton.

Honda's 2003 'Cog' commercial for the Accord, a two-minute Rube Goldberg chain reaction of car parts. It was filmed practically rather than with CGI.

Google's 2009 'Search Stories' ad, shown in the Super Bowl, tells the story of an American who falls in love in Paris entirely through search queries.

A promotional commercial for Microsoft Songsmith, software that generates backing music from a vocal recording. The ad became widely known for its awkwardness.

A compilation of the first four iPhone commercials from the June 2007 launch. The ads walk through using the device and stress real web browsing.

A short clip of President George W. Bush stumbling through the saying 'fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me'.

An early 2009 tech test by Notch of an Infiniminer-style cave game running about 700 fps on a 256x256x64 tile map. It is the prototype that grew into Minecraft.

A short classic Sesame Street clip in which a mother sends her young daughter to the store to buy a loaf of bread, a container of milk and a stick of butter.

A short EDS television commercial that shows an airplane being built while it is in flight. It is an early use of the 'building the plane as it flies' metaphor.

A 2006 iPod commercial set to Daft Punk's Technologic, with dancing silhouettes and bright white headphones.

The famous 1984 Apple Macintosh television commercial, framed as a rebellion against an Orwellian Big Brother. This copy was uploaded to YouTube just after the site launched.

Apple's famous 1984 Macintosh television commercial, which casts the company as a rebel breaking a Big Brother-style conformity.

A 1999 Qwest commercial in which a weary traveler at a remote motel is told every room offers every movie ever made, on demand. It was shot at Roy's Motel in Amboy, California.

A one-minute clip of the famous 'Where's the Beef?' catchphrase from a classic fast food commercial.

A short Apple Get a Mac ad that mocks Windows Vista's constant security pop-up prompts.

The classic 1980s anti-drug PSA in which a father confronts his son about drugs and is told 'I learned it by watching you'.

A Spike Jonze-directed Ikea commercial in which a discarded lamp is treated sympathetically, until a twist undercuts the sentiment. It is a short, well-known piece of advertising.

A TiVo-captured clip of the notoriously repetitive 2006 Head On headache remedy commercial, with its 'apply directly to the forehead' jingle.

A one-minute 1949 television commercial for Camel cigarettes claiming that more doctors smoke Camels than any other cigarette.

A short 2000s Apple commercial for the PowerMac G4 that plays on the computer being classed as a weapon under US export restrictions, with tanks as imagery.

A one-minute UK road safety advert showing a family car crash in which an unbelted rear passenger kills his mother in a head-on collision. It is a notoriously graphic public information film.

Top Gear segment in which Hammond and May try to turn a Reliant Robin into a space shuttle. Launching is easy, but landing it safely is the problem.

A roughly one-minute TV clip in which a guest accidentally breaks a rare, one-of-a-kind wax cylinder recording on camera.

A short Los Alamos National Laboratory safety video on how to use stairs, including handrail advice in a music-video style. It was posted as an example of government spending.

A one-minute animated commercial for the antidepressant Zoloft, described as the original that inspired later sequels and parodies.

A short clip of a Garry Kasparov press conference interrupted by a flying object in a prank. It is a brief, crude stunt video.

A 2000 IBM commercial in which Avery Brooks complains that we still have no flying cars. It plays on the failed futurist promises of the twentieth century.