Year of the Ninja?

[GeneChing]

We're only three months into 2007 and there's been a lot of ninja buzz lately.

Last week there was T M N T.

'Ask a Ninja,' OK Go win YouTube Video Awards
Seven honorees announced for video-sharing site's inaugural awards
By Jake Coyle
The Associated Press
Originally published March 26, 2007, 12:55 PM EDT
NEW YORK // The video series "Ask a Ninja" and OK Go's treadmill-choreographed music video are among the winners in the first YouTube Video Awards.

The video-sharing site announced the seven winners from its inaugural awards today, a week after the nominees were put forth for voting. Each category included 10 nominated videos, which users could rank in order of their liking.

"These individuals put the first stitches in the fabric of the YouTube community," said Jamie Byrne, head of product marketing for YouTube. "Instead of seeing a way to share videos, they saw an opportunity for worldwide visibility and through their success have changed the landscape of how a 'star' is defined."

The power pop band OK Go, perhaps the most professional of the mostly amateur nominees, won most creative video for their "Here It Goes Again" music video. "Ask a Ninja," the popular comedy created by Kent Nichols and Douglas Sarine, won for best series.

"Ask a Ninja" triumphed over perhaps YouTube's biggest celebrity: Lonelygirl15. That bedroom production finished fourth, behind "Ask A Gay Man" and "Chad Vader."

Terra Naomi won for best music video for her song "Say It's Possible," a one-shot clip of her playing acoustic guitar and singing. Naomi has parlayed her online success into a record deal with Island Records, and will release her debut album this summer.

Best commentary was one of the most hotly contested categories, as it pitted several of YouTube's most high-profile personalities against one another. A vlogger known as "The Winekone" won over Peter Oakley ("Geriatric1927") and Paul Robinett ("Renetto").

A video calling for a "Free Hugs Campaign" won for most inspirational video. Australian Juan Mann's video set off an online wildfire of similar "Free Hugs" campaigns.

Anthony Padilla and Ian Hecox, also known as Smosh, won for best comedy video. Dony Permedi's animated video "Kiwi!" -- which began as a master's thesis on animation, won for most adorable video.

The winners and nominees are compiled in a gallery online. YouTube says it will later unveil what a YouTube Video Award will look like.

Google-owned, San Bruno, Calif.-based YouTube Inc. was founded in February 2005. Media conglomerate Viacom Inc. recently sued YouTube for $1 billion, claiming the site infringes on copyrights on a "huge scale." Several other media companies have reached agreements to supply YouTube with clips.

According to comScore Media Metrix, YouTube attracted 133.5 million visitors worldwide in January.

See the YouTube video awards.

And coming soon.

Looks like we better stock up on ninja gear....

[The Xia]

Perhaps the ninja craze of the 80s is making a comeback.

[Oso]

can we get a ninja smiley?

[GeneChing]

There should be more pix like these on the web.

[jethro]

Agreed.

[Soo Ma Tai]

Yes!, Ninja should beat the Pirates. Year of the Ninja though....wasn't that in, like, like, 1986 or somthing like that.

[GeneChing]

Check out Walking on Water coming soon to Mythbusters.

APR 25 2007 @ 09:00 PM
APR 26 2007 @ 01:00 AM
APR 30 2007 @ 08:00 PM
MAY 01 2007 @ 12:00 AM

[GeneChing]

It's just like this around the office here. The only difference is that instead of an apartment, it's a warehouse stocked full of this.

[GeneChing]

The Mythbusters go Ninja.

Apr 25, 9:00 pm (60 minutes)
It's east meets west in the Mythbusters Ninja Special. Shrouded in secrecy and mythology, not to mention cult popularity Ninjas are perfect fodder for the Mythbusters. In this episode the whole team combine to pit science against martial arts mystique.

[GeneChing]

Mail Order Ninja is running in some syndicated newspaper comics now. It's a regular installment here at San Francisco Chronicle.

Actually, I've known this for a long time. I'm just ttt-ing this for the Mythbusters episode, which airs tonight!

[GeneChing]

Those Mythbusters can't get their facts straight. I didn't get to the credits of that ninja episode personally, but my sources tell me that I was credited as 'Gene Chen' and it was spelled 'King Fu Magazine' and 'Tigerclaw' (instead of Tiger Claw). Oh bother. We must have been sabotaged by jealous ninjas...

[GeneChing]

Vanilla Ninja - obviously this site is in some sort of ninja code talk.

[GeneChing]

EA announces Wii ninja game
Wednesday 5-Dec-2007 3:36 PM Party like you're a ninja
Ninja Reflex is a party game for Wii (and DS) that'll test your ninja, er, reflexes.

Basically, you'll be hit with a number of martial arts-related challenges which you must pull of with the precision of Bruce Lee. Reaction times are measured to the millisecond, we're told.

You're ultimate goal in single-player is to earn a black belt, while you can also try and out-ninja other ninjas in multiplayer.

"Ninja Reflex channels the accessible multiplayer fun of Wii Sports and the self-improvement aspect of Brain Age into a martial arts universe that is ideally suited for the Wii and Nintendo DS," says David Luntz, president and CEO of Nunchuck Games which is co-publishing the game with EA.

Ninja Reflex ninjas into shops next March. Have a look at the Wii screenshots if you're ninja enough.

It's DAY OF THE NINJA 2007! How are you celebrating?

[NinjaStar]

Obviously, some one leaked our plans. The rise of the Ninja Nation starts this week.

[GeneChing]

...sometimes it's a curse.

Well, we had a lot of fun with our NINJA STAR contest. I had a feeling it would be early, mostly because Ninja Assassin opens just before T-Day. But we had to go with NINJA STAR when we did, since it was essentially a costume contest and we planned it to cross Halloween. If Ninja Assassin fulfills it's promise for an R-rated ninja flick, we were in front of another great ninja wave. We'll see in a few weeks.

The NINJA STAR contest has put me in tune with ninjas again so I'm really ready for Ninja Assassin.

Meanwhile, and this one just speaks to the bottom of my heart, here's some ninja chips.
The Doritos Dynasty begins...