"Haul" videos. Why.

I dunno. I’m a female Doper who likes fashion/make up/shopping but watching someone else pull out their purchases sounds even duller than watching their vacation slides. If I’m interested in looking at stuff, I’d just go to a store or the company’s website.

All the cool kids know that owling is the new planking.

WTF is wrong with our civilization?

I suddenly have an urge to watch George A Romero’s DAWN OF THE DEAD.

I’m a male and these videos leave me frightened and confused.

The only rationale I’ve been able to come up with is that people don’t actually watch these videos. It’s like when people post stupid fucking song lyrics in chats. Everyone likes to think that people actually give a fuck about their interests, so they all do it, despite the fact that nobody is actually reading this shit. So I’m of a mind that the vast, vast majority of “views” that these videos have are not actually full views (or even close to full views) and the “popularity” that they have is artificial- after all, nobody is actually watching this crap.

My guess might be incorrect but it’s the only way I can reconcile the existence of these videos with my understanding of the universe.

I’ll admit up until I read about it this week on Cracked, I had never heard about haul videos. And I have no personal interest in watching them. But I am not surprised they exist. This seems like essentially the same as people blogging about what TV shows they watched last night - the urge to share the small details of your life with other people via the internet.

Yeah, but…oatmeal?

Well, I understand doing it with coworkers and friends. These things, not so much. It’s like “having dinner with someone” by putting an iPad on your table with a video of somebody you don’t know eating and talking. That’s not sharing anything.

Why do you post on a message board with people you don’t know instead of sharing with coworkers and friends? It’s not like you are really talking with people. You are staring at a computer screen instead of looking into someones eyes. How could you possibly enjoy that?