I recently came across this article from Mashable.  It was an article on a site called Chatroulette that was coming back after being down for several weeks.  No one was exactly sure why it took several weeks to relaunch the site, and I was interested in what this site was all about.  I had only just heard about Chatroulette last week because of the viral marketing campaign for Eli Roth’s latest producing effort, The Last Exorcism, which came out over the weekend to top the box office.  The viral campaign below was placed on chatroulette as a way to lure in young men to check out the website for the movie.  When I saw the viral video I found it really funny and an interesting way to market a film to the young male demographic.

However, I still didn’t understand exactly what Chatroulette was.  According to Wikipedia, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chatroulette) Chatroulette was invented by a seventeen-year-old student in Moscow, Russia.  His goal in creating the site was to take the video chats he had on SKYPE to the next level.  When you go to the website it asks if you want to connect your webcam. You can’t simply watch.  In order to be a part of the experience, you must accept connecting your webcam to the site, and if you decline the site goes black.  Once you approve, you have access to anyone in the world that is also connected.  What you find is literally a roulette situation, random strangers pop up in a larger window next to your smaller one and will either start a chat dialogue in another pop up box below or will “next” you, click off of your connection to connect to someone else.

In my research, I also came across this article in NY Magazine by Sam Anderson, http://nymag.com/news/media/63663/.  Anderson actually spent some time on the  Chatroulette site to understand the ins and outs before writing his piece and so naturally I did the same.  I logged in, accepted my webcam and in less than five minutes about 10 people “nexted” me, a few nude people popped up so I “nexted” them and that was the extent of it.  I found the experience in general a little unnerving to be honest.  A bunch of random strangers can see me and strike up a conversation; frankly it seems a little odd.  Someone could say there isn’t much difference when a perfect stranger comes up to you and asks if you prefer Gouda or Muenster while shopping for cheese, but typically they aren’t naked or trying to flash me and there are other people around which is comforting. The site in general is not exactly work safe.  From exploring the site and my other research, a lot of what you find is x rated, a lot of nudity and other sexually explicit situations, people who get a kick out of exhibiting their naughty bits.  However, this didn’t deter me from taking a look at the site during work.  A couple of screen grabs are below to show my reaction to some of what I came across.

However, besides my reaction to the site, I have found some entertaining uses for Chatroulette.  Besides the advantages of viral marketing in film campaigns like The Last Exorcism, Chatroulette has also been used for a Dr. Pepper campaign that ran in the UK for April Fools Day that involved a buxom blonde cheerleader that suddenly became a man in a cheerleading uniform sporting a blonde wig.

Chatroulette also has turned some every day people into web super stars. Take Merton, an Internet sensation that posted his first YouTube video of himself connecting to people on the site in March of this year.  Merton improvises songs on piano about the people he comes in contact with.

http://www.youtube.com/user/PianoChatImprov

Merton refuses to reveal his actual identity and feels the anonymity makes his Chatroulette experience more fun.  Compared to Ben Folds in both looks and musical style, Merton’s videos have been rated the highest in YouTube history and in only five months has almost three and a half million channel views and his individual videos have surpassed six million.  Here is Ben Folds response to his doppelganger Merton:

I think Folds sums Chatroulette up nicely when he says for him, “It’s like going to the mall.  I mean I like going to the mall once in awhile, but it would be weird to sit down with a thing of nachos all day long with the teenagers.  It’s fun for a moment giving me a glimpse into the world of mainstream YouTube users.”  I concur.  Learning about Chatroulette for the I Design Your Eyes community was enjoyable, but too much could give me indigestion.

What do you think I Design Your Eyes?  Is Chatroulette just another fad or does it have legs, growing to what could be a far bigger phenomenon? Let me know with comments below.