[myNetWords.com] : Lip dub

Lip dub

Updated : Tuesday 12 October 2010

A lip dub (the word was suggested by cjpkicherche) is an online video in which a group of people lip-synch to a song being played to them – it could be an original or a remake. Lip dub is simply short for “lip dubbing”. To make one, all you have to do is film yourself and your friends lip-synching to a song. The video is then put together with the original song. A genuine lip dub is supposed to be filmed in one single take, without any editing.

Jakob Lodwick, the founder of Vimeo, “invented” the term “lip dub” in 2006. He got the idea when he was singing along to something he was listening to on his MP3 while out walking. University and business school students soon started doing their own lip dubs to promote their school and tell the world what a great place it was. Companies were quick to follow, seeing the lip dub as a good way to recruit young talent and “hype” their openness and image. Guerlain, Mappy and eBay all tried their hand at lip dubs, and in the main they worked well. The lip dub of the UQAM school in Montreal came out as one of the most-watched internet videos of 2009. A more recent hit is the one from the Business School of Maastricht University in the Netherlands. Some lip dubs have been viewed as many as 6 to 8 million times on YouTube or Dailymotion. In the USA, those receiving the most hits are broadcast by the major television channels.

Originally, the lip dub was something fun and spontaneous – students filming each other lip-synching a song using a mini camera, and posting it on YouTube. Once it caught on, though, it was swiftly adopted by professionals who saw these videos as a modern and distinctive means of communication and marketing. True, some younger people might be attracted more easily to a company that thinks nothing of putting its employees on stage, or making a spectacle of itself on the internet. Even if there’s something faintly laughable about the sight of young managers in business suits dancing on their desks, or grooving around on their office chairs waving pink feather boas, or workmen in blue overalls yelling into their microphones. It’s worth a try – and, on the whole, it has gone down pretty well. The communications professionals have got in on the act, and now the images are edited and reworked into a sort of high-class video clip. Of course, politicians have been quick to embrace the lip dub. In France, the Europe Ecology party got in first, to boost its campaign in the European elections. Less successful (at least with the party elders) was the attempt by younger members of Sarkozy’s UMP party to produce a lip dub involving various government ministers. Before the UK General Election in May, the totalpolitics.com website released a lip dub designed to encourage people to vote, featuring an improbable assortment of (obviously consenting) politicians from across the spectrum including the now legendary former New Labour spin doctor, Alistair Campbell. There’s now even a website that lets you create your own lip dub, so go ahead, and do it yourself; you might create a buzz on the web and put yourself in a strong position for a pay rise.