Erica Buist 

Unboxing – the YouTube phenomenon that lets you see what you’re getting

Erica Buist: First it was 'haul girls' showing off their purchases, now it's videos of people unpackaging toys – and they're potentially making millions
  
  

DisneyCollectorBR shows off an Angry Bird
DisneyCollectorBR shows off an Angry Bird for one of her YouTube videos. Photograph: PR

What do you need to be a YouTube sensation? An international pop career? A witty Game of Thrones spoof? Footage of a wet cat? How about a short video of someone unwrapping plastic toys? The channel run by DisneyCollectorBR was the third most-viewed on YouTube last week, beaten only by Shakira and cult Swedish game commenter PewDiePie. It is estimated to have made millions after racking up more than 2.4 billion views with videos of toys being "unboxed".

The mystery woman's most popular video, with more than 90m views, is "Angry Birds Toy Surprise Jake and the Never Land Pirates Disney Pixar Cars 2 Easter Egg Spongebob". The video opens with a shot of "six egg surprises I just found at Target", on a blue surface against a bright green background.

The internet phenomenon of "unboxing" could be the ultimate I-could-have-done-that million-dollar venture. Unboxing is essentially filming yourself opening boxes of toys or gadgets, uploading it to YouTube and, for users such as DisneyCollectorBR, realising you're rich.

All we see of the anonymous presenter is her disembodied and nicely manicured fingers unwrapping the contents. Some quiet guitar music kicks in as she pulls out the contents and describes them in a sing-song voice, with an occasional comment such as, "This is awesome!" or "No candy in this one." It's weirdly hypnotic, delivering the fun of endless egg surprises for its young audience.

How could someone make millions just by unwrapping figurines from Kinder eggs? If they get enough views, any YouTube user can make money from ads displayed during their videos. If their video is engaging enough to keep the viewer's attention long enough for them to watch the ads that pop up, they get paid a nominal fee. By captivating small children and toddlers to the tune of billions of views, that translates into serious cash for DisneyCollectorBR.

But the unboxing audience isn't made up entirely of small children getting a midsummer hit of Christmas-morning excitement. Its origins lie in the gadget and fashion world, where vloggers unbox everything from Xboxes to video games, phones, clothing, trainers, coffee machines or Uggs, so consumers can get a preview of what they're buying. You can even watch people unbox live reptiles. In short, if it's for sale, someone is probably unboxing it on YouTube.

Useful as it is to see what comes in the box, adults are just as susceptible as children to so-called "toy porn". Even though several videos on gearlive.com's unboxing page are marked "unboxing review", suggesting a grown-up unboxing with sensible and practical commentary, the page tagline is: "Vicarious thrills from opening new gear." Even as adults, we still evidently squirm at the excitement of opening a brand new toy.

 

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