Entertainment Weekly columnist Diablo Cody stopped writing for a minute (she's also a scribe on Showtime's The United States of Tara and penned Juno) to share her favorite YouTube videos with the world. Here she reveals which videos make her laugh, cry and feel all nostalgic.

"Dog and Elephant":
This CBS News report never fails to make me cry. We're talking ugly,
ragged sobs. It actually replaced "Christian the Lion: Reunion" as my
go-to animal weepfest. 

"Valentine for Perfect Strangers":
Though it's a few years old, this bizarre short is still my all-time
favorite thing on YouTube. I wish Otto had made a sequel, but perhaps
it's best that he wasn't subjected to "Chocolate Rain"-style
overexposure.

"Alternate Duck Tales Intro":
Truly sick (and from a production standpoint, truly slick.) Those of us
who always suspected Scrooge McDuck was evil will be vindicated after
watching this. Warning: disturbing content.

"Love in this Club, by the Rock-afire Explosion":
If you grew up with the Showbiz Pizza Place chain in your area, you
might remember the "house band"-- a gang of animatronic singing
animals. Today, Rock-afire fan Chris Thrash reprograms the robots to
play modern club bangers. Funny and impressive. 

"Suzy Snowflake":
I remember watching this vintage stop-motion short  on Chicago's WGN
every Christmas. I hope to show it to my kids someday. It's easy to
forget that YouTube isn't just a time-suck, it's an archival tool.

For more celebrity playlists, click here.

Mia Quagliarello, Community Manager, recently watched "Norah Jones and Jimmy Kimmel Sing YouTube's 12 Days of Christmas."

This year’s iteration of The Davos Debates is up and running, offering one YouTube user the opportunity to attend this year’s World Economic Forum meeting in Davos to put forward the cause they are most passionate about at a specially convened panel. Our candidate will get the opportunity to engage and debate with the world’s leaders and take the opportunity that Davos offers to elevate the cause that is closest to their heart. As you can imagine: we’re looking for someone a bit special. Someone like you? See below for more details: What sort of person are we looking for? The winner of the Davos Debates will be someone with knowledge and passion for a public cause, who can demonstrate they're able to interact with the world's leaders. We want to hear real stories from people working on local issues, with a view to offering the opportunity to make these concerns global. Maybe it's fighting for human rights, or the environment, or against poverty? Maybe it's world fishing, education, or political freedoms? Whatever it is, we're looking someone who isn't afraid to get their voice heard, and give them the chance to be at Davos. How does it work? From today until the January 4, we're asking YouTube users to submit their video entries. Five finalists will be selected by a judging panel comprised of Paolo Coelho, Arianna Huffington and Muhammad Yunus. These finalist videos will then go to public vote on January 8, with a winner announced on the January 19. Beyond that, and the information at the World Economic Forum channel, it's up to you. So get filming, rally some support and Make Your Pitch To The World. Steve Grove, News & Politics, recently watched “CNN/YouTube Climate Debate"

Today we are teaming up with Katalyst, a studio for social media co-founded by Ashton Kutcher, and HP to bring previously unaired episodes of Katalyst’s television drama The Beautiful Life to YouTube at www.youtube.com/TBL.



The TBL series is being presented without commercial interruption by HP in connection with its Create Change program. As part of The Beautiful Life experience on YouTube, Katalyst and HP have asked the show’s stars and viewers to participate by recording, tagging and posting video commentary about how they will create positive change in 2010.

We are excited to bring first-run original programming like this to the YouTube community. The first two episodes of the series, originally aired on the CW, will debut today, followed by the remaining three episodes beginning on December 21. We're sure devout TBL fans will enjoy this holiday treat, and we think the show is likely to find many new fans through YouTube.

George Strompolos, Strategic Partnerships, recently watched The Beautiful Life - Episode 2

Our curator of the month is eGuiders.com, a site that asks Hollywood and Internet influencers, media mavens and other experts to select and review their favorite made-for-the-web content. On their YouTube channel, they've replicated much of the discovery experience that reflects the collective sensibilities of their team of curators (aka eGuiders) -- it's a team that includes nalts, mediocrefilms' Greg Benson, barelypolitical's Ben Relles, NPR's Margot Adler, blogger/technology advocate Robert Scoble and many more. The channel hosts seven playlists divided by genre; each one serving as a quick overview of videos eGuiders have determined to be interesting, funny or entertaining. Says CEO/co-founder Marc Ostrick: "Curation is, and will always be, subjective. Our approach is to allow our team to dig and search for content that they find exciting and valuable. Most of our eGuiders have a specific genre that they specialize in or have a proclivity towards, and we support their passion for online video by giving them a platform to share their sensibilities. However, at the end of the day, eGuiders is not about a single voice -- it is about the collection of many dynamic voices that contribute to overall goal of validating the Internet as a credible medium for storytellers." The eGuiders channel also hosts original content focusing on different aspects of social media, all shot with HD pocket video tools like the Zi8 and Flip Ultra HD. As December's guest curators, eGuiders have selected the four undiscovered gems you see in the homepage spotlight today and they've got many more quality clips at the ready as a reward for subscribing to their channel. Mia Quagliarello, Community Manager, recently favorited "The Watch."

Take off your winter coat and warm up your webcams as this holiday season YouTube brings the age-old tradition of caroling to the digital world. Now you can sing and share carols via YouTube without having to abandon your cup of hot cocoa to tramp door-to-door in the snow. Just go to our caroling channel page to join Happy Slip and others in doing your best rendition of classic sing-alongs like "Jingle Bells" and "Deck the Halls," along with other customized carols. For example, sneak a peek at these YouTube Carolers who are already spreading the holiday cheer: Another bonus? In the spirit of the season, our sponsors TJ Maxx and Marshalls will donate money to Toys for Tots for every carol submitted. They are also offering a $5,000 gift card to the best caroler who sings one of their two original songs.This program continues through December, so be sure to add your voice to the season at www.youtube.com/caroling. Later this month we'll be highlighting some of the best submissions on the site.Michele Flannery, Music Manager, recently watched "Silent Night."

Last week, we announced the CNN/YouTube Climate Debate in Copenhagen, an effort to make sure that your voice is included in the climate debate — and that your questions are posed to decision-makers on an international stage. Today, we want to inform you that panelists will include former U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan, journalist Thomas Friedman, U.N. Executive Secretary Yves de Boer and author Bjorn Lomberg. To submit your question for these leaders, upload a short video of yourself posing the question and submit it here: www.youtube.com/cop15. We've already seen some top-notch video questions like this one from Angela in Italy who wants to know about the consequences of climate change, and this question from Mo in Florida who is concerned about the cost of going green: The top questions will be posed to leaders during the debate, and also projected onto the CO2 Cube, a 3-story art installation now residing in the center of Copenhagen, built to represent one metric ton of carbon and powered by YouTube videos related to the climate crisis. Here's an in-depth look at this stunning artistic display: You can submit your video at www.youtube.com/cop15 and vote on questions for potential inclusion in the debate and on the Cube. The debate will be live-streamed in full on the COP 15 channel, and onto the Cube, on December 15 so make sure to watch and see if world leaders answer your question. Cross-posted on the Official Google Blog Ramya Raghavan, Nonprofits & Activism, recently watched, "Day Three of the Climate Talks"

After nearly 35 years on air, PBS NewsHour recently re-launched its broadcast program and website in an effort to provide viewers with NewsHour content wherever, whenever and however they want to access it. As part of this transformation, the nightly news program is starting a major new initiative with YouTube. The PBS NewsHour channel on YouTube (http://youtube.com/pbsnewshour) will host nightly reports from the NewsHour television broadcast, posted the same night the broadcast airs on PBS. The NewsHour will also post web-original videos featuring its new online correspondent Hari Sreenivasan. These news segments will be archived on the NewsHour YouTube channel, ensuring that those looking for video of past news events will easily be able to find it. The launch of the PBS NewsHour channel is the latest in a series of PBS and NewsHour projects with YouTube, including last year's Video Your Vote project that encouraged voters to film and post their experience at the polls during Election Day 2008. The project attracted more than 2,500 videos from across the country, which PBS was able to incorporate into its Election Night coverage. While the new NewsHour program, website and YouTube channel represent the evolution of how we consume the news in the twenty-first century, the journalism within will continue to engage, inform and enlighten Americans about the issues and events that directly affect their everyday lives — just as it has from the very beginning. Jim Lehrer, anchor of NewsHour, and Obadiah Greenberg, YouTube Strategic Partner Manager

Every day millions of people come to YouTube to watch some of the biggest names in music; stars like Lady Gaga, Michael Jackson and U2. Today we are happy to launch VEVO, a video site devoted exclusively to music and powered by YouTube. This new destination hopes to redefine the way people watch and engage with music online, as well as change the way the digital and music industries do business with each other. The partnership blends Google and YouTube's leading technology with material from a broad catalog of top artists from Universal Music Group, Sony Music and EMI. Check it out at VEVO.com and at YouTube.com/vevo, and listen to Rihanna's welcome message: Chris Maxcy, Director of Content Partnerships

With 40,000+ subscribers and a couple of hit videos, the folks behind the phonedog channel know a thing or two about making popular product-review videos (in their case, mobile phone reviews). In the spirit of the holidays, they've kindly agreed to share their secrets with you, to help the next generation of tech reviewers rise up on YouTube. Ask any question you like about how to be an effective gadget reviewer by leaving a comment on -- or uploading a response video to -- this video. phonedog will review your questions and then make a tutorial video, uploaded around December 15, to help give you your start in this field. Take their advice or leave it, but definitely test it out, particularly on any hot new gadgets you or your friends receive this holiday season. We'll be featuring three of the most promising new reviewers, as selected by phonedog, on the YouTube homepage during the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in early January. For more details, Noah from phonedog lays it all out: Mia Quagliarello, Community Manager, recently favorited "The Muppets: Bohemian Rhapsody."

It's no secret that AIDS is one of the deadliest diseases facing our world today. Since the beginning of the epidemic, almost 60 million people have been infected with HIV and 25 million people have died of HIV-related causes. But did you know that some of those hardest hit by AIDS are children? The disease has killed over 2 million children, and in sub-Saharan Africa it has orphaned close to 15 million. That's why, today, on World AIDS Day, we're partnering with Alicia Keys and her organization, Keep a Child Alive, to present a live-streamed benefit concert at 8 p.m. (ET). We're also encouraging everyone to donate $5 to provide the life-saving medication, support, and orphan care to keep these children alive. Learn more from Alicia herself about this important effort: You can make a difference today. Please tune in here at 8 p.m (ET) to watch Alicia Keys and donate to help save the lives of millions of children living with HIV/AIDS. Michele Flannery, Music Manager, and Ramya Raghavan, Nonprofits Manager, recently watched "The Lazarus Effect."

YouTube can be a powerful tool championing the rights of individuals and promoting free expression. This month, during International Human Rights Day, we're partnering with Morgan Freeman and Amnesty International to encourage you to become advocates for equality and justice, through Video Volunteers. Here's how you can help. Create a video about the nonprofit of your choice working on a human rights issue that you care about -- it could be genocide, human trafficking, refugee protection, gender equality or something else -- and submit it to the Video Volunteers channel by December 21. Amnesty International and Freeman, who plays legendary crusader Nelson Mandela in the upcoming movie Invictus, will select three videos to appear on the YouTube homepage at the end of the month. Hear more from Morgan about the importance of taking up this cause: This is your chance to help citizens around the world who often can't help themselves and to bring the vital work of human rights organizations to light. Join Morgan Freeman to protect the rights of these individuals at www.youtube.com/videovolunteers. Ramya Raghavan, Nonprofits & Activism Manager, recently favorited "To Protect & Serve: Police Brutality in India."

Earlier this month, as part of YouTube Video Volunteers, we asked you to create a short video for the nonprofit organization of your choice tackling the issue of hunger in America. Today, we're featuring the top three submissions, chosen by our partner Feeding America and curator David Arquette, on the YouTube homepage in honor of Thanksgiving, to recognize the important work that is being done to feed those in need. We were surprised and excited by the range of videos submitted. For example, partner bigedude33 penned an original song about the Food Bank of Central New York, while HavilahTower lent her voice to the Capital Area Food Bank in Texas: Filmmakers like CassieJaye and nsmith345 powerfully depicted the faces of American citizens being helped by their local food pantries, while vlogger Shawn Ahmed went inside the L.A. Regional Food Bank to demonstrate exactly how they provide support to the Los Angeles community: To view all Video Volunteer submissions for this month, please visit www.youtube.com/videovolunteers. And be sure to check the channel again next week when we kick off another Video Volunteers round, focusing on human rights, with curator Morgan Freeman. Ramya Raghavan, Nonprofits & Activism, recently watched "Charter for Compassion"

Governments, heads of state, and leaders from around the world are on YouTube, including the Pope, the Royal Family, and Queen Rania, and presidents from the United States to France, South Korea to Estonia. Today we're especially pleased to announce that the Iraqi Government has launched a dedicated YouTube channel, at youtube.com/iraqigov. Learn more from Iraq's Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki: Earlier this year, I visited Baghdad as a guest of the U.S. State Department to engage in conversations about the role of technology in Iraq. In discussions with elected officials, private companies and NGOs, I routinely heard the desire to connect with fellow citizens, Iraqis outside the country's borders, and cultures across the world. But it wasn't just the Iraqi Government who expressed an interest in YouTube — I was pleasantly surprised by the high level of awareness from a wide variety of Iraqis. One young student told us she uses YouTube to understand what is really happening in her country based on the variety of opinions, citizen journalism and news reports uploaded to the site. There was little difference between her examples and those we often hear in other countries, which speaks to both the global community on YouTube and the universality of the video experience. Just this past week, our CEO Eric Schmidt traveled to Iraq to meet with government officials there about the challenge and opportunities they face. While in Iraq, Eric shot this video for Citizentube: We hope that by launching on YouTube, the Iraqi Government and their citizens will also find it easy to use YouTube to engage in such conversations, and bring their proceedings, policies and ideas to a larger audience around the world. Hunter Walk, Director of Product Management

Creating captions for your videos on YouTube becomes much easier today, thanks to automatic speech recognition (ASR) technology. Auto-Timing: Upload a transcript (a simple file with the text of what's said in the video), and through speech recognition technology we'll turn it into synchronized captions. Timing is the toughest part of creating captions, but now this should be much easier. The technology works best for videos with good sound quality and clear spoken English. Auto-Captions: We use the same speech recognition technology to create machine-generated captions (which can then be translated into 51 languages). You can see auto-caps in action right now on a range of educational channels, such as UC Berkeley, Stanford, MIT, Yale, UCLA, Duke, UCTV, Columbia, PBS, National Geographic, Demand Media, UNSW and most Google channels, including YouTube's. Click on the menu button at the bottom right of the video player, then click CC and the arrow to its left, then click the new "Transcribe Audio" button. In time, we hope to expand this feature for many more YouTube videos. Auto-caps is a continued step towards YouTube's goal of making video accessible everywhere (web, mobile, TV) and to everyone (other countries, languages, alternative access modes). It's also an example of using technology to enhance the video experience. For more details, please check this post on the Google Blog. To learn more about how to use auto-caps and auto-timing, check out our help center article and this short video: Hiroto Tokusei, Senior Product Manager, recently watched "(HD) 夜のゆりかもめ（新橋→豊洲） 01."

YouTube and Kodak have teamed up to launch For Mom, a robust resource for anyone raising children today. The videos housed on this channel cover everything from cooking and parenting tips, to the best toys and games for kids, to easy ways to maintain your own health and beauty routine. There are even responses to some of life’s most difficult questions, like how much to pay the tooth fairy: Browse through For Mom (and come back often!) for more videos from YouTube partners who know a thing or two about parenting, including Better, Parents TV, Lifetime and popular mommy bloggers who expertly find humor in what's often called the hardest job on earth. Sadia Harper, Howto & Style Manager, recently watched "Things My Kids Will Never Know."

Anthropology professor Michael Wesch has the awesome job of studying YouTube and thinking about what it all means. We asked him to curate a playlist of his favorite videos, and he came back with an impressive list of clips that exemplify how the "wonderfully playful participatory culture" you've created manifests itself on YouTube. Four of those videos are on our homepage today, but he also wrote this thoughtful blog post to accompany his picks. Reading it, you'll get a sense of how a single video or person can create a ripple that swells into something so much bigger than ourselves. What I love about online video is the way that it has allowed more people to join a global conversation. Television was a medium whose content was controlled by the few and made for the masses. It created a one-way conversation, and you had to be on TV to get your turn. We have all been excluded from that conversation for so long, it is no wonder that so many people are now jumping in (over 1 million videos uploaded online every day by my count). One of my first favorites was Gary Brolsma's "Numa Numa dance," which he posted on Newgrounds.com in late 2004. When YouTube came along a few months later and made it so much easier for people to upload videos, thousands of people joined the dance. A search for "Numa Numa" now brings up over 125,000 videos, most of which are people doing their own rendition of the now-famous dance. And it is still going. [Recently], Brolsma led the Michigan State Band (and the whole stadium) doing the "Numa Numa." There is a wonderfully playful participatory culture popping up all over the online video landscape. A few days ago, I was having lunch with a guy who told me that he and his kids (ages 2 and 6) were working on their own rendition of blinktwice4y's YouTube hit "Mario Kart Love Song". When they are done, they will join hundreds of others who have also created their own rendition. And if you love participatory culture as much as I do, you might just

Every day, people with video cameras are changing the ways we get our news. We see it during elections. We see it during earthquakes, fires and other natural disasters. We see it on our freeways, in our schools and in our public spaces. Almost any event that takes place today has a chance of being captured on camera. As YouTube has become a global platform for sharing the news, media organizations have been looking for a good way to connect directly with citizen reporters on our site so they can broadcast this footage and bring it to a larger audience. That's why we created YouTube Direct, a new tool that allows media organizations to request, review and rebroadcast YouTube clips directly from YouTube users. Built from our APIs, this open source application lets media organizations enable customized versions of YouTube's upload platform on their own websites. Users can upload videos directly into this application, which also enables the hosting organization to easily review video submissions and select the best ones to broadcast on-air and on their websites. As always, these videos also live on YouTube, so users can reach their own audience while also getting broader exposure and editorial validation for the videos they create. Though we built YouTube Direct to help news organizations expand their coverage and connect directly with their audiences, the application is designed to meet any organization's goal of leveraging video content submitted by the community. Businesses can use YouTube Direct to solicit promotional videos, nonprofits can use the application to call-out for support videos around social campaigns and politicians can use the platform to ask for user-generated political commercials. The opportunities to use the tool are as broad as the media spectrum itself. Already, we've seen ABC News, the Huffington Post, NPR, Politico, the San Francisco Chronicle, the Washington Post, and WHDH-TV/WLVI-TV in Boston using YouTube Direct. We look forward to seeing

Today, we're shining the spotlight on the men and women who have bravely served -- and are presently serving -- in all branches of the U.S. military. Video has become a vital tool for current soldiers who are trying to communicate their wartime experience to the public and for older veterans who want to share their stories from past battles, like Lewis Bennett, the youngest member of the 84th District in World War II: In addition, on the homepage, we're featuring content from those institutions and organizations that provide much-needed support to veterans. For example, Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America has created a social network specifically for veterans and their families, while UCLA provides an adaptive sports therapy program for injured soldiers from the U.S. Army, including a regiment of rock climbing, wheelchair basketball, and table tennis. Here's a preview: To see more video content from soldiers and veterans, please visit www.youtube.com/veterans. Ramya Raghavan, YouTube Nonprofits & Activism, recently watched "Interview: Army Sgt. Valdez"

Earlier this year, we revealed the rapid growth in mobile video uploads to YouTube, largely spurred by the launch of powerful devices (like the iPhone 3GS and increasing Android adoption). Uploading and sharing mobile videos on YouTube are getting kicked up another notch with today's launch of the Verizon Droid by Motorola. The Droid is the first device to run the latest version of Android (version 2.0) and introduces some remarkable improvements: DVD quality recording and easier sharing: It is now possible to shoot DVD-quality videos and upload them to YouTube with a single flick of a finger. Droid is the first Android powered phone with DVD-quality recording, and it offers the ability to add effects like sepia, solarization and red tint to your videos. In addition, the new YouTube widget gives single-tap access to recording and sharing capabilities right from the home screen, making it even easier to broadcast those special moments or sights, or even silly ones like this video exploring six ways to have a fruitful finish to a lunch meeting: It's more like the YouTube you're used to: The controls on the new YouTube application on Android 2.0 now have a look and feel that's much more like the YouTube desktop experience. We've also added the ability to manage personal subscriptions in 'My Account,' and so now, with the ability to search, share, rate, comment and of course view videos, the on-the-go YouTube experience is closer to the one you're used to on your computer.High quality playback and brilliant screen: The Droid by Motorola has a brilliant 3.7 inch screen with noticeably high resolution and crisp colors: 854x480 pixels with 16M colors. The YouTube App on Android 2.0 plays videos in HQ automatically when you are on wifi, bringing the best possible YouTube watching experience to a mobile device. And if you are out of wifi range, you can still watch videos in HQ by selecting "Menu -> More -> Watch in high quality." Happy watching, recording and sharing --

We're happy to welcome a comedy legend to YouTube today, as Will Ferrell's comedy think-tank Funny or Die joins YouTube as a partner. YouTube viewers around the world will now have access to a collection of Funny or Die classics, plus a steady stream of new videos being uploaded each week.

As comedy fans know, Funny or Die works with some of Hollywood's top comedic talent to create a trademark blend of humor, celebrity and web originals. Jack Black, Natalie Portman and Lindsay Lohan are just a few of the famous names you can catch in hilarious Funny or Die sketches, and you never know who will show up next.

To celebrate this new partnership, Will Ferrell has selected his favorite Funny or Die clips for the spotlight on today's YouTube homepage. Here's a message from the man himself, and his Funny or Die co-creator Adam McKay :


Thanks, Will and Adam! So if you want to keep up with all things funny, "subscribe or die" to Funny or Die's new YouTube channel.

George Strompolos, Strategic Partnerships, recently watched "BAT FIGHT with Will Ferrell."