“Gangnam Style” was the first video to hit 1 billion views on YouTube, a milestone it reached last December. Though arguably less catchy, Psy’s followup video “Gentleman,” a unique blend of pounding beats and fart jokes rumored to be an elaborate commercial for Candy Crush Saga, is now also breaking records on YouTube.
The video-sharing site announced that “Gentleman” has set the record for the most views ever in a single day with over 38 million hits on April 14 alone, making it one of the biggest online music video launches ever. To put the figures in perspective, “Gentleman” was seen 100 million times in less than 4 days worldwide, a milestone that took “Gangnam Style” nearly two months to achieve.
“Gentleman” also breaks the previous single-day record set by the now infamous KONY 2012 video in March 2012. The documentary, produced by Invisible Children, hit 31 million views on March 7, 2012.
According to YouTube, “Gentleman” became April’s top rising search on the site almost immediately after it launched, with global results peaking on April 14. It also debuted at number one on YouTube’s music chart, bumping “Gangnam Style” down to second place.
“Gangnam Style” made its YouTube debut on July 15 and knocked Justin Bieber’s “Baby” off of top place in November–a place “Baby” had held since its debut in February 2010. If “Gentleman” keeps going at its current pace, it represents another windfall for Psy. Google’s chief business officer Nikesh Arora revealed on the company’s fourth quarter earnings call that “Gangnam Style” had generated $8 million in revenue on YouTube alone, or an average of 0.65 cents every time someone plays the video. Since the creator of a YouTube video keeps about half of the money, that means Psy and his record company probably earned about $4 million from “Gangnam Style” alone.
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