Youku has actively sought to promote interoperability with other services. In May 2011, Youku announced Youku Link, a cross-platform synchronization service allowing users to share social aspects of the Youku experience – including comments and favorite videos – across outside social platforms like Sina Weibo, Renren, and Tencent QZone. Other social initiatives have included Youku Classroom, which adds the power of Sina Weibo’s microblogging platform and Dict.cn’s English-Chinese dictionary to educational videos hosted on Youku’s servers, and Youku Music Box, an intelligent, socially aware music video player.

Commenters on the video have pointed out that Sister Cake isn’t just counting the cakes: they’re sold by weight — that is, customers will come in and ask for five kuai’s worth of cakes — so she’s actually estimating how much the cakes weigh while she zips them into the bag. Other commenters have suggested that she might turn a better profit by applying her “skilled hands” to “other things.” Still others have expressed their amazement through Chinese proverbs — 熟能生巧 (basically, “practice makes perfect”) being the most common.

When I say little, I do mean little — at least for the moment. The channel collects Hollywood films from a variety of genres that can be streamed in China, but the selection is a bit thin at the moment, comprising just over 2,000 titles. Some are free, and some cost a nominal fee. The collection ranges from top-flight hits (Juno, The Karate Kid, Twilight) all the way to films that are doing their best to imitate China’s shanzhai spirit (Titanic II, Allan Quartermain and the Temple of Skulls, Alien vs. Hunter). The latter may not really scream “Hollywood” to Americans, but they are from the US, and they’re certainly Hollywood-inspired, even if they aren’t exactly A-list.

It’s nice to be able to watch Inception at a moment’s notice — probably most Youku users are more excited about that than Alien vs Hunter — but it’s the bad films that make me feel at home. I’ve been something of a bad film connoisseur since I saw the straight-to-VHS slasher Uncle Sam, and I’m probably one of the few people who has gotten some enjoyment out of the latter half of M. Night Shyamalan’s career. But whether you prefer good films or, uh, “alternative” films, there are some options.

The channel is definitely worth checking out, but since I’m sure you’re curious, I’ll settle one mystery for you right here. What did Youku users think about the “sequel” to Titanic, one of the most beloved movies of all time? Titantic II — which has no actual connection to the original Titanic — has been viewed over 15,000 times already and is rated 4.7/10. That’s not exactly a great rating; on the other hand, it’s a higher than the Rotten Tomatoes rating so apparently Chinese viewers are a bit more forgiving than critical Western audiences. Perhaps this and other B-movies will find a second market here in China.

Check out Titanic II below, or click through to browse the Hollywood channel for something slightly less budget.

As you’ll learn in the video, Zhang was a bit rebellious in his youth. He smoked — even holding smoking contests with his friends and inhaling so much that he passed out — and got kicked out of school repeatedly. At 13, he left home and put it all on the line in Beijing, passing out cassettes to record labels in hopes of scoring a deal. It worked out, and now he’s one of the best known — and more important, most respected — names in the Chinese music industry.

Video Link

In this video, we see a calmer, more reflective side of Zhang; an older man who has accomplished his goals looking back on his rebellious past. He’s tired of that story, he says, ready to move on to new things. He’s traveled to the top of the music industry and now he’s even made a short film about love, commitment, and the meaning of happiness for Youku’s new Youku Original short film series, “One Step Away.”

Zhang is one of six creative stars from professions other than film who are taking a dive into film production, and his short film will premiere on Youku later this summer.

It looks like Youku users are just as excited for Zhang’s short film as we are, because this bio has been viewed nearly a million times. Together, the six directors’ bios have gotten nearly 9 million views so far. Keep an eye out for the films themselves, which are coming very soon!

Today marks Youku’s fifth anniversary. In his remarks on the occasion, CEO Victor Koo looked back at the emergence of online television in China, and reflected over the steps Youku took along its rise to to the top of the new industry. In addition to the company’s development of partnerships with film and television production and distribution companies, Koo highlighted Youku’s moves to foster paike (video bloggers) and promote grassroots talents and up-and-coming young directors as crucial elements in making Youku the company it is today.

Mr. Koo also touched upon Youku’s goal for the next five years, which include:

• Continued improvements to the Youku user experience. Youku will not only work to improve all aspects of its offerings, from user-facing systems to back-end systems, but will also move beyond being a simple conduit for content by developing new products that will further personalize the user experience and drive user engagement, whether on traditional computers, tablets, or mobile terminals.
• Creating mutually beneficial partnerships with television and film organizations. Youku already enjoys productive partnerships with a number of studios, production companies, and distributors, and will seek to build its library of content by expanding these partnerships in the future.
• Raising brand recognition. Rather than relying on traditional methods like advertising campaigns, Youku will make itself a ubiquitous part of the Chinese internet experience, no matter what platform netizens use or what devices they use to get online.

Some of the milestones Mr. Koo cited in his look back at Youku’s growth:
(continued after the break)

• 2006: Launching in beta in June, Youku is the first Chinese online video company to work with television stations, and is the first to develop its own proprietary backend technology as part of its first-mover advantage strategy.
• 2007: WIth the slogan “anyone can be a paike,” Youku begins heavily promoting paike culture nationwide. By the end of the year, Youku begins seeing more than 100 million video views per day.
• 2008: Under Partnership Plan 1.0, Youku joins with television stations and media companies to develop content partnerships and agreements that will benefit all links in the video industry chain. In November, Youku premieres Hip Hop Office Quartet, China’s first web serial.
• 2009: “Project Niu Ren,” a Youku plan to highlight grassroots talents, brings people like Xidan Girl and Xiao Bao to the attention of the internet community. In March, Youku launches Online Theatre, featuring licensed, near-simultaneous HD broadcasts of popular television shows. In May, Youku celebrates World Telecommunications Day by launching its 3G mobile portal.
• 2010: Youku releases Youku Index, becoming the first online video site in China to offer real-time viewership tracking. In April, the company announces Youku Original, a new plan for the financing, production, and distribution of original content. Youku Original sees major successes in November with Old Boys and Miss Puff’s Goldfish Bowl.
• 2010: Youku unveils Soku, a redesigned search engine that allows users to search through videos across different Chinese platforms, and presents results in a clean, easy to use interface. And the year’s not over yet!

One of today’s top videos on Youku is of students at the #5 High School in Xiangfan, Hubei province shredding their textbooks into confetti and showering the schoolyard with them — a tradition at the school, according to the video description. Being a bibliophile, I hate to see books damaged — but I have to admit, it’s pretty hard to blame them:

(A couple of years ago, Steven Lin posted a video of students in Hanzhong, Shaanxi province ripping up their textbooks after the exam. Great minds think alike, apparently.)

This was one of the most watched videos last week. Videos showing clashes between the haves and the have-nots of Chinese society are invariably popular with netizens, who look at things like the famous Li Gang hit-and-run case, the video of a girl being picked up from college by helicopter that went viral earlier this year, and any number of other videos on the theme of “rich people behaving badly,” and conclude that the wealthy and connected are held to a different standard of conduct.

Then again, there are reasons to be suspicious of this video. A couple commenters say the whole thing was scripted, and when you go back and watch it again, it seems almost too perfect — nearly tailor-made to inspire class rage in Chinese internet users. Consider the almost perfect symmetry of it: the expensively dressed blonde in her BMW against the humbly dressed woman (of approximately the same age) in her junkbox Karry; the loud anger of BMW Woman next to the quiet unhappiness of Karry Girl. And BMW Woman’s final insult, taken straight from the bad-guy playbook of every Hong Kong movie ever, of throwing a fistful of money into the poor woman’s face, and then the closing shot of Karry Girl crying at her steering wheel. It’s a perfect little vignette, and the consensus among viewers seems to be that if it’s not true, then it should be.

Then again, if it’s a viral ad, who is it advertising? What’s the subtext? “BMW: the preferred car of unpleasant nouveau-riche mistresses?” “Karry: only worth it if a rich person runs into you?”

…to flashy demonstrations of athletic prowess… (check out the roller-skaters, starting at 4:17)

…to the almost obligatory Michael Jackson tribute…

…to a trio of foreign sinologues performing a rap song they composed in Chinese.

Check it out!

One of our paike shot this video of a father and son in Yushu, the impoverished region of Gansu that was hit by an earthquake last year, and the way they get to and from school. We saw paike video on this topic recently, but while those kids were just walking over a totally depressing tumbledown bridge, these guys are riding a motorcycle across a zip-line over a fast-moving river. Basically the only thing that could make this sweeter would be some crocodiles waiting below.

So I guess we’re supposed to feel bad about this, but I’m having a hard time feeling anything but envy. That kid is going to grow up to do great things. He’s already approximately a million times more badass than I am.