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From disastrous videos to cringe-worthy stunts, the internet never forgets! Join us as we count down our picks for the most excruciatingly awkward YouTube moments. Our countdown includes the infamous YouTube Rewind 2018, Belle Delphine's bath water stunt, Jake Paul's rap disaster, and more! Which YouTube fail made you cringe the hardest?
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00:00You know, if I controlled Rewind, I would want Fortnite and Marquez Brownlee.
00:06Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we're counting down our picks for the most excruciatingly awkward YouTube moments.
00:12Everyone else has gotten to speak for me, and I've yet to be able to tell this story from start
00:17to finish.
00:18Number 10, Call of Duty Infinite Warfare Trailer.
00:21The Call of Duty games franchise has existed since 2003.
00:24Since then, it's had its fair share of controversies, one of the most famous being their Infinite Warfare reveal trailer.
00:34It was the 13th game in the series, and they doubled down on making the combat more futuristic.
00:40Unfortunately, the fans hated this decision, instead wanting the series to return to its roots.
00:49It quickly became one of the most disliked videos in history.
00:52The developers decided to actually listen to their fans after this, with the following release being set during World War
00:57II.
01:02Number 9, Numerous YouTubers, Cinnamon Challenge Fails.
01:06Cinnamon is one of the most delicious spices, being a staple of countless recipes.
01:11As yummy as it is, eating raw powdered cinnamon is a horrible idea.
01:15What's so challenging about cinnamon? Really?
01:17It's extremely dry, which can irritate your throat, and lead to potentially fatal health issues.
01:22Despite this, people have made a challenge out of eating spoonfuls of raw cinnamon.
01:26It began in 2001, but peaked on YouTube in the 2010s.
01:30I'm using a regulation tablespoon of cinnamon, and I've got my emergency throat evacuator of water here.
01:36It got so out of hand, that at one point, it caused hundreds of daily phone calls to poison control.
01:41People were hospitalized, and it was all for the sake of following online trends.
01:45The moral of the story is, if you want your cinnamon fix, just have a cinnamon roll.
01:49The chemical in the cinnamon, while it may be good on the top of a cookie mixed with some sugar,
01:54it can be very, very damaging, not only to the swallowing tube, to the nasal passages,
01:59they're seeing nosebleeds, but also to the breathing tubes.
02:02Number 8, Rebecca Black's Saturday follow-up fail.
02:05If you were on YouTube in 2011, there's a close to zero chance you missed Friday by Rebecca Black.
02:10It's Friday, Friday, gotta get down on Friday, everybody's looking forward to the weekend, weekend.
02:20The comically poor quality track made her infamous, and quickly became one of the site's most disliked uploads.
02:25After four follow-up singles that gained little momentum, she dropped Saturday in 2013, featuring YouTuber Dave Days.
02:39Somehow, it ended up being more embarrassing than her debut single.
02:43It failed to make a splash, feeling like a lazy attempt to recreate her previous viral success.
02:48It's doubtful that Black cares anymore, though.
02:50As an adult, she started releasing music that's genuinely celebrated.
02:54This includes a hyper-pop remix of Friday, featuring some of the scene's biggest names.
03:03Number 7, Sadak 2 Trailer.
03:05If you're out of the loop with Bollywood lore, this scandal probably flew completely under your radar.
03:10In 2020, the trailer for the sequel to the 1991 movie Sadak dropped.
03:14While the film received little praise, it was mainly controversial for the director's alleged nepotism.
03:19The trailer came shortly after actor, Sushant Singh Dronjput, took his own life.
03:24People believed one reason he did this was that Bollywood was biased against him, since he wasn't related to already
03:30celebrated figures.
03:31This meant he's always had an immensely tough time landing roles.
03:35Fans called for a boycott.
03:36Plus, within 24 hours of its release, it became the website's most disliked video.
03:41Number 6, Gamer Girl Belle Delphine Bathwater Sale.
03:45In 2019, 19-year-old Belle Delphine became known globally for selling her own bathwater, marketed as Gamer Girl Bathwater.
04:00It was sold for $30 a jar, which sounded like a pretty overt scam, but it worked, and sold out
04:06in only three days at first.
04:07It felt like a desperate attempt for attention, but that's exactly what she got.
04:11I just kind of did it because I could, and I kind of wanted to see if I could.
04:16While there was major backlash to the stunt, it definitely worked, with the whole internet talking about her for a
04:21brief period.
04:22Really? The people who actually bought the product should be more embarrassed than Delphine herself.
04:26Well, I kind of like indulging in the insanity of what I'm doing.
04:31Number 5, Jake Paul, It's Everyday Bro Music Video.
04:34When you think of the worst rap songs written by a YouTuber, there's a strong chance It's Everyday Bro is
04:40the first you think of.
04:41This is Team 10, who the hell loves sipping you? And you know I kick them out if they ain't
04:46with the crew?
04:47Jake Paul and his content crew, Team 10, dropped it in 2017, and it was quickly met with overwhelming negativity.
04:54It's full of lyrics that are so awful, they're hilarious, making the track highly quotable.
04:59It's Everyday Bro, It's Everyday Bro, I said it's Everyday Bro!
05:04It's easy to miss the fact that it's a diss track which was aimed at Paul's ex-girlfriend.
05:08It was so prominent that it spawned a trend of YouTube drama being solved entirely with diss tracks, which has
05:14thankfully died down since.
05:15And I will see you tomorrow cause it's Everyday Bro! Peace!
05:20Number 4, James Somerton.
05:22Few internet figures have been criticized for plagiarism to the same extent as James Somerton.
05:27I feel like I have a pretty good view of the film industry from, you know, from a distance. A
05:34very far distance.
05:35He joined YouTube in 2011, then worked hard at becoming a popular video essayist.
05:40Turns out, most of this hard work was being done by other people.
05:43In 2023, he was accused of plagiarism and became a focus of HBomberguy's 4-hour video essay on the topic.
05:50And it quickly became clear he did do it. He's a massive plagiarist. In fact, there's a bunch of stuff
05:55no one else has found yet.
05:57He's just convinced his audience to attack people when they notice.
06:00Somerton released an apology, but he didn't accept full responsibility. Instead, he blamed someone else.
06:05He then mostly vanished until returning in 2025, but quickly repeated his mistakes and got himself chased off the platform
06:11once again.
06:12I also want to apologize to my audience, though. You trusted me to be a good representative of the queer
06:18community, and I was not that.
06:21Number three, React World. Reaction videos are a pretty simple format that everyone with a camera can do.
06:26Today, you are reacting to this.
06:29What is this?
06:30What is that?
06:32Uh, a computer?
06:33YouTube duo Benny and Rafi Fine created the lighthearted series Kids React in 2010, which snowballed into them creating tons
06:41of reaction videos.
06:42The brothers' success went straight to their heads, leading them to try to trademark reaction videos in 2016.
06:47We are excited to announce React World, which is a first-of-his-kind program that allows people and companies
06:52to license all our popular shows online
06:54so that anyone, even you watching right now, can create your own versions in a fully legal way and be
06:59part of a new and exciting global community.
07:01Responses were nothing but negative, and their reputations were decimated.
07:05The pair released an apology video soon after, but this damaged control was too little, too late.
07:10Their channels began losing subscribers, and then in 2020, their company was accused of maintaining a toxic workplace.
07:16We're sorry for confusing people by using terminology like our React format.
07:20We were never trying to say that every video or someone reacts to something else is something we would try
07:25to control.
07:26So, in 2021, they sold their content company and left YouTube entirely.
07:30Number 2. TanaCon Apology
07:33Tana Mongeau joined YouTube in 2015, then became so popular that in 2018, she had the brilliant idea of hosting
07:39her own convention.
07:40TanaCon was something I was excited about. It was a dream of mine that was finally coming true.
07:47This was because she was upset at VidCon not making her a featured creator.
07:51It ended up being a train wreck of a convention.
07:53Approximately 5,000 people came, then spent most of the events standing in queues beneath the harsh Californian sun.
07:59You don't plan a convention in two months.
08:02You don't put that many people's lives at risk.
08:07Little food or drink was provided, causing quite a few individuals to pass out.
08:11All these issues combined meant they canceled it on the first day before it properly began.
08:15She then released an apology that many found insincere,
08:18as she didn't take full responsibility and blamed other people for the disaster.
08:22I'm sorry if you came to TanaCon.
08:25I'm sorry if you had a sunburn.
08:26I'm sorry if you waited in line.
08:28I'm sorry you didn't get to meet your favorite creators.
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08:47Number 1. YouTube Rewind 2018
08:50When we think about the company YouTube's biggest blunders,
08:53few can top their disastrous 2018 Rewind.
08:56Yeah! It's Rewind time!
08:59Every year since 2010, they've been releasing annual recaps featuring all the website's hottest trends and memes.
09:05A lot of the early ones were a blast, with the 2012 one even featuring Psy.
09:09Over time, their quality declined significantly, and their 2018 release was appalling.
09:14Apparently, we control Rewind this year.
09:18Y'all, we can do whatever we want.
09:21Almost everyone hated it.
09:23Even YouTube's CEO said her children called it cringey.
09:26Many of the website's most popular stars were excluded,
09:29but instead, people like Will Smith and Trevor Noah were invited.
09:32They released one more in 2019, which was also disliked,
09:36so they cancelled Rewinds completely.
09:43Were there any other especially cringeworthy fails we didn't mention?
09:46Let us know in the comments below.
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