Written by Liz Shannon Miller
Posted Sunday, September 14, 2008 at 1:20 PM PT

Will It Spread? Tina Fey as Sarah Palin on SNL

With the return of Saturday Night Live, we’re bringing back this feature — because no other pop culture entity has been so good to viral video.

Will It Spread? Palin/Clinton Open, SNL

What’s It About: Saturday Night Live coaxes Tina Fey home for the cameo people have been demanding since day 1 of Sarah Palin’s appearance on the national scene. Amy Poehler, as Hillary Clinton, calls Palin out for her “Tina Fey glasses.”

Premiered: Sept. 13, 2008

Viral Qualities: Ladies and politics are a lethal combination, and in a few short weeks Sarah Palin has cornered the market on this particular zeitgeist.

Star Power: I’ll say it: Tina Fey just is the coolest. Even if her accent is more Fargo than Juneau.

Drawbacks: The back-and-forth comparing of Clinton and Palin’s political backgrounds and the treatment each has received from the media is pretty funny — but a lot of this material has already been covered. (Though, to be fair, not on national television.)

Mash-up Potential: Depends on how you define it. It’s unlikely that anyone will choose to riff on this particular short — but that’s because they’re all already doing their own Palin impersonations.

Current Viral Status: 88,668 views on NBC.com within twelve hours of its premiere.

Spread-factor (scale of 1-10, 10 being Lazy Sunday): 8. It’s one voice in the chorus of people mocking the governor of Alaska — but it’s the star soprano.

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Topic: Online Video

Comments (6)

Well NBC made sure all the Youtube Vids got taken down today so every blog started to embed the NBC widget which could be a viral strategy in itself especially when the Widget serves Ads

Matt_ — 3:11 PM on September 14, 2008 Reply
It was the best skit on SNL last night by far and I think it will be Viral Platinum overnight.

Tim Street — 6:05 PM on September 14, 2008 Reply
I think the Fey for Palin movement is growing:
http://bofads.blogspot.com/2008/09/sarah-palin-faces-new-challenge.html

McGarrity — 7:06 PM on September 14, 2008 Reply
dont see how you can measure the success if you cant find it on youtube. widgets aside, youtube is still king of short form content and limits playout in this environment kills a lot of growth.

this isnt to say it wont spread or reach high numbers using alternate methods — just that you cant expect to be able to compare this to other “youtube-allowed” content that has gone viral

John — 7:39 AM on September 15, 2008 Reply
With out this parody, SNL is CRAP. I watched on Saturday Night and fell asleep. 1 for x number of skits is bad. SNL needs a major makeover – looks like SNL should hire a few outa work Wall Street workers – I bet they have some great stories to tell… about how they fleeced the American public with lamo motgages and then had to eat their own words and companies

Also Good for NBC for Pulling contnet from YouTube. – YouTube is a video parasite – and a large one at that.

Bob Leisure — 3:10 PM on September 15, 2008 Reply
Hmmm…might Tina Fey be the real Sarah Palin?

Kristin White — 10:24 PM on September 17, 2008 Reply

Linkbacks (7)

[...] Tina Fey as Sarah Palin on SNL [...]

Nailed It: Tina Fey as Sarah Palin on SNL… — 4:29 PM on September 15, 2008
[...] story than Hurley’s post. Even after a barrage of copyright claims by NBC Universal, clips of Tina Fey’s Sarah Palin impression from Saturday Night Live persist on the site. Like, really [...]

YouTube’s Copyrighted Past Still a… — 10:55 AM on September 16, 2008
[...] Poehler to Star in Web Series for Girls Hot on the heels of her skit with Tina Fey as Sarah Palin burning up the Internet, Amy Poehler will launch and star in a new web series for young girls. [...]

Amy Poehler to Star in Web Series for Girls… — 10:28 PM on September 17, 2008
[...] Did Sarah Palin Laugh at Tina Fey? Gov. Sarah Palin’s record and political positions have been under close examination over the past few weeks, and as a result, a startling number of inconsistencies have emerged. For example — did she enjoy her send-up at Tina Fey’s hands on last Saturday’s SNL? [...]

Did Sarah Palin Laugh at Tina Fey? «… — 3:04 PM on September 18, 2008
[...] Gov. Sarah Palin’s record and political positions have been under close examination over the past few weeks, and as a result, a startling number of inconsistencies have emerged. For example — did she enjoy her send-up at Tina Fey’s hands on last Saturday’s SNL? [...]

WizReport » Did Sarah Palin Laugh at… — 8:58 AM on September 23, 2008
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SNL Planning Its Own Video Site « NewTeeVee — 7:35 AM on October 13, 2008