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History of the YouTube Drinking Community



In early November 2007, 40oz Crew member nitz011 posted a random video clip of himself drinking a 40oz. He didn't drink the whole thing, he wasn't speaking to the camera, it was just a couple minutes of random footage of him drinking a 40 with a buddy of his, neither of them actually talking to the camera. Not only did he post that video, but he also suggested something that would forever change the course of history. nitz011 suggested that the 40oz Crew start a "40oz Malt Liquor TV channel". Not an actual TV station, mind you, but done online in a way where 40oz Crew members could post drinking videos for each other.

Enter 40oz Crew member satan165. No matter what satan165 is interested in at any given time, he always focuses and dedicates himself completely to the task at hand. satan165 immediately grabbed the bull by the horns and started 40ozMaltLiquorTV, by creating and posting the very first 40ozMaltLiquorTV video and creating a page on his website where 40ozMaltLiquorTV could be featured. Now obviously this isn't the first time someone posted a video of themselves drinking beer on the internet. YouTube already had some random videos of random people trying to chug beer. satan165's video was, however, the first 40oz malt liquor video done with a social networking purpose. It wasn't just a video of him drinking a 40. It was a video of him drinking a 40 for the viewers who were other 40oz drinkers. satan165 uploaded the first actual video for 40ozMaltLiquorTV on November 8th, 2007 - exactly 6 years ago today (I didn't make my 1st video until 9 days later, on 11/17/07)!

40ozMaltLiquorTV's purpose was simple. It was for the 40oz Crew, by the 40oz Crew. The 40oz Crew are the members of the forum of this very website. We know each other very well via the forum, where we talk about much more than just drinking malt liquor or 40oz bottle collecting. We've been meeting up and drinking beer together, across the world, for over a decade now. In our 40ozMaltLiquorTV videos we would talk about whatever we felt like, while drinking a 40oz. It was never originally intended that you had to finish your 40 within the (at the time) 10 minute YouTube video time limit, but it became a sort of unspoken rule and was eventually pretty much expected of you. Soon many 40oz Crew members were making videos with each other as the intended audience.

However, given the public nature of YouTube videos, other people started joining in. People who weren't technically "40oz Crew" but still wanted to make drinking videos like we were, since they had been watching ours. Some members weren't happy with the fact that others were now also making "40oz Crew" or "40ozMaltLiquorTV" drinking videos. By this time 40ozMaltLiquorTV was now a featured part of 40ozMaltLiquor.com. Back then YouTube had a feature where you could create playlists containing up to 200 videos and embed them elsewhere. I was creating and featuring these playlists on the 40ozMaltLiquorTV "channel" of this website but as more and more people started making drinking videos regularly, it became more and more of an overwhelming task trying to keep up. Soon there were well over 1,000 40ozMaltLiquorTV/40oz Crew drinking videos on my site and I just couldn't keep up. The YouTube functionality was infuriating back then, because every time I added a new video to a 40ozMaltLiquorTV playlist it would be at the end of the playlist and I'd have to manually move it up to the front, so that new videos would appear first on the website. 40ozMaltLiquorTV had gotten too big for its own good as thousands of drinking videos now flooded YouTube.

YouTuber jayyjjay was one of the first people who started making YouTube drinking videos not tied to the 40oz Crew. In several of his videos he would be drinking with his real life friend cowboyintn1979. While jayyjjay had no problem downing a 40 quickly, cowboyintn1979 wasn't particularly into rushing through his beer, or 40s in general. So on September 1st, 2008, cowboyintn1979 created the Beer Drinkers United, a group in which you could drink whatever kind of alcoholic beverage you wanted in however much time you wanted.

Another major difference between the 40oz Crew and the BDU was that the BDU's home base, the place where they were born and where every member would originate, was right there on YouTube. No longer did anyone have to feel "left out" or "not a part of" the 40oz Crew, whose main internet domain was outside of YouTube. The BDU was created on YouTube, for YouTube drinkers. In the beginning, the BDU attracted mostly southerners. Drinkers from Texas, Tennessee, and Alabama rose up from the YouTube matrix and grew this social community of their own, where they'd form friendships, meet up, and get to know one another much like the 40oz Crew.

We've all seen what happens when you have two similar "crews" trying to claim the same piece of turf. Especially online turf. When 40oz Crew member Quagz420 (who didn't even make drinking videos) came across a video of BDU member BlackMetalTroy322 drinking a 40 with his black metal face paint on, he posted it on the 40oz Crew forum with a "thumbs down" emoji. A BDU member who was lurking on the 40oz Crew forum saw this, made a video calling out the 40oz Crew, and all hell soon broke lose. Crew members from each faction were soon making videos towards the other, making fun of each other, and trolling each other. This continued for a long time until things escalated to the point where some 40oz Crew members tried calling and harassing a BDU member, which led to BDU members calling and harassing 40oz Crew family members. Once internet trolling reaches "real life", that's when it's officially no fun for anyone anymore. This all led to the majority of 40oz Crew members wanting absolutely nothing to do with YouTube anymore, a feeling which several years later still exists to this day. Similarly, the BDU decided to move their "online drinking" to a more private venue as well, and started drinking together on webcam via ooVoo.

Fast forward many years later, in the ultimate irony, Quagz420 and BlackMetalTroy322, the 2 people who inadvertently sparked a 40oz Crew/BDU war, met each other and drank 40s together at the 10th annual 40oz Crew Meeting of the Minds.

During these years other crews and factions have come and gone on YouTube as well. Some were created by people who for one reason or another didn't fit in with the 40oz Crew or BDU (whether they felt like they didn't want to be a part of them, or were kicked out), or by people who were looking for funny little sub-groups to start (such as the LDU: Laundromat Drinkers United).

Nowadays, YouTube drinking videos are still going strong, and people are still drinking together on ooVoo as well. The difference is, there is no more "crew" mentality. The 40oz Crew and BDU made amends before going their separate ways, and people simply just started posting their drinking videos to YouTube for the other YouTube drinkers to see. That isn't to say everyone gets along - this is YouTube after all. Try drinking a craft beer, or worse yet, a homebrew in a YouTube video and see what the malt liquor purists have to say to you.

Happy birthday YTDC!

-Bruz40
November 2013
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