Did the Diet Coke/Mentos Guys Just Sell Out?

If you still haven't seen the Mentos-and-Diet-Coke-fountain video that came out earlier this year, congratulations. You are among the few, the proud—the ultimate YouTube luddites. Chances are, though, you know exactly what I'm talking about. Which makes what happened this week all the more interesting.

On Monday, Fritz Grobe and Stephen Voltz, the two backyard scientists behind the Diet Coke/Mentos experiment, released a sequel to their original phenomenon as the first Google “Sponsored Video”—a new program from our Internet overlords aimed at sharing ad revenue with marquee videographers. The new video (see below), in which the lab-coated duo initiate a domino-effect chain reaction with their famous two-liter Diet Coke fountains, features prominent linkage to coke.com and mentos.com, followed by a short message urging viewers to enter a coke.com-sponsored contest by submitting their own Mentos/Diet Coke–related footage.

The new Google program presents another potential solution to the challenge underlying the explosive popularity of online video: finding the best way to make money from the immense mishmash of user-generated clips. Grobe and Voltz made $35,000 on their first video’s massive viral success via Revver, a YouTube–like site that serves an ad at the end of each video and splits the revenue generated with you 50/50 based on how many times your clip is viewed. The financial details of their current deal with Google, Coke and Mentos are, so far, unavailable.

Unlike Google’s revolutionary AdSense service, which capitalizes on small amounts of targeted-ad revenue collected by millions of smaller sites across the Net, Google video sponsorship will be available only to large-scale content providers with more than 1,000 hours of content or broadcast exposure.

The question remains, though: Is this landmark arrangement a glimpse at the future of online video? Will the second video, with its unabashed commerciality, be as fun as the first one (which even without the obvious branding probably encouraged the sale of lots of Diet Coke and Mentos)? What do you think? Watch it below and let us know in the comments. —John Mahoney

Comments

[nclark]

This is amazing...I hhave personally tried some Coke and Mentos experiments, but I have never seen anything on nearly this scale. Not very many people try more than one, though I did see two Australians mxing Coke and gasoline with mentos and fire...not a good idea...

Nonetheless, great find. I always red the blog and website, and I suspect that I will soon get a subscription to Popular Science Magazine. Your sites, magazines, blogs, and other things write such fascinating things.

[Michelle]

I'll bet the ants are ecstatic.

[Neill Thompson]

Um, so what happens if you eat a Mentos afte drinking Diet Coke?

[Youngblood]

This is amazing, I have tried the Mentos and Coke rocket, and failed miserably. I should make some sweet videos like this

[Paelka]

This is a gr8 video! I was really amazed after watching this video! P'raps i can do this for someone's b'day...or maybe i should call those 2 diet/coke guys!

[smrgrl5]

Aw!!! All that Diet Coke... wasted!!! You could have fed me for a year!!

[ituloy angsulong]

Amazings experiments.. yeah i also see two australians mixing Coke and gasoline with mentos and fire. it is not good experiments.. nice work and done..

Mito :)
http://ituloyangsulong.blogsome.com

[Sam Zaydel]

Can you say a total waste of time? Whatever happened to performing experiments to discover something new that in some way benefits the world? Now, we are all about stupid useless tricks that do nothing for anybody. Calling this an experiment is a stretch. More a like a bunch of yahoos who could not cut it in school to get a real education in science. PopSci should know better, before blogging crap like this.

[Organic Chemistry]

I am sure someone has already posted this, but i understand that it is the gum arabic in the mentos that is causing the reaction...i wonder if anyone has tried pure powdered gum arabic and diet coke

[huigvhefnivhrw]

well i must say from the bottom of my heart that

this experiment makes me thirsty

[Sriram]

asdfasdf

[Diyetler]

It is strange but i also tried it really works in my garden .And it is real ...

[tj]

it was freaking awesome do it again

[Janet]

You are right, what was I thinking.

[lose 10 pound]

some people have a lot of time

[loss weight cure]

freaking awesome!

[InvestorBlogger]

It's difficult to study the long term impact... for websites like theirs it's very difficult to repeat that... How do you cash in on a one time phenomenon?
Unfortunatly, the splitting of the services is like a lot Google's new offerings, too. The smaller websites/bloggers get poorer quality offerings, lower revenue, and more hassle. Adsense is becoming like that, too.

Kenneth

[Vishal]

For those aspiring people wanting to get tons of website traffic and make money with videos on Youtube and Metacafe etc, read this detailed step by step instruction ... http://www.successonline.in/driving-traffic-from-youtube-and-your-videos/

[John67]

Love the menots diet coke experiment. Did it with my 4 year old this weekend and explained what a chemical reaction and how a volcano erupts. He was digging bigtime. We found another cool site with fun science experiments to do. Will post
the link below for anyone interested.

http://weirdsciencekids.com/FunExperiments.html

[mrkcee]

This is a classic. Although this is kinda old, never tried myself. Awesome nonetheless. :)

[fahrrad]

Dies ist ein großer Ort. Ich möchte hier noch einmal.

[generic viagra]

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[Neo Gold]

Man i have been following the diet coke and mentos experiment. I don't know how those scientists managed to submit those volcanic experiments to coke.com and mentos.com. Aren't these website owned by those respective brands. Why would they feature it if it harms their brand image.

[Lemonade Diet Pills]

Whether they sold out or not, doesnt matter, that video was pretty impressive! Dont know how they would top that. But as they said - wayyyyyyy too much free time.

[video glasses review]

You have to give it to them, that would have taken a lot of planning - and some of those fountain effects looked amazing!