5 Viral Videos That Will Inspire You To a Greater Vision of Life

Videos on the Internet really run the gamut, don't they? Short-form to long-form, LOLCats to TED Talks. My favorite clips to share, like the pinnacle of any art form, inspire their audience to a greater vision of life -- a vision of what's possible that they might not have had before. Free of narrative constraints that govern traditional media, these short films excel by telling meaningful stories in unconventional ways. Mike Sellers, game designer and AI researcher, recently shed some light on our evolving means of storytelling:

We literally have the ability to tell stories in ways not possible before this in human history. Plays, books, radio, movies and TV all changed the way stories were delivered, but not the fundamental structures of the stories told or the relationship between the storyteller and the audience. With immersive, open-ended, multi-user worlds, we no longer have one teller and many listeners; instead we have thousands or millions of points of view in the same world at the same time, creating meaning out of their actions and events in the world. With this, for the first time we have the potential to create new kinds of stories: stories that, in one way to put it, are asked, not told.

Here are five videos that, in my opinion, ask the best kinds of stories.

Last Day Dream, by Chris Milk

Nuit Blanche, by Arev Manoukian

Creep, by Alex Heller

Words, by Everynone

LA Light, by Colin Rich