The Channel of Beeps and Rectangles
In 2014, people discovered a YouTube channel with hundreds of thousands of videos, each showing red and blue rectangles moving to a series of beeps. Was it a secret code?
What was reported
In 2014, internet users noticed a YouTube account called Webdriver Torso that had uploaded hundreds of thousands of short videos since 2013. Each one showed a few red and blue rectangles jumping around a white screen while electronic tones beeped at different pitches.
The videos had no explanation. Theories spread quickly: a spy numbers station, a code, alien signals or a strange experiment.
Explanations offered
Google, which owns YouTube, revealed that the channel was used by its engineers to automatically test video upload quality. The simple shapes and tones made it easy to compare how videos looked and sounded after processing. YouTube later added in-jokes about it.
- When
- Noticed in 2014
- Where
- YouTube headquarters, San Bruno, California, USA
- Witnesses
- Internet users
- Status
- Explained
Famous cases are real, widely reported events. Each file sets out what witnesses said and the explanations that have been offered, without taking a side.
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