Psy’s done it again. The snazzy, relentlessly over-the-top Korean pop star who took the world by storm with his “Gangnam Style” video in the summer of 2012 has gone and broken YouTube’s video counter.
"We never thought a video would be watched in numbers greater than a 32-bit integer, but that was before we met Psy,” YouTube said in a blog post. “’Gangnam Style’ has been viewed so many times we have to upgrade!”
Basically what happened was that the video – which features Psy sitting in a sauna, lying down in an elevator, dancing like he’s on horseback, and swallowing way more than the daily recommended dose of confetti – has been so outrageously popular that the view counter violated a basic computer programming protocol when it passed 2,147,483,647 views. That number, which is also prime, is a standard in 32-bit computer binary programming. When it’s passed, things can get loopy.
The video is by far the most watched YouTube video of all time, and it vaulted Psy to international stardom when it first debuted. Much has changed since 2012, when hitting 1 billion views seemed like a big deal.
"I can't compare it to anything else!" Psy told MTV when his video hit that (once impressive) number two years ago. "Because it all began with YouTube, and to have [the video] reach 1 billion views ... I don't think even I can break that record!"
By Wednesday morning, the "Gangnam Style" music video had racked up about 5 million additional views, with no sign of slowing down. Keep it up, Psy.
