Forbes Magazine named Soulja Boy one of today's hottest new stars. Forbes reportedly researched the digital track downloads for the United States as well as album sales in 2007, and the first two months of 2008 as measured by Neilsen SoundScan.
Forbes tallied up their list by examining several measures of popularity and success. They looked the the top searches and downloads on peer-to-peer networks during the past 12 months as measured by BigChampagne, as well as press mentions as measured by Factiva.
Here's the conclusion:
"On top: Soulja Boy Tell 'Em, whose "Crank That (Soulja Boy)" was one of the biggest hit songs of the year. Soulja Boy (DeAndre Way, to his mom) got his first exposure by posting songs and videos on his YouTube and MySpace pages, which helped attract the attention of hip-hop producer Michael "Mr. Collipark" Crooms and eventually landed him a contract with Universal Music Group's Interscope Records.
To refer to "Crank That" as a mere "song" would probably underplay its multi-platform ubiquity. The official video racked up tens of millions of hits on YouTube and spawned a dance craze that prompted Soulja Boy to shoot an instructional video that generated more than 30 million hits of its own.
Then there were the countless spoofs and imitations that featured mashups of SpongeBob SquarePants, Dora The Explorer, Alvin and the Chipmunks and others. "Crank That" has also sold more than 3 million song downloads and more than 2 million ringtones. With that kind of reach, it was hard to escape the song's catchy refrain of "Yoooooo!/Crank that Soulja Boy, now watch me/Yoooooo!"
"Crank dat!"
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