If you’ve spent time on YouTube (which, if you’re a college student, you definitely have), you’re probably familiar with Dude Perfect. In fact, you might be one of their 47 million subscribers. In the last few years, their trick shot videos have dominated YouTube, making them one of the most subscribed-to channels. They’ve got a decent amount of skill and charisma, and now, thanks to years of growth and popularity, nearly unlimited resources.
Now, YouTube is in no short supply of trick shot videos. In fact, speaking from experience, any 12-year-old with a camera phone and a basketball hoop can make one. But deep within the decades of recorded video that can be found on YouTube lies a hidden gem of a channel that capitalizes on the premise of “trick shot videos.” What could become an overdone basis for a channel is given a fresh new spin (pun intended).
The channel I’m referring to is Pongfinity.
If you think the name Pongfinity is a bit goofy, just wait: it gets better.
The members of Pongfinity—Miikka, Emil and Otto from somewhere in Finland—spend their days recording themselves doing anything and everything you can with a ping pong ball, paddle and table. This includes but is not limited to: using musical instruments as paddles, using fruit as paddles, using exercise equipment to play, playing on a lake, playing a game using four tables, playing Jenga with a ping pong ball, and the list goes on.
This simple yet surprisingly captivating concept is further strengthened by one mere fact: the members of Pongfinity are good. Like really good.
Miikka, Emil, and Otto (which are all the most Scandinavian names I’ve ever heard) can claim a title that not even the members of Dude Perfect can. Pongfinity consists of professional athletes. Now I know I’m using the term “athlete” loosely; they are professional ping pong players after all. But their skill level alone qualifies them as athletes, let alone their dedication to the sport.
As I try to express how amazing they are at table tennis, I realize that nothing I say can do them justice. You just have to watch them. In fact, go watch one of their videos right now, after you finish reading this, of course.
There’s something so absorbing about the way they play. It’s intoxicating to watch experts perform within their area of expertise, and Pongfinity certainly consists of experts. They manage to do things with a ping pong ball that I didn’t even know were possible.
Occasionally, they’ll have a normal match between each other. No instruments, no fruits, just paddles, a ball and a table, and when they do, they turn this sport (sport?) that at its bare minimum consists of hitting a ball back and forth into a gripping, nail-biting competition for dominance.
And yet, throughout the match, they’re still friends. Because of the down-to-earth nature of the game, the platform and (probably most importantly) the players, Pongfinity’s videos never seem out of reach. I mentioned before that Miikka, Emil and Otto are from Finland, and they speak with heavy accents and are sometimes hard to understand. Quite frankly, they’re a little awkward most of the time.
Miikka is short and quirky, Emil is tall and gangly, and Otto looks like he’s more attuned to wielding a battle axe rather than a ping pong paddle. It’s these qualities that make this team so accessible. They are professional level athletes who haven’t been raised up on a pedestal of popularity. At the very most, they are low profile semi-celebrities that spend their time in a ping pong-table-filled gymnasium instead of a Beverly Hills mansion.
They aren’t overly charismatic and magnetic. They aren’t flaunting a chiseled physique or a wad of hundred-dollar bills on social media. They never spend too long daring you to “smash that like button” or subscribe, and it’s exactly this reason that makes their channel so endearing.
Even the likes of Dude Perfect, a haven of wholesomeness in the world of YouTube, has grown to such an extent that they’ve lost some of their “backyard trick shot” appeal.
Pongfinity’s efforts on YouTube seem less about building a media empire (like so many YouTubers have attempted) and more about sharing with the world something that they love doing. They’ve most likely spent hundreds of hours practicing to compete at an international level and out of those hundreds of hours probably spent one or two goofing off. It’s not an unheard-of leap to break out the camera and start filming.
In a world of internet celebrities presenting the most extravagant lifestyle imaginable, Pongfinity simply doesn’t. They’re too busy playing ping pong with a banana.
It’s this kind of content that I love to see and wish there was more of because it’s this kind of content that inspires other people. I know at first it seems like a stretch to say that something as simple as banana ping pong inspires people, but it’s exactly because it’s so simple that it does. It’s not lofty or profound and doesn’t really warrant that much praise. It’s just fun.
I think any creative effort should be at some level fun, both for the creator and for the audience. Pongfinity has found something that is uniquely fun, and they’ve shared it in a refreshingly fun way.
It’s this laid-back style that is so appealing. It’s what immediately draws me into a platform like YouTube. Maybe I’m looking through rose-colored glasses when I say this, but YouTube didn’t start as a way to chase fame. It didn’t start as a mini-Hollywood like many of the most famous YouTubers use it as today. It started as a way to share, a way to connect. It wasn’t a way to elevate yourself, but a way to relate with other people.
In Pongfinity’s videos, there’s an atmosphere of simplicity and authenticity that I think most people would agree is lacking from today’s world. At the end of the day, it’s just three friends with a whole lot of ping pong balls and a desire to make something fun.