Back in April, a young bike rider and his film-maker house mate posted a video of his riding exploits on YouTube. 8 weeks later, Danny MacAskill now has a full-time job riding demo’s and has appeared in a video for the Doves. Oh, and 7,840,271 views.

It is interesting that a movie of the nichest of niche sports went viral like this – 8 million views is a massive achievement. An amazing talent obviously helps, but it was down to a small, very specialised community spotting that their non-bikey pals would find this amazing. I even sent it to my mum.

That is a lot of exposure for his sponsor – even if most of the viewers are not going to buy a bike from them. No prizes for guessing where their marketing budget is going to be spent this year.

Even if you are not into bikes, take a look at this guy’s sheer nerve and creativity on a cycle. I guarantee you’ll be forwarding the link within minutes!

He tells his story in this month’s MBR magazine.

PS. The view count has gone up by 2000 since I started writing this.

Stuff I wish I had thought of from Brazilian sound production company, Saxsofunny.

Via Andy, via formfiftyfive.

YouTube has added the option to watch videos in HD.

Any uploaded movies that are wider than 720px will give you the option to watch in High Definition.

Take a look at this…

Click here to view the embedded video.

Be warned, you need a pretty fast connection. If it’s too slow, YouTube won’t even show you the ‘watch in HD’ link.

Bring it on.