The Force Is With YouTube

Darth Vader may be dead, but his brother is alive and well on YouTube, and has made a couple of former cable-access producers something of a force. Focusing on the power of YouTube to launch entertainment careers, the New York Times chronicles the adventures of  Aaron Yonda and Matt Sloan, whose Star Wars parody about grocery-store manager Chad Vader have been viewed more than 19 million times since July 2006.

In a new "professional partnership program," the pair is now sharing ad revenues with YouTube.That's allowed them to quit their day jobs to make films full time and pay the production crew for the show’s second "season." But they're not leaving Madison, original home of The Onion and the site of their weekly stand-up gig: It's no longer necessary to go to Hollywood, they say, to have an entertainment career. (More Chad Vader stories.)