What makes an online video hit?

NewTeeVee asks a pertinent and long overdue question with some interesting results:

• Does three million plays of Kate Modern over a month make it a hit or a miss?
• 100,000 views say execs at Revver, Funny or Die and Heavy.com — who also point to other metrics such as how much a piece of content is being talked about, forwarded or embedded in users’ sites
• Three to five million in the first week, say JibJab, creators of This Land  (> 80 million plays to date)

Just for perspective: last week’s top-rating show on U.S. cable was The Hills on MTV, drawing an audience of just over three million viewers, albeit using the lacking-in-accountability measurement system which has propped up TV nets for so many years.