Business

This story originally appeared in Saturday’s edition of The Washington Post:

Catch Kevin Wu’s latest comedy program on YouTube, and you might think he’s nothing more than a young Asian American talking to a camera in his bedroom. But almost each of his shows command at least 2 million views — rivaling the nightly TV audiences of Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert.

A disproportionate share of YouTube’s top personalities are minorities, a striking contrast to the most popular shows on mainstream television, where the stars are largely white. These minority-produced, home-grown shows are drawing massive audiences — the top one has 5.2 million subscribers — enough to attract the attention of major advertisers.

On Wu’s videos, ads for Mazda and Toyota pop up. Michelle Phan, a Vietnamese American beauty guru, who ranks 20th among YouTube’s most popular channels, has become a spokeswoman for Lancome. YouTube declined to reveal how much such producers earn, but it says hundreds of them make at least six figures annually.

“A lot of U.S. marketers are leaving minority audiences on the table,” said Seneca Mudd, the director of industry initiatives at the Interactive Advertising Bureau. “Advertisers would ignore that trend at their own peril.”

Facebook announced Monday that it will acquire the photo-sharing software company Instagram for the sum of $1 billion.

The announcement was met with a flurry of responses on social media, including hundreds of photos on Instagram and tens of thousands of shares and likes of the original post by Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg.

Read reactions of social media users, plus official statements from both Facebook and Instagram:

On Monday Apple finally announced its plans for how it would start using its huge $98 billion cash hoard. The company said it will begin paying investors a quarterly dividend of $2.65 per share, and it will start a $10 billion share buyback program later this year. The two moves will total $45 billion over three years, The Post’s Cecilia Kang reports.

So, it looks like it’s tough luck for industry analysts who wanted the tech giant to use its money to buy a space station similar to Darth Vader’s Death Star or go into the perfume-making industry.

If you had $98 billion in your coffers, how would you spend it? Give us your idea – serious or not – in the comments, and vote for your favorite post by clicking on “Recommend.”

We asked Twitter users to share their $98 billion aspirations using the hashtag #98billion. Here are some of their responses:

Feed everyone in Africa #98billion

— Amirah A. (@mirdy_goozies) March 19, 2012

@washingtonpost I'd burn it. That's far too much money for any one person to have. #98billion

— Trevor Hultner (@thultner) March 19, 2012

If I had #98billion I'd get it in $1 bills and do a Scrooge McDuck cannonball into them.

— Peter Pietrangelo (@ppietrangelo) March 19, 2012

If I had #98Billion I would buy a 1968 Shebly GT 500 and donate the rest to the National Park Serivce & railroad preservation.

— Rob den Hartog (@ziggycurrans) March 19, 2012

@washingtonpost make it $100B. #98billion

— Thomas Prehn (@T_Prehn) March 19, 2012

Apple is unveiling its latest iPad Wednesday at the Yerba Buena Center in San Francisco. The Washington Post’s Hayley Tsukayama is reporting on the event. Follow her tweets below.

Related:

iPad’s pricing part of a meticulous, long-range strategy

Apple CEO Tim Cook introduces the new iPad during an Apple event in San Francisco, California March 7, 2012. (ROBERT GALBRAITH - REUTERS) Apple announced today that it is releasing a new version of the iPad, its popular tablet computer. Tell us here whether you’ll buy it.