Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption An extract of the video that's been viewed millions of times 
 
 A YouTube video of a protester in Ukraine has been viewed 3.5 million times - are we seeing the rise of the viral video protest? 
 
 In the three months since the start of the Ukraine crisis, there have been countless videos uploaded to YouTube. But none has had anything like the impact of a video called "I am a Ukrainian". In it, a young protester stands on the street in Kiev on a cold dark night. She addresses the camera directly and simply. "We want to be free," she says - in English. The courts are corrupt, she says, and politicians are behaving like dictators. The video has had thousands of comments, with people writing from around the world to express solidarity - from Egypt to Kashmir to Turkey. 
 
 But some of the comments on the video are critical, calling it one-sided "propaganda" which focuses on violence by the police - and mentions nothing of violence by protesters themselves. The woman in the video is a student called Yulia, who has been involved with the protests from the start. Her message is simple, but the production is slick. It was edited and uploaded by an award-winning US filmmaker, Ben Moses, who met Yulia in Ukraine as part of a documentary he is making about protest movements around the world. 
 
 This is not the only "protest" video to go viral this week. One called "What's going on in Venezuela in a nutshell" - posted on YouTube by a Venezuelan-American - has been viewed more than two million times. "We're seeing more and more of these kind of protest videos," says Melanie Peck from VAN, a London-based agency which specialises in making and "seeding" viral videos. Unlike the Ukraine video, the Venezuelan one is basic in its production. It has a simple voiceover and a slideshow of images and videos sourced from social media. On YouTube, having a "home-made" feel can be an advantage, as it adds to the sense of "authenticity", Peck says. Videos that do well present information in a "bite-sized" format and come with a "strong call to action" for people to share them. "It's about making people feel like they are making a difference," she says. 
 
 Reporting by Cordelia Hebblethwaite 
 
 All our stories are at BBC.com/trending 
 
 Follow @BBCtrending on Twitter and tweet using #BBCtrending ||||| Published on Feb 10, 2014 
 
 Check out the new documentary about Yulia, "Witness to a Revolution" 
 
 https://www.iamaukrainianmovie.com 
 
 
 
 Yulia Marushevska filmed by Graham Mitchell in Kyiv. 
 
 Some Maidan footage thanks to Babylon 13. All other footage captured from various Internet sources. 
 
 
 
 
 
 Like us on Facebook: 
 
 https://www.facebook.com/pages/I-Am-A... 
 
 
 
 And follow us on Twitter: 
 
 https://twitter.com/IAmAUkrainian 
 
 
 
 To find out more about A Whisper to a Roar, visit: 
 
 http://www.awhispertoaroar.com 
 
 
 
 To see more of the Maidan and the people who are protesting there, please visit this website: 
 
 https://www.facebook.com/maidaners1
– A deal is in place in Ukraine to end the bloodshed, though whether it will stick remains an open question. In the meantime, the Daily Beast takes a look at the woman it calls the "viral heroine of the Maidan," referring to the area in Kiev where protesters have gathered. She is identified only as "Yulia," and her anti-government "I Am A Ukrainian" video on YouTube now has close to 6 million views, most coming in the last week. "I want you to know why thousands of people all over my country are on the streets," she says in the video over images of violence. "There is only one reason. We want to be free from a dictatorship." If the video looks slick, that's for good reason—it's from American filmmaker Ben Moses, notes the BBC. Moses, probably best known as the producer of Good Morning, Vietnam, tells the Huffington Post that he came across Yulia in Ukraine while working on a film about democracy. She "personifies the vast majority of the people on the streets in the country, and speaks to the heart of the protest," he says. Yulia tells the Daily Beast's Deborah Stambler via Skype that she "doesn't feel happiness" about the video "because the price is too hard. I dreamt to create something else, not this." She is no longer in Kiev because of her family's concerns about her safety.