I had a spare moment today so I made a list of the top 12 Forest videos.
There's nothing subjective about this. The list is determined by just one criteria – the number of views.
Sadly, no Forest video has ever gone viral. If we achieve four figures that's a good result.
What may surprise you though is the identity of our most watched video, which I have posted last so you'll have to scroll down.
Note: The dates given are the dates the videos were uploaded to YouTube. Where there is an event involved, it may have been up to a week earlier.
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Mark Littlewood in Conversation with Simon Clark
1,025 views • May 28, 2019
This was one of two events - the other being the gala dinner at Boisdale of Canary Wharf - that marked Forest's 40th anniversary last year. I wasn't sure if there would be much interest in an event like this but there was a good turnout and I hope it was reasonably informative and entertaining.
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Smoke On The Water, Forest boat party
1,116 views • July 8, 2013
Our annual boat party ran from 2011 to 2017. Guests included MPs, parliamentary researchers and others working within the Westminster bubble. This video includes soundbites from our guest speakers, Philip Davies MP and David Nuttall MP, plus the IEA's Chris Snowdon who said, "It's undeniable now, absolutely undeniable, that the anti-tobacco blueprint is being rolled out to every other industry that may cause some possible risk." He wasn't wrong.
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Dr Neil McKeganey – The Pleasure of Smoking
1,239 views • February 27, 2017
Neil McKeganey, director of the Centre for Substance Use Research in Glasgow, was the lead researcher and author of 'The Pleasure of Smoking: The views of confirmed smokers'. We invited him to give a short talk about the report ahead of a balloon debate on the subject 'The Best Nicotine Delivery Device in the World'.
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Forest Freedom Dinner
1,529 views • July 3, 2012
The Freedom Dinner at Boisdale of Canary Wharf ran from 2012 to 2017. In 2012 guest speakers were journalist James Delingpole, Claire Fox (Academy of Ideas) and General Sir Mike Jackson, former head of the British Army. The video also features post dinner interviews with guests on the smoking terrace overlooking Cabot Place.
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Amend the Smoking Ban – House of Commons reception
1,744 views • July 12, 2011
To support the Save Our Pubs & Clubs campaign, 200 guests including artist David Hockney attended a reception organised by Forest and hosted by a cross-party group of MPs on the terrace at the House of Commons. Among those interviewed were former Lib Dem MP Lembit Öpik, jailed landlord Nick Hogan, Paul Staines (aka Guido Fawkes) and Hockney himself.
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An Evening of Plain Speaking on Plain Packaging
1,881 views • March 3, 2015
In 2015 opponents of plain packaging of tobacco came together for An Evening of Plain Speaking on Plain Packaging hosted by Forest at the Institute of Directors in London. Over 120 guests were joined by representatives of some of Britain's leading thinks and campaign groups. Despite the serious nature of the subject, the event itself was great fun.
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Ella Whelan, Voices of Freedom Awards
2,673 views • June 29, 2017
At the Freedom Dinner in 2017 we hosted the second Voices of Freedom Awards. Ella is a former assistant editor of the online magazine Spiked and in the previous twelve months she had developed a significant media profile which probably explains why this clip of her acceptance speech got many more views than those of our other award winners. The video also features Claire Fox who added her own appreciation and presented Ella with the award.
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Fight EC Proposals on Tobacco Control
4,168 views • December 11, 2010
It feels like another age but long before we set up Forest EU in 2017 we were doing our best to fight EU proposals on tobacco control from the UK. This campaign video was designed to elicit support for a petition against EC proposals on tobacco control. Contributors included Mark Littlewood (IEA) and Eamonn Butler (ASI). This version, part of which was filmed at the Eurostar terminal at St Pancras Station, also includes some of my many bloopers ...
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Save Our Pubs & Clubs – launch event
6,903 views • June 29, 2009
In June 2009 Forest launched a campaign to amend the smoking ban introduced in England two years earlier. Guests at the launch event in a Westminster pub included celebrity chef Antony Worrall Thompson, the Rt Hon Greg Knight MP, inventor Trevor Baylis, a pre-IEA Mark Littlewood and several publicans. Nigel Farage also made an appearance but he's not in the video.
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Amend the Smoking Ban
13,606 views • July 5, 2009
Before the Freedom Dinner at Boisdale of Canary Wharf Forest hosted two summer parties at Boisdale of Belgravia. This was the second, in 2009, when guests included former model and actress Lorraine Chase (who gave us the perfect soundbite at the end). The event also promoted our campaign to amend the smoking ban and the video begins with our great friend Ranald Macdonald, MD of Boisdale Restaurants.
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Hands Off Our Packs - Nanny Town
16,265 views • March 5, 2012
With the Government is set to announce a public consultation on whether the UK should adopt plain packaging of tobacco, Forest launched the Hands Off Our Packs campaign. Our first campaign video featured contributions from HOOPs director Angela Harbutt, the IEA's Mark Littlewood, director-general, IEA, and Sam Bowman of the Adam Smith Institute among others.
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The Burning Question: Why Did You Start Smoking?
16,841 views • March 6, 2014
Surprisingly, perhaps, this is the most viewed Forest video EVER. Like many of our videos it was filmed by Dan Donovan. This one features contributions from a number of smokers in Dublin and was part of our campaign against plain packaging in Ireland. DVDs featuring the video were sent to ministers and other parliamentarians.
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PS. You can view most of our videos on YouTube here.