Bearded and bespectacled, Juan Mann evokes the spirit of the 60s as he holds up a billboard offering "FREE HUGS" indiscriminately to passers by in his hometown of Sydney.
Since the video was first posted online on September 22nd, 2004, it has now been viewed more than 22 million times. Now, the idea of delivering a "random act of kindness" to a complete stranger has grown into something of an international craze.
Similar videos have sprung up on YouTube showing beatnik "Free Hugs Campaigners" from around the world throwing their arms around bemused passers-by.
In October 2006, a college student, Yu Tzu-wei, began a campaign in Taipei to "hug everyone in Taiwan".
Since then the movement has spread to the US, Europe, and in 2007 it spread to Britain. However it has not always been welcomed everywhere.
In November 2006 a group of eleven people led by a twenty-four year old man named 'Baigu' tried the same campaign in Shanghai, only to be detained for one hour for not having a permit to hold a gathering in a public place.
Mann himself encountered difficulty with police when his campaign first got off the ground, and was only allowed back on the streets after gaining 10,000 signatures for his Free Hugs Campaign.
In an interview, he told The Epoch Times: "There are active Free Hugs Campaigns in over 80 countries around the world and I've heard of people offering free hugs pretty much everywhere. While some cultures aren't keen on the concept of public affection, behind closed doors, everyone loves a hug."
He said that it was in 2004 that he first started offering free hugs. "At the time, I was depressed and lonely. I'd lost my family, friends and fiancée," he said. "I wanted to do something simple that would make me smile. Of all the things I thought of doing and did, offering free hugs did something I didn't expect. It made other people smile as well."
In his video, as in most other free hugs videos on YouTube, "huggers" at first get weird looks or share only awkward embraces, but as they warm up, others warm to them. One of the mottos of the free hugs campaign is "you get what you give".
Mann said: "One of the nicest things about being hugged by a stranger is knowing that there are people out there who aren't so bad after all.
"There is nothing more reassuring than to have a complete stranger come up to you, squeeze you into their arms and then disappear into the crowd. Every day I walk past so many people I've met, hugged and laughed with before. They may still be strangers, but they seem... approachable, now."
He added: "From week to week, people I hug will tell me stories of how important the hug we just shared was.
How they just got fired from a job and need a hug. How they just got engaged and wanted a hug. How they just got diagnosed with Alzheimers and really need a hug.
"People motivate me to hug people. Knowing that such a simple act of human kindness can mean so much to someone in a time of need inspires me to keep offering free hugs." Mann has put together a book about the benefits of hugging available online, which is, predictably, free.
But considering the popularity of hugging, would he ever put a small price on his famously warm cuddles? "Only if the warehouse that makes my hugs increased the cost of hug production and passed that on to me," he said.
"The idea of charging somebody for a hug is pretty ridiculous. You can't put a price on value."
Anyone who has experienced the tut-tutting and elbow-jostling of London's Underground may initially balk at the suggestion that you would get a warm reception offering hugs on the grim streets of England's capital.
Mann himself acknowledges there are people who may think offering hugs is "a little weird" but says that they are entitled to that. "If we live in a world where it's wrong to show a little kindness, then I wouldn't want to be right," he said.
All videos from the free hugs campaign, no matter where in the world they are filmed, are accompanied by a song called "All the Same" by Australian band Sick Puppies, whose lead singer spotted and publicised Mann after seeing him in a shopping centre in Sydney. The song has become synonymous with the indiscriminate way hugs are handed out to strangers on the street.
"Juan Mann", is incidentally not the real name of the founder of the Free Hugs Campaign; it is a homonym of "One Man".
He explains: "It came about from me telling people that who I am wasn't important, it was what I did that was. I am just one man, I could be anybody."
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