All’s Fair in Love and War, but not the Internet
http://time.com/4672540/go-viral-on-internet/
For years, people have been using the term “viral” to describe an internet phenomenon in the form of a video or article that reached the screens of thousands upon thousands of internet users. However, a lot of our ideas about how videos, ideas, and articles go viral are false. The article “Why It’s Harder to ‘Go Viral’ on the Internet Than You Think” by Derek Thompson explains why the notion that a relatively unknown internet user achieved overnight fame through sharing a video or article is false. Videos, ideas, or articles don’t become viral by spreading from person to person until thousands of people have shared it. Rather, Thompson explains that Yahoo researchers “studied the spread of millions of messages on Twitter” and of these millions of messages, only a very slim percentage–about 1 percent–was “shared more than seven times.” Most of the content on Twitter that went viral came not from networks of ordinary people who shared the same tweet or video over and over again, but rather from its “original source or from one degree of separation.” Ideas, articles, and videos are spread primarily by “dark broadcasters,” which are sources such as celebrities or news outlets.
How is this article relevant to our class? Well, Thompson’s explanation of the truth behind “going viral” connects back to our discussion of information cascades. The “dark broadcasters” are “often obscured, blasts inside the information cascade.” These blasts are sources which are broadcasting certain pieces of content to a large audience. This article discusses how according to findings by Microsoft research, the term “viral” isn’t even the correct way to describe the phenomenon of the spread of a wildly popular video, idea, or article. Instead, the information cascade resembles a “bomb fuse–a quiet string of solitary shares followed by several explosions,” which, in the example the author was referring to, was in the form of “celebrity tweets.”
An implication of the truth behind the spread of information is the need for internet users to be cognizant of the articles, videos, and ideas that appear on their news feeds every day. With the rise of fake news and the waning trust in traditional news outlets, people have turned more to social networks such as Facebook. However, users must be discerning about what ideas and content they are consuming. Several of the articles that readers are exposed to on these networks aren’t being presented to them because they possess an “inherent truth or interestingness.” Instead, “broadcasters with hidden motives” are promoting these articles and ideas. Further, the idea that videos and ideas become popular primarily through these dark broadcasters reflects how the internet is not at all a democracy. The widely-believed notion of ordinary people achieving instant fame through a “viral” video is but a pipe dream.