Viral Videos

    Is there anything sweeter or anything more bitter on the internet than a viral video? Think about it. While the cat falling, man dancing, or thing happening is getting traction and it is the first time you've seen it then it is fantastic, hilarious and almost life changing. We can agree the whole Harlem Shake phenomenon was, at the very least, entertaining the first time we saw it. Then we got to enjoy the fox song video... ok, maybe not every viral video is awesome the first time you hear it.


   An article about what makes these videos go viral by the New York Times explains that their ability to catch on and turn into the viral videos we come to love or hate is based off of well... love and hate. In their words happy and sad emotions are the key factor. But not just normal happy and sad, we are talking about the extremes of both emotions. It would be safe to assume that happy would encompass the funny and hilarious videos out there. Obviously there are hundreds of opinions as to why the video are as successful as they are in whatever setting the come.

   The setting itself should play a role as well. There are many different media or sources that feed into the viral video world. Some examples include large companies, small companies, viral video makers, random person, random camera timing, etc... And on top of all of those the video could've been intentional, accidental, or intended for one purpose and took off for another. As for the company and commercial videos Thales S. Teixeira says the key is to help the sender as much as it does the advertiser. Whatever that means...

   Now to the real question, what the heck is a viral video? Think about it, we use the phrase, "it went viral" all the time but is there really a moment when that happens? If we are talking about a city then a couple thousand videos could be considered viral. In a state it could be several million. Getting up to a country it could be hundreds of millions and with the world it could potentially be over 1 billion.

   But does that even imply the volume of its reach will get to everyone it could have? For example, while I was on my mission the KONY 2012 video came out and I still have no idea what it is or really what it is about. The same thing ended up happening with the fox song video. I eventually watched the video but only for about three seconds before I got bored and moved on with my life. And are TV shows viral video?.. Food for thought.