I’m coining the term Trashy Viral to describe the spread of thought-provoking let ultimately useless ideas. These are memes that might be entertaining (like “chimpanzee riding on a Segway”) or just plain media-catchy with little underlying value (”Twitter is 40% useless babble”).
The aforementioned study by relatively unknown firm Pear Analytics went viral after a sensationalistic and completely uncritical Mashable story by Jennifer van Grove set the wheels in motion. The incredibly unscientific, subjective study gave readers a list of unsatisfying out-of-context numbers that ultimately have no use to anyone with a serious interest – you know, like the color-coded Department of Homeland Security terror alert system.
Hey, good for the company – people like me are talking about them, I suppose. And the blog and mainstream media love a controversial story that looks scientific, calls out something beloved, and has no concrete conclusions. But if I were the CEO of a shop like Pear Analytics I would find this amount of negative criticism embarrassing rather than a “call for refinement of the research study.” But I think there’s a mile of difference between something going viral because it’s deliberately useless and going viral because it’s accidentally so.
August 25th, 2009 at 2:53 pm
Kind of reminds me of the term Goverati
– but all together true none the less, and I think its only going to get worse.
August 25th, 2009 at 3:00 pm
Sure, maybe Goverati was an example of Trashy Viral. But at the end of the day it was just a word. In the case of Pear, I don’t think Trashy Viral is a great way to market a services corporation.
August 25th, 2009 at 6:05 pm
What is useless to one is of value to another.
August 25th, 2009 at 6:07 pm
Yeah, I guess so Joan: a lot of people do like trash.
August 26th, 2009 at 1:40 pm
Mark, more than anything, I found this a curious example of how influence works. Mashable currently has a high level of street cred in the business. If they put something in front of their viewers, its going to get a lot of attention – regardless of whether its deserving of such attention. However, Mashable needs to carefully monitor and maintain their influence – and if they continue to push out swill, this will damage their brand.
I kind of think this is a direct parallel to how politics works, don’t you think?
August 26th, 2009 at 1:44 pm
Chris, absolutely. A major reason I don’t currently write for Mashable anymore is that they are focused on the 12 posts a day get the news out fastest for the most hits possible style of “journalism”, which can often come at the expense of quality thinking and writing.
August 26th, 2009 at 3:53 pm
So what’s the answer to the problem? How do we get people to spread ideas that matter?
August 26th, 2009 at 3:59 pm
Re: How do we get people to spread ideas that matter?
Call out BS when you see it. Its the only way.
August 28th, 2009 at 4:33 pm
Now *this* is a social media study that is worthwhile, rigorous, and thought-provoking (just as a timely comparison): http://blogs.harvardbusiness.org/cs/2009/08/will_the_real_myspace_users_pl.html
September 3rd, 2009 at 3:39 pm
There may be little marginal value in a comment that just says “good point,” but, I like how you captured this aspect:
“And the blog and mainstream media love a controversial story that looks scientific, calls out something beloved, and has no concrete conclusions.”
New to your work, following you now, looking forward to learning together.
A.J.