"Going Viral" is something that people who are promoting a product like, a lot. They seek to induce it. Formerly, if there was a video about the product, and something about it caught great numbers of people, the makers marveled at their good fortune. Now, they might create the video with that in mind, asking their creative types What's edgy? What's hot, these days? And then they work those concepts into a video -- or tune, or image -- that promotes their product. Sometimes, they seek to play with your mind, as with the advertising for a television series that started with what appeared to be a billboard-sized note from an aggrieved soon-to-be-divorced wife -- but wasn't. The concept behind the plot of a Michael Douglas film, years ago, was that there was a secret game, and if you were hip enough, you'd be invited to play -- but the game was so hip, it wasn't at all obvious that it was a game. That was much of the appeal: you were in on something that the noobs, the muggles, weren't.
Sometimes, going viral's not so great. A kid in Florida, a first-grader, was bagged for bringing a camping tool to class -- a combination knife, spoon, and fork. The knife contravened the school district's zero tolerance policy on weapons, and he was to be sent to a reform school -- they had a nicer name for it -- for forty five days to have this problem resolved. Several hundred people, hearing of this on the web, expressed their dismay, astonishment, and, of course, outrage over this, and the district backed down, limiting the punishment to three days of suspension.
Sometimes, going viral serves a good purpose, as when people connected with the political process, or became informed about health care. Sometimes, it doesn't. Any bets that this post will go viral? Me, neither.
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