Blog Post #1 “A Gift from the Interwebs”
I viewed this video a few hours after it was posted to Youtube on August 15th, and I immediately knew that it would go ‘viral.’ Now, one issue with this is simple; it is the mindless (yet entertaining) media on the internet that tends to become absurdly popular. Rather than having an educational and thought provoking video go ‘viral,’ we, as consumers of the colossal information superhighway, are left with videos of people eating cheeseburgers and cat videos. Now, I for one am not complaining, as they do satisfy me to no end. However, educational media on the internet is readily available and it is a waste of such a perfect resource to not enlighten the masses of global society with an academic viral video. Other issues arise such as creative expression. If one has the opportunity to use the internet as a tool to provoke the minds of others through creative ingenuity, and rather posts mainstream garbage that will generate a ludicrous amount of ‘hits’ or ‘views,’ yet yield no academic return is upsetting and definitely an problem. People of the internet need to encourage scholarly works to surface and go viral. It can help educate a number of people and positively affect the world.
7 responses so far
I agree and like the idea of a viral academic video. But I don’t think a video like that can make it viral because it requires focus and attention to understand it. These videos are all mindless humor that you can watch while eating or multitasking which makes them amusing. Trying to listen to a lecture while doing the same tasks just wouldn’t be the same and I don’t think most of America would appreciate that.
I definitely agree with you Chris, and that may be another problem with modern society. The fact that you just stated that most of America could not appreciate a provocative lecture upsets me. Also, focus and attention should be apparent in most of the people of America. Yet, as you and I can see by the content of the videos that go viral, attention and focus are not the prized characteristics of an internet video to the average American.
I agree with the views expressed here. We should use the powers of the internet for good! Or rather, more good. It’s not that there aren’t websites and videos and communities on the internet dedicated to the betterment of humanity — rather, the issue is internet use tends to be more focused on personal entertainment. There’s definitely a mindlessness to that kind of internet use, and it worries me. The internet should be used to promote thought, not stifle it.
All mainstream media is presented in a way that will attract our attention and entertain us. Therefore, an academic viral video must be packaged and presented carefully. And of course, that’s the tricky part — what organization would be willing to set aside funds for a project that could fail so easily?
Your idea of implementing an academic viral video inthe real world is a grand proposal, but I personally think that you are overlooking a large part of the internet hivemind. Looking back at many of the memes, videos, and pictures that have gone viral, you will see that these all have one thing in common. They become popular amongst the masses because they are simple. I think that you have failed to consider that a large portion of the word is still vastly uneducated and social technology aimed towards the academics would not be understood on a wide enough scale to facilitate a viral explosion.
One technique which has been implemented many times in todays digital age has been tangential learning. A technique where your presentation does not directly feed information to the viewer, but piques enough interest for him or her to explore the subject on his own. Think of how many people now know what kevlar is due to call of duty? I think we should explore new methods of educating the public rather than exploit this cultural phenomenon, because its driving force is conterproductive to the academic cause.
I completely agree. There is a ways to go before academic viral content would be misunderstood by the masses, which is why there is an issue. Maybe in a perfect world a hybrid of simple memes and scholarly content could co-exist somehow through the vast depths of cyberspace. Where tangential learning and traditional learning can work together and compliment each other to better the education of the masses. Maybe soon there will be a shift in the way we as people learn as a whole. Exploiting the resource would definitely be a bad idea and destroying the fun of the internet would be a terrible outcome. It still has to stay “cool.”
“…videos of people eating cheeseburgers and cat videos… satisfy me to no end.”
I find it amusing that this article connected fast food and chain restaurants and the topic of satisfaction came up. To what extent do they satisfy you? To what extent do they satisfy people in general? Is it genuine personal satisfaction, or merely transient stimulation of the pleasure sectors in our brains?
Ari – They satisfy me on a surface level. A level that is not academic, or scholarly; however, I do feel that this type of satisfaction is relatively needed to stay sane. All work and no play is not a good way to live life. So by being mentally satisfied on the non-genuine level, it allows me to find more satisfaction in a much deeper level of my psyche.