Joseph Gohari
English 2150
Professor Graves
February 15, 2019
Viral Trends
In todays day and age the idea of becoming “viral” is the one of the top motives for millennials. It has become a popular motif amongst millennials to become viral as they share funny videos of themselves and are more inclined to take a video of something rather than live in the moment and experience it through your eyes. More millennials are ditching the books and are picking up the camera in hope of becoming famous on social media or any other platform. Whether the platform be for other people’s enjoyment or to speak out on social matters, virality has been sought out by the youth in every format. The pieces that really depicted this movement are “#selfie” and “Kanye” by the Chainsmokers and a YouTube video of the famous vlogger David Dobrik. These pieces fit the meaning of this zeitgeist “#selfie” talks about how millennials are fixated on self-obsession; Kanye which speaks about how people are so eager to become famous even if it means in a bad way; and a vlog by David Dobrik depicts different methods and extents people will go to reel in viewers. Both the songs and the vlog depict how the viral culture has shifted people’s mentalities into becoming more inclined to become a famous. After seeing how fame was so easily achieved by vloggers on YouTube like Dobrik, Trisha Paytas, Aspyn Parker, and the “Vlog Squad” millennials feel that it does not take much to become like them. Knowing that it does not take much to become viral, only using a camera. The Chainsmokers and David Dobrik both prove how the new millennial age has been based on virality and how one could achieve it through song and videos.
The rise of the selfie started when apple came out with the Apple iPhone 4 in 2010 which included a front facing camera allowing user to take the selfie and see yourself while your talking it. A study came out of 800 teenagers by the Pew Research Centre that found “91 percent of them posted photos of themselves online- up from 79 percent in 2006”. This study has gone to show that people are becoming more in tune with themselves allowing them to post freely and without any doubts. Selfies were always a thing whether it was profile pictures for myspace or Facebook but with the front facing camera users were now allowed to manipulate photos to make it seem more vibrant than it is. Soon celebrities began to flee towards the movement and so the selfie movement began. The selfie became so popular that it earned a place in the Oxford Dictionary.
The Song #Selfie characterized the whole selfie movement millennials were going through. In the year 2014 Electronic Dance Music (EDM) was at a popular demand which helped amplify the whole trend of virality. Song writers like Avicii and Calvin Harris Selfies have become a part of modern society and everyone can admit that they have at least taken one selfie, and it is not a bad thing. Nowadays, society sees self-love as a negative trait and often describe you as narcissistic, but the selfie means much more than that. allowing people to be comfortable with themselves and letting everyone know that they think that. Selfies allow people to express themselves through a simple photo where people can even complement others on their selfie. The selfie movement was a major part of social medias breakthrough and can further be exemplified through the song “#selfie”.
The song gained traction as it became the number 28 song on the billboard hot 100. After the song became so popular it was created into a music video where the fanbase of the song contributed to the video. Soon people all over Instagram and Facebook posted selfies hoping to make it into the music video. Included in the music video had famous actors and artist like David Hasselhoff and Snoop Dogg. The Chainsmokers asked the viewers to post selfies with the hashtag “#selfie” where they received thousands of pictures to place into the video. After numerous amounts of selfies flooded social media the Chainsmokers had enough content to create the video, accumulating over 500 million views. The song became viral and thus the music video as well proving they go hand in hand. The song itself has the viral impact on society the same way the Harlem shake did in that it started a viral movement where people from all over contributed by taking selfies.
The song begins with a woman speaking about a selfie she posted on Instagram and a guy named Jason whom she seems to like. While the woman was speaking the songs takes a lower beat to allow for her to speak until she iterates the famous line of the song “let me take a selfie”. After these words the song does what one would call a bass drop as the beat intensifies and no words are being spoken. As this happens numerous selfies are being shown throughout the video of actual fans and viewer submitted selfies through Instagram. Many of these selfies can describe why the whole selfie movement became such a fad. While looking at the selfie you can notice people taking selfies with facemasks, money, babies with mustaches, and many more. These over the top selfies have gained traction just because of their funny connotation. As well as the song “#selfie”, characterizing the selfie movement, they created the song “ Kanye”
The Chainsmokers have been successful with taking viral trends, making them into songs and becoming viral off that. While the song “#Selfie” talks about the selfie movement and how people became viral off their selfies, “Kanye” speaks about how most people want to “be like Kanye” with the outlandish comments he makes, making him go more viral. The song begins with a maid seeing the girls from the other video of the song #selfie leaving as she picks up a dress and a fur coat. When she puts on the outfit she changes from her regular maid job this more appealing woman. The song starts with the soft voice of a girl talking about how the woman never had an outgoing personality but once she put on the fur coat she became more confident when she said “one day ill stand with a crown on my head” meaning that she wants to breakout of her shell. The visual motif of the crown can be related to Kanye’s single “Power”, but the crown symbolizes Kanye’s attitude on how he feels like he is G-d. Kanye has seen the bitter side of virality as paparazzi remain to flood his life on the streets or even his private residence, but the song wants to prove the happier side of virality. Kanye has always been a monumental figure with his music and fashion sense. The songs line “I wanna be like Kanye” explains how people just want to become famous. Kanye appeared on TMZ and received a lot of backlash over his comments that “slavery was a choice” but this type of impulsive behavior has allowed him to become viral. Kanye has seen all parts of what virality can do to a person as he received a lot of critisicmn form his comments but the fact that the whole interview became so controversial, it got the public to talk about it. That’s viral does not always mean that you have gained attention for good things you have done but can also mean gaining attention for comments that most people do not see eye to eye to. People today have become more attracted to inflammatory comments because it allows people to talk about the subject at hand. When more people talk about it than that subject has become more viral. So as the song goes that the girl wants to be like Kanye it can describe how people want to become viral for the things they do and say and gain attention as fast as Kanye would. As well as Kanye, David Dobrik has found a different way in becoming viral.
David Dobrik is a vlogger on YouTube who has accumulated over 11 million followers on YouTube and over 7 million followers on Instagram. Dobrik first started off on vine which was an app that allowed you to take 6 second video clips of yourself. After his sudden rise to fame on vine David made a name for himself and when vine shutdown he took his talents to YouTube. He owns a channel called David Dobrik where he posts vlogs with his friends who call themselves the “vlogsquad”. David’s rise to stardom on YouTube was achieved with the help of his friends performing funny bits and acts to receive views. Each of his videos are 4 minutes and 20 seconds long which also refers to the smoker’s holiday of April 20th.
In one video in particular called “HE SNUCK INTO MY HOUSE!!!”, Dobrik and his used to be girlfriend Liza are performing a bit where Liza is acting as a man. The two make jokes and Liza’s acting steals the show until the video cuts to David to which he says, “If you went to Brazil and you didn’t make a montage, did you actually go to Brazil?”. Here you can see how the millennials have shifted their views of vacation. For older generations vacation meant time with your family enjoying every second away from society but clearly that idea has changed as now people can not go on a trip without documenting every experience they have on the trip. With the use of mini movies vloggers and people can now document there trip over a short film. Usually they will take videos of the fun parts of their trips and when creating a home video will often add a song in the background while the videos transition from one scene to the other. Dobrik is famous for his videos so it would make sense to video his trip, but documenting trips has become a viral trend where people want everyone to see how much fun they had on that trip. This has led company’s like GoPro to really excel because more people want to document their experiences rather than just live in the moment.
What Dobrik and many youtubers do to gain these viewers is a common trick with vloggers and that is the use of clickbait. Clickbait is similar with the selfie movement and how they use search optimized engines. Dobrik has made a living off clickbait as it became his modo and even sells merchandise such as pants and sweaters with the word’s “clickbait” on them. Clickbait is defined as “content whose main purpose is to attract attention and encourage visitors to click on a link to a particular web page”. The word itself explains itself as its designed to bait you into clicking the video. The picture on the video shows Liza in a disguise holding a knife to Dobriks face as he looks discouraged and scared from her. The image is enticing and gets viewers more inclined to open the video to see what happens in that scene while in fact this image or scene never appeared in the video. Clickbait has not only been used by David Dobrik but has also been used by YouTubers of all kinds. Many vloggers or video creators find more success putting pictures of scary or funny moments in a video and then use that as a thumbnail which is the still image on the cover of the video. Trisha Paytis uses clickbait by using seductive images where she flaunts her body enticing the viewers to click on her videos in hopes of seeing the curvy youtuber. Therefore, the connection is drawn to Instagram on how people use SEO’s to achieve more followers, likes, and views even when the hashtag has nothing to do with the actual picture.
Viral culture can be exemplified by these three artifacts because they all cover the areas of virality. In the “#Selfie” song, the Chainsmokers depict the selfie movement and how people gained popularity through selfies and how they can manipulate pictures in favor of the audience. The selfie movement has allowed SEO companies to prosper as more picture with hashtags with receive more views and get noticed. As well as this the Chainsmokers depicted another form of virality through the song “Kanye”. The song speaks on the fact that people want to be famous like Kanye and even if it means for the worst at times the fact of going viral lights up a switch in their head. Lastly, the vlog from David Dobrik describes two aspects of virality through clickbait and social media. Dobriks use of clickbait helps him gain followers by attracting them to click on his videos through interesting thumbnails. All these artifacts contribute to the overlying theme of virality. SEO’s and clickbait work in very similar ways so that people can gain followers and views in the easiest and fastest way possible.
Works cited
Chainsmokers, The. “The Chainsmokers – Kanye Ft. SirenXX (Official Music Video).” YouTube, YouTube, 28 Aug. 2014, www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ELh8eOzq_0.
Chainsmokers, The. “#SELFIE (Official Music Video) – The Chainsmokers.” YouTube, YouTube, 29 Jan. 2014, www.youtube.com/watch?v=kdemFfbS5H0.
Dobrik, David. “HE SNUCK INTO MY HOUSE!!” YouTube, YouTube, 8 Aug. 2016, www.youtube.com/watch?v=yv2CimNeZ8Q&t=124s.