When South Korean pop star Psy released his “Gangnam Style” video in 2012 it spread like wildfire. Researchers at Indiana University Bloomington tracked the spreading meme by following how Twitter users shared the video with friends and strangers alike. By the time 200 tweets had linked to the video among the subset of Twitter users studied, “Gangnam Style” had already reached 86 different communities of users (blue nodes). After 3,000 tweets the meme had spread to nearly 1,000 different communities (green). “Gangnam Style” soon became the most-viewed video in YouTube history; by late 2013, the video had amassed more than 1.8 billion views.
Graphic by Jan Willem Tulp, for Scientific American SOURCE: Lilian Weng (Companion data set to “Virality Prediction and Community Structure in Social Networks,” By Lilian Weng, Filippo Menczer and Yong-Yeol Ahn, in Scientific Reports, Vol. 3, Article No. 2522; August 28, 2013)
On supporting science journalism
If you're enjoying this article, consider supporting our award-winning journalism by subscribing. By purchasing a subscription you are helping to ensure the future of impactful stories about the discoveries and ideas shaping our world today.
Great science journalism requires human expertise, time, effort and creativity. And it costs money. That’s why I and the journalists here at Scientific American hope you’ll join our community.
When you subscribe, you are supporting staff and freelance journalists who are passionate about telling science stories that are true, important and compelling. Our editors and reporters are often experts in their fields, which means they understand the nuances of big discoveries and can untangle the breakthroughs from the hype. With a subscription, you are also supporting rigorous fact-checking to ensure the words we publish are precise and accurate. And you’re supporting original illustrations, graphics and photos that bring you closer to an advanced laboratory, an ice sheet in Antarctica or a space mission in orbit. You’re helping us craft other types of high-quality journalism as well: Our newsletters are carefully written, edited and curated by staffers you have or will come to know and love. Our Science Quickly podcast is based on original reporting, collaboration with editors and scientists and exacting production.
Subscriptions keep this engine running so we can continue to deliver thoughtful, rigorous and independent science journalism to you. In an era of viral misinformation, this work is crucial. If you value what we do, I hope you’ll consider joining us as a subscriber
Thank you,
Jeanna Bryner, Editor in Chief, Scientific American
