Talk Social To Me: The Language of Social Media is Social Media Itself

CherryChoogles presented Reddit with this very interesting query a few months back:

Which got me thinking. We talk about social media in our real world lives a fair bit – I admit that I have brought up Facebook posts in conversation when I talk to my friends about other friends. It’s how I find out a ton of crap about people I used to go to high school with – you know, the fuel for gossip. But social media pervades our lives even deeper than that.

Social media has become not just the topic of our talk, but a part of the language itself – we talk about how we talk using words related to the medium through which we talk. The message is the medium. And if that’s not confusing enough, check this out:

OMG, I liked your status yesterday about the Vine of that YouTube video. I even tweeted it. I saw it again on Tumblr today and reblogged it. Did you know the channel guys are doing an AMA on Reddit tomorrow? IMHO, it’s gonna go viral and totally pwn Gangnam style. I mean, Bieber doing the Harlem Shake and Miley twerking together can’t compete. It’s #awesomesauce

Anyone care to one-up me on this? Some of my favourite from the Reddit thread are:

Q: What’s the most absurd sounding sentence/paragraph you can make that would completely baffle someone from just a few decades ago?

Bonus Q: Do you think this language shift a bad thing? For language, for my generation for … anyone?

Extra Bonus Q: Has this happened before? Can you think of an example of other medium specific jargon that has seeped into common usage from bygone eras? 

Related articles

• How to Become a Social Media Expert (istitutodiplomatico.wordpress.com)
• About Mindless Social Media Contests And Who Is To Be Blamed – Brands, Agencies Or Contest Players? (business2community.com)
• Three Ways Companies Blow it With Social Media (blogs.wsj.com)

 

The Medium is the Dumb Way to Die

The medium is the message … literally. A YouTube video goes viral and Facebook will post it around, a news site will blog about it which will then get tweeted and then the creators of the video will host an AMA on Reddit to discuss the coverage and how the traffic it brought in made their website crash. All because one little video got 38 million views in it’s first month.

Anyone remember the ‘Dumb Ways to Die’ campaign from a while back? Melbourne Metro Trains put out a YouTube video then supported it through other online channels like Tumblr and a website, posting up .gifs, stats and the like. Then they released the song on iTunes and a follow up app for both iTunes and Google Play which was very popular.

The video exploded on the internet, most news websites and trade, TV, print, radio, etc. covering it. A humble, lowly YouTube video became the talk of the world, a status which was in turn talked about through social channels.

And so the social medium becomes the social content which is pushed through more of the social medium which … You get where I’m going with this, right? It’s the social circle of socialness.

Aside from DWtD, I also really like the ‘Unlock the 007 in You’ video or anything by RedBull really. 

Q: What has been your favourite marketing campaign in the social circle of socialness?

Bonus Q: Do you think any of these viral videos / social campaigns could work in another medium – ie. a more ‘traditional’ channel? 

 

 

Related articles

• “Dumb Ways to Die” Is Not That Dumb (ireneshennyu.wordpress.com)
• The Importance of the First Fifteen Seconds of A YouTube Video (rpmcommunity.com)
• GTA V Meets ‘Dumb Ways to Die’ in YouTube Parody Video (adage.com)