Re:Viral effects are not network effects
by mc32 on Thursday October 08, 2020 @10:32AM
(#24719393)
I think something viral is something transient and isn’t “repeatable”. Network effects allow things to be repeatable and is leverageable. Viral effects aren’t so leverageable. Viral effects do rely on network effect though.
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Re:Viral effects are not network effects
by Pet_Ant on Thursday October 08, 2020 @10:39AM
(#24719460)
That doesn't answer the GP's question about choosing between the two.
All I can imagine is what kind of marketing efforts you fund. Do you try to pay partners to integrate or do you go for a viral ad with a celebrity.
I don’t think you can choose. From the way I see it, virality is an emergent phenomenon. You cannot “make” it viral. Virality happens—except with artificial virality via ‘bots.
So to get back to the question I don’t think one can choose natural (uncoördinated) virality. A celebrity takes advantage of their graph on a network but it does not ensure virality at all. Virality is a property assigned by the ephemeral viewership as that item strikes a harmony with the mood of the network members —which isn’t predictable. Obviously if something natural catches on, you’ll have copycats trying to replicate the effect to ride the wave of the original. For that to work you have to weave your message to fit into the phenomenon without seeming too artificial.
Re:Viral effects are not network effects
by 082349872349872 on Thursday October 08, 2020 @12:24PM
(#24720648)
With normal probability theory, one can calculate that for neutral-fitness (R=1) potential viral things, the chances that a particular one will spread are small — but those few that do spread significantly hit (in order to maintain that average R=1) an arbitrarily large proportion of the population.