There has recently been this phenomenon, “Let me advertise something since it went viral (バズったので宣伝させていただきます)” on Japanese Twitter.
Simply put, this is the act of riding on the wave of large traffic that had almost accidentally been caused. There should be some kind of algorithms running behind the logic of going viral on Twitter, but it’s very often the case that it doesn’t matter how many followers they have; how much money they make; whether they are a business man or not, in order for something to go viral on Twitter.
It’s often a simple image with a short text, sometimes a small gif movie, sometimes a plain text.
The ways things go viral on Twitter already suggest a new mode of attention distribution, but giving credit to the person who made a viral tweet and allowing them to advertise something that they truly recommend implies something totally different.
It is Contingency Web that could be obversed extensively on the pre-2006 Internet. For example, for the viral tweet above, the author (only took a photograph of this page of a comic) is a student from a college of technology (高専 [kōsen]） and s/he decided to advertise a platform suitable for code learning. Presumably, s/he doesn’t even own this website, just merely and purely saying it is a good place to go.
My question is, when algorithms on the web are becoming ever more sophisticated, what kind of interaction are we eager for? Are dating apps (including the ones using Facebook profiles) the ultimate form of human facilitation?
I don’t think so, in my opinion dating apps take away all the space for contingency to happen; there is no such thing as a contingent dating app.
The instance of “バズったので宣伝させていただきます” shows the possibility for overcoming traffic control by a relatively simple cultural protocol. We need to keep looking for opportunities like this and at some moment bind them all together to establish it as a movement.
ｲﾅﾘﾙｯｷﾝｸﾞｱｯﾄｼﾝｸﾞｽ inari looking at things 