This Was Supposed To Go Viral

About a year or so ago, I was crushing a set of lateral pull downs at the gym, when an anecdote hit the airpods and floored me. It was from Derek Thompson’s 2017 book, Hit Makers: The Science of Popularity in an Age of Distraction. You see, jamming out to intellectuals while catching a shvitz is sorta my thing. I bench to Malcom Gladwell, row to Atomic Habits, and as you now know, toss around the free weights to Derek Thompson. But back to the anecdote. It shows up right in the introduction. Thompson tells the tale of a German (maybe Austrian) lullaby. Generation after generation, this lullaby was passed down from mother to child and so on. But this lullaby was only sung in a few German (maybe Austrian) towns and concert halls. Nobody else knew it existed. That was until the late 1800s when immigrants set sail for America. The lullaby was then sung to babies on the decks of crowded passenger ships and in bunks of lower Manhattan tenement houses. By the turn the of the century, this German lullaby might as well have gone platinum. You couldn’t find a baby who didn’t bop to that shit.

Why? It was simple.

While the lullaby was a banger, it was a certified put-your-crying-baby-to-sleep-no-brainer that had absolutely no chance of ever making its way to more than a few thousand people…until it was broadcast to immigrants from Ireland, Italy, and Greece, all packed together and hearing this German tune putting little Klaus to sleep. Many would adopt it. Some would even venture west, This Land is Your Land style, spreading this narcoleptic anthem across the nation. It took over a century for a good idea to become…viral.

And because of that, Thompson argues that viral is a misleading term. Nothing becomes popular from a game of 1 to 1 telephone like the worldwide COVID-19 global pandemic. Movements instead need a turbo charged 1 to 1,000,000 broadcast for any chance of popularity. This German (maybe Austrian) lullaby was nothing for years. But suddenly, it bacame a 13-year-old Canadian on YouTube named Justin. The overcrowded ships and tenement houses filled with immigrants in search of the American Dream? I guess we’ll call that Usher.

Terrifying. Why? Because this was supposed to go viral. I believed that one of you would forward it to someone and then they would forward it to someone else, and then all of the sudden, it would turn into one of those email chains of dirty golf jokes you get from your uncle. But Thompson’s lullaby anecdote damn near convinced me that it would never happen. It never has happened. So what the hell have I been working toward?

It’s a question not just internet men like myself ask but seemingly now…just about everyone. Even if you don’t want to go viral, you want to go viral. There might not be another choice. I’d imagine there’s a failing plumber somewhere in Secaucus, New Jersey, whose daughter has convinced him the key to booking more clog jobs is short form content. The greatest bagel shop in Madison, Wisconsin is like a tree falling in the woods without some well leavened socials. We might not want the attention or fame but we sure as hell want what only virality seems to provide in the absence of old instituion. Legitimacy. And don’t we all want to be taken seriously at what we do? I do. I bet you do, too. You and me…why the hell aren’t we viral?

Even if this 1 to 1 game of email forward telephone won’t occur. Fine. Then how the hell do we find our way to such Usher-esque gatekeepers? Is that 1 to 1,000,000 (adjusted for inflation) megaphone really the only way? I used to believe in true gatekeepers. Ones with gates that were right in front of us. I used to believe in apprenticeships. Someone or somewhere I bring such a body of work to and say “here’s what I can do for you, big dog.” But big dog ain’t listening to just you. Big dog is now layers of algorithmic Kabbalah, controlled by Zuck, Role Model, and PFT Commenter. Algos that are telling us one thing. Market then master. Pray to go viral, then figure out the rest later.

And knowing it hurts the writing. It hurts whatever you’re putting honest work into. Puts a few of those free weights I’d prefer to keep at the gym, on top of my chest. The Pioneer ain’t no Tik Tok sketch. It’s a 1000 words on the weekend and who the hell gonna share that? Even if they do…how many people will even escape such an all-encompassing social feed to read 1000 words on some guy’s weekend they’ve never even met?

Big dog…that simply ain’t viral.

So what is? Recipes? Celebrity gossip? Insufferable meditations on culture like this? All of the above, probably. And here I was…thinking I was above all of the above. But at least so far, I’m not. I’m the 99 percent. The community theater of the internet.

So from here on out, I am making the brave decision to under no circumstances, ever go viral. I do not need the respect it inevitably comes with. The opportunity that arises from it. The money. The influence. The staff writing gig on Industry Season 4. The New York Magazine column. The confidence to put writer on a Raya profile. A Raya profile, just while we’re at it (breaking from sarcasm to tell you Raya just sorta worked as a joke here). I need none of it. This writing shall stay far away from anyone’s megaphone, especially yours Usher. I shall instead pursue anything and everything for myself and absolutely nobody else. And if that means a life of obscurity, then so be it. I’ll die with my low performing content boots on. Because, if it means losing myself, who the hell wants to be viral? Not me.*

*This is a classic reverse jinx. Please for the love of god…let me go viral.