[Edit – Friday 17th August – the irony isn’t lost on me as I’ve deactivated my Twitter account so you will have to use this post to join in my glory]
Over the 10 years, 8 months, and 24 days that I’ve been on Twitter, something which has fascinated me is “going viral”. I’ve seen some utterly ridiculous things being retweeted and favorited over and over again.
If you get a nod from someone “famous” (or who has a lot of followers) then you’re laughing, watch the impressions fly in, but if you’re not, you could tweet something genius and only garner a handful of compliments. Then you can watch as your joke gets “stolen” by someone else and it goes skyward.
I’ve tweeted, what I thought, were some solid takes over the years but otherwise, I’ve given up “trying” for a viral tweet. Afterall, I’m about to deactivate my account tomorrow. I mainly use it now for commentary, to wince at the world events, and otherwise just spout some nonsense.
Often, the viralness is helped by whatever meme is doing the rounds. The latest is a sneak peek from the new Wreck-It Ralph 2 spot:
The meme is taking Merida’s rant and putting other words to it. Things Scottish people would generally say.
I was walking the dog and I had an epiphany on Tuesday night. The classic. I thought, yes, this is bound to get a few likes. A last moment of glory. At least 100 likes? I thought it was funny.
I posted the screencap of Merida and the classic line “It’s legal tender!”
I got a bunch of pings on Tuesday evening, 54 likes to be exact. I thought I might get a few more overnight. I muted my phone.
I was wrong.
https://twitter.com/dougaitken/status/1029456138528612355
Look at those likes!
Currently, my analytics are this:
505 THOUSAND people have seen that tweet. Over 5K likes.
I’ve peaked. Game over. I can’t top that.
Clearly, Polygon hadn’t waited to see if my masterpiece got the numbers before doing their roundup.
doug dot blog... 