Viral Information: A Hidden Manipulation
Viral information is that which reaches a large margin for dissemination on the Internet. They almost always circulate through major social networks such as Facebook and Twitter. They are called “viral” because they behave the same way a virus does. They pass from one individual to another, as if by contagion, spread quickly and become massive.
In principle, any news of general interest or of sufficient importance should go viral. But sometimes the most important information lags behind. On the other hand, some much less significant notes can reach unsuspected levels of interest and dissemination. The worst part is that a lot of this information corresponds to lies or “half-truths”.
The information industry is now based on sophisticated algorithms to try to put within the reach of each person what is part of their interests. Every time you log into a social network, you provide information about who you are and what you like. Without requesting it, you start receiving all types of information, whether it’s because someone is sharing it with you or because it appears in your virtual space.
This way you get to know that this singer has received a passionate kiss from a fan, that a famous actress is going to divorce, another is getting married, or that a footballer has decided to change his hairstyle. Without realizing it, you fall into an information network that was clever when it came to capturing your attention, but which basically offers you information that is not really of interest to you. He managed to get you to click on a link and help you increase his business.
But how is this goal achieved? How can we disguise banal information and transform it into compelling information? We will explain it to you right away.
Viral news: a headline market
Various studies have shown that the largest portion of readers focus specifically on the headline and first paragraph of the news to determine whether it is of interest to them or not. This is something that people who put headlines know very well: they know that a reader will read or avoid a piece of news depending on the attractiveness of the headline. It is therefore not uncommon for a similar piece of information with a different title to attract more or less people.
Titles called “clickbait” deserve special mention. They use phrases like, “You can’t imagine what happened to this man when he opened the door to his house”. Instead of showing you the information, they hide it from you. And when you bite the hook and start reading the article, you find out that the man found his cat sleeping on the couch.
On the other hand, once your attention has been captured, and you wonder what happened to this man to make it news, you will realize that the information you went looking for, the one that fills you with curiosity is not at the beginning of the article but at the end. There is quite a development before it, which aims to maintain or increase your curiosity for you to continue reading.
Viral news does not have titles that aim to summarize the gist of the information in one sentence. Above all, they want to captivate you so that you can be even more curious and read on. They try to make you “click”. Every click has a monetary value. Very regularly, behind these flashy or enigmatic titles, there is nothing special or even true.
Viral news uses this uninhibited way of presenting information, that’s very clear. But it is also clear that many readers are involved in this plan. Even if you guess that behind this headline that you are reading there is nothing surprising, you cannot help but enter the page offered by the news. This is something that advertisers know very well: it is even for that that they insist with this formula. They know that the reader will surely get angry when they feel like they have been “manipulated”, but they also know that they will move on quickly and quickly fall back into the trap.
Other manipulation mechanisms
Exaggerating and “cheating” with headlines isn’t the only mechanism used by viral news. Those in charge of this industry carefully study the behavior of their consumers. And that’s how they discovered that a lot of people tend to bite on a different type of hook.
One of them is to use graphics that make a strong impression, whether in photography or video. Having the video of an evisceration is presented as a more informative. This industry seeks to arouse the morbid curiosity of readers and, in the long term, succeeds. Its members also know that the majority of their consumers are bad readers and that is why they do not hesitate to delay, in the text, the information that corresponds to the title.
They also have no qualms about resorting to a lie to achieve their goals. Sometimes it can be an open lie, like saying that a famous character is dead when it’s not true. Other times it may not be a direct lie. They ultimately want you to enter their page in order to receive a sum of money.
People with a tendency to fall in the clutches of this viral information could end up with the wrong idea of reality. They could also open the doors of a taste for the morbid which would greatly impoverish their intellect and their life. The success of the viral news industries is so great that the mainstream media themselves have started to use up some of their resources. This is a new form of semi-slavery that we are only consolidating.
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