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When something goes viral, it means that images or videos have spread across social media within a very short time
Going viral – spreading like a virus
The phrase “going viral” emerged in the mid-1990s with the World Wide Web and social media. The word viral goes back to the medical term virus and stands for something that spreads quickly. Similar to a viral disease that spreads from person to person.
- The meaning of the phrase, however, is that a picture, article or video clip is shared particularly quickly by contacts on social media. It is clicked on and shared by thousands
- In the early days of the internet, this was mostly done via email. Nowadays, it is shared via social networks such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, TikTok or even WhatsApp andInstagram.
- A video clip that goes viral spreads like wildfire on the internet without any major influence from the video creator. The content of the viral video is, for example, very entertaining, spectacular, mysterious or makes people laugh.
- The extremely rapid spread of certain videos, images or articles can also be attributed to very active influencers. If they have many followers on social networks, in their own blog and on video platforms, they can reach many people with just one post.
Viral videos with the most clicks
When a video goes viral, it is clicked, liked and shared millions of times on the World Wide Web. These can be animal or baby videos created with little effort and financial means that became an Internet hit by chance.
- The most popular viral clips include, for example, funny cat videos or so-called fails, which spread rapidly and led to millions of clicks. Creepypasta such as Smile Dog or Slenderman have also gone viral very successfully
- A very prominent example of a viral phenomenon is “Grumpy Cat”. There are pictures and videos about the now deceased cat with up to twelve million views in some cases.
- Music videos are still the most-clicked videos on YouTube worldwide. Above all the song “Baby Shark” with over 13 billion views.
