The anatomy of a viral tweet: The "rehashing old news" variant
Ever wondered why certain tweets go viral? Here's the answer.
I recently asked my Twitter followers if they’d be interested in reading a breakdown of why certain tweets go viral, and the answer was a resounding “YES!” So today, I’m introducing the first piece in a series that will answer the question, “Why did that tweet go viral?”
Before we look at today’s tweet, I should note that I’m not using a strict definition of “viral.” In general, the term takes into account both engagement and time — so, a tweet that is said to “go viral” is generally one that has garnered a certain number of interactions within a specified time frame. In this series, I’m mainly interested in looking at tweets with high engagement, particularly retweets, so I am considering any tweet with more than 1,000 retweets in 24 hours to be a “viral” tweet. I also want to make sure that the focus of this series stays on the content and tactics, not the person behind the account. These articles aren’t an attack on the person who wrote the tweet, nor are they a reason for anyone to go harass the account owner.
With that said, let’s look at today’s tweet, which at the time of writing had more than half a million views, 1,125 retweets, 398 quote-tweets, and 2,449 likes. (Update: More than 2,000 retweets now).
“BREAKING: The Chicago Police Department officer who is involved with the Proud Boys and lied about it will not be fired by city officials,” the tweet read.
What was your first reaction to reading that? It was probably an emotion, right? Anger? Exasperation? Frustration? Outrage? Your reaction is an important piece of the puzzle because anger and related emotions make us want to take action — and fast. These emotions are typically associated with physiological arousal and maladaptive behaviors, including retaliatory actions and aggression. This is true both offline and online, and research has shown that negative tweets, particularly those characterized by outrage, are more likely to be shared than positive tweets. This is especially true for tweets expressing anger or outrage towards an out-group.
But why did that particular tweet elicit those emotions? And what other characteristics of the tweet contributed to its vitality? Let’s take a look.
Let’s start at the top of the tweet and work our way through.
First, the account has a blue checkmark. Although the meaning of the blue checkmark has changed substantially in the past few months (a topic that I will publish an article about shortly), our brains have been conditioned to associate the symbol with legitimacy and credibility. The mere presence of a blue checkmark, therefore, is unconsciously processed as an indicator that the information in the tweet is credible.
Secondly, the tweet starts with the all-caps word “BREAKING”. This conveys a sense of urgency, which makes people more likely to share information without taking the time to verify it or look for additional context. People like to share news on Twitter in part for its informative nature, but also as a means of status-seeking, and for some, it’s a race to be among the first to share a breaking news story. According to a 2016 study by computer scientists at Columbia University and the French National Institute, 59 percent of links shared on social media have never actually been clicked, meaning that most people share news without ever reading it (though in this case, no link was provided — and there may be a reason for that, which I’ll get to shortly). With the proliferation of online content, it has become impossible to process all of the information we encounter online, so our brains rely on shortcuts to tell us which information to pay attention to. Cues such as all-caps text and keywords like “BREAKING” or “NEW” are attention-grabbing and prey on our brain’s cognitive shortcuts. In this case, however, there was no breaking news. The story about the Chicago Police Department failing to terminate the employment of an officer with ties to the Proud Boys actually happened in October 2022, not January 2023.
Thirdly, as discussed above, the tweet elicits anger. Specifically, it elicits moral outrage by highlighting an incident characterized by hypocrisy, injustice, and norm violations on the part of law enforcement. Anger is a moral emotion that often leads to black-and-white thinking, or the tendency to think in extremes. As a result, when we’re angry, we’re more likely to make poor decisions and to act impulsively, including in our social media activity.
Those three factors are the key “ingredients” to this viral tweet, though there are other characteristics of the tweet and the account that likely contributed to it going viral. For example, the account is an overtly partisan left-leaning account whose followers skews heavily to the left. This introduces a strong in-group/out-group dynamic along with the heavy influence of polarization. Furthermore, partisan influencers often play a significant role in the dissemination of news, including both accurate news stories and mis/disinformation. Research shows that most people who get their news on social media actually rely on intermediaries — mainly influencers — rather than getting information directly from the accounts of news outlets or journalists. These influencers are often involved in the early and rapid dissemination of breaking news, but this dynamic also contributes greatly to the spread of mis/disinformation.
The style of tweet featured in this edition of “The Anatomy of a Viral Tweet” — a style I call “rehashing old news” — is quite common. Some political activists and influencers look back at their best-performing tweets, as well as tweets from other accounts that went viral, to find content to recycle for the purpose of engagement. In this instance, the content included in the tweet is true, but it’s missing crucial context and it misleadingly presents a 3-month-old story as “BREAKING”. The tweet also failed to provide a link to the original story, which is often a red flag. When someone who isn’t a journalist is reporting on breaking news without providing a link to the story they’re tweeting about, it’s always best to find the original story and check the facts — and context — for yourself. When someone makes it hard to find the original source for a claim, there’s often a reason for that.
Check back soon for the next article in this series!
Great dissection of a viral tweet. Emotion is always the key to getting responses. But we also need to examine why their is an emotional response. In this case, injustice. But with right wing viral tweets, it taps into something else: 1) sense of loss (something lost by the person receiving it; or 2) sense of insecurity that leads to a desire to denigrate the different group being being highlighted.
I see it everyday in working in policy and regulatory matters in the power and gas industry. All interests have their code language to invoke emotions via injustice, loss, or insecurity. Fascinating to try and use more neutral or less emotionally loaded language and see people get uncomfortable.
What makes someone an "influencer"?