Social Media Case 2

I thought this was a funny social media case because it started out as a kid who just wanted free chicken nuggets, and Ellen turned it into a competition. I thought it was interesting how in the video clip on youtube, Ellen calls her Oscar’s selfie “A cultural phenomenon”. I remember when Ellen took the selfie and how much I saw it on different platforms of social media. I remember there being a lot of different memes about it, and in a way I guess it was a cultural phenomenon.

 I do think that Ellen’s picture was retweeted so many times because of her popularity and fan base, along with the popularity and fan base of everyone else in the photo. It is easier to get millions of retweets when you have millions of fans. Whereas Carter, this kid who did this probably just as a joke in the beginning, was not a celebrity and did not have nearly as many followers. I think to ‘go viral’ is to have something interesting that spreads extremely quickly.

I think that Ellen might have put herself in a position to lose the title of the most retweeted tweet by bringing Carter onto her show. He was steadily gaining popularity and by having him on her talk show it introduced him to all of her fans. Even though she warned that anyone retweeting his chicken nuggets tweet would also need to retweet her photo, it might have been playing to an audience that had already retweeted her photo. They now had someone new to follow and retweet.

Carter has passed Ellen and holds the record of the most retweeted tweet. Although I doubt it, it makes me wonder if Ellen will stay true to her word and take back all the gifts she gave him like she said she would if he passed her.

While Carter did not get the 18 million tweets he would need for the free chicken nuggets, he was still granted them. What I found the most interesting about this case was that Carter used this platform that he now has to do good with it. What started out as just wanting chicken nuggets has given him a strong voice to use to help other people.  

https://blog.twitter.com/official/en_us/topics/events/2017/-nuggsforcarter-is-now-the-most-retweeted-tweet-of-all-time.html

https://www.fastcompany.com/40419538/carter-got-his-wendys-nuggs-and-a-twitter-world-record

McDstories

I had never heard of this hashtag until reading about it for this assignment. Having eaten at McDonalds and having a bad experience, I am not surprised by what happened with the hashtag. When the board members who thought this marketing campaign would be a good idea overlooked the fact that not everyone loves McDonalds, I think they also overlooked, or maybe did not understand how sarcastic and cynical people on the internet can be.

Forbes wrote an article called “When a Hashtag Becomes a Bashtag” https://www.forbes.com/sites/kashmirhill/2012/01/24/mcdstories-when-a-hashtag-becomes-a-bashtag/#6ced885ded25  that highlighted many tweets that used the hashtag to complain about the restaurant instead of using it to share happy stories and memories it was originally created for. Many of them include how eating at McDonalds made them sick, and several shared how one experience was so bad they have not been back since.

“Why McDStories Didn’t Have a Happy Ending” https://thenextweb.com/twitter/2012/01/24/why-mcdstories-didnt-have-a-happy-ending/ talks more about why the hashtag was not a success and pointed out that if McDonalds was wanting praise, they should have gone to their fans and not to twitter. I think that it a very true statement, if you are going to put something out there for anyone and everyone to use, especially on a forum that is known for people posting snarky remarks, you should not expect it to go the way you want it to. The article also pointed out that if you are going to use a promoted tweet, it should not be that vague and it should promote what you are intending to promote. The other hashtag McDonalds was using in this campaign, #MeetTheFarmers, made sense because it was introducing the farmers where McDonalds received their produce. McDStories was intended for heartwarming moments had at McDonalds, but any story told could use the hashtag.

I think that it can be easy to see how something can go wrong when you can only think of good things to say about it, but when using social media and the internet, you need to be extra careful. 

Social Media Change

How has social media changed communication?

The first thing I think of when I think about how social media has changed communication is text messaging. I remember when I had all of my friend’s home phone numbers memorized, and now I do not even have my husband’s number memorized. If I ever need to communicate with someone it is predominantly through my cell phone. All of the numbers are saved in it, so there is no need for me to remember anyone’s number, and I do not have to actually call them I can just text them. While I do prefer text messaging, I do think it is less personal than a phone call.

Higher Ed Marketing Journal published an article called “6 Ways Social Media Changed the Way We Communicate” http://circaedu.com/hemj/how-social-media-changed-the-way-we-communicate/

It talks about how social media has created a sense of urgency to share aspects of our lives on different media platforms. With twitter we can instantaneously share what we are doing. With media like Snapchat and Instagram, there are temporary ways to share, such as the stories that will disappear after 24 hours. If you want to see everything that is going on, you need to be checking all of these sources multiple times a day. It is that sense of not wanting to miss out I do not remember having until I joined Facebook for the first time in middle school. I did not care about what everyone was doing until I was part of a place that made it possible to know.

Another point from this article is it made the world smaller. If you had wanted to talk to someone across the world you would need to coordinate time zones and how much extra it would cost to place a long distance call. With instant messaging on Facebook or many other platforms you can have direct access to almost everywhere on the planet.

In an article from Future of Work,  https://fowmedia.com/social-media-changed-communicate/ it talked about how social media has brought about a lack of face to face social skills. How sometimes people can carry on conversations perfectly fine while online, but when speaking to someone physically they have a hard time. I can relate to this, when I first got a phone when I was in ninth grade sometimes it was much easier to text someone that to talk to them in person. I felt very awkward when I was around them, but I could text them for hours.

Another example of how social media has changed communication is the use of abbreviations. Because it is such a fast paced way to communicate, we are always finding new ways to shorten our language so that it can be put out there more quickly. Social media has had a huge impact on how we communicate.