5 Ways Social Media Tricks You Into Using Social Media

4. How Many People Are Following Me?

This isn't exactly a new feature, in fact it has been a selling point for social media since its inception, but it still says a lot about the ways in which we are goaded into using the internet as a form of attaining a greater social status. Remember when Myspace was a thing? Every seventh grader would brag about how many friends they had, even going as far as adding the complete strangers of your least intimate complete strangers in order to fulfil a need to have their identity validated by a quantifiable and large mass of humanity. But websites like Twitter, Youtube, and Tumblr focus less on being forums for interpersonal connections and more on building a legion of followers and admirers. It has gotten so that celebrities can identify their popularity based on the figures of the people who are following them, but more importantly it has created an environment in which people think that they can attain a certain level of celebrity through the media channels that serve as the basis of quantifying popularity. Youtube sent out a message to every email account of people who had watched Ylvis's "What Does the Fox Say?" video to let them know when they watched that annoying video for the first time, and what percentile they fell into in relation to the rest of the people who saw it. It was a blatant attempt to make people excited that they jumped on a trend before other people, but also to let them know that worldwide fame was only a bad song and a funny video away for anyone. Maybe it will be you?