Kony 2012. It seems like just over a week ago you could not check any social media site without seeing some sort of post about that title. Kony 2012 became one of the most successful viral campaigns thus far. With over 80,000,000 hits on youtube in such a short amount of time, it has spread at an unprecedented rate.
Critics were quick to question the validity of the campaign and of the Invisible Children organization. I myself did not buy into the video. To this day I still have not seen more than a minute or two of the 30-minute video. It bugged me with how highly produced it was and that they could not convey the issue in a more bite-size format.
The main problem I have is that once people shared the video on Facebook or Twitter or thumbed up, liked or even posted ‘Kony 2012’ everywhere they could, they came off as a self-righteous social activist. In reality they are far from that and probably could not even point to Uganda on a map. Yes, there are some out there that could have been motivated to actually become involved, but it is reasonable to assume that a good majority of people will do nothing beyond liking, sharing or tweeting Kony 2012.
I came across an interesting article this past week that further builds upon my opinion that majority of online discussion is fruitless. Here, we can see that it is tough to engage an audience whether it’s a readership or a viewership (in the case of Kony 2012). The article goes on to explain how to improve on that front and I think that will be very helpful to those in my social media research and techniques class.
Recent events that could only serve to further take away from the campaign’s momentum alongside the criticism, is that the video’s creator, Jason Russell was hospitalized after being arrested for vulgar, nude acts in public.
In conclusion, there is a lot to learn and admire from this campaign regardless of some of its drawbacks. The biggest concept to tackle is how to keep something as viral as Kony 2012 in people’s conversations and maintain that momentum.
artido van root 