Insights into Internet Memes
Item
Title
Insights into Internet Memes
Creator
Christian Bauckhage
Abstract
Internet memes are phenomena that rapidly gain popularity
or notoriety on the Internet. Often, modifications or spoofs
add to the profile of the original idea thus turning it into a
phenomenon that transgresses social and cultural boundaries.
It is commonly assumed that Internet memes spread virally
but scientific evidence as to this assumption is scarce. In this
paper, we address this issue and investigate the epidemic dynamics
of 150 famous Internet memes. Our analysis is based
on time series data that were collected from Google Insights,
Delicious, Digg, and StumbleUpon. We find that differential
equation models from mathematical epidemiology as well
as simple log-normal distributions give a good account of
the growth and decline of memes. We discuss the role of
log-normal distributions in modeling Internet phenomena and
touch on practical implications of our findings.
or notoriety on the Internet. Often, modifications or spoofs
add to the profile of the original idea thus turning it into a
phenomenon that transgresses social and cultural boundaries.
It is commonly assumed that Internet memes spread virally
but scientific evidence as to this assumption is scarce. In this
paper, we address this issue and investigate the epidemic dynamics
of 150 famous Internet memes. Our analysis is based
on time series data that were collected from Google Insights,
Delicious, Digg, and StumbleUpon. We find that differential
equation models from mathematical epidemiology as well
as simple log-normal distributions give a good account of
the growth and decline of memes. We discuss the role of
log-normal distributions in modeling Internet phenomena and
touch on practical implications of our findings.
Date
2011
Is Part Of
Proceedings of the Fifth International AAAI Conference on Weblogs and Social Media
presented at
Fifth International AAAI Conference on Weblogs and Social Media
Publisher
AAAI Press
Language
EN English