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「core tips」

human hearts are hard to predict, and unexpected popularity cannot be attributed entirely to algorithms.

author | chen fashan

editor | liu yang

in this era where traffic is king, there are always some people and events that suddenly become popular and become the focus of heated discussion.

for example, the release of the domestic 3a game "black myth: wukong" not only made the game itself a hot topic, but also unexpectedly pushed shanxi's cultural tourism to the top of the hot searches; zheng qinwen's withdrawal from the olympic mixed doubles unexpectedly made the "zhenxinbang" combination popular; dong yuhui and li dan, two people with very different styles, were put on the stage because of the "tastes" of their mothers-in-law and the girls...

when people discuss their popularity and why they are popular, they always mention strength, luck, opportunities, etc., and analyze the reasons behind the sudden "huge traffic". after the rise of short videos and recommendation algorithms, there is an additional question: did the algorithm choose him?

many people believe that it is algorithms that created these "internet celebrities". "algorithms guide traffic, and whoever the traffic is given to will become famous. all internet celebrities are created by algorithms" and "algorithms create gods."

but is this really the case?

1. analysis of the popular samples in zibo

from last year to this year, cultural and tourism cities have become popular on social platforms one after another.

harbin, zibo, tianshui, altay, heze... continuing people's thinking habits, one question is repeatedly asked:what role does the algorithm play in the popularity of these cities? are they popular because of the algorithms?

in order to find the answer, we try to analyze the timeline of zibo's popularity and see what conclusions we can draw:

in january 2023, a netizen posted a short video titled "at this moment, the biological mother of a zibo princess is eating zibo barbecue", which became a hot topic and zibo barbecue came into the public eye.

in february, relevant departments of zibo invited "big v" to do outdoor live broadcasts to recommend zibo barbecue to netizens, and zibo barbecue ushered in its first big explosion.

in march, a group of shandong college students went to zibo to eat barbecue to thank the local government for its free hospitality during the quarantine period. the grateful college students used social media to record their trip, and the zibo municipal government announced measures to create the "zibo barbecue" food brand.

in april, "mrs. b", a social media celebrity who is keen on exposing unscrupulous businesses, released a short video after an undercover investigation in zibo, saying that zibo never shortchanges people on weights or measures.

then, the local government started a series of actions: opening a special bus line, preparing gifts for tourists on the high-speed rail, not allowing businesses to raise prices, not allowing taxis to overcharge, calling on citizens to give benefits, roads and scenery to tourists; government agencies and institutions opened parking lots and toilets, and the public drove private cars to pick up tourists for free...

during this period, various hot topics related to zibo barbecue continued to appear on the internet., #college student special forces travel#, #barbecue in the north and water splashing in the south#, #what are the soul ingredients of zibo barbecue#, #zibo official document level is crazy# and other hot topics continue to top the hot list.

zibo has become a popular choice for may day travel...

through this review, have you discovered thatthere is a reason why “zibo bbq” continues to be so popular.

first, there are ongoing events that keep zibo in the public eye.

secondly, the local government’s incentives and the participation of the entire nation have caught this “huge flow of traffic”, and officials and the public have worked together to add fuel to the flames, helping them burn higher and higher.

third, there are public sentiments - whether it is the everyday atmosphere of sitting on a small stool and eating meat rolls after the epidemic, or the gratitude journey of college students returning to their hometown, or the exposure of the blogger's unsuccessful "anti-counterfeiting" that reflects the simple folk customs of the hospitable shandong, etc., all of which can attract countless likes, comments, and reposts.

the combination of multiple factors, including the right time, the right place and the right people, ultimately created the phenomenal result of "zibo gankao".

the sample analysis is completed, but the problems related to the algorithm have not been solved - the algorithm was not mentioned in the three reasons, and zibo’s popularity has nothing to do with the algorithm?

2. internet celebrities are related to algorithms, but algorithms do not play a decisive role

let me first state the conclusion: it is related to the algorithm, but the algorithm does not play a decisive role.

in today's new media era, algorithms as efficiency-enhancing tools are everywhere.on social platforms, algorithms are activated based on users' interactive behaviors such as reading, viewing, liking, commenting, and forwarding, allowing creators to gain traffic and make the content that users want to see and spread visible to more people among massive amounts of information.

zibo became popular because of the continuous ignition of public emotions, which activated the algorithm through massive interactive behaviors and then recommended it to more users to watch, like, comment, and forward, forming a geometric explosion and gaining billions of traffic.

if it weren't for shandong's thousand-year-old hospitality culture and simple folk customs, if it weren't for the "soul seasoning" of zibo barbecue itself with its cultural heritage, and if it weren't for the consumer sentiment after the epidemic, zibo would not have become so popular just by having algorithms.

except for a few cities such as zibo, tianshui and harbin, there are still only a few cities that can become "popular".judging from the case analysis of zibo, algorithms can only add icing on the cake, adding bricks and tiles from 1 to 2, but they cannot go from zero to 1 and create a god out of thin air.

let’s take lei jun as an example:

since becoming famous in the 1990s, lei jun has always been a legend in the business world, and his extraordinary life experience has been jokingly called the real-life version of the "male protagonist in a cool novel" by netizens.

before the beginning of this year, lei jun's fans on douyin were always in the tens of millions. but when xiaomi su7 was launched at the end of march, with mi fans enthusiastically supporting it and the live broadcast craze of car industry bigwigs, his douyin fans quickly increased to nearly 30 million.

on douyin, mi fans saw a different lei jun: he got a racing driver's license, tried drifting, walked on the streets of paris with su bingtian, and even raced on the nürburgring. with the right time, right place, and right people, lei jun, an "old internet celebrity", found a new audience on douyin.

it can be seen from this that without the support of events and content, it would not be easy for the "old internet celebrity" lei jun to go further. because of the promotion of the new car's launch, the recommendation algorithm pushed lei jun to more netizens who care about su7 and lei jun, and he was able to gain more fans and traffic.

it can be said thatlei jun's popularity is not driven by algorithms; lei jun's "greater popularity" is related to algorithms - because xiaomi and lei jun's new actions have attracted the attention and interaction of many netizens, and have gained more traffic.

3. from the perspective of the role of algorithms, there is no need to create gods

from the perspective of content, it is dangerous and unnecessary for algorithms to unilaterally "deify" a blogger. a blogger may be an idol to some users, but may be nothing to others. as netizens said, "small fame depends on promotion, big fame depends on luck, and forced promotion will lead to vanishing into thin air." if a platform tries to deify a blogger, it may please some users, but at the same time lose others.

even if a person is a loyal fan of lei jun, dong yuhui, and guo youcai, if he only watches the videos and live broadcasts of these three big vs every day, i believe he will get aesthetic fatigue in no time and may even want to uninstall the platform.

in addition, the fundamental purpose and function of recommendation algorithms is to improve efficiency. they are essentially created to solve the problem of effective distribution of massive amounts of information, so that good content can be distributed to the phones of people who want to see it. from this perspective, algorithms or platforms still have no motivation to "create gods".

according to statistics, china generates 90 billion gb of information every day, and the total amount of information generated each year exceeds the total digital resources of 10 million national libraries of china.in the face of such a huge amount of data, without the efficient screening and matching of algorithms, on the one hand, good content will find it difficult to effectively reach matching users; on the other hand, everyone will be overwhelmed by the huge amount of information and will not be able to see the content they want and that is useful.

thanks to the recommendation algorithm, shi tiesheng and "i and the altar of earth" can continue to be popular on short video platforms; 81-year-old agricultural technician liang zhenqing has gained countless "students" by teaching agricultural technology knowledge; drama fans can watch the traditional chinese yue opera "new dragon gate inn" performed by chen lijun and li yunxiao online; the creator @水星水星逛博物馆 with a phd in archaeology has attracted 5 million fans with his excellent explanations...

the role of algorithms does not seem to be as mysterious and huge as people imagine. algorithms are more of a tool to help more people see content at the right time and place.

for individuals, facing the wave of ai and algorithms, instead of studying how to become famous overnight, it is better to learn technology, understand algorithms, and use algorithms well to adapt to the changes of the times and technology.