Why does people forward memes, more spesific this video.
This is the viedeo:
Bad mountain bike crash
The problem is that the video is an artifact not an idea. But when it comes to online activity we (as cyborgs) can spread videos and other media just as easy as we can as humans spreasd ideas.
Longevity: The video shoving a bike crash is not dependent of time, it’s funny years after the originale incident. The point is easy to remember (a guy is doing something difficylt and falls down in a horrible but funny crash).
Fecundidy: The video is online so it is easy to share. It’s short and don’t take to long to be viewed by the next person. Others will make videos of siliar accidents. It is something that happens often enough for it to be in mind, but rarly enough that people will find it special.
copying-fidelity: To tell the tale insted of the video is not so funny.
Henry jenkins writes in this text “if it dosn’t spread, it’s dead” abut seven traits of a meme that makes it a good meme.
1. humour
For some reason people falling and hurting thenself are funny and/or facinating.
2. provides different levels of engagement (i.e. you don’t have to get all the in-jokes to like it)
You don’t have to know the guy involved to get it, it is a guy on a binke that falls down. You don’t have to be able to do the simmilar sport to understand thins, but if you do. You probably think its more or less funny/facinating.
3. or is parody and requires cultural knowledge (so makes you feel good about your knowledge and getting the joke)
Everybody falls sometimes. The gut did it in style. You as a non practitioner of the sport, will probably not fall as often or as bad.
4. makes you want to find more info, so you engage your network to do so – search for origins, what it really means, who made it, etc
Is it fake? I don’t care.
5. “gaps”, interactivity, i.e. you have to do something for it to work
Not really interactivity. you can just viewit over and over.
6. nostalgia and community
I don’t ride extreme bikes, but i ride ordinary bikes, and i don’t like to fall down. It’s not really connected to a spesific periode. The clothes are modern (post 1970) but not very spesific.