Between the barbenheimer shit and the grimace shake tiktok trend (e.g., social media users creating organic viral marketing for these products), I don’t think most people hate corporations nearly enough
This kind of thing where people promote products for free is a corporate wet dream btw. Word-of-mouth (and the memes have the same impact as traditional word-of-mouth) is more convincing to consumers than actual ads, and the corporation doesn’t have to pay for it. Everyone making Barbie memes and shit is doing Warner Bros’s job for them!!!
ok so what exactly are we supposed to do when we like something then? i’m really curious as to why you think people enjoying things is bad when this is how we as humans have been bonding for a long time. it’s not like ppl are singing warner bro’s etc praises specifically, they’re just doing silly things to have fun with media they like. i’m so confused
Ok to be fair I need to remember that most of you aren’t versed in this shit. I work adjacently to media and it all seems very obvious to me but I can see it isn’t translating. When I say “organic viral marketing” that is a specific thing. I’m not referring to fandom. Viral marketing is when companies (and other entities eg nonprofits) try to create hype for a product or campaign using easily-spread images, memes, etc that spread exponentially (thus “viral”). Think the grimace videos, the “this Barbie is…” edits. “Organic” in this case means it’s not paid for, users do it on their own, which creates credibility because the audience doesn’t feel so much like they’re being advertised to. Usually marketing and advertising teams try to seed this type of engagement (if that’s what they’re going for) with hashtag campaigns, social media contests, etc but in this case users started posting stuff that corporate teams would want from such campaigns *on their own*, using only the base promo material as a starting point rather than being directly encouraged to engage in a grimace challenge or Barbie hashtag or whatever
These trends im mentioning like the grimace and barbenheimer shit are incredibly in line with these types of marketing/advertising campaigns yet appear to be mostly or entirely organic. Fandom doesn’t typically resemble a viral marketing campaign to this degree; I think making a “this Barbie is…” edit or Barbie mugshot edit based on movie promo images prior to the movie even coming out, for example, is very different from typical fanfic, movie reviews/discussion, or even fan art—the edits created a lot of buzz in advance of the actual movie and *directly replicate the promo material.* The grimace tiktoks were basically free user-generated ads that riffed on a character that exists purely to sell fast food, there isn’t even a “fandom” there (…I’m sure there’s jokey Ronald McDonald yaoi or something but McDonald’s characters generally don’t have the same fandom presence as something with a story). Tl;Dr this isn’t typical fandom, it’s the kind of thing marketing teams dream of kickstarting with their own planned campaigns and it has been VERY effective at driving sales
alright that makes more sense, i can kinda grasp what you’re saying now, ty
now this may surprise some of the audience, but the majority of humans have to survive a phase called “being a teenager” and the results are often catastrophic
seeing people be like ‘I know it’s going to be hard to support the sag strike because movies and shows will stop coming out but-’ is so fucking funny like can I introduce you to a beautiful concept called the million billion movies and shows that already exist that you couldn’t even get through in a lifetime if you wanted. welcome to heaven <3
