![]() ![]() These factions expanded their audiences in 2018, citing new “investigations” and circulating the rumor that a (hoax) website sold adrenochrome in exchange for cryptocurrency. Even with early intervention by Reddit and recent movements by Twitter, Facebook and TikTok to crack down on QAnon, adrenochrome harvesting remains a mainstream conversation for some online communities. The impact of hidden virality can’t be stopped by retroactively banning a few thousand Twitter accounts it is an iterative, memetic phenomenon that outpaces terms of service. Named by researchers Britt Parris and Joan Donovan, hidden virality describes dominant content in specific pockets of the internet that are largely unseen by journalists and mass audiences, making them difficult for social media companies to identify and act upon. The adrenochrome harvesting conspiracy theory is a potent example of “hidden virality” and the ways in which unpopular culture animate social media platforms outside of the mainstream view. Blending academic research and open-source intelligence techniques, Friedberg is an investigative ethnographer, focusing on the impacts that alternative media, anonymous communities, and unpopular cultures have on political communication and organization. Brian Friedberg is the senior researcher for the Technology and Social Change Research Project at the Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics, and Public Policy at Harvard's Kennedy School. ![]()
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