This week I came across a very interesting case study from AdAge on how the digital age can make someone a superstar overnight. Greyson Chance posted his clip on YouTube three weeks ago and already has 18,000,000 video views. From average 12 year old kid one month ago, Grayson is now larger than the Jonas Brothers and Lady Gaga.
Let’s take a quick step back. Stories like Greyson’s are so fascinating because they weren't possible a decade ago. This week, YouTube hit its 5th birthday. From a single one-minute long video posted 5 years ago, there is now enough content on the site to watch for 1500 years straight.**
When the Internet (and the rise of AOL in particular) was gaining steam in the mid 90’s, experts proclaimed that the information age had arrived. With the growth of micro-blogging and social media, the new ways we share information in real-time, and how the digital space has evolved over the last year or two, I would argue that only now are we reaching the true potential of the information era. A few years from now, Greyson’s story may not be such an anomaly after all.
Thoughts and resources:
- With the increasingly diminishing privacy barriers, I wonder if we will see a social media/online privacy backlash in the very near future.
- The first ever clip posted on YouTube, titled “Me at the zoo” http://bit.ly/MeZoo1
- **Business daily May 20, 2010
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