I just got the following retweet:
Help @SesameWorkshop raise money to promote #HealthyKids! For every RT of this message, @SamsClub will donate $5! Thanks for your support!
Let’s assume that this is real (it seems plausible, anyway, given what I can find online). And granted, it looks like a good cause, and very well-intentioned.
But would anybody care to place any bets on when this chain-tweet will ever end? Newer social media, with one-click access to resharing, does look likely to make chain letter memes even more dangerous and ever-spreading than they have been historically.
Although it does seem like an interesting challenge. What would be the perfect chain-tweet? It would need to tug at heartstrings, look deeply plausible, have no obvious end goal or date, and still fit into 140 characters. The above is quite good: can folks do better?
July 13, 2011 at 2:50 pm |
It needs to tie into the most recent panic about harm to light-skinned children, although that would somewhat limit its longevity. Past examples, though, show that people will alter the chain-mail so that it seems more current since “the message needs to get out!”
July 20, 2011 at 2:10 am |
It’s important to make people feel like someone is being wronged, and that through just a little bit of click-through altruism they’ll be helping.
If you want to go truly evil, you piggyback on a hot-button issue (abortion springs to mind)…