Researchers at one of the world’s most popular networking site, Facebook, have done a detailed study on links of the largest circulated stories. A majority of them are related to issues regarding family or parenting. Other favorites include postings on videos, which had become hits on the Web after going viral. Changes made to Facebook itself was another commonly shared subject, and the weather, to a extent.
The stories ranged from light hearted to thought provoking topics and represented the type of articles people have been keen to discover in 2011. Looking closely at the 40 most shared articles’ list on Facebook in the US this year will help us draw certain conclusions. As the TIME magazine Tech writer Graeme McMillan mentions: “Apparently, if you are looking for something really viral to spread through the social network, you should rather be looking for a tragic tale about families & dogs, ignoring news in favor of sentiment.
The most shared story is the Satellite Photos of Japan – Before & After the Quake/ Tsunami courtesy New York Times, but that’s much the exception that tends to prove the rule; of all the stories in the list, almost fourteen have some familial connection; 3 of the top 10 (What Teachers Really Want To Tell Parents and Parents, Don’t Dress Your Girls Like Tramps from CNN and Father Daughter Dance Medley from Yahoo).
If you happen to include pets as family, that particular number goes up to 17; two of those figuring in the top 10.There is just one breaking news story by comparison in the list – a CNN report on Steve Jobs’s death – with the analysis pieces, making it on there largely viewing things from the sheer human interest angle.
What’s probably missing is almost as curious as what’s on the list! With the honorable exception of stories about late Steve Jobs (the CNN obit, one about his patents in NYT and thirdly A Sister’s Eulogy) apart from a CNN story on how much you will freak after seeing the new Facebook. Beyond this, there are hardly any tech stories. The current financial and political situations are almost ignored. So Occupy Wall Street does not rate a place, and also does the presidential nominee race of Republican. The list is dominated by Yahoo (12 stories), CNN (10), the New York Times (seven), the Huffington Post (six) and the Washington Post (two stories).
To conclude, the results are quite interesting, not only because they are reflective of the wide range of topics that hold the people’s attention and interest for them to find same worth sharing, but also because of their source is mainly mainstream news organizations’ sites. Hardly any of the Top 40 list had a link to an individual writer’s essay or even a YouTube video.
