That Michael Jackson effect
By Davey Winder in Editorial
Posted in Twitter, Blog, Google, Internet on
Whatever your opinion of the man and his music, there can be little doubting the impact that the death of Michael Jackson has had on the Internet. I was working late when I spotted the first message floating past on Twitter which said that Jackson had suffered a fatal heart attack. Of course, Twitter is not immune to the usual run of hoaxes and fakes, so I did not take much notice. At least not until the next message popped up on-screen within a few minutes, and pretty soon the unconfirmed news of the death of the King of Pop was pretty much dominating my Tweet stream. So it was I Googled ‘Michael Jackson’ only to warned that my query “looks similar to automated requests from a computer virus or spyware application.”
It would appear that Google mistakenly thought it was under attack, when in fact all that was happening was a huge spike in the need for information from millions of people around the world at the same time. You know, the kind of thing that Google was pretty much invented for, that the Internet is meant to do so well. Google called it a “meteoric rise in related searches” and “one of the largest mobile search spikes we’ve ever seen.” In fact it admits that the Michael Jackson search spike was “so big that Google News initially mistook it for an automated attack” and took those malware warning precautions.
Twitter wasn’t faring much better, with more than 60,000 Michael Jackson tweets posted in 60 minutes and causing a slowdown in service accessibility. I’ve heard tales of protestors in Iran being unable to get their Twitter updates which have served them so well, for example. Indeed, I have posed the question before that celebrities could be killing Twitter and on this occasion a celebrity managed to crash the site for a while.
I would have hoped, given just how important the Internet has become around the world, that such a news spike would be absorbed much better than this. If Google, Twitter and others struggled to stay working properly because of this, just what would happen if World War Three was declared? The kind of event for which we would, as a nation, as a planet, turn to the Internet for information and advice. So much for the network that could survive a nuclear attack, it couldn’t even cope with the death of a controversial pop star.
Rated: 80% (3 votes)
Loading ...Pingback by - June 28, 2009 on 10:39 pm
[…] This post was Twitted by charliepaule […]
Comment by - June 28, 2009 on 11:44 pm
Imagine you own a huge bar-like Mickey Gilley’s, and you have around 500 people on a typical Saturday night. Now imagine if one Saturday night 5,000 people showed up with no warning, I daresay you would run out of beer real fast.
I commend any social media platform that can remain up and running during an onslaught such as this. Servers aren’t cheap. Redundant data pipes to the Internet backbone aren’t cheap either.
Pingback by - August 30, 2009 on 9:05 am
[…] IT PRO: Blogs: Davey Winder: That Michael Jackson effect www.itpro.co.uk/blogs/daveyw/2009/06/28/that-michael-jackson-effect – view page – cached , Whatever your opinion of the man and his music, there can be little doubting the impact that the death of Michael Jackson has had on the Internet. I was working — From the page […]
Comment by - October 9, 2009 on 8:20 am
i like
Comment by - October 16, 2009 on 7:42 am
It was a very nice idea! Just wanna say thank you for the information you have shared. Just continue writing this kind of post. I will be your loyal reader. Thanks again.
Comment by - November 4, 2009 on 7:36 am
I must say cool post. But i truly like the heading of the post that Michael Jackson effect. I am wondering if I can share your article in the bookmarks of society,
Make a comment
Tag cloud
Archives
- June 2010
- May 2010
- April 2010
- March 2010
- February 2010
- January 2010
- December 2009
- November 2009
- October 2009
- September 2009
- August 2009
- July 2009
- June 2009
- May 2009
- April 2009
- March 2009
- February 2009
- January 2009
- December 2008
- November 2008
- October 2008
- September 2008
- August 2008
- July 2008
- June 2008
- May 2008
- April 2008
- March 2008
- February 2008
- January 2008
- December 2007
- November 2007
- October 2007
- September 2007
- August 2007
- July 2007
- June 2007
- May 2007
- April 2007
- March 2007
- February 2007
- January 2007
- December 2006
- November 2006
- October 2006
- September 2006
- August 2006
Most commented posts
- 80 percent of viruses love Windows 7
147 comments
- Has Microsoft gone mental?
- Has the US Army declared war on Windows 7?
- Cuil frozen out: market share drops to next to nothing
- Xbox 360 FAIL
- The 24GB RAM Desktop is born
- Use old version of Windows instead of Linux, says teacher
- Microsoft reveals time-based licensing model
- Nexus Two - The Next Generation
- Windows XP: the invincible OS
Highest Rated Blog Posts
- Why ecommerce fails (100%)
- Google Chrome stands alone at PWN2OWN (100%)
- Betting on Hubdub technology (100%)
- Has Google gone insane as GMail goes back to beta? (100%)
- Chinese whispers as government implicated in UK hack attacks (100%)
- Crimeware toolkit targets 10,000 trusted sites (100%)
- Black Hat risk to migrating VMs (100%)
- Tough on cyber crime, tough on the causes of cyber crime (100%)
- Firefox 3, Beta 4, Enhancements 900, Tested 5 (100%)
- Has the US Army declared war on Windows 7? (100%)
