Wasik feels that the viral culture, of sudden sensations that capture imagination widely and then disappear just as suddenly, has been further perpetuated through the web. Think viral games, viral videos. Think Twitter, think advertising. Viral marketing is the buzz word today. This interview and Wasik’s book make for a fascinating read as he de-constructs the hype around virals.

In the interview, Wasik says ”…the idea of a quick hit disposable culture…the idea that everybody piles on something and then everybody disperses from it, and you repeat the process, and that’s the media culture that we now live in — and the internet has only tightened the cycles and made that more pronounced.”

He terms these spikes as ‘nanostories’ and goes on to add in response to another question…”We are social animals, and the internet plays to that — it plays to that urge to try to get attention and to try to make connections and to try to get on board with the interesting new thing as it’s happening and to feel in that way like we are at the very heart of the culture.”