Missouri State viral video demonstrates emotional reactions to social media

A Missouri State professor teaching a class on "The Fundamentals of Media Convergence" has become an internet sensation because of a final exam he gave his students, challenging them to make a viral video.

And after one group of six students was successful, Cline has been doing interviews all over the country to discuss the outpouring of emotions and questioning of the ethics surrounding the assignment.

Sydney Arlt, a student in professor Andrew Cline's media class, posted a tweet on December 5th saying that Cline had thrown a surprise holiday party instead of a test on the day of the final exam but nobody showed up. And her video showed only five of the 30 students in the class in attendence with gifts on their desk followed by a pan over to Cline, sitting at his desk at the front of the class with a Santa Claus hat on and a sad, forlorn look on his face.

The 10-second video immediately went viral and has almost eight million views. Twitter lit up with people saying they were in tears, upset, disappointed, and amazed that students failed to attend Cline's holiday party.

A party that never happened.

The fake video has already had its rights sold to an aggregator.

"Aggregators are people scouring for content that appears to be going viral and then they try to continue the viralness to make money," Cline explained. "If you can develop the skill to make content go viral on purpose, you're going to be very rich."

Cline's final exam assignment for students to try and make a viral video was a test that few of them have succeeded in doing over the last six years. But he says this story line struck a chord because it plays on a fear that many people have.

"Throw a party and nobody comes," he said.

But he said the reality of the video going viral and the tremendous response both positive and negative was much different than he envisioned.

"There's no control," Cline said. "You're watching it happen to you like a slow-motion car wreck and it's uncomfortable in that regard."

After Missouri State's official twitter account sent out its own reaction, Cline let it be known that the video was fake and part of his final exam. And while some reacted that it was a good lesson about taking everything on social media with a grain of salt, others criticized Cline for the unethical nature of the assignment.

"I have no ethical problem whatsoever," Cline replied. " I only have two restrictions. No pornography and no portrayal of anything illegal. In terms of fakeness, it isn't fake news because it isn't news. It's entertainment. The audience has to bring some critical thinking to their consumption of the media."

And Cline says if people learn from this experience that they shouldn't get emotional and take everything as real when they get on social media, then his project has been a success.