Diffusion Theory

     Diffusion Theory: What is it?

There has been rapid changes in technology in the past 100 years, well even just in the latest 30 years. We've all benefited from the change and growths throughout our lifetime, but we have also all encountered those people who struggle with it. Change is difficult, some embrace it while others reject it. Will I someday end up being that grumpy older woman complaining about the good old days? Or will I learn and understand the new innovations that come my way? Let's talk a bit about it! 

    The theory is Diffusion of Innovation which was popularized by Everett Rogers in 1962. Rogers' theory was formed in order to find explanations for the rate in which new ideas and technologies spread. It is fascinated theory that not only gives us a look in to the rate but as well as the why and how. Rogers' believes that there are five main elements to the spread: the innovation, adopters, communication channels, time, and a social system. 

    Looking a bit deeper you learn that there four types of adopters: the early adopters, early majority, late majority, and the laggards. The early adopters are the people who are ahead of the curve and actively search for new ideas, think of those very first videos on YouTube. The early majority are those bring the new technology into mainstream, a great example of this is YouTube Influencers like Smosh, Freddie Wong, Michelle Phan, or Ryan Higa. Late majority are those that follow the early majority into integrating the new technology into their everyday lives, so think of the the everyday user. Finally, Laggards are the people go lag behind or straight up refuse to use the new technology. 

    I'll be using YouTube as the example throughout this article as it is one of the largest platforms worldwide. Our innovators are Chad Hurley, Steve Chen, and Jawed Karim. In 2005 they set out to create a website that made it easier for individuals to publish and share videos. They uploaded their first video on April 23, 2005 titled "Me at the Zoo." Our early adopters probably didn't even know the impact they were making, what paved the way for YouTube were viral videos like Judson Laipply's Evolution of Dance, and Charlie bit my finger. Our early majority would be the YouTube Stars of the 2005-2007, Michelle Phan, Ryan Higa, and Smosh to name a few. Michelle Phan was a beauty influencer, her first video was uploaded in May of 2007. Smosh is one of the oldest YouTubers with their very first upload being from November of 2005, they were a skit comedy duo. Ryan Higa was also a comedy channel with his first video dating back to July of 2007. Smosh is one of the oldest YouTubers with their very first upload being from November of 2005, they were a skit comedy duo.

    

    YouTube hit their first video to get a million views in 2005, does that mean that their were a million early adaptors? To me, I don't think so. So many people were using Google and MySpace that naturally one would end up watching a viral video being shared around. The one's who put their selves out there and uploaded and tried to make their own content before anyone even batted an eye at the site are our early adopters. Smosh could be considered an early adopter with how early they uploaded their first videos and continued to post when no one else was. Who is our late majority? The late majority would be our modern YouTubers and general audiences. The ones who were aware of YouTube but didn't really use it for everyday use until it really blew up.        

    What maybe the reason for people not really using YouTube or other social media's until everyone is using them? One reason I can think of is because they don't see a point in using it, why do they need to watch YouTube when they have Television? Why do they need to go to instagram when they have Facebook? Once the early majority moves to the next big thing it lessens the value of the other.  Why YouTube? There's a wide variety of content to find at the drop of a hat, you can create your own without needing to find a huge company to hire you, and because you don't want to miss out. YouTube has something for everyone, cooking, beauty, comedy, commentary and is completely free, so who are our laggards? Well theres a reason why it's the largest website in the world, almost everyone uses it. 

    To better answer the question I would like to move away from YouTube and onto TikTok, another way that people watch and post videos. TikTok is similar to YouTube in many ways; millions of users worldwide, video based content, and has wide variety of things for one to enjoy. But why move from YouTube to TikTok? The early adopters would be the people who were on Musical.ly and they have been using the app to lip sync to popular songs or funny audios. Our Early majority are those who joined after TikTok bought out Musical.ly and joined around 2019-2020, think Charlie D'Amelio. Everyone who joins after that point are our late majority, many people didn't get the hype but ended up getting it. Ou laggards are those who to this day refuse to join. As TikTok got popular many other social media apps tried to replicate that style, we see with Instagram Reels and YouTube shorts. Those can sway people away from TikTok because they don't see the point if they have something close enough. 

    I have noticed that as the years go on I lose interest in the things I once loved and found new exciting things to replace them with. That being said, there are times that I found myself in the same mindset of "if it isn't broken, don't fix it" especially with apps when they attempt to copy something that was already there. Now knowing all of this I would think in most cases I will be the Late majority when it comes to new technology.