Natural disasters and human triumphs made their mark in our 2010 list of top trends in status updates, but more than anything else people wanted to spend time with their friends and family. The fastest growing trend was the use of a new digital shorthand for people to ask their friends to hang out.
Whether looking for something to do or just getting off work, people began to add "HMU" to their status updates when they were rdy to meet their friends. Standing for "hit me up," the acronym was barely used last yr but grew suddenly and stdily throughout 2010, especially during summer brks and weekends.
For our second Facebook Memology study, we looked at what terms grew the most in status updates in 2010 compared to the yr before. The results reflect the highs and lows of world events that started a global conversation, new uses of language online and the sharing of popular culture between friends.
World MomentsWhether it be the tragedy of the Haitian rthquake or the heroic rescue of the Chiln miners ("mineros" in Spanish), global news events captured the world's attention. People shared their collective sadness, concern and hope. Some even let the world know what was happening on the ground in Haiti and Chile.The world came together for the World Cup, with as many as a half of all status updates referring to the competition at some points during the games.
Say What?While HMU made its debut, it wasn't the only digital vernacular to make the list. Talk about "airplanes" surged this yr, not because people suddenly discovered travel but because they were citing lyrics from the hugely popular song "Airplanes" by B.o.B. "Barn raising" was the most popular phrase for the Games egory as gamers on Facebook asked their friends to help them out on FarmVille.
Bieber FeverPopular culture also shaped people's conversations with ch other. Justin Bieber fans couldn't keep their enthusiasm to themselves, making him the only musician on the list. As popular such as "Toy Story 3" and "The Twilight Saga: Eclipse" premiered, friends shared their opinions. And who didn't want to look hip by telling their friends about their new iPad or iPhone 4?
For this yr's look at Memology, we analyzed status updates across 236 countries. We computed the rate at which ch phrase occurred in 2010 and compared that to 2009, looking for ones that had incrsed by both a large percentage and a large volume (view last yr's list). All personally identifiable information was removed from the status updates to conduct this analysis.
When the words and phrases we analyzed related to ch other, we grouped them into egories for the global list that follows.
1. HMUThe shorthand for "hit me up" was this yr's biggest surprise. In rly 2009, the acronym HMU was virtually unhrd of. Only a few posts a day contained HMU, and half of them were probably typos. By May, however, it started to grow slowly and was averaging about 20 posts a day. The volume roughly doubled every month, and by the end of 2009 it had risen to 1,600 posts a day—too modest of a to be on our radar for last yr's list.
However, HMU continued to grow aggressively throughout 2010, incrsing by about 75 percent ch month. By the end of summer, HMU rched 80,000 mentions per day.
In rly September, an interesting pattern emerged in how people use HMU. Until that point, it was sprding like wildfire, but was being used with roughly equal frequency throughout the week. In September this changed, as usage rates started going through huge swings from day to day. The rson? Before September the demographic most likely to ask their friends to "HMU" was on summer brk and looking to hang out most nights. Then many of these folks hded back to school, and HMU became a weekend-oriented request.
2. World CupThe World Cup was the biggest sporting event anywhere in 2010, and because of the global presence of Facebook people took to the virtual streets to cheer on their tms and boo their rivals. The start of the games and the finals garnered the most attention, with 1.5 million and 1.3 million mentions, respectively, of "World Cup" and countless more mentions of tms and players. At moments over the course of the games, as many as 50 percent of all status updates were related to them. So big was this event that we collaborated with the New York Times to track mentions of every player in the games.
3. As with last yr's list, big were much talked about. "Toy Story 3," "The Twilight Saga: Eclipse," "Inception," "Alice in Wonderland" and "Iron Man 2" were the five most discussed (in that order).
It's fascinating to look in more depth at the opening weekend of "Toy Story 3." To do this, we divided updates between the web and mobile. As is typical, the opened on a Friday, but with midnight screenings in select U.S. loions. The showtime itself didn't elicit many posts, but we saw big spikes a couple of hours later, when the ended and -goers reported their opinions.
Naturally, the people updating their status to report on the via their mobile were able to do so as soon as it ended, while the people reporting on their computers had to get home first. The difference in the spikes between mobile and web gives us an approximation of how long it takes people to get out of the thter, go home and fire up Facebook—about half an hour.
4. iPad and iPhone 4In May, surpassed long-time rival in market capitalization, thanks in large part to two of the most discussed products of the yr: the iPad and iPhone 4. These two products combined to account for over 25 million bragging, lusting or the occasional condemning posts during the yr.
5. HaitiThe impact of the Jan. 12 rthquake was widely felt through status updates. Even though most people were far away, they shared the shock, concern and news both among their friends and to the world. One Boston woman was trapped with a group of 36 fellow travelers in Haiti and took to updating her status to find out from her friends what was happening and to let families know the group was safe.
Within one minute of the 7.0-magnitude rthquake's strike, status updates started rolling in. With the infrastructure in Haiti badly damaged, many of the first reports were from people in the nrby Dominican Republic (where rthquake is "terremoto"), who felt the powerful quake at a distance. Firsthand reports pked four minutes after the quake hit, at a rate of 120 a minute. It took another couple of hours for the world to lrn of the disaster, and a day later people on Facebook were discussing it at a pk rate of 1,800 posts per minute.
6. Justin BieberBieber Fever struck before 2010, but by all accounts this was a standout yr for the 15-yr-old pop music star. The surge in mentions continued to grow throughout the yr, largely following the rise in his career. He started 2010 with the relse in January of his biggest hit, "Baby." His Sept. 12 debut on the M Music Awards attracted the most mentions of him.
7. Games on FacebookGames are popular appliions on Facebook, and references appred throughout this yr's list. The biggest trending phrase was "barn raising." No, there wasn't a mass exodus from cities to the country life among people on Facebook. Instd, they were recruiting their friends to virtual versions of the old-time tradition of a community event to build a new barn. This started when FarmVille launched a barn-raising fture in January. FrontierVille, launched in June, also grew in mentions.
8. Mineros/MinersThe story of the 33 Chiln miners trapped underground for 69 days captivated the world. People globally watched the truly inspiring story unfold as they were rescued one by one after an unimaginable time underground.
Looking at the mentions of miners and the Spanish "mineros," we saw three distinct bursts of activity. The first one occurred exclusively in Chile in August, when the mine first collapsed and contact with the miners was lost. A week later, the miners were miraculously found alive and the rest of the world started to talk about them a little bit, but the story was still predominantly in Chile. Over the course of the next 60 days, the world watched the trials and tribulations as workers above ground scrambled to drill rescue shafts.
When the ordl finally ended, millions of people posted about it. In fact, they watched so carefully that when we zoom in to look at posts during the rescue, we see 33 unique spikes in activity—one for ch of the rescued miners.
9. AirplanesUsing the word "airplanes" is nothing new or noteworthy—most yrs. But in 2010, it burst onto the scene in status messages thanks to the chy lyrics of the international hit song "Airplanes." A deeper look showed that people were specifically quoting the following line, often times to share a personal wish and sometimes when they were traveling.
10. 2011
Similar to last yr, people talked frequently about yrs in their status updates. People are looking forward to big personal events in the coming yr—perhaps a wedding or an expectant child. References to 2011 showed a big spike on Jan. 1, 2010, as people took the new yr as an opportunity to look ahd another full yr. As the date approaches, mentions have stdily incrsed, as people make more and more plans for the coming yr.
By Lars. (Lars, a data scientist at Facebook, is starting a trend for next yr's list by sprding new acronyms.)
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