Media Organizations Following Viral Posts on Internet

.@pmarca on why everything from TV to traditional news organizations now behave like a viral post: "Marshall McLuhan was the great media theorist of the TV era." "He said, 'If it's on TV, it's a television show.' In other words, the medium is the message." "What's the native medium of the internet? What's the form of media on the internet that rips and dominates? It's clearly the viral post." "The traditional media and the former newspapers and television—they're basically covering whatever was the viral post yesterday or a week ago. They're being driven by the viral post." "That's not going to change. If you're a TV producer or if you're a news editor, you can't possibly move your organization fast enough to stay ahead of these cycles." "So what you end up doing is you end up chasing them. That's basically the role of mainstream media for the rest of our lives—is them following the internet's viral posts."