Facebook Launches Memology To Track The Most Popular Status Trends
This afternoon Facebook announced a new product called Memology which tracks the most popular status trends of the year. Rather than aggregating the most popular keywords alone, as Google does in their annual Zeitgeist, Facebook has decided to group status updates into various topics. All of the most popular topics are listed in the Memology chart below.
Most interesting was that Facebook showed Facebook Applications as the most popular trend. FarmVille and Farm Town both ranked extremely high. That Facebook users would talk about the applications they are using is not surprising, especially considering that applications prompt users to publish feed stories about their in-app experience. Interestingly enough, the second most popular topic was “FML”.
This is impressive and highlights just how much Facebook users like to use their status updates as a way for venting their frustration. While I believe FML stands for “F*** my life”, I’ll let you determine if there’s a better word. I should also state that the most popular phrases are being compiled from the English language, although a large percentage of Facebook users speak other languages (70 percent of users are international).
Also popular this year was Swine Flu and Michael Jackson’s death. Facebook’s memology paints an interesting picture of its user base as it better describes users’ actual lives, rather than things they are searching for (as is the case for Google’s Zeitgeist). In a post where Facebook discusses the methodology for compiling status updates for the year, they also highlight some of the key phrases users write about.
Most popular this year was “just got back from”, followed by “is getting ready to”. While we don’t know what each user writes about, we can assume that Facebook users are posting status updates about everything from their most mundane moments to exciting life experiences. If you want to get the full details of Facebook status trends this year, check out today’s blog post from Facebook.
