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<\/figure>\n\nSpecial polling and social media content analysis by the Pew Research Center tracks how the \u201cKony 2012\u201d video and information about it reached so many Americans in a relatively short period of time, and the critical role social media played, especially for adults under age 30.<\/p>\n\n
A national phone survey in the days following the video\u2019s release shows that 58% of young adults said they heard about the video, including 40% who said they heard a lot about it. That compares with 20% of those ages 30-49 who heard a lot about it; 18% of those ages 50-64; and 19% of those ages 65 and older.<\/p>\n\n
Even more striking is the way people learned about the story: 27% of young adults first heard about it through social media such as Facebook or Twitter and another 8% learned about it via other internet sources. The internet was more than three times more important as a news-learning platform for young adults than traditional media such as television, newspapers, and radio. Some 10% of young adults first learned about the video via traditional media platforms.<\/p>\n\n
For those ages 30-49, the mix of news sources was about even: 22% first learned of the \u201cKony 2012\u201d video from internet sources \u2013 15% via social media \u2013 and 21% learned from traditional media sources. Those 50 and older were much more likely to have learned of the video from traditional sources, especially television: 29% of adults ages 50-64 heard from television, newspapers, or radio, compared with 12% who heard via the internet. For adults age 65 and older, 47% learned about it from traditional sources and 5% learned from internet sources.<\/p>\n\n
All those figures above apply to all adults<\/i> in those age cohorts. If one examines the adults who had heard about the video, the numbers shift even more dramatically for social media as the top source for young adults. The figures, though from a relatively modest number of cases, suggest that perhaps half of adults 18-29 learned of the video from social media and, overall, nearly two-thirds heard first about the video from some online source.<\/p>\n\n
Word-of-mouth was also a noteworthy source for those under age 65. Some 9% of young adults learned of the video by talking with someone, 7% of those 30-64 also first heard of it during a conversation, and 2% of those 65 and older learned of it that way.<\/p>\n\n
In addition to hearing a lot about the video, young adults were much more likely than older adults to have watched the video: 23% of adults ages 18-29 watched it, compared with 11% of those 30-49, 8% of those 50-64, and 13% of those 65 and older.<\/p>\n\n
The organization\u2019s effort to promote the video by social media was very successful. Invisible Children noted that one of its goals in launching the video was to capture attention for it through campaigns in social media to encourage celebrity Twitter users to post about it. Those who did tweet included Oprah Winfrey, Ryan Seacrest, Justin Bieber, Alec Baldwin and Taylor Swift, and the campaign was saluted by White House Press Secretary Jay Carney, who said President Obama offered his congratulations for calling attention to the campaign to stop Kony and his army.<\/p>\n\n
An analysis by the Pew Research Center\u2019s Project for Excellence in Journalism found that there were nearly 5 million tweets about the video in the week after it was posted online on March 5. The Invisible Children video portrays Kony and his Lord\u2019s Resistance Army as a brutal force that kidnaps children to become soldiers. And the narrator, Jason Russell, asks viewers to participate in the anti-Kony movement by contacting politicians, donating money and putting up posters.<\/p>\n\n
Most of that social media response supported the video\u2019s message:<\/p>\n\n
- \n
- 66% of the Twitter conversation from March 5-12 supported the anti-Kony campaign<\/li>\n
- 17% was skeptical or negative about it<\/li>\n
- 16% was neutral (mostly consisting of people asking questions about what was going on)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n
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<\/figure>\n\nIn recent days, however, the tone of the conversation has shifted a bit. The first two days after the video was online, when attention on Twitter was relatively modest, 77% of the Twitter conversation was supportive compared with only 7% that was skeptical or negative.\u00a0 Since March 7, when the response picked up dramatically, the percentage of tweets reflecting skepticism or criticism rose to 17%. Some of the positive responses came from notable celebrities whose posts were widely retweeted.<\/b><\/p>\n\n
A large amount of the awareness of the documentary can be traced to Oprah Winfrey. After she began tweeting about the film to her 9.6 million followers on March 6, the amount of attention skyrocketed. According to Invisible Children, the video had about 66,000 views during its first day online. But the next day, when Oprah began to further publicize the effort, it received more than 9 million views.<\/p>\n\n
\u201cI know, was trying to get people’s attention yrs. Ago,\u201d tweeted Oprah. \u201cBut glad people are waking up to his atrocities and want to stop him.\u201d<\/p>\n\n
\u201cWas going to sleep last night and saw ur tweets about #StopKony…watched in bed, was blown away,\u201d added<\/a> television host and radio personality Ryan Seacrest.<\/p>\n\n
Millions of other Twitter users followed suit.<\/p>\n\n
\u201cNothing is more powerful than an idea whose time is NOW. Please watch and share this video,\u201d wrote Sarah, aka @yems28.<\/p>\n\n
The mainstream media also picked up on the video, and the reaction to it, with coverage on all three evening network newscasts on March 8. That was followed by a page one March 9 New York Times story headlined; \u201cOnline, a Distant Conflict Soars to Topic No. 1.\u201d And some reporters and commentators began to raise questions about the film.<\/p>\n\n
[Democratic Republic of the Congo]<\/p>\n\n\n