Design studio maps out spread of viral facebook pics

What would the spread of a viral photo or video on a social networking site like Facebook look like? A San Francisco-based design studio may provide a glimpse into such a phenomenon, as it studied three viral Facebook photos and turned them into videos. "Each visualization is made up of a series of branches starting from a single person. As the branch grows, re-shares split off on their own arcs, sometimes spawning a new generation of re-shares, sometimes exploding in a short-lived burst of activity," Stamen said on Facebook Stories. The visualizations were based on shares originating from news feeds from July to September. It said the different colors show gender, and each successive generation becomes more and more white as time goes by. Stamen said the viral images as featured on the Facebook page of actor George Takei included "Marvin the Martian," "Famous Failures," and "AbFab London 2012." The videos visualized "a single piece of content being shared between hundreds of thousands of individuals on Facebook." "We've tried to capture the frenetic energy surrounding three of the most shared images, all of which were photos published on George Takei's Page," Stamen said. — LBG, GMA News