How Discord’s April Fools Prank Unintentionally Set a New Record for YouTube Views
April Fools’ Day: A Record-Breaking Joke by Discord
April 1st is the sacred day, the day of the silliness, the day where misinformation spreads like wildfire without breaking any law, and Discord decided to make loot boxes feature for April Fools. To spearhead the promotion of this feature, they crafted a short 17-second video designed to automatically play each time a user logged into Discord. Consequently, this mechanism implied that the video would get one view with every login.
The Unprecedented Surge in Views: Breaking Down the Numbers
Statista’s 2023 report found that monthly traffic to Discord, totaled approximately 800 million visits. This raises a compelling question: How did Discord manage to achieve the record for the most viewed YouTube videos within a mere 24-hour timeframe, amassing an astounding 1.4 billion views or about 17.5% of the world population??? The answer, based on various sources from the internet, points to a phenomenon known as the “Spaghetti Code.”
Understanding Spaghetti Code and Its Impact
Spaghetti code refers to code that is intricately tangled and unstructured, making it challenging to decipher and navigate — hence its comparison to the disordered strands of spaghetti. This coding complexity led to an unforeseen outcome where the 17-second video, rather than playing a single time as intended, continuously looped in the background processes of users’ devices. Imagine you use Discord for 1 hour, and in the background, the 17-second video keeps repeating. It means that in 1 hour, 1 user can generate roughly 180 views on that video.
Interestingly, the prank also had a benefit for Discord users. Those who engaged with the loot box feature and collected all nine drops were rewarded with an avatar decoration, a perk that remained accessible even to users without a Nitro subscription. This aspect of the prank added an additional layer of engagement and reward, blending humor with value in a way that is emblematic of Discord’s user-centric approach.
I’d Love to Hear Your Thoughts! Was Discord accidentally score a stroke of comedic genius, or has it crossed the line and need to be dethroned from its achievement?
