#TheDress, Science, and The Digital Age
The internet is like a volcano.
Most of the time it merely gurgles and bubbles. Little wisps of smoke rise up, swirl, drift aimlessly and disappear.
Someone asks harmlessly, “Hey did you see that thing? You know, about that thing?”
“Oh yeah, that thing,” you reply. “Sure, I saw that. Interesting, huh?”
Bubble, bubble. Gurgle, gurgle.
Then BAM! The whole thing blows up in spectacular fashion and no matter how hard you try you can’t escape the wall of ash and heat- a billion and one little bits of digital data- that is rushing towards you.
The subject line simply read, “That Damn Dress .”
And thus my morning began with an email from my co-worker suggesting that we get one of our perception researchers to comment on the dress that at this very moment is destroying countless relationships. Surely I cannot be the only one a bit bewildered by the heated debate instigated by one poorly lit, not particularly cute dress? Alas, my Facebook feed suggests that perhaps I am. But personal apathy aside, how are so many people seeing such different things in the same image? Michele- Friday, February 27th 11:31 AM
I wrote that e-mail subject line. My name is Mike. I’m the “communications” guy at The Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences at Indiana University in Bloomington, IN. The quote above came from Michele. She works with me on our social media accounts. It was meant as an introductory paragraph to an informal account of the science behind #thedress from a researcher who studies vision in our department.
7:22 PM, the night before.
“What color is this dress,” my wife says, turning her laptop around to show me a photo in her Facebook feed.
“Lavender and gold.”
“Or white and gold, but definitely not blue and black, right?”
“Of course.”
“Well, Justin sees black and blue, and evidently others do to.”
“Weird, I’ll ask the researchers in the Vision Lab about it tomorrow.”
At this point I had yet to look at my personal feed. I had no idea that this dress thing had taken over the internet.
“I know, I’ve gotten about 10 emails about it already…I have a theory about why it is happening, but I could be wrong.”
Jason Gold, Associate Professor
His lab is called VISION LAB
It was 10:30 AM when I got a reply from Jason Gold. I wanted to know his thoughts on why people were seeing the dress differently.
By this time a new “science of the dress” article was popping up every minute. Every publisher, media outlet, blogger, tweeter, social media guru, and probably that cool french guy who makes Vines, were in full-on frenzy mode. I was getting anxious. It’s not everyday that an internet craze is directly related to your research. We could contribute something meaningful. We had something to say! But time was running out.
“I also think it’s funny that Jason’s “informal” response reads like an encyclopedia. I wanted to preface it by saying “He’s smarter than all of us.” The subtext was basically “terrible lighting.””
An e-mail from Michele regarding what Jason wrote in his reply.
It should be noted that Jason was incredibly busy that day, outside of the dress volcano. I am grateful he took the time to write something. Despite his disclaimer about how he “might be wrong”- he wasn’t. This piece (view at Forbes.com) by Steven Pinker of Harvard University is basically an expanded version of what Jason wrote off-the-cuff.
The bullet-point version goes like this:
- It has something to do with Color Constancy.
2. Color Constancy is mainly about how your brain makes estimates and corrections to adjust for different lighting environments.
3. Brains are pretty good at making these adjustments to arrive at the actual color of something, hence the term “color constancy”.
4. “Why people have such different interpretations is beyond me.”
Basically, every article I saw was saying the same thing. Here’s the rub- the headlines all read something like “Science Explains Why We Can’t Agree On #TheDress,” but that doesn’t jive with #4. If everyone saw white and gold then a recap of color constancy would be sufficient. As Michele said, “terrible lighting.” The internet doesn’t go bananas over bad photographs.
Don’t be scared, Taylor.
“Can we re-shoot all of Karate Kid (the original) with the main source of tension between Daniel and Johnny being the blue dress debate instead of Elizabeth Shue?”
I e-mail this to Michele as we continue to brainstorm how we jump into the conversation. Attached to the e-mail is a feeble attempt at creating my own #thedress meme.
The morning quickly turned to afternoon and it’s becoming clear that we aren’t going to be able to pull together any science-based content by the end of the day. We are not Buzzfeed. Our faculty are busy doing research, teaching class, attending meetings, you know, being professors and social media is just one part of what Michele and I do. We simply can’t move as fast as the teams of social media experts employed by media companies.
This gets posted to our Instagram:
The internet is going bonkers and some of the most qualified experts on the subject in the world have offices just a few doors down from mine. How is this the only thing we have to contribute?
I create a Flipboard magazine for #thedress to collect articles on “the science of…” At some point I flip a non-dress related article I see titled, “15 ways you are failing at social media,” into this magazine. It felt like it belonged there.
While I am collecting articles and suggesting a re-shoot of Karate Kid, big brands are churning out little clever nuggets of content.
I take some solace in the fact that the best some of the largest brands in the world could muster was “all we see is (insert their brands colors) #thedress”- really?
(when did Denny’s get to be so cool? http://blog.dennys.com/ )
So, kid, you think you would be good at social media?
A few weeks earlier we did a series of Valentines’ Day videos on Instagram. One of the videos featured students I met in the lobby of our building. A sophomore psychology minor named Christian was one of those students. He asked if he could be involved with our marketing/social media efforts. We had made plans for him to come by my office at 2:30PM on the day of the dress volcano.
Instead of small-talk, and the “tell me about you,” chit-chat. Christian is immediately folded into #thedress conversation. Michele has joined us in my office. The three of us brainstorm a little.
I see a tweet from a freind- “I only learned about #thedress at 10:38 this morning. 10:37 RIP me.” It’s over. We will not pull off any social media coup today. We will not be heros.
Or, will we?
It’s around 3:30 when I see a post for BuzzFeed’s experimental app- Cute or Not. I first saw it a few days earlier and quickly dismissed it. This time a desperation fueled idea pops into my head. One that, at the time, seemed so rich with irony and sheer ridiculousness, that for 30 seconds or so I saw us standing in triumph on the apex of the mountain of zeros and ones that was #thedress.
I open up Outlook and begin to type.
“Can we build an app like this that uses all of #thedress memes floating around and thus crown a champion meme?”
Discard changes? Outlook asks as I close the composition window. Yes!
It’s a silly idea. Also one I know full well we can’t execute. I have succumbed to the delerium of an interent craze. I have become the thing I have been fighting all day. Remember, this was about having something of substance to contribute. Now, I want to clone the Cute or Not app?
I spend most of my waking hours thinking about how to best communicate the value of what we do in a crowded media landscape. It’s not an easy task. Science is complex, nuanced and unfolds methodically. Science isn’t well-suited to generate the juicy, shareable bits of content the internet craves. In fact it demands the exact opposite.
The human brain has 100 billion neurons and 100 trillion connections.
It is the most complex thing in the universe. The monumental task of unraveling the neural connections behind human behavior represents a new frontier for the human race.
The faculty here are doing innovative, cutting-edge research that has the potential to impact nearly every aspect of human existence. It’s fascinating work. They are fascinating people.
Big, massive, mystery-of-the-universe goal + innovative research + smart, interesting people + the potential to change lives= a pretty darn compelling story, IMHO.
So while #thedress may have been a missed opportunity that left us stumbling to keep up and grasping at increasingly absurd ideas- we’re not mad at you, internet. We still have plenty of mysteries to solve, break-throughs to make, students to educate, and stories to tell. See ya around.
For more on #thedress and the challenges of science communication read this from Jordan DeLong, Visiting Assistant Professor at Indiana University.
