Thread by @JYSexton

Working on the new book, linking multi-level integrated marketing of the LOST TV show to QAnon and rise of social media conspiracy theories, and I can’t stop laughing at all the early-2000’s era moody cast shots with poorly done edits.

For what it’s worth, corporations like Disney/ABC trained millions of people to spend their lives searching for “clues” and conducting “research” to unravel “mysteries,” all of it designed to push fan attachment.

It didn’t take long for that to short circuit people.

Corporations got people creating extra content around their products, podcasts and sites and accounts pushing theories to answer mystery box questions.

This is what QAnon is. What it’s always been. Marketing of neofascistic conspiracy theories using this same model of engagement

The same marketing ideas that push shows like WandaVision, with an emphasis on interaction, research, and prognosticating, power QAnon, leading adherents to engage in their own efforts, protests, insurrections, violence, and ultimately buying products from affiliated grifters.

The dictum of Web 2.0 was letting the audience build the business by giving them free reign to create and expand around the property. Just as LOST viewers made podcasts and accounts and sites, QAnon was decentralized creation through collaborative storytelling.

And as politics were totally consumed by money, special interests, and neoliberalism, American reality became a mystery box with mystified workings.

Collaborative storytelling in Web 2.0 gave “audiences” an interactive conspiracy theory with a built-in market. QAnon.

Q drops were the mysterious IP, inspiring the audience to dig for their own meaning, all while promoting Q, associated podcasts, sites, videos, and accounts.

QAnon is a fully multi-level integrated conspiracy based on Web 2.0 marketing. And it pushes neofascism.

For the record, no matter how many people try and take this out of context, I’m not saying LOST radicalized anyone. I’m saying the same advertising/integrating techniques that made it popular were mirrored by the QAnon phenomenon.