Ripples

"Dracula," Tame Impala's song with a viral remix featuring JENNIE, had its biggest day yet on Halloween: 2.8 million official on-demand U.S. streams on Oct. 31, according to Luminate, a new single-day high by a nearly 40% margin, Billboard reports. Rolling Stone says the original and the remix together drew 16 million global on-demand streams from Oct. 30 to Nov. 1.

It still trailed the perennial favorites on Oct. 31: Michael Jackson's "Thriller" (10 million), "Monster Mash" (7 million) and Ray Parker Jr.'s "Ghostbusters" (6.6 million). But Billboard says it led 21st-century spooky songs comfortably, ahead of Rihanna's "Disturbia" (2 million) and Lady Gaga's "Bloody Mary" (1.4 million). The song, in its 58th week on the Hot 100, has topped Billboard's Radio Songs chart for seven weeks.

Karol G drew 4.8 million entries and 3.6 million unique viewers to a TikTok Live performance on Wednesday, Nov. 4, which Billboard Español, citing a press release, calls the most simultaneous viewers ever for an artist on a TikTok Live. The one-hour set for TikTok LIVE Premiere, the platform's flagship live series, celebrated her album No Me Arrepiento de Sentir Tanto, Digital Music News reports.

About 2,000 fans were at Quarry Studios in Mexico for the show, where she performed 11 songs, including a remix of "BbY WOW" with DJ John Summit, Billboard Español reports. The album, released Aug. 7, debuted at No. 1 on Billboard's Top Latin Albums chart and spent 11 weeks there. The stream was a warm-up for the Latin American leg of her tour, starting with stadium shows in Monterrey on Nov. 6-8.

NBC News election analyst Steve Kornacki became the internet's favorite part of midterm night again. Fans set clips of him walking into the studio to sports-entrance music, as if it were "Game 7 of the NBA Finals," For The Win reports, using The White Stripes' "Seven Nation Army," the Chicago Bulls' starting-lineup song "Sirius" and NFL Primetime music.

NBC's "Kornacki Cam," a livestream of him working the big board, drew "29 million views across all platforms," according to an NBC News press release cited by Entertainment Weekly, which called it the top election livestream of the cycle. Just over 10 hours into a planned 13-hour stream, at about 3:26 a.m., Kornacki said he needed "about five minutes" and walked off. About 30 minutes later he posted on X: "I was sure 13 hours would be fine but things caught up to me in a hurry at hour 10."

Harry Styles wrapped up his Madison Square Garden residency on Oct. 31, its 30th show and the second night of his "Harryween" concerts, dressed as New York's Pizza Rat, Billboard reports. He took the stage in a furry brown onesie with oversized pink ears, a long tail and black sunglasses, carrying a giant foam slice of pizza, a nod to the viral 2015 video of a rat dragging pizza down subway stairs. The Hollywood Reporter reports that the New York Knicks' Jalen Brunson made a surprise visit.

On Oct. 30, Billboard reports, Styles opened as Elvis Presley while his band and dancers dressed as versions of Styles from across his career, then changed into the outfit from his 2010 X Factor audition and sang Stevie Wonder's "Isn't She Lovely," the song that got him through that round at 16.

New this week: Walt Zerod, the Red Baron delivery worker whose run-in with a prankster went viral (we covered the fundraiser in Issue 6), has paused the GoFundMe set up for him, The Detroit News reports. As of Nov. 5 it had raised nearly three-quarters of a million dollars from about 22,800 donations. It was started on Oct. 27 by an Arizona man, Luke Oakenshield.

"I still cannot believe how much you have all rallied behind us," Zerod wrote on the page, adding that he has been able to spend extra time at home with his family. He said he has become friends with Oakenshield and will not give media interviews: "My family's safety and privacy come first, and I feel this is the best decision for us." In the original two-minute clip, the prankster played a fake Apple Pay sound and claimed to have taken $10 from Zerod's phone while he stocked frozen pizzas.

Surveillance video from Bagel Dock Express in Southport, North Carolina, shows a 3-foot alligator coming in through an open back door, passing through the stockroom and kitchen and ending up near the front counter, NBC 6 South Florida reports. The shop was closed at the time, on Oct. 29, and owner Jesse Driscoll was there while a new oven was being installed, Boston 25 News reports.

"Never in a million years did I think I'd see an alligator," Driscoll told WWAY. He called 911; Southport police and Animal Protective Services caught the young alligator and relocated it, and no one was hurt. Police joked "Alligator- Isle 1" on social media, and the shop's Facebook post of the video said "word of our fresh bagels has made its way into the swamp!" The video spread widely this week.

Instagram is reportedly offering one-off payments of up to $500,000 to a selection of big-name creators to post long-form videos in Features, its new format for horizontal videos up to 90 minutes, Social Media Today reports. It is also giving long-form video a prominent spot at the top of the Explore page for some users, per screenshots shared by creator-economy analyst Lia Haberman.

The push addresses creators' main question: why post long videos on Instagram when its payouts are nowhere near YouTube's Partner Program? Instagram chief Adam Mosseri has acknowledged the app will need to change its payment program to attract long-form creators but hasn't settled how, Social Media Today reports. This follows Instagram's test of Features, which we covered last week.

A sculpture of La Catrina, the elegant skeleton of Day of the Dead imagery, standing in Mexico City's main square is now the Guinness World Records holder as the tallest Catrina monument, Popular Science reports. At nearly 110 feet, roughly 11 stories, the steel-and-fiberglass figure tops the 92.3-foot Catrina built in Puerto Vallarta in 2023.

About 140 people assembled it. Her purple dress is more than 88 feet long, and the ofrenda (memorial altar) around her is surrounded by an estimated 70,000 marigold plants grown in the Xochimilco borough. Day of the Dead is observed on Nov. 1 and 2.

Comedian Connor Wood, known online as @fibula and a contestant on Dancing with the Stars, told BuzzFeed in late October that Jennifer Lawrence was his biggest celebrity crush and that he just wanted "a little acknowledgment" from her, Complex reports. Lawrence replied on Instagram: "I saw you on 8th avenue drinking a smoothie and you paid me no mind." The exchange went viral.

New this week: Smoothie King and Wood released "Connor's Paid Me No Mind Smoothie" on Nov. 5, a limited-time, in-store-only strawberry-banana drink with 26 grams of protein, zero added sugar and electrolytes per 20-ounce serving, according to the company, Complex reports.

Layla Clark, a senior mallet percussionist in the Thomas Jefferson High School Marching Band near Pittsburgh, went viral playing AC/DC's "Thunderstruck" in the band's arrangement, Allegheny County Spotlight reports. The West Jefferson Hills School District shared the clip, credited Clark and the band, and later said it had passed 3.1 million views.

Reactions came from several platforms, the Spotlight reports: one Threads user suggested she tackle the song's famous guitar riff next, another made sure the viral "Xylophone Girl" was credited by name, and film producer Franklin Leonard weighed in on X. (Some outlets, including CBS Pittsburgh, describe the instrument as a marimba.)

Indiana Fever guard Caitlin Clark spent Halloween night scaring trick-or-treaters in her neighborhood in a skull mask, then handing out candy, The Big Lead reports; the children likely had no idea a WNBA star was behind the mask. Heavy reports that Fever photographer Bri Lewerke posted the video on TikTok.

It came days after the Fever's front-office shake-up following a first-round playoff exit to the Las Vegas Aces: team president and general manager Kelly Krauskopf stepped down and Amber Cox was fired, Heavy reports.

A video of a prankster pretending to steal money from a Red Baron employee's phone spread widely online this week, Newsweek reports. The worker, a father of four identified only as "Walt," angrily told the prankster it was not a joke to him; he said he was working late to make ends meet and was due back early the next morning to cover more stores.

A stranger in Arizona started a GoFundMe titled "Support a Harassed Red Baron Worker." Per Newsweek, it stood at about $5,500 on Wednesday afternoon, passed $48,000 that night and topped $100,000 on Thursday. Conservative commentator Benny Johnson helped spread the appeal, VINnews reports. The prankster's Instagram account has gone dark, according to Newsweek.

Newsweek's Shane Croucher argues the happy ending is "a lottery": viral attention rescued one worker, while most crowdfunding campaigns fall short.

YouTube is testing a Shorts bonus program, invitation-only, with creators in the US, UK, Germany, Brazil, Japan and South Korea, Music Ally reports, citing YouTube's Rene Ritchie in a Creator Insider video. It offers a minimum payment for uploading a set number of public Shorts per month, plus a monthly "promotional payment" based on views.

The required numbers are not public; YouTube says they will be in the invitation emails. Music Ally notes the test follows YouTube raising its Partner Program thresholds in August and saying earlier this month that the Shorts algorithm will favor original content over re-uploads.

Several dozen people gathered outside Liberty Mutual's headquarters in Boston's Back Bay on Sunday, Oct. 25, calling on the insurer to stop running ads with its fuzzy yellow "Liberty Biberty" mascot, The Boston Globe reports.

The protest was organized by Connor Harvey, a 19-year-old YouTuber from Wilmot, N.H. He told the Globe it "initially started out as a joke" in a video called "Death of Mascots"; his follow-up "official announcement" drew more than 600,000 views and briefly topped YouTube's most-hyped list. The mascot, which debuted this summer, had already drawn mockery on Reddit, TikTok and late-night TV, including an Oct. 11 Last Week Tonight segment in which John Oliver said, "I hate this thing."

Protesters carried signs such as "Liberty from Biberty," and Harvey called it "the next Boston Tea Party." He said they would leave if asked. Liberty Mutual did not immediately respond to the Globe.

Videos of children dumping whole bowls of unattended Halloween candy into their bags, often caught on doorbell cameras, have become an annual viral debate, Parents reports via Yahoo. Data from the short-form trend platform Virlo, shared with Parents, puts candy-bowl etiquette videos at about 91.7 million views across social platforms. The article cites a survey finding doorbell cameras in about 39% of U.S. homes.

Virlo cofounder Deniz Sancar says the footage makes viewers "feel like they're standing on the porch," and the comment debates add to its shareability. Texas counselor Brook McKenzie argues that posting the clips confuses "accountability with humiliation" and that online ridicule can follow children through school. The article says taking the whole bowl is still wrong, but suggests parents correct it privately.

Instagram is testing a format called "Features" that lets creators post horizontal videos up to 90 minutes long, the A.V. Club reports. Instagram head Adam Mosseri, who said "for a long time, I have been against doing long-form video on Instagram," announced it Monday, Oct. 26, in a nearly seven-minute video with product VP Tessa Lyons.

Lyons said people like watching Reels together on a TV, and a TV version of Reels needs more than short-form video. Mosseri described a "symbiotic" link between short and long videos across the mobile app and Instagram's TV app, and said the rollout will expand to more users over time. The National reports that it is being tested with select US creators after a trial in Brazil, and that Features videos will also appear in Instagram for TV, now on Apple TV in the US.

Neither executive named competitors, but the A.V. Club notes the move puts Instagram closer to YouTube's long-form territory.

When severe hail and wind hit Phoenix last week, employees at a PNC Bank helped street food vendor Hilario Cruz Cruz pull his customized cart inside, FOX 10 Phoenix reports. A video shot inside the bank has passed 1 million views on TikTok, with hundreds of thousands of likes.

Cruz Cruz, who sells elotes and fresh fruit along Peoria Avenue near Interstate 17, said the staff had bought from him for years. He recalled telling them the cart would not fit, and the manager answering, "I know it will." He said business has been booming since the video went viral.

"Brain stacking" is a trend on TikTok and Instagram Reels in which creators keep a stack of books, Sudoku, crosswords and journals within reach and show it off in morning or bedtime routines, as an alternative to doomscrolling, Mashable reports. One creator, @shykikii, credits @mandyrulez with seemingly coining the term.

Mashable links it to last year's "analog bag" trend and a wider 2026 turn toward film cameras, knitting and other "grandma hobbies," amid worry about attention spans. It also points out the irony of learning about a screen-free hobby on TikTok.

Jacksonville Jaguars running back Bhayshul Tuten and teammates celebrated a touchdown against the Houston Texans at Wembley Stadium by acting out the "Tip Toein' In My Jordans" meme, shushing the camera and tip-toeing, Yahoo Sports reports; the clip drew millions of views within a day.

The meme comes from an AI-generated video of Rumpelstiltskin dancing in a barn, posted on Instagram in late August as a demo of AI filmmaking, according to Know Your Meme's explainer on Yahoo. In late September a TikToker paired it with Riff Raff's 2014 song "TIP TOE WiNG iN MY JAWWDiNZ," and it spread across TikTok, Instagram Reels and X. Many viewers believed it came from a real 1980s fantasy film.

Hundreds of people gathered at London Fields over the weekend of Oct. 17-18 to watch artist Jack Carden and actor Camtholomew the First, in armor and cloaks, charge at each other on rented Lime e-bikes with striped poles, The Standard reports. Videos show one rider knocked off his bike.

Carden had billed it as a "free public joust" and "performance art." Lime responded on Monday: "While we appreciate the medieval spirit, safety must always come first. Lime bikes are designed for getting around the city, not for jousting."

Madonna posted a TikTok of herself in a gold dress set to Adéla's "Nicole Kidman," Billboard reports, joining Kesha, Tove Lo, Pedro Pascal, Dua Lipa and Kristen Wiig in the trend; Kidman herself has embraced the song.

Adéla, a Slovak singer, released her debut album PRIMA in September; it debuted at No. 4 on the Billboard 200, and "Nicole Kidman" recently reached No. 9 on the Hot 100, her first top 10 there. Billboard describes the song as a playful celebration of confidence and manifestation.

When Keni Cedanio Ramirez, 17, was named homecoming king at Mahanoy Area High School in Schuylkill County, Pennsylvania, he shared the crown and sash with the other nominee, his friend Axton Kuhla, 17, who has Down syndrome and had become overwhelmed by the crowd, TODAY.com reports. Keni said he had decided beforehand to share it if he won.

Video of the moment, first posted by local outlet Skook News, spread widely. "He'll talk about it forever," Axton's mother, Alyssa Shellhamer, told TODAY. Keni said he didn't cry at the ceremony but did when he watched the video.

Matthew Hobbs, who posts dog songs to more than 800,000 TikTok followers as Puppy Songs, filed copyright lawsuits on Oct. 19 against Kroger and LG Electronics, Billboard reports. He alleges both used his 2023 viral track "Cheese Tax" in TikTok marketing videos without buying sync licenses.

Billboard explains that personal TikTok accounts can use trending sounds for free, but brand accounts are limited to a commercial library unless they license music directly; Hobbs says his song was never in that library. Both videos came down in April after legal demands, but Hobbs says he hasn't been paid. LG declined to comment; Kroger did not immediately respond. Billboard notes Sony Music sued Kroger over similar posts in August.

Alza, billed as New York City's first microdrama film festival, ran Oct. 16-18, founded by former Tribeca Festival COO Pete Torres, The Verge reports. It screened vertical series and features made for phone apps, including a vertical Pride and Prejudice, in a Manhattan AMC theater, alongside industry panels.

The reviewer found jump cuts from the apps' short-episode format jarring and screenings far from full, but heard laughter and gasps from an audience of many middle-aged women. Executives at GammaTime, founded by former Miramax CEO Bill Block, said they target "mainstream women who are part of this mobile-first movement," including former daytime TV viewers.

After screenshots on X showed YouTube's dislike button moved into the three-dot menu, YouTube told The Verge on Oct. 21 that it is "not testing hiding the dislike button on YouTube for users." Spokesperson Kimberly Taylor said a new layout is coming for creators viewing their own uploads, with dislike behind the menu; creators can still see full dislike counts in YouTube Studio. It rolls out "in the coming weeks."

The Verge notes YouTube hid public dislike counts in 2021 to curb harassment and removed the dislike button from Shorts earlier this year.

Searches on TikTok for peptides such as semaglutide, BPC-157, TB-500 and retatrutide now return a "no results found" page, The Verge reports. Videos have not been removed, a general search for "peptides" still works, and slight spelling variations get around the block. TikTok's U.S. owner did not immediately respond to The Verge.

Peptides include approved drugs like insulin and GLP-1s, but also unapproved substances that influencers promote, sometimes pointing followers to compounding pharmacies, for uses from weight loss to wound healing with little clinical data, The Verge says. Influencer Jeff Tang flagged the change and blamed Eli Lilly in a video.

An exotic green bird, possibly a parrot, flew into Terminal 5 at Chicago O'Hare International Airport and perched on passengers' heads and luggage near the Air France check-in line, pecking anyone who tried to catch it, UPI reports. The visit was on Oct. 13, according to the worker who filmed it; the videos spread in the following week.

Paris Elbert, the O'Hare worker who filmed it, told CBS Chicago the bird "chose fight, not flight." A janitor eventually caught it in a shirt and took it to a veterinarian to be checked and scanned for a microchip.

Brady Rogers, 33, won a seat on the city council in Kelowna, British Columbia, in the Oct. 17 municipal election after a campaign of self-mocking signs such as "How hard could it be?", "Fine. I'll do it" and "Under 60!", Daily Hive and IBTimes UK report. IBTimes says he placed fourth of 37 candidates for eight seats, with more than 12,600 votes.

Rogers, a former robotic automation engineer who runs a downtown shop, told Daily Hive he had conflicted feelings about politics and thought that "genuine tension was a great place to start a campaign." He acknowledged the signs sought attention, saying he wanted it because he has meaningful things to say.

A TikTok account began promoting the "Losercore Playlist," a Spotify playlist of moody alt-rock, in the summer, and by September and October had moved to retro-styled AI animations with recurring characters, including a couple inspired by the band TV Girl. Know Your Meme says users on X mocked the AI visuals, questioned the effort spent on a playlist, and accused the creator of using another artist's work without permission.

The Boo Trend has people say "boo" while crossing their eyes and moving toward the camera, copying a video that started circulating in late September. Know Your Meme says it spread through recreations and pranks in which creators coax partners or family members into doing it.

Meta stopped accepting ads from ByteDance, TikTok's parent, on Facebook and Instagram in the U.S., Canada, Egypt, Indonesia, Japan, Thailand and Vietnam. The ban also covers other advertisers whose ads send people to TikTok or other ByteDance apps in those markets, Bloomberg first reported. "We don't have to run ads from a competitor whose goal is to pull people off our apps," Meta said, calling it normal business practice. TikTok did not comment. The move follows weeks of public sparring between the two over child-safety terms that Meta agreed to in an August settlement with U.S. states.

WIRED reports that Threads has become a central venue for Black social media conversation, citing the reaction after a Mississippi grand jury declined to charge anyone in the death of 18-year-old Nolan Wells.

This American Life tells how the host of NPR’s Wild Card noticed gibberish comments on a Spotify episode page that turned out to be teenagers using it as a hidden chat room.

The Karol G “Bby Wow” dance trend climbed to No. 2 in TikTok trending searches on September 25.

Why it rippled

This looks like a second-wave music signal: a track can already be commercially successful, then receive another burst when a specific piece of choreography gives users something easy to imitate.

MrBeast’s “I Built A City To Save Kids From Illegal Labor” was one of the biggest YouTube releases of the week, with public tracking showing roughly 64.4M views.

Why it rippled

It combines the strongest pieces of the MrBeast formula—huge scale, a simple moral premise and a visual transformation—with a humanitarian subject. That makes it both entertainment and a conversation about whether creator-led philanthropy can mobilize attention faster than traditional nonprofits.

Creators are organizing routines into “once a day / once a week / once a month” buckets for skincare, exercise, cleaning, content creation and other habits. Trend trackers surfaced the format on TikTok and then again in Instagram’s late-September roundup.

Why it rippled

This is exactly the kind of lightweight structure that migrates between platforms: recognizable in one second, useful enough to save, and endlessly customizable.

MrBeast’s Instagram Reel “scariest meal of my life @erling”, featuring football star Erling Haaland, was tracked at roughly 127M views, among the largest Instagram posts of the week.

Why it rippled

The interesting signal is the crossover itself: sports celebrity, creator spectacle and short-form comedy are becoming increasingly interchangeable forms of pop culture.

Instagram trend trackers flagged “This is your sign” as a rising Reels format on September 25. Creators reuse existing B-roll, point viewers toward the literal or metaphorical “sign,” and finish with a punchline or call to action.

Why it rippled

It has almost no production barrier and works across travel, fitness, food, work and personal storytelling—the kind of format that can spread because everyone can adapt it.

Mrwhosetheboss’ “Xiaomi made an iPhone Duo. It’s Unhinged.” was tracked around 13.4M YouTube views.

Why it rippled

Phone launches are no longer just review events. They are short-form entertainment, with creators packaging product differences as spectacle, comedy and identity.

Fresh Step produced a cluster of absurd cat-themed Shorts—including “Is it crazy to play cat soccer?” and “Is it crazy to get a cattoo?”—with each tracked around 19M views.

Why it rippled

The interesting part is repetition. Instead of a single successful ad, the brand appears to have found a serial comedy format that viewers will watch more than once.

TikTok Week 39 tracking showed several breakout creators reaching extraordinary scale, led by @chickenfingers at about 57.4M views and @melikeonurofficial_ near 47.5M, with multiple other accounts above 20M.

Why it rippled

This is an important counter-signal to celebrity-heavy Instagram: TikTok can still produce enormous algorithmic breakout reach for accounts that are not globally famous. For Cascadity, creator-outlier performance may be more interesting than raw platform rank.

Creator Celine Dept’s Mbappé challenge videos reached roughly 12M views on YouTube, while On’s Mbappé-focused short-form content was also heavily viewed on TikTok around the edge of the Issue 1 window.

Why it rippled

Elite athletes increasingly participate in creator-native challenges rather than simply appearing in conventional ads. That makes them part of the meme and format ecosystem, not just its subject.

KATSEYE’s “mom!! megan’s doing it again!! 🍍” and related “going M.I.A.” clips kept circulating across short-form platforms during Issue 1. Public trackers showed the pineapple clip at roughly 10.6M TikTok views and 15.8M YouTube views, with follow-on KATSEYE dance content continuing to spread.

Why it rippled

This looks less like one celebrity post and more like a repeatable fandom format: music, choreography, an inside joke and a visual cue that fans can copy or remix.

Approximate Issue 1 ranking based on public trend trackers rather than complete platform APIs.

Cristiano Ronaldo posted a minimal Portugal-themed Reel that public tracking placed above 100M views during the week.

Why it rippled

Not every viral signal is a new format. Sometimes the signal is the sheer portability of a global personality: a tiny amount of content can produce enormous attention when identity, sport and fandom are already doing the storytelling.

Chef creator Nick DiGiovanni’s “$1 vs $100,000 Knife” was tracked at roughly 16.9M YouTube views.

Why it rippled

The format compresses several reliable hooks into seconds: absurd price contrast, craftsmanship, food culture and the promise that viewers will see whether expensive actually means better.

Manish Kharage’s “When babies don’t smile back” was tracked at roughly 14.8M YouTube views.

Why it rippled

The premise needs almost no cultural translation. Short-form comedy often travels best when viewers understand the entire social situation before the first sentence is finished.

Star Sports’ Japan vs India T20I highlights reached roughly 27.2M tracked YouTube views during the week.

Why it rippled

The number is a useful reminder that a U.S.-centric short-form sample misses huge cultural events. Cricket repeatedly produces global-scale video attention that can rival mainstream entertainment.