'Kony 2012' becomes the most viral video in History with more than 100 Million views [Study]

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With more than 70 million views in five days, Kony 2012, a 30-minute documentary about Ugandan rebel leader Joseph Kony, has become the most viral video in history, according to one researcher.

In a blog post, Visible Measures found Kony outpaced other record-setting viral videos.

For instance, the video featuring Susan Boyle on Britain’s Got Talent in 2009, hit 70 million views in six days. Old Spice’s “Responses” campaign didn’t hit 70 million until five months after it launched.

Visible Measures got its figures by tracking not just the original Vimeo version of Kony, but also responses to the video. By March 8, three days after Kony went live, there were 200 such responses, which ran six minutes on average. The video has also netted more than 500,000 comments.

Despite the rapid rise of Kony 2012, the video has brought a shower of criticism to Invisible Children, the organization behind it. Many of the negative critiques have been targeted at Invisible Children’s practices as an organization, not whether Joseph Kony, the leader of the Lord’s Resistance Army, is a war criminal.


In particular, a Tumblr blog called Visible Children, outlined how just 32% of Invisible Children’s money went to direct services, while the rest went to staff salaries and other overhead.

Invisible Children responded with a blog post outlining its expenses. The post didn’t dispute the 32% figure, but illustrated how another 26% went to “awareness programs.”