Every few months, social media introduces another food trend. Whether it’s a fun candy or drink, suspicious food combination or so forth, they are all incredibly basic. Now, the next trending food item is Dot Cakes.
Inspired by the New York City based bakery, The Dot Cakes, these sweet treats have blown up on the internet with their rainbow dot sprinkles, and that’s about it.
Though these cakes sound great, you can find all these ingredients at the store and make an identical Dot Cake yourself, showing how social media rebrands desserts, changing almost nothing, and causing a viral outbreak.
The aesthetic component of these cakes comes along with these sprinkles. Many social media users will grab a couple cakes from the bakery and scrape their spoons against the satisfyingly crunchy top coating. Not only are these cakes visually appealing, but they also provide a satisfying ASMR. As a result of this, the bakery’s lines began to become endless, as this online sensation created a roaring demand.
With the long lines and limited location of this viral trend, it is no wonder why consumers discovered that this trend can be substituted at home with simple ingredients. These Dot Cakes are simply composed of simple cake mix and icing combined in a glass jar or ramekin. And to achieve the aesthetic appeal of the sprinkles, spread a thick layer of icing on top of the cake, then dip the cup into an even thicker layer of these fun sprinkles.
This trend is easy to recreate and it’s almost nothing new, so why are people blowing this out of proportion? It’s because social media possesses a power to make ordinary things seem exclusive.
Along with its influencers, social media is rooted in aesthetic presentation. It doesn’t matter the quality of a food item because as long as social media users approve something as aesthetically pleasing it creates room for a viral trend outbreak.
We could see this even a decade ago with the Starbucks Unicorn Frappachino which is now a symbol of nostalgia, we can also see this with Dubai Chocolate and now these silly Dot Cakes which are causing extreme waiting lines and chatter.
The problem of social media’s viral micro trends is the waste of attention span. Social media users will immediately participate in a trend when a new one arises. They will throw their time and money away to be included in nothing special.
This is concerning because it shows social priority towards fulfilling trends over important issues, such as environmental, political, or human rights directed. These issues are somewhat treated similarly to a micro trend. Users like, post, and repost about how serious the topic is. However, unlike The Dot Cakes, they wouldn’t spend hours of their time or even a couple dollars to help solve it.
While these issues reach the periphery of viewers’ attention, it’s never viewed the same as a trend. A trend takes priority over an issue, it’s sad but true.
Social media is an overall example of how anything can go viral, even basic and simple things. The issue here is that these micro trends acquire more attention than more serious issues.
