This morning I was watching the local news to catch the weather before I head off for work and I saw a spot about how (local?) couples are making weddings more memorable. Of course they go directly to funny dances and of course they show a clip from the JK Wedding Entrance Dance. After the news piece, one of the reporters comments how that video “went viral.”

And that brings me to my point …

Excuse me! No, you’re video is not viral if it gets you on The Today Show! That’s just plain ol’ popular. And that goes for every video on the Internet. If it’s popular and it can be found on YouTube does not mean it’s a “viral video.”

It’s viral because of how it’s popularity spread through e-mail or instant messaging. This kind of one-to-one transmission is what makes the circulation of a meme so interesting and thus viral. But let’s face it, once a meme makes it to any of the social news sites (digg, reddit et al.) it’s proliferation is no longer one-to-one. And if it makes it to the front page of a social news site or major blog then really we should consider it to be popular and we should remove the “viral” label.