Top 10 buttons that had to be pushed

An interesting online group social experiment was carried out recently on Reddit. It began on April 1, 2015 and ended on June 5, 2015, after 65 days. It was not ended by Reddit, but by the online users who took part, or should I say, who didn’t take part.

The experiment involved a timer that was placed on the website, which came to be known as “the button.” The timer would count down from 60 seconds, and anytime during that 60-second countdown, if a user clicked “the button,” the timer would restart at 60 seconds and begin counting down again. The experiment would end whenever the timer reached zero, with no one pushing the button during a 60-second countdown to reset it. The only rule Reddit imposed was that a user could only push the button once during the entirety of the experiment.

Over 1 million users pushed “the button” and, as noted above, kept the timer going for 65 days.

What did this experiment tell us? In this interview with NPR, data expert from FiveThirtyEight.com Mona Chalabi explains that colored circles were placed beside usernames, denoting in which interval of the 60-second countdown the user clicked “the button.” The users took it from there by spontaneously creating a virtual world of clans and characteristics based on these color designations. According to Chalabi, researchers see future applications of the button experiment for policymakers and public projects.