Diffusion theory can be defined as why, how and at what rate ideas of and technology spread. People fall into 5 separate categories in the diffusion theory and they are innovators, early adopters, early majority, late majority and laggards.
Innovators are willing to take risks, have the highest social status and have financial liquidity. Early Adopters have the highest degree of opinion leadership. Are interested in trying the new technology and catching on before everybody else. Early majority are people who adopt the innovation after the innovators and early adopters. Tend to set the wave for the general population in terms of popularity. Late majority are those who adopt and realize the importance of the innovation later than most. Are late to the trend but still realize its importance. Laggards are the last people to realize and adopt the innovation. Can be considered followers who jumped on the trend late.
The best example of diffusion theory in todays day and age that I can think of has to be TikTok. TikTok was an innovation in itself. During my lifetime I have never seen an app get downloaded and talked about so much in such a short amount of time like TikTok was. The average consumer of the app TikTok can be broken down into the same five separate categories as the diffusion theory is.
The innovators of TikTok would be the early influencers and makers of the app. They paved the way of this new form of social media. They were the first people to realize the potential of this app and how great it could be.
The early adopters were the first couple thousand people to download the app and share it with their friends. Them sending the videos to their friends in a way influenced them to download the app therefore spreading it more.
The early majority were the first couple million people to download the app. They started making the app really known worldwide. Wether that be by posting TikTok's or sharing it with their friends. Creators started to be able to make a living when the early majority caught onto the popularity of TikTok.
The late majority would be the people that have downloaded TikTok in the past year. TikTok really blew up in 2019-2020 so the late majority would be people that have downloaded the app anytime after 2021. The late majority in this case tended to be a bit older and people who got the app from recommendations from their children or grandchildren.
The Laggards would be the people who downloaded TikTok this year. It is way past the peak of the app and these people are too late to the worldwide trend that is TikTok.
Sources
“Networks.” How Diffusion of Innovations Made TikTok More Popular than Instagram? : Networks Course Blog for INFO 2040/CS 2850/Econ 2040/SOC 2090, https://blogs.cornell.edu/info2040/2020/12/16/how-diffusion-of-innovations-made-tiktok-more-popular-than-instagram/.
“Diffusion of Innovations.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 29 Jan. 2023, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diffusion_of_innovations.
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