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The a16z Show · Sunday, August 2, 2026

The Misperception of Social Trends: Case of 'Succession' Viewership

Ruby Turlough highlights the discrepancy between perceived online popularity and actual viewership numbers, using the show 'Succession' as an example. She notes that while the show felt ubiquitous on platforms like X, its viewership numbers were lower compared to shows like 'The Big Bang Theory', illustrating how online discourse can skew perception of cultural trends.

personRuby Turlough

The tape

2 quotes
That something that feels as big as like a show like succession, if you take a look at what the viewership for that is, compared to a show like Mash, compared to even the finale for Lost, not that many people have seen it.
Ruby Turlough
But if you're on X, it feels like everyone's watching succession. Yeah. And yet the numbers, kind of when you compare them to even a show like big, like more people watching Big Bang than they're watching succession, which sounds crazy when you think about it.
Ruby Turlough
Heard on The a16z Show — “Ruby Thelot on Internet Culture, AI, and the Future of Taste, published Sunday, August 2, 2026. Heardvine summarizes and quotes with attribution and timestamps, and links to the original everywhere.
Transcribed via Gemini audio transcription · $0.05
The Misperception of Social Trends: Case of 'Succession' Viewership — Heardvine