New MyIQ data suggests internet users increasingly feel that viral moments are being commercialised before audiences have had time to understand, debate or emotionally process them.
The internet used to move in trends. Now it moves in reactions.
A new global survey from MyIQ points to a growing unease with what the platform describes as fastvertising: the rapid-response advertising cycle in which brands, platforms and creators attach themselves to cultural moments almost as soon as they appear. The pattern is no longer confined to major campaigns or planned social media activations. For many users, it has become part of the daily texture of being online.
The survey, based on responses from 14,600 adults across the US, UK, Europe, Latin America, Australia and Canada, found that 72% of respondents believe online culture now becomes commercialised “almost immediately” after a moment gains attention. Among adults aged 18 to 34, 61% said they sometimes encounter branded content, ads or influencer campaigns referencing a viral moment before they feel they have fully processed the original story themselves.
That finding captures a subtle but important shift. The complaint is not simply that users see too many ads. It is that the pause between event, reaction and monetisation appears to be disappearing.
Respondents described opening social platforms after a celebrity breakup, sporting incident, public controversy or trending meme and finding brands already speaking in the language of the moment. Some saw sponsored jokes. Others noticed influencer commentary, product tie-ins or “relatable” posts designed to ride the emotional charge of a story while it was still unfolding. The speed made the content feel less like participation in culture and more like extraction from it.
One respondent from London said: “By the time I work out why everyone is talking about something, a brand is already making a joke out of it.” Another user from São Paulo described a similar sense of compression: “There is no gap anymore. Something happens, people react, and then suddenly someone is selling through it.”
The acceleration reflects a wider shift in the business of attention. Social teams, creator partnerships and paid media strategies are now built around the same real-time signals that shape algorithmic feeds: velocity, visibility, emotional intensity and shareability. For brands, the incentive is to arrive while a topic is still moving for users, which can make the commercial layer feel inseparable from the cultural one.
The findings suggest a broader exhaustion with the way online culture is absorbed into marketing language. Nearly half of respondents said they find brand reactions to serious or emotionally charged events “uncomfortable,” even when the content is intended to feel humorous or socially aware. At the same time, 58% admitted they still regularly engage with reactive content because it feels difficult to avoid inside modern feeds.
That contradiction sits at the centre of fastvertising. Users increasingly recognise the mechanics behind attention online, but recognition does not remove them from the system. A post can feel cynical and still be watched, shared or discussed. A campaign can seem opportunistic and still become part of the conversation it is exploiting. In feeds built around speed and visibility, discomfort is not always a barrier to engagement.
MyIQ Managing Director Sarah Meyer said the survey points to a deeper change in how people experience digital culture.
“People are not only noticing more advertising online; they are noticing the collapse of time between something happening and something being sold back to them,” Meyer said. “That matters because emotional processing needs distance. When every public moment is instantly reframed as a brand opportunity, users start to feel that even their reactions are being organised for engagement. Fastvertising is not just a marketing tactic. It is part of a broader shift in how attention, feeling and commerce now move through the same feed.”
The survey also found that 64% of respondents believe brands now feel pressure to respond to online moments even when they have nothing meaningful to add, largely because silence itself is increasingly perceived as absence. That pressure helps explain the repetitive rhythm users described: a news event breaks, reactions flood social media, brands join the conversation, creators produce commentary, and targeted products or campaigns quickly follow.
For younger users, that rhythm has become so normalised that the absence of commercial reaction can feel unusual. A 24-year-old respondent from Paris said: “If something trends and brands are quiet for a few hours, it actually feels unusual now.”
The result is an online environment in which cultural moments appear to have shorter emotional lives. They are discovered, interpreted, monetised and archived at a pace that leaves little room for ambiguity or reflection. What once looked like marketing reacting to culture now often feels, to users, like culture arriving already prepared for marketing.
About MyIQ:
MyIQ was launched in 2024 and is used by over a million individuals worldwide. It is a digital self-knowledge platform that offers more than an IQ score, with over 9 million completed tests across the various test categories: cognitive, personality, and relationships, all with personalised, actionable insights. The platform offers over 25 brain games, more than 150 intelligence puzzles, over 20 hours of expert video content, and 300+ available lessons on emotional intelligence, problem-solving, innovation, confidence-building, and decision-making. Through its IQ test, full-spectrum personality assessment, and relationship insight quiz, MyIQ delivers structured, personalized feedback that helps individuals better understand their inner world and behaviour.
MyIQ was launched in 2024 and is used by over a million individuals worldwide. It is a digital self-knowledge platform that offers more than an IQ score, with over 9 million completed tests across the various test categories: cognitive, personality, and relationships, all with personalised, actionable insights. The platform offers over 25 brain games, more than 150 intelligence puzzles, over 20 hours of expert video content, and 300+ available lessons on emotional intelligence, problem-solving, innovation, confidence-building, and decision-making. Through its IQ test, full-spectrum personality assessment, and relationship insight quiz, MyIQ delivers structured, personalized feedback that helps individuals better understand their inner world and behaviour.