The dress (viral phenomenon)

The Dress

The dress
Designer Roman Originals[1]
Material Lace[2]

The dress, also known as Dressgate[3] and associated with the hashtags #thedress, #whiteandgold, and #blackandblue,[4] is a viral photo and meme which became popular on the evening of 26 February 2015. The meme originated from a washed-out photograph of a dress posted on the social networking service Tumblr, and a dispute over whether the dress pictured was blue and black, or white and gold.[5] In the first week after the surfacing of the image alone, more than 10 million tweets mentioned the dress.

Although it was confirmed that the dress actually was blue and black,[6] the image prompted discussions surrounding the matter across various platforms, with users discussing their opinions on the color and why they perceived the dress as being a certain color, while others discussed the triviality of the dispute to begin with. Members of the fields of neuroscience and colour vision provided scientific commentary on the optical illusion.[7] The dress itself, which was identified as a product of the retailer Roman Originals, experienced a major surge in sales as a result of the meme.[8]

Origin

About a week before the wedding of Scottish couple Grace and Keir Johnston, Grace's mother sent her a photograph of the dress she planned to wear to the wedding. The couple disagreed over the color of the dress. They posted the image on Facebook, and their friends also disagreed over the color; some saw it as white with gold lace while others saw it as blue with black lace.[9][10]

Caitlin McNeill is a friend of the Johnstons and a member of the Scottish folk music group Conach, which performed at the wedding on the island of Colonsay. Even after seeing that the dress was "obviously blue and black" in real life,[10] the musicians remained preoccupied by the photograph; they "almost didn't make it on stage because we were so caught up discussing this dress". On 26 February 2015, McNeill reposted the image on a Tumblr blog she operated and asked the same question to her followers, which led to further public discussion surrounding the image.[9][10]

Response

Later in the day, the image went viral worldwide across social media, including on Twitter, where users took to hashtags such as "#whiteandgold", "#blueandblack", and "#dressgate" to discuss their opinions on what the color of the dress was, and theories surrounding their arguments. The photo also attracted discussion relating to the triviality of the matter as a whole; The Washington Post described the dispute as "[the] drama that divided a planet".[9][11][12] Some articles suggested that the dress could prompt an "existential crisis" over the nature of sight and reality, or that the debate could harm interpersonal relationships. One man was so intrigued by the dress that he decided the best option was to get his friend's opinion, a tattoo artist. He then got a tattoo of the dress with the hash tag BlueandBlack.[9][13]

Ben Fischer of the New York Business Journal noted that interest in the first BuzzFeed article about the dress exhibited vertical growth instead of the typical bell curve of a viral phenomenon, leading BuzzFeed to assign two editorial teams to generate additional articles about the dress in order to drive ad revenue,[14] and by 1 March, the original BuzzFeed article had received over 37 million hits.[15] The Dress was cited by CNN commentator Mel Robbins as a viral phenomenon having the requisite qualities of positivity bias incorporating "awe, laughter and amusement", and was compared to and contrasted with a video that went viral earlier that week of llamas loose on an Arizona roadway, and tributes paid to actor Leonard Nimoy after his death on 27 February.[16]

68% of BuzzFeed users polled responded that the dress was comprised of white and gold as of 1 March.[17] Some commenters have suggested that the dress changes colors on its own.[9] The dress attracted the attention of celebrities; Taylor Swift, Jaden Smith, Frankie Muniz, Demi Lovato, Mindy Kaling, and Justin Bieber announced that they see the dress as blue and black, while Anna Kendrick, B.J. Novak, Katy Perry, Senator Christopher Murphy, Julianne Moore, and Sarah Hyland saw it as white and gold.[18] Kim Kardashian tweeted that she sees it as white and gold, while her husband Kanye West sees it as blue and black. Lucy Hale, Phoebe Tonkin, and Katie Nolan saw different color schemes at different times. Lady Gaga described the dress as "periwinkle and sand," while David Duchovny called it teal. Other celebrities, including Ellen DeGeneres and Ariana Grande, mentioned the dress on social media without assigning it a color.[3][19][20][21][22][23] Politicians, government agencies and social media platforms of well-known brands also weighed in on the issue.[24]

Media outlets noted that the photo was overexposed and had poor white balance, causing its colors to be washed out, giving rise to the perception by some that the dress is white and gold rather than its actual colors.[9][25]

The dress itself was identified as being a royal blue "Lace Bodycon Dress" from the retailer Roman Originals; although available in three other colors (red, pink, and ivory, each with black lace), a white and gold version was not available. The day after McNeil's post, Roman Originals' website experienced a major surge in traffic; a representative of the retailer stated that "we sold out of the dress in the first 30 minutes of our business day and after restocking it, it's become phenomenal."[8] On 28 February, Roman announced that they would make a single white and gold dress for a Comic Relief charity auction.[26]

Scientific explanations

The duck-rabbit, described in Ludwig Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations

Neuroscientists Bevil Conway and Jay Neitz believe that the differences in opinions are a result of how the human brain perceives color, and chromatic adaptation. A similar theory was expounded by the University of Liverpool's Paul Knox.[27] Conway believes that it has a connection to how the brain processes the various hues of a daylight sky, noting that "your visual system is looking at this thing, and you're trying to discount the chromatic bias of the daylight axis", and that "people either discount the blue side, in which case they end up seeing white and gold, or discount the gold side, in which case they end up with blue and black."[7] Neitz remarked that

Our visual system is supposed to throw away information about the illuminant and extract information about the actual reflectance... but I've studied individual differences in color vision for 30 years, and this is one of the biggest individual differences I've ever seen.[7]

One hypothesis focuses on the naming of colors as a possible explanation. According to this view, the eye can differentiate between over 3 million colors but we only have names for 20 to 30 of them.[28]

Neuroscientist and psychologist Pascal Wallisch points out that while inherently ambiguous stimuli have been known to vision science for many years, this is the first such stimulus in the color domain that was brought to the attention of science by social media. He attributes differential perceptions to differences in illumination and fabric priors, but also notes that the stimulus is highly unusual insofar as the perception of most people does not switch. If it does, it does so only on very long time scales, which is highly unusual for bistable stimuli, so perceptual learning might be at play.[29] In addition, he notes that discussions of this stimulus are not frivolous, as the stimulus is both of interest to science and a paradigmatic case of how different people can sincerely see the world differently, an acknowledgement of which is a precondition for world peace.[30] The philosopher Barry C. Smith has invoked Ludwig Wittgenstein and the rabbit–duck illusion by way of comparison.[31]

There is explanation of the colors of the dress with additive color mixing. The explanation is of Ignat Ignatov and Oleg Mosin.[32][33]

Legacy

Daniel Howland, a Texas piercer, got a tattoo of the dress in blue and black with the words "White and Gold?". According to Howland, "It's actually a great tattoo. It's just dumb." He also "thought it was funny that it upset a lot of people".[5][34][35]

The dress effectively captured the collective attention of online networks; in South Africa, the Salvation Army has attempted to re-direct some of this mass awareness towards the issue of domestic violence.[36]

SSI Shredding Systems Inc. based in Wilsonville, OR featured the dress in their weekly YouTube series Shred of the Week. The 1 April 2015 episode features a woman wearing the blue and black dress. The dress is shredded and in the process turns to white and gold.[37]

See also

References

  1. ↑ Spargo, Chris (27 February 2015). "The optical illusion dress that's divided the internet: Celebrities join fierce debate over whether this dress is white and gold or blue and black... so which colors do YOU see?". Daily Mail. Retrieved 27 February 2015.
  2. ↑ "Lace Detail Bodycon Dress". Retrieved 27 February 2015.
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 "#Dressgate the dress is in fact black and blue". Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved 27 February 2015.
  4. ↑ Klassen, Anna (26 February 2015). "What Colors Are This Dress? White & Gold or Black & Blue? The Internet Is Going Insane Trying To Find Out – PHOTO". Bustle. Retrieved 27 February 2015.
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 Moss, Caroline (2 March 2015). "A man has tattooed the color-changing dress on his leg". Business Insider. Business Insider Inc. Retrieved 11 March 2015.
  6. ↑ "Optical illusion: Dress color debate goes global". BBC. Retrieved 28 February 2015.
  7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 7.2 "The Science of Why No One Agrees on the Color of This Dress". Wired. Retrieved 27 February 2015.
  8. ↑ 8.0 8.1 "'The Dress' flying off racks following Internet sensation: 'We sold out in the first 30 minutes of our business day'". New York Daily News. Retrieved 27 February 2015.
  9. ↑ 9.0 9.1 9.2 9.3 9.4 9.5 "The inside story of the 'white dress, blue dress' drama that divided a planet". The Washington Post. Retrieved 27 February 2015.
  10. ↑ 10.0 10.1 10.2 "The Dress Is Blue And Black, Says The Girl Who Saw It in Person". BuzzFeed. Retrieved 27 February 2015.
  11. ↑ "Color Bind: This Dress is White and Gold, Right?". Boston Globe. Retrieved 27 February 2015.
  12. ↑ "The Official Live Blog: Is This Dress Blue and Black or White and Gold?". Slate. Retrieved 27 February 2015.
  13. ↑ King, Kirsten (26 February 2015). "This Dress Is Ruining People's Lives". BuzzFeed. Retrieved 1 March 2015.
  14. ↑ Fischer, Ben (27 February 2015). "The Dress phenomenon didn't happen by accident. It took big money.". New York Business Journal. American City Business Journals. Retrieved 1 March 2015.
  15. ↑ Holderness, Cates (26 February 2015). "What Colors Are This Dress?". BuzzFeed. Retrieved 1 March 2015.
  16. ↑ Robbins, Mel (28 February 2015). "Why blue/black/white/gold dress went viral". CNN. Retrieved 3 March 2015.
  17. ↑ Holderness, Cates (26 February 2015). "What Colors Are This Dress?". Buzzfeed. Retrieved 1 March 2015.
  18. ↑ "What Colors Are This Dress? Kim Kardashian, Miley Cyrus, Justin Bieber and a Bajillion Other Celebs Weigh In". MTV News.
  19. ↑ Iyengar, Rishi. "The Dress That Broke the Internet, and the Woman Who Started It All". Retrieved 27 February 2015.
  20. ↑ Jinks, Caitlin. "'I feel like it's a trick somehow': Taylor Swift and Kim Kardashian join other celebrities in dress debate taking over the internet". Retrieved 27 February 2015.
  21. ↑ Sanchez, Josh. "'What color is this dress' confused celebrities, too". Fansided.com. Retrieved 27 February 2015.
  22. ↑ Mahler, Jonathan. "A White and Gold Dress Overloads the Internet". The New York Times. Retrieved 27 February 2015.
  23. ↑ Iyengar, Rishi (26 February 2015). "Taylor Swift Says The Dress is Black and Blue". Time. Retrieved 1 March 2015.
  24. ↑ Jim Dalrymple II. "Politicians, Police, And Brands Have Weighed in On "The Dress"". Buzzfeed.com. Retrieved 6 March 2015.
  25. ↑ "Why that dress looks white and gold: It's overexposed". Mashable. Retrieved 27 February 2015.
  26. ↑ "'The Dress' returns in special edition gold and white version for Comic Relief charity auction". The Independent. 10 March 2015. Retrieved 10 March 2015.
  27. ↑ "Viewpoint: Blue and black or white and gold?". News.liv.ac.uk. Retrieved 27 February 2015.
  28. ↑ "The Dress: The Big Color Debate". Beamled.com. 2 March 2015. Retrieved 6 March 2015.
  29. ↑ "An experts lesson from the dress". Slate. 2 March 2015. Retrieved 6 March 2015.
  30. ↑ "Why discussing the dress is not frivolous". pascallisch.net. 2 March 2015. Retrieved 6 March 2015.
  31. ↑ "What would Wittgenstein say about that dress?". BBC. 27 February 2015. Retrieved 6 March 2015.
  32. ↑ Ignatov, I., Mosin, O.V. (2014) Photoreceptors in Visual Perception and Additive Color Mixing. Bacteriorhodopsin in Nano-and Biotechnologies, Advances in Physics Theories and Applications, Vol. 27, pp. 20 -37.
  33. ↑ Ignatov, I., Mosin, O.V. (2015)Electromagnetic Conception for the Eyesight. Explanation for what the People See Different Colors in Additive Mixing, Journal of Medicine, Physiology and Biophysics, Vol. 11, pp. 39-57.
  34. ↑ Durando, Jessica (2 March 2015). "Man tattoos #thedress on his leg". USA Today. Gannett Satellite Information Network, Inc. Retrieved 11 March 2015.
  35. ↑ Kooser, Amanda (2 March 2015). "Tattoo celebrates blue/black/white/gold dress meme". CNET. Retrieved 11 March 2015.
  36. ↑ "Salvation Army uses The Dress in ad targeting violence against women". Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. 6 March 2015. Retrieved 25 March 2015.
  37. ↑ "SSI's Shred of the Week: The Dress". 1 April 2015. Retrieved 1 April 2015.