Abstract

Over the last twenty years, viral has become a catchword, standing for everything which gained sudden and global diffusion on the web. Be it a post, a software, an influencer or an algorithm capable of sabotaging hundreds of thousands of devices, viral referred to the emerging power of digital connectivity. With the outburst of the Covid-19 pandemic, viral has gone back to its original biological meaning of a deadly threat to human life. The real virus seemed to take center stage again in social and political discourse. Yet, it has been thanks to the extraordinary resources of Ict technologies that citizens have been able to cope with the severe limitations imposed upon each household by governments all over the world. With circulation, working and studying blocked, most activities turned to a laptop or a smartphone as their main means for survival. With the web becoming the key agora for public opinion and political interaction, the world has become a battle of virus versus virus. A battle which will go on, for a long time to come.