Social Experiment

Synonyms:
See also:	wank, kerfuffle, sockpuppet
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"It was all a Social Experiment," is the cry often heard by wankers, sockpuppets and trolls when they are caught in the act of their nefarious stirring up of internet drama and are trying to get off the hook. In some cases the claim is that the whole ball of wank was literally done as part of their homework.

The term became particularly relevant on YouTube, where people would create prank videos or the like in which they disturbed or harassed people under the guise of a "social experiment."

Examples

• Though he did not explicitly attempt to stir up wank, child actor Cole Sprouse of The Suite Life of Zack & Cody created it when he ran a Tumblr account for a few months in 2012 as an experiment. His last post does not explicitly use the phrase "social experiment", but this is what it was often referred to in the fallout.