I just found out how many views the 'distracted boyfriend' meme guy got from one photo

I was reading an article about old memes and it said the actual guy in the stock photo, his name is Diego, got over 4 million new Instagram followers in a week back in 2017. He was just a model doing a normal shoot in Barcelona. The article said he got so many messages he had to turn off notifications. It's wild to think one picture from a job he probably forgot about changed his life that much. He still gets tagged in memes every day. Does anyone else remember the first time they saw that meme and had no idea the guy was a real person?

3 comments

3 Comments

paige861mo ago

the_tara honestly that kind of fame is way more than just followers though. getting 4 million people suddenly knowing your face and attaching a meme to it changes how you live your daily life. you cant just walk around without people staring or taking pictures of you to post online again. plus once you go viral like that brands and agents start calling, people dig up your old posts, your family gets dragged into it too. its like your whole identity gets replaced by that one moment. lisa's friend going through the grocery store thing proves its not all positive attention either. all that without even asking for it, just from a random job you did years ago.

the_tara1mo ago

You said it changed his life, but idk, getting a bunch of followers for a meme doesn't seem that life changing to me.

wright.lisa1mo ago

Yeah, the "bunch of followers" thing. A friend of mine got semi-famous from a viral tweet. She got a book deal out of it, which was cool, but now she gets recognized at the grocery store and hates it. It really did flip her whole world around.