UCLA History: Chancellorial Responses in the Age of Social Media

I am not sure when the age of social media can be said to have begun. But students began to use social media early on. The notion of things going viral developed along with such usage.

Maybe the first episode in which something happened and the chancellor responded was the "Asians in the Library" affair of 2011.

It began with a student making derogatory remarks about Asians at UCLA and in the library in a YouTube video. Apparently, she was trying to start a blog and - with parental support - thought her remarks would attract attention for this endeavor.

When attention was attracted - but not in the way she had hoped - she took down the video, but - of course - others put it back up at other links, e.g.: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CA83ymTsMKU. In any event, Chancellor Block very quickly put up his own video in response:

Or direct to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6feGp0GQVJ8.

There may be been similar occurrences at other universities. But at UCLA, "Asians in the Library" appears to be the point at which it was expected that the chancellor would respond on social media or in other ways to controversies on campus.