The thrill of social media is often the possibility of surprise. It's fun to log on and see which viral videos, political rants, news stories, and baby pictures your friends and family have shared.

What we don't expect is to see someone die. Watching a suicide attempt (or murder) in real time is not part of the bargain we've made to stay connected with the world. And yet it happens. Earlier this week, a Thai man killed his infant daughter and himself on Facebook Live. The video appeared on both Facebook and YouTube before being taken down by the companies. 

While such incidents are rare, even news coverage of them can make us feel sad or angry. For some people, learning explicit details about these tragedies may lead to suicidal thoughts or behavior. We know this from years of research, but the phenomenon of broadcasting suicide via live video is so new that even experts in suicide prevention are grappling with how to understand its emotional impact.

"This whole medium has not existed long enough for us to have a good understanding of how it might be different from what you might see in the newspaper or on a TV show," says Victor Schwartz, chief medical officer of The Jed Foundation, a suicide prevention nonprofit. 

"There’s nothing more lurid than seeing something like this in real time." 

He suspects, however, that witnessing a suicide on social media can be as bad or even worse for our emotional health as encountering graphic details in the media: "There’s nothing more lurid than seeing something like this in real time." 

That violence could be overwhelming and deeply disturbing, particularly for people who are at risk for or already experience anxiety or depression, or are struggling with their own suicidal impulses. 

To ease that anguish, Schwartz recommends first walking away from its source. "If you were eating or drinking something that tasted [bad], you would stop," he says. "This is the same thing — we can’t control what [we see] online, but you can spit it out." 

Once you've got some distance, find ways to make that space bigger. Try talking to a supportive, trusted friend about the emotions you felt after watching or hearing about the suicide. Sit down with a TV show that makes you laugh, take a walk or run, or do something else that gives you joy. Essentially, says Schwartz, find ways to distract yourself. 

Taking action is important too. If you see a suicide attempt take place on a social media platform, report it to the company. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Tumblr, and Snapchat all provide users a way to report suicidal behavior or content, and Schwartz says following those guidelines can make someone feel less helpless. (If someone appears to be in immediate danger, you can also contact local law enforcement or 911.) Finally, he urges people experiencing relentless despair or suicidal thoughts to discuss their feelings, seek profession help, or call or text a hotline. 

Testing how suicide on live video affects people would be unethical, which is partly why we don't know its consequences for our emotional health. Yet Madelyn Gould, a professor of epidemiology in psychiatry at Columbia University who specializes in suicide prevention research, believes the existing evidence on the "contagion effect" of suicide is robust enough to suggest that it could harm certain people. 

Most of these studies look retrospectively at whether the suicide rate spikes after a high-profile incident and show there appears to be some association between media reports and increases in the suicide rate. Those most affected are likely to be emotionally vulnerable people who can identify with the person who died. So geography, gender, age, and other factors can make a difference in how someone perceives the death, whether it relates to their own life, and how it could influence their frame of mind. 

Gould is less worried that we lack research on the impact of seeing a suicide on live video and more concerned that the norms around suicide may be changing to the point where people see it as a widespread, acceptable outcome. 

Talking about suicide requires a careful balance of acknowledging how and why it happens while avoiding making it seem inevitable, glamorous, or the best solution to ending one's pain. That's why she and other prevention experts were so alarmed by the vivid portrayal of suicide in the Netflix show 13 Reasons Why, in which the main female character meticulously plans her suicide almost as a means of revenge against those who bullied and assaulted her. 

"It’s ok to talk about your fears or concerns about what you’ve seen or felt." 

Gould, among other advocates, want to focus more time on encouraging healthy conversations about self-harm, including coping strategies, how to get help, and spreading the knowledge that many people who have suicidal thoughts or attempt suicide can still lead happy lives. 

These are all things to focus on the next time a suicide airs live on social media. And don't be afraid to express what it meant to encounter that imagery or reporting — or to listen to someone else trying to make sense of that. 

"It’s O.K. to talk about your fears or concerns about what you’ve seen or felt," says Schwartz. 

If you want to talk to someone or are experiencing suicidal thoughts, text the Crisis Text Line at 741-741 or call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255. Here is a list of international resources. 

Sorry, Kendrick. The pope is the greatest rapper alive. 

On Saturday, His Holiness was on a flight from Cairo to Rome, where he warned about the devastating effects of a war with North Korea. 

A serious topic, for sure. But the internet was too distracted by the above photo to care about the message. Francis: Tell 'em how you feel. 

A few people referenced #popebars—an old hashtag born from a similar photo of the pope in Bangui back in 2015. 

In case you don't remember the miracle that was #popebars ...

Bless up, Pope Francis. 

People are getting tired of The Donald's tweets.

According to a new report from digital agency Huge, the number of engagements (replies, retweets, likes) per tweet has dropped 66 percent in the three months since he took office. 

The number of likes per tweet has seen a yuuuge drop since his first day as president: 72 percent. 

What's going on? Are gems like these not captivating the public anymore?

Before your faith in humanity is restored, engagement with Trump's tweets has dropped not because users are tired of his rants—it's because he's not ranting as much anymore. 

The report breaks down Trump's tweets into three categories: agitated, calm, and prepared. 

In the last three months, the percentage of his total tweets that were "agitated" dropped from 44 percent to 26 percent. Meanwhile, his "prepared" tweets—canned announcements most likely written by his staff—rose from 15 percent to 27 percent. 

Essentially, he's tweeting less angry, off-the-cuff remarks, and more boring prepared statements, which is to be expected now that he's president. 

I get why people aren't into it. Here, he threatens Canada, which is interesting because who gets angry at Canada?

Now here is one of his "prepared" tweets. 

I mean, he's barely threatening anybody. Snooze alert. 

"In social media, nothing alienates a core audience faster than an inauthentic voice," the report said. "Watering down the president’s Twitter account with static and predictable prepared tweets has chipped away at its authenticity, giving its fans and followers license to look away."

Not being an unhinged, impulsive bully is ruining your brand, Donald Trump. But I have faith that you can fix that.  

Poor Mark Zuckerberg. The Facebook CEO spent the weekend wandering America, scoring free meals from kind strangers, who no doubt took pity on a 32-year-old man unable to afford anything but gray T-shirts and hoodies. 

The first family to feed him were the Moores of Newton Falls, Ohio, who learned only 20 minutes beforehand who their dinner guest would be. 

The Zuck reportedly told his staff that he wanted to dine with a family of Democrats in a swing state who voted for Trump—which is totally something that a person who's not running for political office would do. 

A week before dinner, Daniel Moore got a call asking him if he'd like to have dinner with a "very wealthy philanthropist," according to WKBN news. 

Sadly, it wasn't Richard Branson parachuting in from space, but Mark Zuckerberg—fresh from awkwardly drilling things at a Ford plant in Michigan—who showed up at 6 p.m. on Friday night.  

According to a local newspaper with a badass name, The Vindicator, Daniel and Lisa Moore talked about more than just politics with Zuckerberg. They also discussed their work with the Kisiizi Good Shepherd Orphanage in Uganda. 

"We got to know a very cool guy" Moore told The Vindicator. "Just down-to-earth and real easy to talk to."

Afterwards, Zuck hit the road and found more generous strangers in South Bend, Indiana. On Saturday, he ate chicken and ribs with the crew of the Elkhart Fire Department.

"Thanks to the fire department for letting me crash your dinner," Zuckerberg wrote on Facebook.

Hopefully this Facebook thing works out so he can afford his own meals. 

Over the course of his first months in the White House, President Trump notoriously turned Twitter into his personal outlet for unhinged political venting. That of course inspired the creation of dozens of parody accounts that became tools of resistance, coping mechanisms, and light-hearted distractions from the political chaos. 

A simple Twitter search for "Donald Trump Parody" reveals a collection of over 50 accounts, and though each tackles Trump’s presidency with a different approach, they all set out with a common goal: to make Twitter in the Trump era a bit more bearable. 

To get a better sense of what it takes to challenge Trump on his favorite social platform, we reached out to the creators of two of the most popular Trump parody accounts on Twitter and uncovered some intriguing facts about the 24/7 job. 

For instance: One of the most thought-provoking accounts on Twitter was inspired by Trump's spat with the musical Hamilton.

While accounts like @RealDonalDrumpf and @mechanicaltrump attempt to imitate Trump's unique online behavior, tweeting with an excessive amount of exclamation points and bashing Obama and the Democratic party every chance they get, others, like @aTinyTrump, give followers a good laugh with the help of Photoshop.

The more serious parody account @DTrumpExposed, meanwhile, provides followers with essential information related to Trump's presidency and his administration, serving as an alternative source of news for those who want to stay in the loop.

@IfHillaryHad imagines American politics in an alternate reality, tweeting on a day-to-day basis as Hillary Clinton had she won the election. @BRIDGETTRUMPSD1 is a depiction of Trump's diary entries if they were written in the style of Bridget Jones. You know, very normal stuff.

Which brings us to @HalfOnionInABag, the scrap of a vegetable just looking to get more Twitter followers than Trump. It hasn't quite reached the president's 28.4 million, but 739,000 followers is still pretty impressive for a vegetable.

Trump — now with maturity!

If there's anything we've learned from the overzealous, typo-ridden 140-character messages posted to the president's Twitter account, it's where there's a Trump tweet, there's room for improvement.

One man decided to take on the taxing job of editing those tweets to try and make the president's words sound more, well, presidential. Under the promise of anonymity, the 52-year-old creator of Mature Trump Tweets spoke to us about the inspiration behind the thought-provoking account, how life has changed since starting it, and what kind of impact he hopes his revised words have on the world.

Here's how he edited one of Trump's tweets about "fake news":

Since several early followers wondered if Barack Obama were behind the account, the creator has decided to go by the nickname Barry.

"I think he's failed to recognize, or worse doesn't care, that his words matter."

He began the account last fall, a few weeks after Trump won the election, as things on Twitter got more and more surreal.

"I think he's failed to recognize, or worse doesn't care, that his words matter," Barry said. "I became almost numb due to the Twitter assault that seemed to attack first amendment rights and lack of civility in his tone," he went on, identifying the president's Twitter beef with the cast of Hamilton as one of the events that drove him to create the account.

"I needed to do something because I felt powerless. So I decided to recreate his tweets and tweet the way I think a true diplomatic statesman would. It was cathartic for me, and I had a hunch it would be for others too."

Throughout the course of the young presidency, Barry's goals for the account have evolved. "Originally it was selfish. I needed an outlet," he explained. "I also was determined to not allow this type of tone to be normalized. That's a scary proposition."

Retweets from powerful social media voices like J.K. Rowling, Ricky Gervais, Seth McFarlane, and Mark Cuban were soon to follow. Mature Trump Tweets has 123,000 followers, some of whom have reached out to tell Barry how important the account is to them, offering to start GoFundMe or Kickstarter campaigns to ensure it remains up and running.

"Today, I have bigger goals," Barry admitted. "I think this could be a counter movement. One that espouses kindness, civility, decorum — things I think Americans and people around the world truly want and crave."

Maintaining an account that directly responds to Trump's relentless Twitter activity isn't always easy. "I usually retweet Trump when he tweets, which means daily — usually early in the morning or late at night," Barry said. 

Barry also tweets whenever he feels the president should be tweeting, even if Trump remains silent. "Those are often the most popular, because it demonstrates the fact he seems tone deaf on what's important and what the majority of Americans want to hear from him."

Embracing the chaos through humor

During Trump's first month in office, executive order signing became something of a sport for President Trump and it wasn't long before 34-year-old Mike Gaines took notice.

With each document Trump presented, Gaines thought he resembled a proud little kid showing off his drawings to his parents. Gaines was inspired to take a more lighthearted approach to manage his political frustrations. Trump Draws — a brilliant collection of photoshopped GIFs — was born.

When Trump fired Sally Yates, the deputy attorney general who refused to defend his travel ban, the Los Angeles-based visual effects artist decided to transform the proud president into an ambitiously doodling toddler with the help of his iPad Pro, the app Procreate, and Adobe After Effects.

Gaines began posting to the account several times a week, showing Trump dramatically revealing drawings of cute little animals and holiday greetings, with timely political references. He misspelled captions (in too-real Trump fashion) and occasionally even doodled with his non-dominant hand to really capture the youthful aspect of his photoshop creations.

"In this increasingly divisive political world, the account somehow cuts through all the BS," Gaines said. It's "simply a way to laugh at the doodles of a very proud man, who just happens to be the president of the United States."

After the account — which is currently at 439,000 followers — received such a positive response from Twitter users, Gaines decided to expand the endeavor to include paintings in the White House, presentation tools, and really any other white surface begging to be memed.

"I feel like these accounts really are a bright light in a pretty dismal world right now, he said. "Laughing and comedy are the best way to cope."

Though Gaines refers to Trump as "a diamond mine for comedy," he thinks the president's seemingly unfiltered, unprofessional Twitter account is a true cause for concern. "Dude needs to pick a new game ... maybe trying to run the country instead?" he suggested, clarifying that he's not trying to use Trump Draws to make a political statement. 

"I really just want to add some levity to this crazy political climate," Gaines said. "Sometimes you just need to see Trump childishly draw an elephant to get you through the day."

So simple, yet so effective.

Parodies FTW

Though it’s tough to say definitively whether Trump is the most parodied president in history — I mean, even George Washington was subject to sketches — The Donald does seem to have a big target painted on his back in the social media age.

Even when it comes to more recent presidents, a search for "Barack Obama parody" yields eighteen results on the platform. "George Bush parody" reveals a mere three. (Though, to be fair, Obama was elected when Twitter was only in its infancy.)

The takeaway? When it comes to being parodied on Twitter, Trump is winning. So much winning.

If you spend a lot of time on social media, then you've probably heard about music and culture event Fyre Festival — the exclusive Bahamas getaway all the pretty people were headed to this week. If Coachella was for the plebs, Fyre Festival was supposedly for the truly cool.

And because the festival is for the truly cool, you can charge thousands of dollars for it. After all, getting pretty people to shill for products of questionable effectiveness is a hallmark of the influencer industry. So it's understandable why the people behind Fyre Festival (A.K.A. Ja Rule) would charge a minimum of $1,500?

If you haven't been living under a rock, you probably have an idea of what happened next: The festival, billed as a luxury getaway, just about imploded on all fronts, with musicians pulling out, laughably bad food, lack of accommodations, and so on.

Fortunately (or unfortunately if you're Fyre Festival), now everyone knows about the disaster because a bunch of social media-savvy people who paid a lot of money for something that turned out to be a disaster ended up ... posting about it on social media for us all to enjoy. And in the process confirmed everyone's worst assumptions about social media influencers.

The promotion

For a first-time festival, Fyre had plenty of media and social media buzz — much of it centered around the influencer blitz.

"Hey quick question: What's Fyre Festival, and why are all the models in the Bahamas promoting it?" asked Fashionista back in December. "And most importantly, will it be lit?" the subhead added. 

"Can a critical mass of Victoria's Secret Models and a Hadid give Bahamas tourism an Insta-boost?" asked Vanity Fair.

Hell, even Kendall Jenner was involved. 

If influencers have turned social media platforms into a gigantic version of high school (complete with the social stratifications), Fyre Festival seemed to represent a chance to hang with the cool kids and get a taste of their life — for a price. Many packages included chartered airfare and "glamping" accommodations. There was even a $400,000 package that offered a house on the "VIP island" that included "dinner with a performer." 

It's an attractive offer to people who follow Instagram stars and imagine the lives behind their sunset-on-the-beach photographs. 

Think: less music festival, more a millennial version of those fantasy rock-and-roll camps. 

The festival

Turns out, it's pretty hard putting on a gigantic event with tons of moving parts. 

Problems were already apparent in the weeks leading up to the event: Deadlines missed for paying artists, confusion spread about travel logistics. The event's cofounders even had to seek outside investments to pay for costs, according to a report by the Wall Street Journal. 

Perhaps even more interesting? Fyre came right after Coachella, among the biggest and most successful U.S. music festivals. People who bought Fyre packages conceivably picked it over Coachella, which had a better lineup of acts and, you know, the promise that it would actually happen.

The promotion worked and the festival was sold out of general admission tickets. Bad press somehow wasn't able to overcome bikini-clad models on boats.

Meanwhile, Fyre organizer Ja Rule was speaking at SXSW on a panel about authenticity in advertising. You honestly can't make this stuff up. 

The aftermath

Fyre Festival ended like it began — as a social media firestorm, though not the way its organizers intended. 

By Friday morning, the schadenfreude was in full swing. Twitter, Instagram, even Reddit were filled with horror stories. The organizers cancelled the festival, and transportation was a mess. There wasn't even beer. 

This tweet of food, allegedly from the festival, summed up much of it.

Are we all going a little overboard in our enjoyment of this disaster? Yes, but not without reason. Fyre Festival brought together so much of what many people find disgusting about social media influence — crass materialism, braggadocious vanity, empty aspirations — and packaged them into a single event. Then, it confirmed our assumptions that the entire scene is fake.

When a bunch of pretty people pay big bucks to discover that fact we all already know — social media is intensely staged — it's hard not to laugh, particularly when entire thing was then roasted by the same social media platforms that made this possible in the first place.

Now, please share this post on your social media feeds.

Hint: Look at the woman's hat in the photo, above. 

President Donald Trump has been in office 100 days as of Saturday, April 29. In honor of the occasion, Twitter put out some stats about the president's use of Twitter. At this point, you really should have guessed his favorite hashtag: #MAGA. 

That acronym, of course, is short for Trump's "Make America Great Again" campaign slogan. The president also used a lot of #AmericaFirst, #USA, #Obamacare and, because he's just like a bunch of reporters on Twitter, #ICYMI. 

Trump's favorite words on Twitter are also straight out of a caricature. His most tweeted word since taking office is "great," followed by America/American, followed by news/media, because he's nothing if not a hater. "Fake news" finished in sixth place, and "big" took home the ninth prize. 

Trump's favorite handle is his new home, @Whitehouse, followed by @foxandfriends (which he loves) and @NYTimes (which he often hates on), both of which tie for second. @FoxNews came in third, while @CNN managed a tie for fifth. 

You and I could have predicted most of this. But what many folks would have gotten wrong is his most retweeted tweet since Jan. 20. I'll leave you with that: