Up until today, no one knew for sure who was behind ViralNova, the home for sharable, clickable, viral content that takes stories circulating the news and churns them into a simple format that reaches the emotional threshold of its readers. When it launched in May of this year, according to Alexa, it was the 443,652nd most popular website in the world.

Now it's ranked 1,685th.

 

The headline model for the site is laughably smart. First, take a news story, add the phrase "you won't believe" or "this ____ made me cry, but" and then the kicker sentence: "what happens next will blow your mind" or "then this happened." There's your recipe for viral success.