Well, it also has to be believable.
The entire world of online platforms is a story of false manipulation of engagement stats. Because every content producer, from the big corporations to the little individuals, need a viral moment, corporations have become highly skilled at manipulating algos to make content seem more popular/viral/engaged with than it actually is. This then excites the Streisand Effect and the thing in question should then, according to the plan, also go viral for real.
Most of social media and online streaming is created and manipulated to play on the very human phenomenon of FOMO. We're a herd species of course, and social media plays to this and thus manipulates our attention (and, for many, our behaviours too).
There's a whole world of academia about this, it's a scary rabbit hole but I believe important that we all educate ourselves at least a little bit, to protect our minds and our critical thinking faculties. And more importantly those of our children and grandchildren.
Of course legacy television could never do this because the ratings were compiled by third parties and there was a great deal more transparency over commercial channels' deals with advertisers. So if we read that, I dunno, 20 million people sat down on Christmas Day to watch the last ever episode of Only Fools and Horses, then we can actually be confident that 20 million people really did do that, and we enjoyed a shared cultural moment. These days? never happens. Bit sad really!