Lee Hsien Loong v Leong Sze Hian 96 [2021] SGHC 66 The plaintiff argues, relying on Dr Phan’s evidence, that the total number of persons based in Singapore who accessed the Post is likely to be large and in the thousands.38 I am not certain that Dr Phan’s evidence bears this out. The core thrust of Dr Phan’s reasoning in explaining why the number of views would be several times higher than the number of reactions, likes, comments, and/or shares of the Post is what is described as the “cascade effect”.39 Dr Phan, relying on a number of academic articles, explains the cascade effect as being that the reach of a Facebook post can extend exponentially as it is “reacted” to, commented on, or shared.40 Dr Phan pointed me to articles by Watts (2002),41 and Watts and Dodds (2007)42 to show that there may be exponential growth and cascades in the reach of posts made on social media networks. Papers by Vosoughi, Roy, and Aral (2018)43 and Bakshy et al (2012)44 were said to show that the reach stemming from an initial post or “seed” could be extensive. 97 In terms of specifics, I sought to understand from Dr Phan the actual numbers which he estimated would have viewed the Post. Dr Phan gave evidence that, applying what in his view was a very conservative estimate of (a) 38 PCS at [148(b)]. 39 2 BA 401 at [27]. 40 2 BA 401 at [27] and [28]. 41 Watts, Duncan. 2002 “A Simple Model of Global Cascades on random Networks” Proceedings from the National Academy of Sciences 99: 5766–71. (Annex F to AEIC of Tuan Quang Phan). 42 Watts, Duncan J., and Peter Sheridan Dodds. 2007. “Influentials, Networks, and Public Opinion Formation” Journal of Consumer Research 34 (December): 441–58. (Annex G to AEIC of Tuan Quang Phan). 43 Vosoughi, Soroush, Deb Roy, and Sinan Aral. 2018. “The Spread of True and False News Online” Science 359 (6380): 1146–51. (Annex H to AEIC of Tuan Quang Phan). 44 Bakshy, Eytan, Itamar Rosenn, Cameron Marlow, and Lada Adamic. 2012. “The Role of Social Networks in Information Diffusion” In Proceedings of the ACM Conference on the World Wide Web. Lyon, France. (Annex I to AEIC of Tuan Quang Phan). 53