Some YouTube videos have themselves had a direct effect on world events, such as "Innocence of Muslims" (2012) which spurred protests and related anti-American violence internationally. TED curator Chris Anderson described a phenomenon by which geographically distributed individuals in a certain field share their independently developed skills in YouTube videos, thus challenging others to improve their own skills, and spurring invention and evolution in that field. Journalist Virginia Heffernan stated in "The New York Times" that such videos have "surprising implications" for the dissemination of culture and even the future of classical music.