Makes a Meme Instead [612241]

Makes a Meme Instead
A Concise History of Internet Memes

Linda K. Börzsei
Utrecht University
February 2013

Abstract | The aim of this research paper is to investigate
the ontology and history of the Internet meme (a piece of
content spreading online from user to user and changing
along the way) from the 1980s to the early 2010s. After
looking at the question of defining the Internet meme, I will
analyse the evolution of the phenomenon from social,
cultural and technological perspectives, such as chaos
theory, the new aesthetics, generative systems, as well as
trace the origins of certain elements of the Internet memes
from a media -archaeological aspect.

Keywords | Internet meme, Internet humour, digital culture, Internet culture, media
archaeology, new aesthetics

2
“Used to give a bit of pseudo -academic gravitas to stupid viral shit.”
('Meme.' Urban Dictionary1)

The study of memes and memetics began in 1976 with Richard Dawkins'
The Selfish Gene , the book in which the concept was born. However, of all
the different types of memes, the focus on Internet memes – a piece of
content spreading online from user to user and changing along the way – is
only a recent development. Researchers have mostly tried to capture single
moments of the story and produced studies with a synchronic approach
towards Internet memes, such as migration (Shifman & Thelwall), appeal
(Miltner, of LOLcats) or their role in s ubcultures (van de Fliert). The history
and evolution of the ever -growing phenomenon of Internet memes have
been overlooked by academics so far.
The story of memes is crucial to the understanding of digital culture, and
not only as a characteristic of an I nternet subculture, but as a cultural
artefact that is gaining new meaning and function as it is breaking more and
more into the mainstream. The aim of this research paper is to trace this
process from the earliest Internet memes to the current trends, whe n
memes are not only amassed on specialised humour sites, but the Internet
meme is also a way of communication and genre. To understand this
evolution, I will try to pinpoint the technological, sociological and cultural
reasons for the emergence of the Int ernet meme culture that is so prevalent
today.
Trying to achieve a diachronic analysis of culture, I created a short timeline
of Internet memes. For researching, collecting data and fact -checking, I
mainly relied upon Know Your Meme, Wikipedia, and an alre ady compiled
(yet often inaccurate) timeline on an interactive timeline creating website
(Tatercakes). Unfortunately, the sheer amount of Internet memes makes it a
difficult task to gather everything (Know Your Meme is the biggest site
currently attempting to do this task with numerous volunteer contributors),
let alone mention everything, so the timeline and history in this paper is – in
a way – incomplete and arbitrary. Instead of setting on a mission that is

1 Definition by Lord Grimcock, submitted on 23 June 2009 to Urban Dictionary.

3
most likely impossible, I have chosen a number of examples that all show
different aspects of the evolution of Internet memes. They were probably
not the first in a certain trend, but they are useful and interesting examples
that have a wide reach (i.e. not only a subculture). Attempting a media –
archa eological approach, I will use theories such as generative systems,
chaos theory and the new aesthetic to find out what is new and what is old
about this phenomenon; as well as to analyse the recurring patterns, and
the social and ideological influences th at shaped one of the most interesting
phenomena of digital culture.

Challenge Accepted: Identifying Internet memes
Most definitions of Internet memes rely on a concept in evolutionary
biology, coined by English evolutionary biologist and author Richard
Dawkins. He proposed the term 'meme' (based on the Ancient Greek word
mīmēma 'something imitated') to denote all non -genetic behaviour and
cultural ideas that are passed on from person to person, spanning from
language to the conventions of football (Davison ). The concept became
highly debated, and “[s]ince then, like any good meme, it has infected the
culture” (Dawkins). The debate mainly concerns what is and what is not a
meme, but so far, creating a substantive definition has seemed impossible
(Knobel & La nkshear). With the emergence of the Internet, the term 'meme'
was also applied to content that spread from user to user online. The first
“academically rigorous” definition for this particular variation was proposed
by Patrick Davison in 2009 in his essay The Language of Internet Memes :

An Internet meme is a piece of culture, typically a joke, which
gains influence through online transmission. (122)

He also developed a framework for analysing Internet memes, which
involves the deconstruction of memes into three elements: the ideal, the
behaviour and the manifestation. This method builds on the replicability of
memes, and it can also help in tracing migration and evolution, as well as in
categorisation. Knobel and Lankshear denoted two types of Internet mem es
based on replicability in their 2005 typology of meme media. They
differentiated between high fidelity static memes and remixed memes which

4
are “replicated via evolution, adaptation or transformation of the original
meme vehicle.” The largest non -academ ic website for meme and Internet
phenomenon research, Know Your Meme makes the same distinction in
their definition of memes, arguing that content that is only shared and
which has not changed or evolved while being passed on to others is viral
content, an d not a meme.
Strangely, even though high fidelity static memes are properly elaborated
on in their tree diagram, Knobel and Lankshear only add a short description
of remixed memes (“collaborative, absurdist humour in multimedia forms”)
and then list examp les (2005, figure 3). Know Your Meme is the most
updated, focused meme research site that bases its definition on the regular
users' perception of
a meme, which (as
mentioned above)
seems to indicate
that the term
'Internet meme' has
recently gained a
new meaning in
online meme
culture; Davison's
definition is not
specific enough
anymore . This new
genre of the
remixed Internet
meme is the subject
of this research
paper.
Despite these
definitions and
categorisations, the
Internet meme
remains a highly subje ctive concept. Still, there are a number of
characteristics that seem prevalent, and these will form the basis of this
Figur e 1. Basis of variation in remixed Internet memes. Haters Gonna
Hate: text-based ; Sad Keanu with the Hung arian constitution : image –
based ; Joseph Ducreux and the son g 'Ice Ice Baby' by Vanilla Ice,
Demotivator referencing a line from Return of the Jedi : image and
text style .

5
investigation. The Internet meme is a form of visual entertainment, which
can manifest in many different formats, such as a still image ( for example an
image macro2), an animated GIF, or even a video. For practical reasons, this
paper will focus on still images, but all findings should be applicable to
animated types as well. Most of these images are simplistic, often low quality
and mundan e in style. They are not meant to be beautiful or particularly
realistic; the focus is on the message. They are often multimodal, however:
to single images there are often “additional texts, images and even sound or
animation (…) added to enhance the mem e‟s contagious qualities” (Knobel
& Lankshear). The ideals of remixed still image Internet memes can be
reflected in text and image: the meme can be a phrase, a standalone image,
or an image accompanied by text or the expected style of text (fig. 1). The
possible sources of a meme are limited „only by the number of things there
are in the world for us to discuss‟ (Allen, cited Shifman): it can be cinema,
video games, celebrities, as well as politics. In one image, a meme can be
used with a certain topic, or it can be juxtaposed with other memes. Last but
not least, a remixed meme is not only shared online (through email,
websites, social media) but also encourages participation, inviting people to
often anonymously contribute to the entertainment.

True Story: Beginnings
One of the earliest (and maybe even the first) Internet meme was the
emoticon (Davison). The “sideways smiley face” composed entirely of
punctuation marks was created on 19 September 1982 by Scott E. Fahlman.
An avid USENET user, Fahlman realised that the lack of a visual channel in
online communication needed to be overcome to avoid misunderstandings,
for example while using humour or sarcasm. He suggested the usage of ': -)'
as a way of marking posts that were not meant to be taken seriously. He
also created ': -(', which he proposed to be the sign indicating that the post
is indeed serious.
The smiley quickly spread to other communities and it soon became a
mem e. The emoticon, as it began to be called, already displays many

2 An image with text (generally white letters with black borders, and in Impact font) superimposed. Most widely
used format for e.g. LOLCats.

6
definite characteristics of Internet memes in a very minimalistic form. The
early years of the Internet were script -based3 – like USENET, the “original
text-only social network” (Biggs) – and yet visuals were seeping in.
Emoticons are pictograms (or icons) of faces, created by putting certain
characters (e.g. letters, numbers, punctuation marks) on a regular computer
keyboard in a certain order; similar to ASCII Art (which has been around
since about 1966) yet simpler, as knowledge of ASCII codes was not
necessary. Their
function was two –
fold: to intentionally
communicate
specific non -verbal
information (Yus
167) and to
entertain.
Their pragmatic use
is well -known to all
Internet users, as
many emoticons are still in use today: they are so much a part of language,
of the idiolect, that many people choose their own preferred emoticons,
based on fashion or what their peers are using (e.g. whether to use [:) ] or
[=) ]; [:DD ] or [XD ]). Thus the m eme as a vehicle for communicating certain
ideas is very much present in emoticons already, especially as Dresner &
Herring (qtd. in Yus 166) point out “many facial emoticons do not seem to
express a single emotion, or indeed any emotion at all” but they c onvey
more complex ideas or emotional states4.
The use of emoticons as entertainment is a fad that seems to have long
disappeared. For a considerable time, however, people were playing with
emoticons, aiming for more and more complex pictograms of faces, o ften
of famous people and funny characters ( fig. 2). These emoticons are not

3 A number of scholars even applauded this quality of the Internet, claiming that it restored “the power that the
written word has lost in the 20th century” (Shifman & Blondheim qtd. in Shifman).
4 A good example is [:P ] which is generally attributed to be a sign of teasing, flirting and sarcasm (Dresner &
Herring qtd. Yus 166).
Figure 2 . A selection of humorous emoticons from the collection of David
W. Sanderson (http://w2.eff.org/Net_culture/Folklore/Arts/smiley2.list)

7
necessarily easy to understand, which means these “jokes” work only with
the explanation (as in what the emoticon means); it is the surprising
“solution” and the simplistic means of creating these images that yield the
humour. Multiple books were published showcasing these, such as the
Smiley Dictionary (1993) by Seth Godin, and with the emergence of text
messaging, even telecommunications companies like Vodafone circulated
similar glossaries. However, the remixing of emoticons for humour has
mostly faded since.
The emoticons were in a wa y an experiment with a new technology, and this
one experiment had a lasting effect. In becoming a meme, and their iconic
nature played a crucial part. As Douglas Rushkoff writes, “[t]he simpler an
icon, the more universal its application” (55): and so the icon – the meme –
will be shared, used, reused, remixed. But it cannot be too simple either, for
then its meaning can become ambiguous; as Balázs Karafiáth put it, a meme
has to be big enough to have its own substantial meaning (Kurucz). At the
same time, it also has to be small enough to not be able to mutate in its
basic form (Karafiáth qtd. in Kurucz), and Rushkoff echoes this thought in
saying that an icon too detailed “becomes too specific and less widely
applicable” (55).
Another experimentation
with new technologies
was the website Bert Is
Evil, which hosts images
that can easily be
considered examples of
the first modern remixed
Internet meme (fig. 3).
Created by Filipino artist
and designer Dino
Ignacio in 1997, the site
aims to collect
“documents and images
that show that Bert
[character from Sesame
Figure 3. Bert and some compromising pictures. On the far right is th e
infamous photograph from a Bangladeshi protest.

8
Street] is evil.” The whole site is dedicated to proving Bert evil by these
pictures5. Ignacio made all the images, in which Bert is photoshopped into
existing photographs, showing him in incriminating situations (e.g. at the
assassination of President Kennedy, or in the company of Adolf Hitler). Every
image was accompanied by a short background story to make them seem
more realistic.
Bert Is Evil is an early example of online visual humour. Although there are
still relatively long texts on the website, the real attractions are undoubtedly
the images. The layers feature had already been introduced to Photoshop in
1994, which made the manipulation of digital(ised) photographs easier than
ever before (West). Nevertheless, participation in Bert is Evil was not open,
as Ignacio was the only one posting images. Half a year after the site bega n,
he started to receive submissions, but only a selected few made it to the site
(Ignacio). Nevertheless, this did not stop the Internet from playing with the
meme, and soon numerous parodies and mirror sites starting appearing,
dedicated to the spreading of the “truth about Bert”, even after Ignacio
stopped updating the original site (Cassel).
In his books, Douglas Rushkoff alludes to the Rodney King tape multiple
times as a “high -leveraged butterfly's wing” (25). Bert is Evil is another
example. “Chaos c an be disheartening” (Rushkoff 25): Ignacio never
expected “the horror”, as he phrased it, that would come from him trying to
get featured in an underground Internet magazine and to make his friends
laugh. On 5 October 2001, Photoshopped images of Bert and Osama bin
Laden appeared on countless banners in a pro -bin Laden protest in
Bangladesh (FoxNews.com). At that moment, the hurricane spawned, and
“[f]rom his bedroom, Ignacio sparked an international controversy” (Jenkins
2006:2). In 2001, Ignacio was frig htened by how “reality was imitating the
Web6.” Indeed, the dynamical system of world media (Rushkoff 25) and the

5 This collective strain was already ch aracteristic of websites, and not only links to interesting content but
collecting visual content. One striking, also humorous example was Fat Chicks in Party Hats (2000) and this
pattern reappears to this day, on sites such as Tumblr (e.g. Kim Jong -Il Loo king at Things or Nick Clegg Looking
Sad). Remixed meme versions include Kim Jong -Il Dropping the Bass and Selleck Waterfall Sandwich .
6 Ignacio was also not the creator of the Bert -bin Laden image, which came from a fansite. On 11 October
2001, he inactiv ated his own (the original) Bert is Evil website, as it was not “contained and distanced from big
media” any more.

9
convergence of different media platforms (Jenkins 2006) provide just the
right space and atmosphere for memes to flow and be passed on in
previously unexpected ways. Evil Bert was one of the first “children of
chaos”, and definitely not the last.

Yo Dawg I Herd You Like Memes: The Rise of the Internet Meme
The term Web 2.0 was coined in 1999 to describe a number of new
technologies that seemed to be changing the landscape of the decade -old
Internet. A misleading term, however; as Tim Berners -Lee pointed out, Web
2.0 is just “a piece of jargon”, as the Web was always planned to have the
possibilities that it offers now: connecting people around t he world, sharing
content and experiences. Something still changed around the turn of the
millennium, and this shows in the story of Internet memes as well. Learning
from such popular viral personal websites as Mahir Çağrı's7, advertising
agencies created the first instances of viral marketing, such as Super Greg
by the Minneapolis based agency, Fallon Worldwide8. Memetics was gaining
significance.
One of the most significant Internet phenomena in the early 2000s was All
Your Base Are Belong to Us (fig. 4), a meme that spawned from the badly
translated opening sequence of the 1989 arcade shooter game Zero Wing .
The meme has been popular since 1998, but it has reached previously
unimagined heights after November 2000, when the first Photoshop thread
dedicated to the meme was opened on the forums of Something Awful. The
thread reportedly had 2000 images, and that was only the beginning of a
saga that later involved even more manipulated pictures of “[s]treet signs,
restaurant awnings, cinema fronts, advertising , cartoons, T -shirts, tattoos,
golf balls inserted into turtles, all bearing this new phrase” (Johnston)
uploaded to the Internet.
No remixed meme had reached such heights of virality before, and there
are a number of reasons why this particular meme became so popular at

7 Mahir was one of the first Internet celebrities. In 1999, he created his personal website, where he introduced
himself in bad English and p osted domestic pictures of himself. The unintentional humour of the website made
it into one of the first viral websites in Internet history.
8 Their most notable project include three fictional characters with their own homepages: Super Greg , Roy (Born
to Destroy) and Curry (a.k.a. Rubber Burner).

10
that particular
time. One
secret for its
success lies in
the increasing
generativity of
Internet memes
in the late
1990s and early
2000s. Remixed
Internet m emes
are generative
systems in that
they are “a set of of tools and practices that develop among large groups of
people” (Zittrain 74). In the case of Internet memes, one generative system
is built on another generative system, the Internet (Zittrain deems this to be
often “the best recipe”). In his book, The Future of the Internet , Jonathan
Zittrain defines five principal factors that affect the generativity of a system
or a tool: leverage, adaptability, ease of mastery, accessibil ity, and
transferability (71). The more these qualities are maximised, the more
contributors can take part in the system, and generativity can develop and
be sustained.
The main leverage for creating memes is provided by graphics editing
softwares and the Internet (the generative layer below). Software make the
creation possible by having the necessary functions. The Internet serves as
the platform for sharing, where the meme can migrate, reach others and
evolve. In a recent development, these leverages hav e even blended to
make the process even simpler: this shows in the appearance of meme
generators, the most famous being Memegenerator.net . These generators
are “meme editing software” built into websites, making other software like
Photoshop redundant as t he whole process can be done on one platform
(although this only works for certain types of memes).
In terms of adaptability, we have already seen a few different uses of
Internet memes. The most obvious use is the meme as the vehicle for a joke
– All Your Base Are Belong to Us is a perfect example. The emoticons are
Figure 4. The original screen capture from Zero Wing, and some of the variations.

11
the first example for using them to express certain emotions and retain non –
verbal conversational cues in a medium where the visual and audio channels
are absent in communication. This use is a lso a recurring pattern in Internet
memes; one modern example is Do Not Want (2005), which most often
manifests as a reaction image macro, illustrating disgust and/or disapproval.
Their value to marketing specialists and advertising agencies has also
already been mentioned, and even more, newer functions and possibilities
for Internet memes lie in the road ahead – to be discussed in later
paragraphs.
As it has been mentioned before, one of the most important characteristics
of remixed Internet memes is thei r simplicity, and such a simplicity that
makes their creation easy with the available leverage. Most of them are
made by using two functions at maximum: cut -copy-paste and text tool.
The most widely used graphics editing software Adobe Photoshop went
throu gh crucial development in the years leading up to All Your Base Are
Belong to Us. The functions needed for creating Internet memes have
become considerably easier to master; this is not surprising as already from
its initial release in 1990, Photoshop was marketed as a “mass -market, fairly
simple tool for anyone to use” (Computer Arts). As it has been mentioned
before, Photoshop 3.0 introduced layers, to make the manipulation of
images easier. Photoshop 5.0 (1998) offered improvements in adding text to
imag es, a crucial element of Internet memes. Photoshop 5.5 (1999) came
with the option of adjusting image quality and size so that the image would
be fit for Internet use – the 'Save For Web' function. Photoshop 6.0 (2000)
again made the layers interface and t he text tool more practical (West).
Mastering the creation of a meme is thus open to everybody, and the
aforementioned meme generators are even easier to use with their pre –
made templates and straightforward instructions.
The accessibility of Internet meme s first depends on the accessibility of their
natural habitat, the Internet. According to demographic reports published
by NielsenNetratings.com, “more widespread possibilities of access to the
Internet (…) can be dated from roughly 2000 onwards” (Knobel &
Lankshear). The growing number of message boards, forums, and social
networks offer a platform to share and enjoy Internet memes, and most
require only a free registration. Due to it being marketed to the masses, the

12
accessibility of Photoshop (as a cre ative tool) was also provided by keeping
it at a low price and compatible with all operating systems (not to mention
the emergence of peer -to-peer file sharing application in the early 2000s,
where Photoshop is available for “free” download).
The last fact or, transferability is related to the most important quality of
memes: replicability. The simplicity of memes ensures that it can be learned,
copied and changed according to the creator's wishes. The Internet offers
visibility and unprecedented speed for t he migration and evolution of
memes. Images also transcend cultures more easily than language, and
even if there is text in the image, it is most likely to be in English, the
language that “one out of four of the world's population speak (…) to some
level of competence” (statistics of the British Council).
Apart from their generativity, an important reason for the success of All
Your Base Are Belong to Us is its humour, which is a key component of the
meme. It was the desire to continue this joke that spa rked the “remixing
epidemic” (Knobel & Lankshear), to spread this particular example of “geek
kitsch humour” (Taylor qtd. in Knobel & Lankshear). Enjoying the ridiculous
outcome of bad translation between languages (here from Japanese to
English) is not a peculiarity of “geek culture”, however. This type of humour
had been popular for many years by then; it is no surprise that All Your Base
Are Belong to Us has struck a chord with people on a scale wider than just
subcultures. One celebrated earlier example is English As She Is Spoke , a
Portuguese -English conversational guide written by Pedro Carolino in 1883,
containing predominantly incoherent English phrases. A celebrated source
of unintentional humour stemming from faulty translation, author Mark
Twain h eralded the work as a true classic9. The real difference between such
works and All Your Base Is Belong to Us is in the reaction to the humour –
passive enjoyment has turned into active involvement in creating (and
adding to) the joke.
All Your Base Are Be long to Us was popular enough to reach out of the
circles of Internet subculture into the mainstream. The story was covered in

9 Mark Twain wrote in the introduction to the US edition of the book: "In this world of uncertainties, there is, at
any rate, one thing which may be pretty confidently set down as a certainty: and that is, that t his celebrated little
phrase -book wi ll never die while the English language lasts. Its delicious unconscious ridiculousness, and its
enchanting naiveté, as are supreme and unapproachable, in their way, as are Shakespeare's sublimities.” (1883)

13
multiple major papers in early 2001 (one example is the Guardian article
referenced in this paper), and it is one of the most wel l-known Internet
memes to this day. The reaction that crossed media platforms and swept
through the world in a matter of days shows again the dynamical nature of
the Internet and memes. “The tiniest change within the tiniest detail”, such
as the surfacing of the Zero Wing video at the right place and time turned
the entire media world upside down for a few weeks (Rushkoff 24;
Johnston).
Such dynamics provide the perfect environment for spreading false
information and hoaxes, as it can be harder to tell what is real and what is
not in a chaotic mediaspace. In September 2001, after the 9/11 attacks, a
Hungarian man named Péter Guzli took an old picture of himself standing
on top of the World Trade Center in New York, and with the help of
Photoshop, added a pla ne heading towards the tower in the background.
He sent it to some of his friends, intending it to be just a bit of a joke. The
image went viral, however, and a story started circulating about how a
camera was found in the debris after the collapse of the towers, with a
picture on it
of a tourist
who had his
picture taken
just seconds
before the
collision. The
photograph
was sent
around en
masse in
emails in all
seriousness10,
inciting all

10 Know Your Meme quotes the original text accompanying the image: “ We‟ve seen thousands of pictures
concerning the attack. However, this one will make you cringe. A simple touris t getting himself photographed
on the top of the WTC just seconds before the tragedy … the camera was found in the rubble!! ”
Figure 5. The Tourist of Death “photographed” on the World Trade Center and at
various historical tragedies.

14
kinds of conspiracy theories. The hoax was so efficient, there are people to
this day believing the picture was genuine.
On 26 September 2001, the generative machine started working, and a
thread appeared on Something Awful, just like in the case of All Your Base
Are Belong to Us. Guzli (although his identity still unknown) was dubbed the
Tourist of Death (touristofdeath.com is the website dedicated to the
phenomenon and collecting the remixed images of the meme), and he was
photoshopped into photographs of countless other historical and fictional
tragedies, from the assassinati on of Abraham Lincoln to the bomb -rigged
bus in the 1994 movie Speed (fig. 5).
Although Guzli came forward in November 2001 and admitted to the image
being manipulated (Index, 2001), the news of the image being fake did not
spread as efficiently as the original hoax, or even the remixes. Guzli issued a
public apology in 2011, a few days before the ten year anniversary of the
attacks, saying how so rry he was about a private joke going wrong as the
police was still receiving calls about the photograph11 (Orange News).
Reality and the Internet entwined dangerously again, and Tourist Guy
turned out to be another butterfly's wing, photoshopped to stand a t the
edge of chaos. All Your Base Are Belong to Us came from an obscure video
game already a decade old during the meme‟s rise to popularity, while
Tourist Guy stemmed from an event very real when it appeared. As Rushkoff
says, we need to adapt to this li fe of chaos, of which the Internet meme
culture is just a small fraction.

11 His full apology reads: “It was a private matter – I assumed my friends would recognise me and call me to see
if I was alright, but they didn‟t, they posted it on to other friends and suddenly it was all over the world. … I am
ashamed that even now the police still get calls about it, I never did it for money and I never intended to cause
any harm to the real victims or their families … I didn‟t really stop to consi der the consequences and never
thought it would go o utside of my small circle of friends.”

15
Little Fatty (known as Xiao Pang in China; fig. 6) also came from a similarly
unexpected source: a private photograph of 16 year old Qian Zhijun from
Shanghai. Originally
posted on t he Internet
by one of his teachers in
2002, the image soon
ended up in numerous
Chinese forums, and
people started
photoshopping Qian's
face onto celebrities,
especially on movie
posters. Qian quickly
became a nationwide
celebrity, and in early
2003, the r emix meme
reached US forums, and
soon he was known
worldwide. Little Fatty is
one of the earliest
instances of a meme
spawning from private digital photographs uploaded to the Internet.
The advances in the technology of digital photography, as well as its
accessibility to a wider public, resulted in an increasing number of private
images a ppearing online, right at the meme community‟s disposal.
Alongside domestic photographs of people, by the mid -2000s, it was the
large amount of pet photos uploaded12 that played a part in formulating
new trends in Internet memes. The two famous instances Advice Dog and
LOLCats are both said to originate from 2006, and they proved very
influential in shaping today's meme culture.

12 As Ethan Zuckerman ironically phrased it: “Web 1.0 was invented to allow physicists to share research papers.
Web 2.0 was created to allow people to share pictures of cute cats.” (2008)
Figure 6. The original photograph of Qian and some of the remixed
images. This meme s till appears sometimes, as the image on the far
right references a 2012 news story.

16
Advice Dog is the first
example of the Advice
Animals (fig. 6), a
series of Internet
memes all based on
the same format: a
cut-out of an animal
or the head of an
animal, pasted over a
generic colourful
background, with text
added above and/or
below the face. The
original Advice Dog
was used as a reaction
image in a thread on the Mario fansite The Mushroom Kingdom . The
creator of the t hread was asking for advice on having his first kiss, to which
user T.E.M. replied with an image of his own dog's head on the colour
wheel background, and commented 'Just do it, man'. This original advice
was soon followed by not only remixed versions, but multiple spin -off
memes featuring different animals (and people13), such as the Socially
Awkward Penguin , Courage Wolf , or Foul Bachelor Frog .
The history of LOLCats (fig. 7) also began in 2006, possibly on PHP and
vBulletin message boards (e.g. General Mayhem), but the popularisation of
funny cat pictures happened through and on 4chan14, especially in their
weekly feature Caturday15. Most of these images were image macros with

13 Notable examples include: Success Kid , Good Guy Greg , High Expectations Asian Father and The Most
Interesting Man in the World .
14 The website that is considered to be the home of countless Internet memes was launched on 1 October 2003.
Also known as the base of Anonymous.
15 The earliest archived thread for Caturday on 4chan was started 26 December 2006, but this is quite possibly
not the first ever thread dedicated to cat pictures on the /b/ board. The Livejournal community Caturday: Post
Some Fucking Cats (caturday.livejour nal.com) was created 5 February 2005, also encouraging users to post cat
image macros.
Figure 7. Memes from the Advice Animal series, from left to right: Advice
Dog, Socially Awkward Penguin, Courage Wolf (one of the few not
necessarily humorous Advice Animals), Foul Bachelor Frog, and Success Kid

17
the text written
in lolspeak16. I
Can Has
Cheezburger? ,
the most
popular LOLCat
site to this day,
opened on 11
January 2007
and with that,
funny cat pictures were undoubtedly launched into the mainstream.
The popularity of the Advice Animal series and LOLCats can be attributed to
them being a digital reimagining of anthropomorphic animals traditionally in
folk culture. In her in vestigation into the appeal of LOLCats, Miltner noted
that people identify with LOLCats; they often see themselves in the animals,
and in the situations they are facing. This notion is also the basis of the
beast fable genre, which was “a particularly popu lar continental literary type
throughout the Middle Ages” (Treharne 332), and in which animals “speak
and behave like human beings in a short tale usually illustrating some moral
point” (The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Literary Terms). As Howard
Needler w rites, “the identification of humans with animals is a reflexive
operation of humans seeking to view themselves by 'holding the mirror up
to nature,' as it were – albeit to a nature manipulated by human agency”
(426).
It is no question that anthropomorphic animals have always been a
significant part of culture, and since the Middle Ages they have appeared in
fairy tales, animal jokes and Disney films a mong others17. Animals in these
stories often have a stereotype attached to them (many of which transcend
cultures), such as the cunning fox, the brave and noble lion, or the wise owl.

16 In her thesis on LOLCats, Miltner describes lolspeak as “the lingua franca of the LOLCat world. Its exact origins
are unknown, but it appears to incorporate elements o f Motherese (baby talk), AOL Chat Speak (“BRB”, “LOL”)
and Leetspeak.”
17 Anthropomorphic animals also appeared in a series of postcards created by Harry Whittier Frees in the early
20th century, which featured the animals dressed up in human clothes, posed in human situations. They even
had humorous captions, which also makes them a progenitor of LOLCats.
Figure 8. The supposedly original LOLC at and some variations. Monorail Cat is often
considered a submeme.

18
These memes can be considered the source of Advice Animals, which
simila rly have certain characteristics attributed to them. The reason why cats
as LOLCats are endowed with so many different qualities probably stems
from the wide variety of stereotypes associated with them traditionally too,
such as the cool cat, the lazy cat, or the evil (black) cat.
Advice Animals and LOLCats also resemble comics, which Rushkoff argues
are our key to understand the modern language of visual information – and
that includes the language of Internet memes. Just like in comics, where
actions, emo tions and events are iconic (Rushkoff 57), the ideal that an
Internet meme wishes to represent is also done iconically; thus making
comics in several ways a precursor to remixed Internet memes. The Rage
Comics phenomenon (fig. 9) is
a very literal example for this
parallel. The first of these
stereotypical stock characters
created with simple drawing
softwares, FFFUUUU Rage Guy ,
appeared on 4chan in 2008 in
short comics form. This was
later followed by a subred dit
on Reddit in January 2009
where people could upload
their own comics, and soon a
great number of new
characters were introduced
by contributors in and outside
Reddit, such as Forever Alone
Guy, Trollface , “Y U NO” Guy
and Cereal Guy . Many of these
iconic characters soon were
turned into Advice Animal –
style memes as well, showing
the connection between the
two genres.
Figure 9. On the top: a Rage Comic featuring the first character,
FFFUUU Rage Guy in the last image . Below , clockwise from top
left: Y U NO Guy, Forever Alone Guy, Cereal Guy and Trollface .

19
Rushkoff explains
how one of the
most bizarre
aspects of the
Marvel Universe is
that superheroes
from different
comics set in
different times,
places and
fantas ies often
appear together
in one comic
strip; even the drawing styles might differ inside one frame (60). In a way,
this is what happened to Rage Guy and his fellow characters when they
were inserted into the completely different format of Advice Animals.
However, just like Marvel characters “[a]lthough they are divorced of their
original contexts, the characters maintain their own iconic identities and
traits” (60); similarly, memes are often purposely juxtaposed in one single
image but they still retain t heir character (fig. 9). By communicating mostly
through icons, both comic books and Internet memes are teaching readers
about understanding such a language – “to recognise new patterns or new
combinations of established ones” (Rushkoff 56) – as well as in spiring them
to communicate in a similar fashion.

I Can Has Cheezburger and Public Opinion
There exists a LOLCat image m acro which reads “Memes: inside jokes for
people with no lives.” For the longest time, Internet memes were seen as a
strange output of an Internet subculture, which are separated from reality
except on those occasions when a mainstream news article reporte d on the
unusual ways people spend their time on the Internet. In the “chaotic
mediaspace” (Rushkoff 49), however, more and more people are in on the
online inside jokes known as Internet memes. Websites such as 9GAG (2008)
and Memebase whose main profile is to feature user -uploaded Internet
Figure 10. From left to right: Kanye Interrupts & Chuck Norris Facts; This Looks
Shopped & Bayeux Tapestry; Sad Keanu & Strutting Leo

20
memes are one of the major, most frequented humour sites today (9GAG
has an estimated 4 million unique visitors every month, and as of November
2012, it has an Alexa Rank of 252).
As Internet memes are becoming a more a nd more conventional type of
humour, their use is becoming more varied. For a long time, Internet
humour was mostly focused on global topics such as sex, gender and
animals (Shifman) – fitting for the “global village”, greatly outnumbering
local topics lik e politics and sports. The visual form of Internet memes and
the overwhelming use of the English language as the lingua franca (the
same reasons that make Internet memes an accessible system) have also
played in a role in their global nature. Starting from the late 2000s, however,
online meme culture has seen a continuous increase in more localised
Internet memes. The ongoing process of “glocalization” (Roberston qtd. in
Shifman & Thelwall), or blending of global and local, turned the Internet
meme into a global vehicle (reflecting global culture with its Western
influences) that allow
people to talk about their
local topics, closer in time
and space (and often
language), alongside the
more universal themes.
Remixed memes also
showcase this change, as
seen i n the memes that
talk about celebrities and
mainstream popular
culture. On 13
September 2009, at the
MTV Video Music
Awards, as singer Taylor
Swift was accepting her
award for “Best Female
Video”, rapper Kanye
West went up stage, took
Figure 11. Examples of the Kanye Interrupts meme, the last image a
remix with the Bayeux Tapestry meme.

21
the microphone from h er and gave his infamous speech about how
Beyonce should have won the award18. The event turned into a scandal, to
which the reaction of the Internet was the Kanye Interrupts meme (fig.11 ).
Kanye Interrupts and similar memes point to a new trend in Internet memes,
which is a result of the increase in cognitive surplus, a novel resource
described by Clay Shirky. Cognitive surplus is created from the increasing
free time available to educated population, and the spread of public,
participatory media (Shirky 27). The Kanye West scandal was not only
gossiped about but people put time and energy into creating new content,
for example, by using the generat ive system of Internet memes. As Shirky
notes, production and participation can bring enjoyment, and the output is
generally shared: a similar thing can be observed with Internet memes, as
they are created by millions of enthusiasts around the world.
In th e chaotic, dynamical mediaspace, cognitive surplus can be a useful
asset in processing the large amounts of information fired at the population
at all times.
Memes show
that, even if
at a low level,
even if just
for the sake
of a joke,
more and
more people
are engaging
with the news
and what is
happening
around them,
trying to make sense of it all. The generativity of Internet memes allows
instant reaction and encourages virality, so people can comment on the
most current issues, events and people, as well as find an audience. Memes

18 West‟s entire speech was turned into a catchphrase by the Internet: “Yo Taylor, I‟m really happy for you, Imma
let you finish but Beyonce had one of the best videos of all time…one of the best videos of all time!”
Figure 12. A screenshot of Meme Generator on 7 November 2012, a day after the US
presidential elections.

22
can “tell the news”: sites like Memegenerator reveal that, to this day, the
most popular memes at any given time will likely cover important news
stories (fig. 1 2).
Capturing the world in the form of Internet memes fits perfectly into the
everyday aesthetics of our age. What Susan Murray realised while
researching Flickr and digital photography rings true when looking at
Internet memes too. She describes our new everyday aesthetics as “fleeting,
malleable, immediate”, where one image lasts until the next one appears.
Johnston already noted this in relation to All Your Base Are Belong to Us,
where not only the life of one imag e is short but of the meme itself. The
information overload of the current media does not permit longer
engagement with one piece of news, as the next hour will supply with many
new ones. The Internet meme (and its popularity) is a poignant illustration of
this condition.
On 8 November 2009 a photograph was posted by then French president
Nicolas Sarkozy's official Facebook page of the president at the Berlin Wall
on the day it was taken down in 1989. Already the same day, several
journalists raised concern s about the photograph being genuine, and
inspired by a user comment on their site, Le Post announced a contest for
the best parodies of Sarkozy‟s misfired attempt to raise his reputation on the
social network. The Internet meme Sarkozy Was There (Sarkozy y était) was
born, where mostly French users created manipulated pictures of Sarkozy
appearing at f amous
historical events (fig. 13 ).
Sarkozy Was There
brings yet another
comic -related genre into
mind: the poli tical
cartoon. Similarly
“succint, sharp analyses
of the events unfolding
around us” (Dougherty),
Internet memes seem to
be the digital age
Figure 13. Examples of Sarkozy Was There .

23
political cartoons, with infinitely extended
participation. Addressing political and
social issues in a humorous and iconic
form, cartoons and memes alike can grab
“attention in a way that an article does not”
(Dougherty). As Zuckerman phrased it: “My
single favorite comment on SUP‟s
acquisition of LiveJournal is a lolcat (fig.
13:1), which sums up the situation better
than any angry post could have.”
Sarkozy Was There was one of the first
examples of a trend that continues to this
day. In 2005, Knobel and Lankshear found
a mere 5 memes to be social commentary
(employing humour) out of the 19 analysed
in their study. The y reported that these
memes were generally high fidelity memes
(meaning such content was only passed on
and shared), while evolving memes were
the vehicle mostly for online jokes with little
to no serious content. People often turn to
popular culture and h umour to find
answers to societal dilemmas (Rushkoff 68);
in the early 2010s, the Internet meme is
one of the ways people are addressing
such issues. Their nature and virality made
Internet memes a fitting genre to express
opinions, encourage participation , and
stand up for a cause, be it in France or
China19 (fig. 1 4).

19 An Xiao Mina has analysed many Chinese Internet memes, calling them social media street art, and heralds
their use in that they can avoid censorship and still provide political commentary on a range of issues.
Figure 14. 1. LOLCat reaction image mentioned
by Zuckerman; 2. United States: the Binders Full of
Women meme – criticisng statements of Mi tt
Romney; 3. Hungary: “Brussel s is not Moscow…
unfortunately”, parodying the stereotype of the
Hungarian “Socialist Pensioner”; 4. Netherlands: a
comment about Dutch politician Geert Wilders; 5.
China: calling for the freedom of lawyer and civil
rights activist Chen Guangcheng .

24
Internet memes
showcase a new kind of
understanding of the
world, and a new kind
of creative and social
outlet. In 2012, a
student of the Radboud
University of Nijmegen
created the Facebook
page Nijmegen Uni
Memes (fig. 1 4)
dedicated entirely to
Internet memes about
“[w]hat's happening at
the [university]”. In such
communities, general
gossip, university rivalry,
as well as discussions
about exams and
papers all happen online and by using Internet memes that users submit to
the page. Nijmegen Uni Memes is only o ne of the numerous university
meme pages that launched on Facebook, which show how Internet memes
have become a part of vocabulary for Internet users. In 2012, the Internet
meme is undoubtedly one of the most widespread modes of online
communication, and i t is not only the emoticon any more.
This development also often serves as proof of the idea that the attention
span of the younger generations is decreasing dangerously. Rushkoff not
only points out that this is relatively undocumented, but argues that “the
ability to piece together meaning from a discontinuous set of images is the
act of a higher intellect, not a lower one” (49 -50). Internet memes would not
be this popular if users did not know how to read them. Similarly t o
(political) cartoons, memes “require knowledge if the viewer is to „get it‟”
(Dougherty). Remixed Internet memes are intertextual by nature, and
consequently, people who enjoy and create memes – like readers of
cartoons and comic books – are drawn toward s a more non -linear way of
Figure 15. Nijmegen Uni Memes .

25
thinking, because of the “icons, gaps, and discontinuous relationships” they
are faced with (Rushkoff 60).

Problem? Conclusions
Shifman says that humour can be “a unique key for the understanding of
social and cultural processes.” Internet memes also offer this unique insight
into the changes in our perception of the world, the media and our own
lives. Although cut -and-paste techniques ar e nothing new, “such dislocated
imagery” has never before been so conventional and in the mainstream
(Rushkoff). Internet memes are only a small fraction of the converging
mediaspace, where “stupid viral shit” (Urban Dictionary) is just as visible as
anyth ing.
Rushkoff writes that as members of a chaotic mediaspace, everybody will
have to be “equipped to absorb the data flying across our screens, make
sense of the postlinear grammar with which it is formatted, and participate
in its production as amateur jo urnalists” (49). He claims children of the late
20th century – the “children of chaos” – are already doing this, and they are
ready to face what lies ahead in terms of social and cultural processes. They
are making memes.

26
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