Internet meme (from Wikipedia):
The term Internet meme is a neologism used to describe a catchphrase or concept that spreads quickly from person to person via the Internet. The term is a reference to the concept of memes, although this concept refers to a much broader category of cultural information.
I guess this definition is geek-speak for "what Internet junkies think is cool".
Many say that the first Internet meme was the Dancing Baby...
But, as confirmed by the Internet Meme Timeline, I remember the first real Web-based meme: It was the "episodic" website "The Spot".
This format was a precursor to what ultimately would become "Big Brother" on TV, cameras "spying in" on members of a household. It was said to be a Web-based soap opera similar to TV's "Beverly Hills 90210", but really, it's true inspiration had come from several porn websites that had been successful with this voyeuristic format.
Soon after "The Spot", which I actually only intermittently followed, I became truly hooked by another episodic website with a sci-fi theme: Eon-4
I was an addicted devotee of the bulletin boards on this sci-fi mystery drama site and I spent hours after hours logging in with my 19200-baud modem ignoring almost all else. That was 1996 to 1997 and I think I cried a little when the parent company of the website went under and the site was shut down...before the mystery of the story had been resolved...I'm still hoping and waiting for a resurrection of the site, but frankly this format is out-of-vogue now. Too bad.
The Internet went on after the collapse of Eon-4 of course, and the memes kept a comin'. Here are some of the ones that I fell in love with over the years:
Bert Is Evil caught my fancy right off, 'cause, other than the fact that he is a closet queen, I always had a feeling that he was really evil.
Soon after 9/11, when those fanatic parading crowds appeared on TV news holding posters supporting Osama Bin-Laden and Bert was present in some of them, the fact of Bert's evil-ness was all but confirmed. (Actually, some poster maker in the Middle East just used Internet images of Bin-Laden for his collaged posters and some had Bert in them from the humor sites. Little did the printer know, since he was oblivious to American culture, thus wouldn't have recognized the Sesame Street muppet, he naively thought those images were homages to his hero, not mockeries which in fact they were.)
This one slew me. You gotta love pics of kittens. Especially when they're chased by foam and felt "monsters". It did make me think twice a few times when I set out to have a little "right-hand fun".
Then the kitten thing blew up into this, LOLCATS. To this day I will crack up if it's a good one. 'Cause you know that if we could hear what cats are thinking, they would sound just like this.
With YouTube came the viral videos and the memes spawned by them, like:
The "Numa Numa Song" videos
Dramatic Chipmunk
And my favorite, videos that start off as something else that's become popular, but are spliced and interrupted abruptly with the 1980's music video of "Never Gonna Give You Up" by Rick Astley.
I personally love being rickrolled, since I love this song...
Eh, just call me a geek. I wear it like a badge of honor.
The term Internet meme is a neologism used to describe a catchphrase or concept that spreads quickly from person to person via the Internet. The term is a reference to the concept of memes, although this concept refers to a much broader category of cultural information.
I guess this definition is geek-speak for "what Internet junkies think is cool".
Many say that the first Internet meme was the Dancing Baby...
But, as confirmed by the Internet Meme Timeline, I remember the first real Web-based meme: It was the "episodic" website "The Spot".
This format was a precursor to what ultimately would become "Big Brother" on TV, cameras "spying in" on members of a household. It was said to be a Web-based soap opera similar to TV's "Beverly Hills 90210", but really, it's true inspiration had come from several porn websites that had been successful with this voyeuristic format.Soon after "The Spot", which I actually only intermittently followed, I became truly hooked by another episodic website with a sci-fi theme: Eon-4
I was an addicted devotee of the bulletin boards on this sci-fi mystery drama site and I spent hours after hours logging in with my 19200-baud modem ignoring almost all else. That was 1996 to 1997 and I think I cried a little when the parent company of the website went under and the site was shut down...before the mystery of the story had been resolved...I'm still hoping and waiting for a resurrection of the site, but frankly this format is out-of-vogue now. Too bad.The Internet went on after the collapse of Eon-4 of course, and the memes kept a comin'. Here are some of the ones that I fell in love with over the years:
Bert Is Evil caught my fancy right off, 'cause, other than the fact that he is a closet queen, I always had a feeling that he was really evil.
Soon after 9/11, when those fanatic parading crowds appeared on TV news holding posters supporting Osama Bin-Laden and Bert was present in some of them, the fact of Bert's evil-ness was all but confirmed. (Actually, some poster maker in the Middle East just used Internet images of Bin-Laden for his collaged posters and some had Bert in them from the humor sites. Little did the printer know, since he was oblivious to American culture, thus wouldn't have recognized the Sesame Street muppet, he naively thought those images were homages to his hero, not mockeries which in fact they were.)This one slew me. You gotta love pics of kittens. Especially when they're chased by foam and felt "monsters". It did make me think twice a few times when I set out to have a little "right-hand fun".
Then the kitten thing blew up into this, LOLCATS. To this day I will crack up if it's a good one. 'Cause you know that if we could hear what cats are thinking, they would sound just like this.
With YouTube came the viral videos and the memes spawned by them, like:The "Numa Numa Song" videos
Dramatic Chipmunk
And my favorite, videos that start off as something else that's become popular, but are spliced and interrupted abruptly with the 1980's music video of "Never Gonna Give You Up" by Rick Astley.
I personally love being rickrolled, since I love this song...Eh, just call me a geek. I wear it like a badge of honor.