A Short Guide To Internet Memes

Internet memes (pictures, videos, links, and other content) now go viral in minutes, not days or weeks. What originally started as someone dancing along to a pop song has become one of the most watched videos of ALL time.

Warning: Reading this post and clicking on the associated links may cause you to be very, very unproductive. While all these links are “safe for work”, laughing out loud in your cubicle might attract unwanted attention. You have been warned.

As more and more people are connected and online, the ability to send (and spread) jokes, stories and other media has never been easier. Media now goes “viral”, spreading instantaneously around the world through social networks, email and instant messaging. Whereas the early Internet saw annoying chain-mail emails, now it’s all about the latest YouTube video, blunder (e.g. Kanye West) or funny link. Memes can range from hilarious to offensive to disturbing (unfortunately) but most are lighthearted and whimsical.

According to Alexa, YouTube is the 4^th most visited site for the US, Canada & the Internet as a whole. Sandvine, a manufacturer of broadband networking equipment pegs YouTube as being 5% of TOTAL Internet traffic. That’s A LOT of bytes.

I’ve already had discussions with friends about where I was/what I was doing when something broke. Alongside discussions of human rights in Sino-Asia (with the poliscis), green technologies (and my not-so-favourable feelings towards environmentalists who just spew rhetoric, with the engineers), and airport security (with those now living in the US), we chat about growing up without broadband, classic DOS games (which many of us still play due to actual replay value, instead of just graphics), and life before instant messaging (anyone remember ICQ?).

A handful of 9-year-olds were interviewed and it just shows how things have changed so dramatically over the past decade.

Anyone that’s surfed the Internet for a decent amount of time has encountered numerous Internet “memes” – videos, phrases, pictures and other media have become so widespread as to become ingrained into the global Internet culture.

A site was even created to track and catalogue the various Internet memes:
http://www.knowyourmeme.com/ / Wikipedia’s entry

A random assortment of (in)famous memes:

LOLcats: http://www.icanhascheezburger.com/ Pictures of cats
“Rickrolling”: Sending something a link, pretending it is relevant to the topic at hand, but really is a link to a music video by Rick Astley.
Chuck Norris facts: Fictional, outlandish, superhuman facts. E.g. “Chuck Norris’s tears cure cancer. Too bad he never cries. Ever.” Top 100 Chuck Norris Facts
One red paperclip: A Canadian who started with a single red paperclip & kept trading it for other things until he eventually ended up with a house in Saskatchewan.
Diet Coke and Menthos: The reaction of various ingredients causes the Diet Coke to spray out of the bottle, often spectacularly. The inexpensive cost of the ingredients led to hundreds of videos.
“Stuff White People Like” : A satirical site explaining why Caucasians like various things. E.g. peacoats, taking a year off, promising to learn a new language, The Onion, etc.
Will It Blend?: A viral marketing campaign by a blender manufacturer where they show off their blenders by destroying electronics.

Just how big are memes? Every year, there is a conference (ROFLcon – “rolling on the floor laughing” conference) at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (what were you expecting, a Holiday Inn?) where various creators, purveyors and fans of Internet memes gather to discuss Internet technologies, meet their memes and party.

(If you didn’t know what “ROFL” stands for, visit UrbanDictionary.com & NetLingo.com.)

A recent article in the Globe asks the question whether the Internet is changing/shaping society or if it’s the other way around. It turns out that despite the advances in technology and connectivity & the pervasive nature of social networks, at the end of the day, it’s about connecting people.

We all share common values, goals, triumphs and failures. And we all want need to laugh.

One of the most popular viral videos of all time involved a kid who recorded himself dancing and singing along to a pop song. The video has over 34 million views on YouTube and an estimated 700,000,000+ views globally.

Recently, the “Numa Numa Kid” (Gary Brolsma) was invited to lead the marching band at Michigan State University, which played the original Romanian pop song that made him so famous. In front of crowd of 75,000 people, he led them through that same dance that he recorded back in 2004, with thousands of people joining in.

What was once an Internet joke is now a mainstream, accepted celebrated (Internet) cultural phenomenon. Just as how “Google” has now become a verb, “Numa Numa” will forever be associated with Gary Brolsma.

What are your favourite/most hated Internet memes?

Filed Under: Blogging > Downloads > Entertainment > Facebook > Found on the Web > Fun > Instant Messaging > Music > My Online Life > Online Video > Search > Social Media > Social Networking > Web 2.0 > Web/Tech
Tags: Chuck Norris, Google, Internet memes, LOLcats, memes, Numa Numa, rickrolling, ROFLcon, UrbanDictionary, Videos, viral marketing, viral videos, YouTube