The Rise of the Memes

 

Memes are the works of art on the internet. They are a sort of visual poetry using multimedia, usually images and videos.

There are many different types of social commentary and various groups using them. Some popular ones are illustrated below. Many people are under the assumption that all of these forms of online social phenomenon are nothing more than pointless fodder for humor purposes, when the truth is a little different. Take a look at some of the most popular forms of documentation of the past decade.

Funny or obscene Memes are a type of instant cultural comment that many people enjoy. Many times, they are a form of harmless humorous statements that are meant to make people laugh but, in actuality, are intended to convey a certain message to an audience. An excellent example of this is a video of a dog pooping in front of a fire that quickly goes back on. This has become known as one of the most popular forms of online social commentary and is often referenced in video games and images.

Funny or obscene political Memes are a way for many people to let off steam about current events. Many internet forums are packed with examples of controversial topics of the day. These threads often center around controversial politicians and controversial topics that attract a tremendous amount of discussion. People enjoy pointing out the hypocrisy of others and some use internet memes to do so.

Internet Humor is a term that describes a type of conversational comedy internet user participates in which the participants attempt to use internet slang and other internet jargon to lampoon another person or topic. A perfect example of a humor circle is the ongoing joke about how some tech terms are really just a spelling error. The first mention of such a circle I can remember was a joke posted on a tech forum. Numerous members of the forum were participating in a heated debate over a certain software program and one of them was going on a tangent about internet terms and their definition. One member said something to the effect of "So, now we know what internet users think of all those terms, huh? Let's go vote on the most popular insult."

The earliest evidence of online social circles using moths as a means to communicate came about during the height of the World Wide Web when net users took an interest in a local high school in Australia that had posted a picture of a topless woman on the school's website. The topless woman had the caption, "pics or it didn't happen!" and soon several local internet users took the term to mean a humorous photograph.

One way to think about the beginnings of the phenomenon of moths, in regards to the global phenomenon of internet usage, is to think about the early iterations of webpages. Many early websites used graphics like pictures or video to hyperlink to other parts of the site and often included links to other relevant content. As these early websites matured, they began to draw on a variety of different types of multimedia in order to draw traffic and to place advertisements. Today's most commonly used forms of multimedia and the ones that come hand in hand with the current definition of a "meme" are image macros and image and video loops.

There is nothing about using these forms of Memes that could be considered controversial. In fact, many social media users find them amusing and witty. This is because the internet users who use these forms of Memes are often discussing topics of common interest to the internet users that create them. For example, a picture of a topless girl can lead to an argument between two women because one of them thinks it is offensive and the other thinks it is funny. The original poster, in this case, is using a form of free speech in order to bring awareness to an issue but the offended party will more than likely take offense to the joke. While there have been instances where businesses have been sued for using controversial material in their advertising, the use of Memes is often allowed by most social media sites since most forms of online communication crosses international boundaries.