How significant are internet memes?

A recent article is claiming that internet memes are "the most significant cultural phenomena of our time". How can we assess this claim?

My immediate reaction was skepticism. The author doesn't consider any other candidates - making me wonder whether they had thought the claim through. For example, how can internet memes be more significant than the internet? Or, what about technological progress? Or, how about language?

If confronted with these objections I think advocates of this thesis would have to do some clarification of definitions. For example, they might argue that a "cultural phenomena" refers to something that can be transmitted from person to person (typically over an electronic network). "The internet" doesn't really qualify here - since you can't pass "the internet" from one person to another. As for language, that's been around for a very long time. It might well be highly significant - but it would be hard to claim that it is "of our time" since it isn't just of our time.

How then do internet memes stack up after these caveats have been imposed? Maybe not too badly - but if they win, their victory seems a bit hollow. The term "internet meme" does not really refer to a particular cultural phenomenon, but rather to a whole class of phenomena. It mostly just refers to things that are shared a lot. So the claim that internet memes are "the most significant cultural phenomena of our time" boils down to the idea that the most popular things are the most significant ones. I wouldn't normally equate popularity with significance - but they are certainly correlated. For one thing, sheer popularity tends to make things have more impact - which tends to make them more significant.

Perhaps, competition for internet memes in this area comes from machine intelligence - or indeed, computer software in general. This could potentially be more impactful without being more popular. Relatively few people need to understand software for it to have a large impact. As with internet memes, machine intelligence is influencing elections and leading to social change - and notoriously, software is eating the world. In a war metaphor, internet memes would be bullets but machine intelligence systems would be generals.

The article closes with "memes are, without a doubt, the most significant cultural phenomenon of our time". Presumably we are supposed to read that as "internet memes" - or else it is an empty tautology. That claim seems even more debatable: there seems to be considerable room for doubt.

US president references internet meme

I don't know if it's the first time, but it's the first time I currently know about.

The evolution of the "meme" meme

I described the recent evolution of the term "meme" in a 2010 article.

Recently Richard Dawkins and Daniel Dennett have attempted to characterise this evolution. Dawkins wrote:

Instead of mutating by random chance before spreading by a form of Darwinian selection, Internet memes are altered deliberately by human creativity

Daniel Dennett recently stated:

Dawkins introduced memes to be evolvers, to be things that evolve by natural selection but internet memes are the creations of presumably intelligent designers. There's competitions on the internet: who can design the meme that goes viral best. An intelligent designed meme would seem to be a contradiction in terms. And I admit: for a while I thought so too and I deplored the fact that Dawkins' wonderful word and concept was being sullied, was being cheapened by being transformed in this way into the word it is on the internet... and then I suddenly realized: no! no! maybe this is a contradiction in terms - so what. After all the splittable atom is also a contradiction in terms. The word "atom" initially meant "unsplittable thing". Now we have splittable atoms.

The idea that memetic engineering makes the term "meme" less appropriate seems like pure nonsense to me.

We still call genetically engineered genes "genes". I see no reason why we should not call memetically engineered memes "memes". No definition of gene or meme that I am aware of excludes the use of engineering techniques.

The idea that internet memes are engineered is also an incorrect characterization of the way the meaning of the term "meme" has changed. Plenty of memes were memetically engineered before we had the internet - and plenty of internet memes were not memetically engineered - for example most "fail" videos.

The real difference in meaning is the one I mentioned in my 2010 article: that internet memes must be popular. The difference is well illustrated by the "Millhouse is not a meme" meme. Internet meme experts seem to agree with the sentiment expressed by this meme, while enthusiasts for the Dawkins meme think that the idea that "Millhouse is not a meme" is ridiculous: of course Millhouse is a meme. You got it by from someone else via human culture - and it has been copied millions of times all over the internet.

The new meaning of "meme" as an abbreviation for "internet meme" - referring to things that spread in massive numbers on the internet - is all very well, but it takes the term "meme" away from its origin as a unit of cultural inheritance. Scientifically, all culture should be made of memes. Memes that only account for some parts of culture are not a general enough concept to do very much useful scientific work. Meme critics have already had a field day with the idea that memes only explain culture that is copied with high fidelity. Soon we will probably be hearing the equally ridiculous objection that memes only explain popular culture.

The Journal of Visual culture, Themed Issue: Internet Memes

The Journal of Visual culture, Themed Issue: Internet Memes - Edited by: Laine Nooney and Laura Portwood-Stacer.

The contents are freely available online.

The memexplosion continues

Three years ago I wrote an article for this blog titled "2011 - year of the meme!". It started out by saying:

The latest Google Trends results for "meme" are pretty spectacular

However, what happened next was even more spectacular - memes exploded on the internet - mainly in the form of "internet memes". 2011 was the year that memes went viral on the internet.

Another article tracked the gene-meme crossover point. Retrospectively we can say that 2011 was the year when memes became more popular than genes on the internet.

However then things seemed to plateau and level off. I wrote the peak meme article - wondering if internet memes would prove to be a fad.

Now, memes are on the rise again. It seems clear that the memexplosion is continuing. Here are the graphs:

The current Google Trends results for "meme"

The current Google Trends results for "memes"

The memexplosion has probably been good for memetics. We have lots of new article and scientific articles using the "meme" terminology. There's a new association with shallow pop culture - which might further put off those in academia - but I think we can live with the association for the sake of sheer popularity. It is hard to say for sure - but it looks as though the resistance to memes in academia hasn't held back the online memexplosion very significantly. If it did ever have an effect on meme adoption, it looks as though it isn't going to any more.

There still seem to be a lot of scientists who are simply confused about memes, memetics - and cultural evolution in general. However, it now seems practically inevitable that the next generation - who have been brought up with memes - will enthusiastically adopt the term. While it is true that science is not a popularity contest, I expect that, as time passes, more of the older scientists will cave in to popular usage - and make their peace with the excellent and appropriate term for sections of heritable cultural information: "meme". Even if that doesn't happen they will eventually die off: "Science progresses one funeral at a time".

Couch potato memes

Humans judge memes, in part by the success, health and fitness of those that bear them. That makes some sense. However, the modern world allows some memes to disguise their bearers. Information obtained via the internet or television may be transmitted by a collection of individuals, many of whom are unseen. This allows one of our bad meme detection systems to be subverted. What appears to be coming from a beloved celebrity might actually be the product of a an acne-ridden script-writer.

As Marion Blute (2005) put it:

Assuming you care more about your biology than your culture (which is not necessarily the case - ‘you’ after all are a combination of both), practical lessons, particularly for teenagers, emerge from memetics. Listen more to mommy and daddy and less to your friends! Beware more of fads and fashions which can infect you multiply than of whole social identities like ethnic, religious and occupational identities. One of these latter normally precludes another and hence may be willing to leave something of your biology for itself to live on tomorrow! And finally, trust information conveyed personally rather than via mass media which, like insect-borne diseases, can get to you even when you are down and unable to circulate!

The comparison between mass media and malaria-like insect-borne diseases - which can be transmitted even from bed-ridden victims - is an interesting one.

Now that the internet has enabled practically anyone to become a meme producer, we might see more internet culture that results in couch potatoes who stay permanently glued to their computers - to better emit their stream of memes.

In the past, most memes have required their owners to socialise and engage in direct relationships with other humans. However, now it is no longer necessary for memes to leave their hosts in a mobile state. Humans can infect each other via the internet while they are bed-ridden - just as happens with malaria.

Memes are more gene-like on the internet

The internet has turned into quite a crucible for all things meme-related. In the wake of the 2011 internet meme explosion, there have been many papers on memes - which probably wouldn't have been published otherwise. When I got into the field in 2008, it was pretty inactive - and the 2011 meme explosion has been a very welcome upturn.

The whims of youth/geek/nerd culture is probably primarily responsible for the explosion. However, one thing that has probably helped with meme adoption among academics is the fact that memes found on the internet are more like the genes of molecular biology. One of the historical criticisms of memes is that they are not digital and discrete - and so are not much like the genes of molecular biology. Of course, the term "gene" has historically had a quite different meaning in evolutionary theory - but not everyone understands that.

Anyway, memes on the internet are digital and discrete - at least for some of their lifecycle. The ease of classifying the resulting discrete variants makes it more obvious that gene-like dynamics apply to their evolution.

Daniel Dennett described the internet as the drosophila of memetics in 2009. The internet is the main object of study for memetics - but it's also the crucible in which many memes form. Not just the the "drosophila of memetics", but also its "warm little pond".

Many evolutionary processes tend to start off with low fidelity. After a while, they become advanced enough to invent digital copying, there's a digital revolution, and things mostly stay digital from then on. We've seen a digital revolution going on over the last few decades. It seems likely that memes will retain their more gene-like dynamics far into the future - effectively eradicating one of the sources of confusion about memetics in the process.

The best internet memes of 2013

To get meta, here is a curated list of other folks' lists of the best memes of 2013. Enjoy:

• Best Memes of 2013: Editorial Choices - Know Your Meme
• So Wow. The 20 Best Memes of 2013 - Mashable
• 13 of The Best Memes From 2013 - TheNextWeb
• Gone viral: The memes and videos that defined 2013
• The 10 Best Memes of 2013
• Check Out The Top 10 Memes Of 2013 - MTV
• The top memes and viral videos of 2013 - BBC News
• Top Ten Meme Celebrities of 2013 - Know Your Meme
• The 10 Best Memes of 2013 - Wired

Here are my corresponding lists from 2012 and 2011.

The internet: the drosophila of memetics

Daniel Dennett described the internet as the drosophila of memetics in a 2009 Harvard lecture. It's so true.

It's not that we didn't have data before, but now we have a huge mountain of it, on every topic, complete with search engines, frequency analysis, cross-referencing and APIs for querying the mountain. There are good archiving facilities and high-fidelity copying is ubiquitous. Practically every aspect of human culture has been digitized and put on the internet. We have audio, video, pictures, words and all kinds of new machine-readable data. The 2011 internet meme explosion highlights some popular areas. Plus there's a bunch of other researchers working in the field.

Additionally, the internet promises to accelerate research in all scientific fields - by facilitating the sharing of data, making criticism easier and generally making it easier for researchers to communicate and collaborate with each other. I look forwards to more rapid progress in my own field - as well as in other ones.

The internet is pretty-much a paradise for meme researchers. Thank ARPA for the internet.

What's in a meme - infographic

I've featured quite a few "meme" infographics before. Here's a particularly large one, titled "what's in a meme". It seems to be mainly concerned with internet memes. I've added it to my collection.

Entrepreneurial LOL, Fail & Meme

Cheezburger CEO explains how he used internet memes to build a business and raise 30 million dollars in venture capital in 2011.

This is mostly a "how-to-run-a-successful-business" talk.

Hashtag gestural meme

OK, this is a current internet meme. My excuse is that it's a meta meme. Or at least it's about hashtags, twitter and social media. The blurb reads:

Jimmy Fallon & Justin Timberlake show you what a Twitter conversation sounds like in real life.

The video features a "gestural meme" that I hadn't seen before - the gesture for hashtags. Probably like a few other people who have watched this video, I might be using that one myself in the future.

The video has news coverage - here's CNET (Justin Timberlake and Jimmy Fallon mock #hashtagmania) and TheVerge (Watch this: Justin Timberlake and Jimmy Fallon show us what hashtag abuse really sounds like).

Richard Dawkins - Just for Hits

Dawkins gives a brief lecture on memes - that disintegrates into a psychedelic light show five minutes in.

He seems to claim that internet memes are distinguished from other memes by being memetically engineered. Of course, that isn't right - internet memes are popular internet-transmitted memes.

Memeophobe Andrew Brown takes a moment to contribute some sour grapes in Richard Dawkins and the meaningless meme.

Memeophobe Jerry Coyne weighs in as well - in Dawkins as you’ve never seen him before.

Dawkins was interviewed at the same event. There's also a "making of" video from the folks behind the visuals - and a panel discussion from the event: Just For Hits: Memes and the Internet as an incubator of creativity.

Memes are cool

OK, I risk stating the obvious here, but: memes are cool. By this I mostly mean that memes are cool to the younger generation - the kids who are growing up with the internet. Yes, some memes are a daft waste of time - and it's possible to overdo it - but meme literacy is critical for anyone who wants to follow the latest trends, absorb and embrace youth culture - or just generally appear to be "with it".

I like mememolly's way of putting it - her memethusiasm is infectious.

Here's what it's like to be square:

The "M" word

I don't normally post raw internet memes - but this one goes out specially to those academics that still can't bring themselves to use the "M" word:

The best memes of 2012

A roundup of lists from other sites:

• The best memes of 2012: the most important year-end wrap-up you'll ever see

• KnowYourMeme's Best Memes of 2012: Editorial Choices

• The 32 Best New Memes Of 2012 (buzzfeed)

• KnowYourMeme's Best Memes of 2012: Community Choices

• Best Meme Nominees – TheFW 2012 Awards

• Rewind, YouTube Style

• Best of 2012: Top Lists of Trending and Popular Videos

The 'Buzzfeed' article says: "2012 will forever be known as the year the meme went mega-mainstream" - yay!

...but is it art?

According to this internet meme video by PBS's Idea Channel, "People are creating images and sharing them with strangers for the purposes of communicating their personal experiences? That, my friends, is art. Plain and simple."

Meme infographics

There are quite a few meme-related "infographics" out there. Here's a few of them:

• What's in a meme
• The Selfish Internet Meme
• Memories - three decades of the way we were
• Online schools guide to memes
• Meme-ories: The top Internet memes of 2011
• Best memes of 2010
• Teh Internets
• Memes for marketing: good, good

South Park revisits memes with "Faith Hilling" episode

This recent episode of South Park centres around internet memes.

The episode begins with the boys attempting to get a photo of Cartman "Faith Hilling" (making pretend boobies with your shirt) at a Republican debate.

It continues with planking, owling, Bradying, Tebowing, and "Taylor Swifting" - a curiously-named meme which involves pulling your pants down and rubbing your butt along the ground like a dog. There's also a meme involving shoving a cat's head through a slice of bread and a meme called "Oh Long Johnsoning". There's also a public service announcement about memes (featured above) - which features the catchy tagline:

Use the approved poses if you wanna be a memer. Peace sign, bunny ears, fake wiener.

The idea of "fake wiener" is not at all new - but the specific photographic pose illustrated seems to be largely South Park's invention.

The blurb for the episode reads:

Mankind's evolution begins to accelerate at a rapid and disturbing pace. Concurrently, another species on the planet is exhibiting the same drastic development. Eventually the two species will battle to the death and Faith Hilling may be humanity's only hope.

The whole episode is pretty good. It's also a reasonable advert for memes and memetics. It features a consultation with a meme expert who goes into the history and theory of memes a little (8:30). Here's the specific bit:

The expert has a book apparently called "Memes through the Ages" - or something like that. It traces meme history back through "Fonzying", "mustaching", "Poodle Fisting", "Ass Wedging" and "Donkey Dicking". The book has some funny stuff in it - for example, it says:

In his book "The historical significance of Fonzy", Richard Dawkins states, "Fonzying showed a giant leap forwards in human intelligence because it was a very simple meme..."

I don't want to supply too many spoliers, but just to say it is a suprisingly worthwhile 20 minutes - assuming that you are interested in memes.

News coverage (contains spoilers): New South Park Episode: Faith Hilling, Swifting, Breading and Other Memes).

"Faith Hilling" wikipedia page (contains spoilers).

Here's a "Taylor Swifting video". It was uploaded before the episode aired - and so is probably part of an online publicity campaign. Of course after the episode many uploaded their own Taylor Swifting attempts.

The episode seems to have been somewhat successful in launching both "Faith Hilling" and "Taylor Swifting" memes on the unsuspecting world. "Taylor Swifting" seems to be a reference to Taylor Swift's existing undesirable meme fame at the VMA award ceremony - which we covered here. "Faith Hilling" is presumably a reference to Faith Hill's Stepford Wives breast growth scene.

After this episode, being "Taylor Swifted" now seems to be a pretty reasonable term for unsolicited fame that involves embarassment, grossness or other high negativity.

The rather obvious terms "memer" and "memeing" seem to have had a rather low frequency before the broadcast of this episode. I expect they will become more widely used in the future.

The last South Park "internet meme" episode was Canada on Strike.

LOLSpeak

LOLSpeak is a dialect of English that appears to be largely associated with image macros. It features shortened and often misspelled words.

Abbreviation

Like the abbreviations used in mobile phone text messages, instant messages and emails, LOLSpeak is abbreviated. Because space in image macros is limited, LOLSpeak is often highly abbreviated.

Function

LOLSpeak apparently exists to make image macros more surprising, fun - and more shareable.

LOLSpeak sometimes acts like a cultural tag that marks the sender as part of a "cool" net-savvy in-group.

LOLSpeak represents an interesting example of an English subdialect evolving. There's an interesting thesis about the evolution of LOLSpeak.

Examples

Video

References

• SpeakLOLSpeak
• I CAN HAS THESIS?: A LINGUISTIC ANALYSIS OF LOLSPEAK
• LOLCats - Wikipedia