>> STEVE: What is a MEME?
Wikipedia says it’s an idea, behavior, or style that spreads from person to person within
a culture.”
A meme can be anything from a symbol, a word, a phrase.
To a gesture or even a ritual.
>> JOE: The WORD Meme was coined in 1976 by a British evolutionary biologist named Richard
Dawkins in his book titled, The Selfish Gene, as a concept for discussion of evolutionary
principles in explaining the spread of ideas and culture phenomena.
>> STEVE: Thanks Joe.
Today most of you know of meme’s as funny pictures, or perhaps a silly Internet video,
like the one you’re watching right now.
A meme can simply be a funny picture with words on it that you share with your friends,
like this one we just made up!
>> STEVE & JOE – HA HA HA HA HA.
>> JOE: But since the word and concept of the “MEME” was coined well before the
internet existed, that means MEME’s existed in the real world before your precious porn
robot came about.
Like this little guy with the words, “Kilroy was Here” beneath him.
The image was spray painted on walls, scratched into lockers, and doodled on high school notebooks
for decades.
And to this day, no one knows its true origins.
But we do know that it started showing up well before World War 2.
>> STEVE: Some other quick examples of IRL meme’s “Frodo Lives” was another spray-painted
phrase scrawled all over the world.
It of course is a reference to Frodo Baggins, from Lord of the Rings, who was made a sort
of a cult hero in the 60s and 70s.
>> JOE: And who can forget the charming “Andre the Giant Has a Posse”/“Obey”, images
that started showing up on telephone poles and sidewalks in the US in the 80s and 90s.
Those were started by popular artist Shepard Fairey, who went on to create this iconic
image of Barack Obama.
>> STEVE: But when the internet came around, an explosion of new meme’s hit the scene.
It was now way easier to spread an image around, than driving all over town at 4am and plastering
your stickers, or spraying your funny dude with a weird nose on a wall.
>> JOE: Some say the Hampster Dance was one of the first examples of an internet meme.
From there shit got cray with dancing baby, ORLY, LOLcats, RickRolls, Goatse
>> STEVE: All your base are belong to us, Bert is Evil, Star Wars kid, peanut butter
jelly time, badger badger, Pedobear, the list goes on, literally forever.
There’s no signs of stopping.
And new memes are created every day on 4Chan and Reddit, and even more obscure internet
forums.
There’s no end to the madness.
>> JOE: And that’s ok!
Because we love memes!
They’re funny, and we love funny things.
And the world loves funny things, and because of that, meme’s will live on forever.
>> STEVE: So what’s your favorite meme!?