WHAT?S IN A ?MEME?? A ?meme? by any other name would still be what it is?a sometimes funny, other times annoying Internet-generated content (from uploaded digital files or hyperlinks) such as images, videos and surveys.
While memes are often just passed around through social networking sites, blog posts and e-mail links, they?re often lifted from a website that specializes in memes, such as 4chan.org.
4chan is one of the world?s most popular image boards. It is responsible for spawning content such as ?lolcats? (funny images of cats with irreverent and grammatically incorrect captions plastered on them) and ?rickrolling? (a bait-and-switch link that leads to a YouTube video of Rick Astley?s ?Never Gonna Give You Up? instead of the original content the user was searching for).
Christopher Poole, founder of 4chan, recently spoke at the ?Re:Publica ?09: Shift Happens? blogger?s conference held at the Friedrichstadtpalast in Berlin, Germany. The 20-year-old Poole, who founded 4chan over five years ago, was known only by his nickname ?moot? until last year.
He was invited to the conference to speak about 4chan in a talk entitled ?The Dark Heart of the Internet,? explaining 4chan?s philosophy and its influence on Internet users. The website, which Poole started in October 2003, actually began as a forum where people could share information on anime (Japanese cartoons) and manga (Japanese comics), a topic the teenager from Long Island was deeply interested in.
?Basically, 4chan is an outlet for young, nerdy kids,? Poole said. The website, which receives 400 million page views every month, actually started in his bedroom (Poole bought the bandwidth with his mom?s credit card). Now, it?s undeniably one of the Internet?s biggest influences, and spawns online memes (notably the gags) that make their way to different parts of the globe.
?What makes 4chan so popular is its no-barrier entry policy,? Poole said. ?Our emphasis on anonymity invites a wide range of topics from a diverse set of users. We don?t censor anything, so we do get a lot of wild content?but that?s what makes 4chan fun. It?s all artistic works of fiction and falsehood.?
Anything goes
The most popular section of 4chan, the /b/ board, is where anything goes?it?s a notorious board where people could post random items, most of which are nonsensical and humorous. An average of 350,000 posts are uploaded on the 4chan /b/ board. ?4chan is a meme factory. It generated hundreds of memes, most notable lolcats, rickrolling and FAIL,? Poole noted. (The ?fail? meme is where people plaster the word ?fail? in capital letters on funny photos).
?There?s no telling what people will like,? Poole said. ?Generally, you must post something remotely funny, repost it ad nauseam, and hope you get lucky.?
However, 4chan?s anonymous posting has led to not-so-funny incidents.
In the US, several threats of violence were posted on the /b/ board, which led to alarmed responses from the online community.
For instance, on September 11, 2007, a student from Pflugerville High School in Pflugerville, Texas posted photos of him holding fake pipe bombs with the threat that they would be remote-detonated in school. He warned that he was armed with a ?Bushmaster AR-15, IMI Galil AR, a vintage, government-issue M1 .30 Carbine, and a Benelli M4 semi auto shotgun.?
Last February 4, another post on the /b/ board announced a school shooting in Eskilstuna, Sweden. Authorities evacuated 1,250 students and 50 teachers before arresting a 21-year-old man whose IP address had been provided by 4chan.
Also last February, a person who called himself Timmy posted a video of him physically abusing a cat called Dusty. Again, outraged members of the community tracked down the perpetrator (a 14-year-old kid from Oklahoma) and had him arrested.
?There?s really a lot of stupid stuff on the /b/ board,? Poole admitted. ?Most of the content shouldn?t be taken seriously, but when you have an anonymous board, there?s no telling what people will post.?
But for every offensive or dangerous post on 4chan, there are thousands of silly?but funny?posts on the board. An April 2008 poll by SurveyUSA said that at least 18 million Americans had been rickrolled, with even more users around the globe tricked into watching the ?80s music video.
The New York Times likened the site to a ?high school bathroom stall, or an obscene telephone party line,? while others have said that ?reading /b/ will melt your brain.?
But there?s no denying that the popularity of the board indicates the trend of where humor on the Internet is going?and considering that /b/?s users often refer to themselves as ?/b/tards,? that might not be a good thing.
Lolcats, anyone?
E-mail biancaconsunji@yahoo.com.
