Assignment # 5 Advice Dog- Joseph Ricasa

The advice animal format for memes has become a great example for the explanation of memes. They are all very simple image macros, featuring an animal that represents a specific theme. Foul bachelor frogs are for foul bachelors, awkward penguins are for representing awkward situations or people. The meme that started this trend off, however, “Advice Dog” is often forgotten amongst the plethora of spin offs. Advice Dog is a picture of an exuberant Labrador retriever, and its gimmick is offering users the worst advice possible. 

The origin of the Advice Dog meme came from a forum dedicated to the Mario Brother’s videogame franchise. A user was requesting advice on kissing from the forum. Evan Herrington replied to the thread with a picture of his Labrador retriever with the caption, “Just do it, man”. Since then the meme has been used to dispel terrible advice across the internet. 

See more on Know Your Meme
See more on Know Your Meme

 This is the original advice animal, but it is nowhere near as popular as its spin offs. According to its “google insights” page it peaked in 2009 and has been on steady decline since then. Though it has now falling into obscurity, the memes that have spun off of from its format are incredibly popular. The advice animals subreddit has over 3 million subscribers. 

Sources:
http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/advice-dog
http://www.reddit.com/r/adviceanimals

Assignment #5 - Amanda Hariri - Doge

“Doge” is most commonly associated with photos of dogs (specifically - and for some fans strictly - Shiba Inus) often with superimposed internal monologues in Comic Sans font. The term “doge” originated in a 2005 video of flash-animated character Homestar Runner, where the titular protagonist referred to a friend as “doge” as a misspelled variant for the slang term “dog” (meaning friend).

The meme began to spread in 2012 when several Doge-dedicated Tumblr pages were created. These pages complemented and rode on the increasing popularity of “Shiba Confessions,” another Tumblr topic. Doge threads gradually began to pick up popularity on sites like 4chan and Reddit later in the year.

Searches for Doge have been relatively consistent and stable since 2004 (mainly because doge is a Venetian term for “leader”) but experienced a dramatic spike this last May. What makes the meme hilarious for most people is how the interior monologues are written in incredibly basic – yet very enthused and earnest – language (e.g. wow such describe, much definition). However, that alone does not really explain the recent surge in Doge searches following May 2013. It’s possible that once the spread of Doge left Tumblr and gathered a following on sites like 4chan and Reddit it has only experienced a naturally increasing popularity. Social media greatly facilitates such a dramatic growth, as I discovered Doge on my Facebook newsfeed during a rapid-fire Doge status posting session that several of my friends were engaging in. For a good week, the Doge onslaught continued but with a participant count that had at least tripled among all of our mutual friends.

Google Insights: http://www.google.com/trends/explore?hl=en-US#q=doge&cmpt=q

Sources:

http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/doge

http://www.google.com/trends/explore?q=doge#q=doge&cmpt=q

http://www.tumblr.com/tagged/doge

http://www.reddit.com/r/doge/

Assignment #5 - Jenny Måkestad - "Imma Let You Finish" (Kanye West)"

This meme became popular after an on-air mishap at the MTV Video Music Awards in 2009. It was during Taylor Swift’s speech after winning Best Female Video. Kaney west unexpectedly went up to the stage and took the mic from her to proclaim “Yo Taylor, I’m really happy for you, Imma let you finish but Beyonce had one of the best videos of all time…”  During the event people started commenting on his acts on Twitter and it quickly spread across the internet and the social media. The scene he made was very surprising, but the fact that it was Kaney West who said it is probably the main reason why it became so popular. 

On of the most famous videos of this meme is a mashup with a speech by Barack Obama:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VxKIcrDsJAs

The meme remained popular for over a year. Even 3 years later when Kaney and Jay-Z won the Video of the year award, Jay-z interrupting kaney in his speech by saying “Kanye, Imma let you continue, but…”  

Google insights

http://www.google.no/trends/explore?q=imma+let+you+finish#q=imma%20let%20you%20finish&cmpt=q

Yo X, I’m really _____for you and Imma let you finish, but Y is the best Zs of all time. OF ALL TIME.”

Assignment #5 - Bjørnar V. Christiansen - "Nyan Cat"

Description of meme

Nyan Cat is a YouTube video consisting of a GIF animation of the Nyan Cat and a remix of a Japanese pop song called "Nyanyanyanyanyanyanya!”. The GIF animation was created and posted by the user “prguitarman”, who’s real name is Christopher Torres, on his website “LOL-comics” on April 2. 2011. The GIF features the Nyan Cat, with a body of a pop-tart flying through space and leaving a rainbow after itself. The remix of the "Nyanyanyanyanyanyanya!” that is used in the video was posted on the Japanese video sharing service Nico Video on January 30. 2010. YouTube user “saraj00n” uploaded the “Nyan Cat [original]” video on April 5. 2011. Soon after the meme became a viral success. As of November 28. 2013 the video have over 104 millions views. This is the original video posting:

 

When did "Nyan Cat" begin to become popular on the Internet?

Looking at Google trends we see that the Nyan Cat meme became popular over a short timespan from April 2011 to its top peak in June 2011. The video kept a steady popularity until the end of that year. After December 2011, its popularity has been steadily declining, as we see on this graph. But despite the decline, it seems like the meme still have some popularity today. 

Source: http://www.google.com/trends/explore?q=nyan+cat#q=nyan%20cat&cmpt=q

Why did “Nyan Cat” become popular?

First of all i think it is fair to assume that the video gained a lot of its popularity simply because its annoying and that the idea of a simple animated cat flying through space is funny. I think a great part of what makes the video exciting is the annoying effect it could have on others if the video its played for a long time as a prank or similar. There seems to be several extended versions of the original video posted on the internet, which i assume is made for this purpose. Also the GIF and the song are available for anyone who want to make their own version of it, making it easy to participate and generate new versions of the Nyan Cat, which to some extent also could be a reason the meme generated its popularity as quickly as it did.

Other memes that emerged from this or have been influenced by "Nyan Cat":

The Nyan Cat meme has been modified and re-uploaded in numerous of different ways. A simple search for "Nyan Cat" on YouTube gives you 764,000 results. An example of what have come out the original meme is the "Nyan Cat world collection" video which features new versions of the cat:



Similar examples include websites like http://www.nyan.cat/ where the point is to watch a version of the Nyan Cat meme as long as possible, and this 8-bit video/music version of the original meme:




Examples that might show the diversity of Nyan Cat memes emergence is this metal cover of the Nyan Cat song here; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i3_nAzNwyBo, or this smartphone game which is based on the meme https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=hu.butcher.nyanCat&hl=en.

Sources:

http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/nyan-cat-pop-tart-cat
http://www.prguitarman.com/index.php?id=348, 
http://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm13455867
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QH2-TGUlwu4
http://www.google.com/trends/explore?q=nyan+cat#q=nyan%20cat&cmpt=q

Assignment 5 - Aria Aminian

Scumbag Hat Meme The “scumbag hat” (also known as scumbag Steve) is a limited addition Boston Red Sox cap. Memes have been created with literally anything’s wearing the hat to describe the character of the person or object. The scumbag Steve meme was originally a picture of a 16-year-old boy Blake Boston, who was wearing the cap with a fur coat. His friends took the picture and created a meme, scumbag Steve. It was made that; the cap represents that one friend who always freeloads off people. A person or thing that seems to be always annoying and does things that affects everyone but himself/itself. For example, backing out of agreements, always borrowing things from others and never returning it, a person who can be really obnoxious it their own subtle ways. The meme can also be represented as something or someone who may backstab you or do things that may mislead people. Meme generators now have a “add scumbag hat” button. The hat becomes pretty popular during elections, debates, government issues (shutdowns) and other controversial issues. This meme became popular after January of 2011 after it was presented. The scumbag hat is an excellent meme that can explain so much about one person or thing with just a simple hat add-on.

Works Cited:

http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/scumbag-hat

http://www.fastcompany.com/3020097/leadership-now/how-a-scumbag-meme-and-massive-marketing-opportunity-was-born#11