The reasons for using the internet are abundant. It’s a great way to keep in touch with friends and family, an infinite source of entertainment, ideas, and recipes, and a treasure trove of information on nearly any topic there is; and that’s just the tip of the iceberg.
For many internet users, memes are a very valid reason to spend time online, too. And it’s not hard to see why – memes are fun, they are usually relevant, but they can easily be adapted, too, if one feels like creating their own version. It’s no secret that popular memes often become a template leading to an immeasurable quantity of variations.
Research on the role meme templates play in a globalizing world suggests that the significance of such type of content lies, to some extent, “in their apparent lack of significance”. What might be a seemingly insignificant picture with a line of text or two can do way more than just entertain, as such a form of content is often used to express views and emotions, build community, and even engage in political protest.
One of the quickest ways to see just how easily adaptable—and widespread—memes can be is taking one example and trying to count all of the different versions there are. Take ‘Hide the Pain Harold’, for instance, a picture of an awkwardly smiling gentleman (a retired electrical engineer from Hungary, András Arató) with some text that typically sums up what is causing the sad expression on his face. Chances are, in your country alone, there is an abundance of versions of the meme featuring Harold’s painful smile, not to mention the number on a global scale. There is even a subreddit dedicated to ‘Hide The Pain Harold’ alone.
But ‘Harold’ is far from the only face that has become popular all over the world thanks to memes. An abundance of other individuals, including but definitely not limited to Renata Sorrah, Drew Scanlon Reaction, Kyle Craven, and Zoë Roth, have received their fair share of fame after becoming the face of a viral meme.
You might be thinking that, unlike ‘Hide The Pain Harold’, these names don’t really ring a bell. Well, that’s because they’re usually better known as the ‘Math Lady’ (or ‘Confused Lady’), ‘Blinking White Guy’, ‘Bad Luck Brian’, and ‘Disaster Girl’. If you’re still not quite sure about who they are exactly, a quick image search ought to make you go “Aaaaah, that’s right!”
The same way templates are different, the reasons for using them tend to vary, too. But for some generations, memes have become a way of communicating, allowing people to express themselves in a matter of seconds.
Talking to Forbes about the power of memes, the 18-year-old founder of the meme platform Memeois, Anushk Mittal, suggested that memes are the internet speak of millennials. “Over three billion people use social media, and at least 60% of them use it for content that’s funny. College students trade memes like kids used to trade Pokemon cards,” he said.
“Our researchers observed over 10 million meme interactions across a variety of topics, interests and user demographics. We estimated that an average millennial looks at 20-30 memes every day,” Mittal continued.
Other sources suggest that more than four-in-ten (44%) internet users, aged 18 to 34, share memes regularly, seconding Mittal’s idea that memes play a significant role in the way young generations communicate online.
If you’re a fan of memes yourself, or simply curious what kind of memes circulate in the online world nowadays, head to Bored Panda’s meme category next to find an abundance of memes on any and every topic there is.