Internet Fads

[CyraXZero]

There's alot of stuff on the great net...
there's lolcats, star wars kid, tourettes guy, the guy from brooklyn, Pico series, Super Mario Bros Z and so on.

so which one is your favourite thing?
feel free to link something off that and show off to the other people!

Personally i love webcomics...in general x) like ctrl+alt+del and cyanide & happiness.





Mod Note: Let's try to open this discussion to talk about internet fads in general. What starts one? Will they last? Etc...

[Dxon]

Happiness and Cyanide! That's a great web comic. :D

[~*Red*~]

Cyanide & Happiness is the best web comic on the Internet. It's my favourite :)

[Ichiro Matsuchani]

What starts them? College students with too much free time and wild imaginations.

[Eris]

Can we please call them memes and not "fads"? Because the former is a lot more accurate than the latter. And what starts them? They start themselves. It's essentially the same process as evolution. A ton of people create all sorts of gibberish on the internet. Some appeal to people more than other, and therefore they survive. Survival of the fittest.

To think that we were once biochemical "fads" in the primordial soup.

And as for cyanide & happiness. It's honestly a bit overrated. There are better comics on the tubes. xkcd and the Perry Bible Fellowship to mention two. Oh, yeah, and my comic. It's the most disturbing garble of loosely connected images you'll find anywhere.

[overwatch]

fads memes -- well whatever you call them you cannot mention webcomics without mentining Ctrl Alt Delete -- or DM of the Lord of the Rings!
especially if you are geek!

ps -- Eris is now an MP! My impression of you has lowered now that you have joined the flock of sheep that is parliment!

[Eris]

I am merely destroying the system from the inside, a cancer on society, if you like that sort of rhetoric.

[Wio]

Memes are basically the same as fads. "Internet meme" is superfluous because if a meme manifested itself IRL, it would be most likely be called a fad.

[Storm Strife]

Wait a minute, webcomics are memes now?

[Sanosuke23]

Well it also depends on exposure on frequently-visited communities. Even the funniest video or image can die in obscurity if not enough idiots get the chance to see it.

I don't think webcomics as a whole are a part of this discussion, though individual series like PBF are valid("Did somebody say weeaboo? Because I think I heard somebody say weeaboo." is, to my knowledge, what's to blame for the word's current popularity).

[SGI]

Memes, those can be great or obscenely annoying. Remember the whole Badgerbadgerbadger (http://www.badgerbadgerbadger.com/badger.swf) deal?

Sadly, most of these memes originate on that pit of wallow known as 4chan. And are usually insanely stupid. But there are a few good memes out there. For example, satirical motivational posters are usually hilarious.

[Fiery]

It's essentially the same process as evolution. A ton of people create all sorts of gibberish on the internet. Some appeal to people more than other, and therefore they survive. Survival of the fittest.

Looking at the content, quality, and general overall stupidity of the majority of internet memes, I'm scared to consider what this "quality" most of humanity harbors is that makes things like internet memes appealing. And the fact that they will pass it on through reproduction.

I'm also going to give my vote to xkcd and Perry Bible Fellowship.

[Eris]

Looking at the content, quality, and general overall stupidity of the majority of internet memes, I'm scared to consider what this "quality" most of humanity harbors is that makes things like internet memes appealing. And the fact that they will pass it on through reproduction.

That is inline with natural selection. Only the most annoying memes (badgerbadgerbadger, for an instance) make it out of gray mass of information that is the intertubes. It is not the most appealing memes that make it, it's the least appealing.