Memes grew alongside the internet

Memes emerged in the 1980s and 1990s

Today's Internet users might think of memes as references spread online through images, videos, and audio clips. But the merger between memes and the internet didn't happen until the 1980s and 1990s—years after the term meme was first coined to describe a different phenomenon.

Most memes now begin on TikTok

The website Know Your Meme looked at the data for 700 to 1,400 memes uploaded to the platform each year from 2010 to 2022. In 2010, a majority of memes began on YouTube (34%) or 4chan (28%), but by 2022 most were starting on TikTok.

Memes are 'ready-made language'

Internet memes—groups of texts with shared core content, medium, and stance—are what we, as creators and consumers, make of them. Through their seemingly innocuous and irreverent design, these "bite-sized" transmissions have become vehicles of misinformation, conspiracy, propaganda, activism, and subversive messaging.

Social media algorithms are shaping real-life language through memes

The evolution of the internet in the early 2000s supercharged the creation and spread of memetic content. Now, highly tuned algorithms on platforms like TikTok and YouTube influence the language, phrasing, and content of creators, which shapes how we use language in the real world.

50 famous memes and what they mean

Memes are one of the most immediate ways to communicate. The 50 most popular ones are found everywhere on the internet. Sources for this article came from Tumblr, Twitter, Know Your Meme, and other online pop culture resources and publications. This piece examines memes from the early 2000s through 2019.

Memes can be traced back to the chain letter

Such intentional reshaping of communication transmissions dates back at least hundreds of years to the advent of the chain letter, a type of message that asks readers to create their own copy or at least forward it to others.

How Chuck Norris 'Facts' gave birth to the modern meme

In the early 2000s, anonymous, absurdly hyperbolic jokes about one B-level action star suddenly appeared everywhere on the internet. "Chuck Norris Facts" were spawned by a high school senior, who'd noticed something funny online and taken it to the next level. As Ryan Hockensmith shows in this detailed history, Spector's joke laid the groundwork for the modern meme.

Meme stocks often have little underlying value but are fueled by crowd funding

"Meme stocks" is a phrase originating in the early 2020s, referring to companies with little underlying value who gain recognition through social media and whose stock price experiences rapid gains.

2025 showed that memes continue to blend politics and pop culture

This list from InsideHook ranks the top 25 memes of 2025. A recurring trend is the thin line between politics and popular culture, with users often using memes to comment on the state of the country. Of course, there was also a fair amount of highly specific and highly bizarre content, something the internet has been known to highlight.

Articulating weird memes

Some memes eschew established formats and references, creating new variants that resonate with scrollers through strange meta-jokes or compositions. This episode of this podcast, geared toward blind netizens, dives into some of the weird memes being shared online, such as one in which a pigeon sitting on a shoddy excuse for a nest, single egg forgotten, is meant to inspire comfort in those whose efforts have fallen short.

Memecoins are a type of cryptocurrency—a form of digital currency with a wide variety of uses—created around popular 'memes,' or viral internet jokes.

YouTube's first-ever video was nothing special

YouTube has grown into a cultural force in its two-plus decades of existence. Its beginnings, though, were modest, especially its first video: a 19-second clip about a visit to the San Diego Zoo. This brief resource explains the origins and longtail impact of "Me at the zoo," a simple video uploaded by Jawed Karim on April 23, 2005.

Pepe the Frog went from internet meme to symbol of hate

The character first appeared in 2005, in an online comic called "Boy's Club," inspiring countless memes in which his likeliness was used as a supportive shorthand. Then, people started pairing Pepe with hateful messages, morphing him into something his author never intended.

Browse millions of 'Simpsons' screencaps

"The Simpsons" has become an integral part of internet meme culture, with jokes and images from decades ago still finding their way into online discourse. This searchable database allows you to search for your favorite lines and instantly turn them into memes.

Where did emoticons come from?

Carnegie Mellon professor Scott E. Fahlman says he's one of the original creators of emoticons. In the 1980s, the Carnegie Mellon computer science community was already making heavy use of online bulletin boards, and users began to run into issues of attempted humor not coming across through virtual text. The solution? Using "joke markers" to denote non-serious posts, which prompted Fahlman to propose :-) and its inverse :-(.

The history of Reddit, the front page of the internet

The hyperactive online forum and social media platform has transformed since 2006 from a simple link-sharing site to a behemoth in digital media. Topping off its ascendancy, Reddit went public on the New York Stock Exchange in 2024, solidifying its future amid a shifting technological climate. Dive into Reddit's nearly two decades of growth with this detailed timeline.

The story behind one iconic meme

The 2012 post titled "Just a book owners smile" shows 11-year-old Maggie Goldenberger—resplendent in her braces, pigtails, and treasure map-like vest—holding a trio of Goosebumps books and grinning wildly at the camera. Another user quickly captioned it, "GERSBERMS. MAH FRAVRIT BERKS."

'Creepypasta' is a meme that has its roots in folklore

The genre of crowdsourced, horror folklore comes from copypasta, a term that refers to snippets of content copy-and-pasted online ad nauseam. These memes' allure stems at least partly from how they seemingly rise from nowhere, with tales crafted by many hands over many iterations.

How Guinness became a social media trend

In early 2024, an unexpected meme emerged on Instagram and TikTok: "splitting the G," where Guinness drinkers would attempt to take a first sip big enough to leave the remaining beer perfectly aligned with the middle of the "G" on a Guinness pint glass. This Vinepair article explores where the trend came from and how it took off.

Many early computer viruses were not created for malicious purposes

Besides those authored in research labs as proofs of concept for self-replicating software, hobbyists would create malware that played music or displayed text and animations that intentionally revealed the infection as a means of showing off, rather than hiding their spread.

The first comic strip appeared in American newspapers in 1895

This video traces the evolution of the comic book from early newspaper strips to the Golden, Silver, and Modern Ages—highlighting milestones such as the debut of Superman in 1938 and Marvel’s humanized heroes of the 1960s and marking their rise as cultural icons.

Where did artful screen savers go? A history

Early on in the personal computer days, users and engineers realized screens could be damaged if the same image—of a button, a logo, or a navigation bar—stays static for too long. To preserve the screen, developers deployed screen savers—automatic reductions in the light intensity, or regularly changing patterns on the screen. These artful screen savers had a heyday in the 1990s, but have since lost popularity to the simple black screen. Read the history here.

Walt Disney’s Laugh-O-Gram Studio featured his earliest innovations in animation

Before he founded his iconic film company, Walt Disney was a young animator in Kansas City, Missouri. After scoring a contract to create animated newsreels for local movie theaters, Disney formed Laugh-O-Gram Studio, where he created innovative animated shorts that set the path for his later work.

Nintendo developed the character as its technology improved

Nintendo developed the Mario character as video game technology became more sophisticated. In 1991, Charles Martinet began playing Mario at trade shows and then voiced the character for 1996’s “Super Mario 64,” which included the now-classic catchphrase, “It’s a-me, Mario!”

Domains were like real estate in the dot-com era

In the early days of the World Wide Web, users needed to type URLs directly in the search bar to navigate to webpages (as opposed to the more general keyword search that browsers use now). This made simple, short, and intuitive domain names a hot commodity. So having a domain name, like Pets.com or Rent.com, that was easy to find and understand was like owning prime real estate on the WWW. (Some users may experience a paywall.)

Edgier burlesque shows helped define the form

Stand-up came into its own at burlesque shows, thanks to audiences who sought humor that reflected the hectic, urban settings where they lived. According to historian Joseph Boskin, “The tempo of the comedy, like the movement of city streets, was swift and jolting and possessed highly recognizable parameters.”

Children are now three times more likely to say they want to be a YouTuber when they grow up than an astronaut, with some even attending 'YouTube camps' that teach kids how to create content for the platform.

Graffiti dates back to at least ancient Pompeii, where citizens scrawled messages to one another on public walls

Mid-century modern graphic designers, known for their bright colors and bold lines in advertising, also found success with children's books.

A 2019 Facebook event called on attendees to "Storm Area 51, They Can't Stop All of Us," resulting in countless memes, the creation of a music festival, and eventually the arrests of those who did try to approach the area.

Fast-casual restaurant Chili's is experiencing a resurgence, with its parent company recently reporting a nearly 32% increase in sales, thanks to passionate Gen Z fans on TikTok.

Hear 50 years of iconic hip-hop samples, the genre's foundational looped tracks

This site reaches millions of visitors who are tired of AI chatbots and seeking human connection. Pretend to be an AI chatbot and ask questions, provide answers, and draw for people in real time.

See 33 images that became central to huge scandals, including a young Charles and Camilla, Michael Jackson's baby on a hotel balcony, and Hugh Grant's mugshot.

Elk Cloner, the first computer virus to spread in public, was written as a practical joke by Richard Skrenta, a Pittsburgh high school student.

The first horror movie is believed to be George Méliès' 1986 short 'The Haunted Castle,' which pioneered the use of special effects

See images of medical cases of firework injuries shared on this 'Instagram for doctors.' (Warning: Graphic content)

Browse a detailed visual analysis of over 200,000 similes—comparisons that often use 'like' or 'as'—from popular fiction to see how frequently writers the same idiomatic expressions.

Long before Major League Baseball began allowing instant replay for balls and strikes, an umpire reluctantly used the technology to determine whether a hit was a home run, a move that inadvertently ushered in a new era for the sport.

While the first exchange-traded fund (a 'basket' of different assets that can be bought and sold on a stock exchange) in the US only launched in 1993, the global ETF market has grown to more than $10T in the short time since.

'Shogun,' a 1980s TV series, helped popularize sushi in the US by stimulating an American interest in Japanese culture.

The word 'jazz' evolved from 'jasm,' 19th-century American slang for 'energy'

Massive blooms of microscopic plankton called dinoflagellates produce the neon blue light seen in glowing tides.

Before humans, the Soviet Union and the United States sent animals—including apes, dogs, and cats—to space during the Space Race.

The power and influence of the American presidency have expanded significantly over time—far beyond what the founders envisioned.

The Brothers Grimm were lawyers before they were storytellers, and became interested in fairy tales as they began investigating how rules and customs had been passed down through cultures.

The first image of a black hole was captured by creating an Earth-sized virtual observatory from a network of eight radio telescopes.

SpongeBob exemplifies Aristotle's philosophy for living well because he understands that happiness doesn't come from external factors like money, recognition, or power.

How Amazon operates a 'flywheel' business model, a self-reinforcing cycle that drives continuous growth

Alzheimer's can lead to brain shrinkage, with an average of around 2% of volume reduction per year