Format Parody
Since the formats of memes have been so ubiquitous to specific years, there have, of course, been a number of abstractions and parodies.
Bottom Text
As early as 2009,“ Bottom Text” is a meme that originated because of the format of“ Advice Animals.” The website‘ memegenerator. org’ is a well known site for creating memes because of its easy to use template. With the format of“ Advice Animals” there is placeholder text. At some point, a user created a meme and forgot to fill in the bottom text.( Fig. 53) This has been removed from its original format and become a punch line to end memes. It is especially popular for memes whose format is commonly appropriated, or for those whose punchline is already known and so the humor is derived from the bait and switch of replacing the known punchline with“ bottom text.”
Coaxed Into a Snafu
“ Rage Comics” are also a popular avenue for parody and abstraction. Since each“ Rage Face” and the text associated with them are so specific, it is easy to create new jokes by parodying these. One example of this is“ Coaxed Into a Snafu” which came about in 2012 and is a parody of“ You mad bro.”( see page 14) Hundreds of memes were created with new line drawings of the popular“ Troll Face” paired with variations on the phrase“ you mad bro.”( Fig. 51) Other variants of this meme was the intentional misnaming of known memes, such as calling“ Troll Face”“ Smiling Man.” These memes also allowed for a short resurgence of“ Rage Comics” since this was popular in 2016.
fig. 53
fig. 54
Meme Timeline
The internet has always been fascinated with explaining memes and the successes of particular ones. This often becomes a meme in itself. The“ Meme Timeline” memes first began in 2016 as an attempt to curate the sheer number of memes that rose to popularity in a year. Often formatted like a calendar, the each month boasted a specific meme that was the most popular at the time. This meme adds a layer of nostalgia in that the users are reminiscing about the most popular memes of the year. Interestingly at this time, the lifecycle of memes seemed to be about
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