Know Your Meme

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Know Your Meme
Type of site
Encyclopedia
Available inEnglish
OwnerLiterally Media Ltd.
Created byRocketboom
EditorDon Caldwell
URLknowyourmeme.com
RegistrationOptional
LaunchedNovember 25, 2007; 16 years ago (2007-11-25)
Current statusOnline
Know Your Meme
GenreInternet documentary
Starring
  • Joanne Colan (Former)
  • Kenyatta Cheese (Former)
  • Greg Leuch (Former)
  • Elspeth Rountree (Former)
  • Jamie Wilkinson (Former)
  • Patrick Davidson (Former)
  • Mike Rugnetta (Former)
  • Kristina Horner (Former)
  • Forest Gibson (Former)
  • Sarah Hiraki (Former)
  • Alison Luhrs (Former)
  • Rob Whitehead (Former)
  • Brian Colbert Kennedy
  • Katie Molinaro
  • Eric Bellows
  • Jon Allen
Country of originUnited States of America
Original languageEnglish
No. of seasons7
No. of episodes113 (as of March 28, 2023)
Production
Running timeVaries
Production companies
Cheezburger Network
(2011–)
Original release
ReleaseDecember 17, 2007 (2007-12-17) –
present
Jamie Wilkinson and Kenyatta Cheese at ROFLCon II

Know Your Meme (KYM) is a website and video series which uses

Cheezburger Network, which, in 2016, was acquired by Literally Media.[1][2]
Know Your Meme includes sections for confirmed, submitted, deadpooled (rejected or incompletely documented), researching, and popular memes.

History

2007–2010: Web series origins

Know Your Meme was created in December 2007 as a series of videos which were part of the

memes seemed uninterested in how they began and spread.[4][5]

Each episode of Know Your Meme covered one meme in detail, exploring its history and context in internet culture. They were hosted variously by Colan, Cheese, Rountree and Wilkinson, who donned lab coats and dubbed themselves "meme experts".[5] Baron noticed that each episode attracted more views than typical Rocketboom shows.[6] According to Cheese, memes were only starting to become popular on sites such as 4chan when the series began, and Rocketboom allocated more resources as their popularity grew.[4]

Wilkinson had also been developing a personal database of internet memes.

safe for work, which is fucking lame".[3][5]

2011–present: Sale to Cheezburger

In January 2011, Cheese, Rountree and other employees left Know Your Meme, claiming that Baron had created an "atmosphere of paranoia and competing egos" within the company; Baron disputed this and claimed that Cheese organized a "mass exodus [out of] personal vengeance".

Cheezburger for an undisclosed seven-figure amount.[7]

In April 2016, Cheezburger was acquired by Literally Media.[5]

In June 2021, the

USD). The NFT sale was certified by Know Your Meme.[8]

Website

At the end of 2008, after more than a year of growth, Rocketboom released an expanded database with Jamie Wilkinson as the lead developer.[9] The database includes entries for memes, trends and events, along with people and other aspects of subculture (such as films, video games and anime). Each entry has its own photo and GIF gallery; a video gallery was added in November 2010. As of January 2017, the database contained more than 2,700 entries of "confirmed" memes.[10]

The administrators have a say on what gets confirmed and what gets "deadpooled", or rejected.

Not Safe For Work (NSFW).[12] NSFW entries have warnings placed along the top of the entry and ads are usually disabled. These warnings may differ from consequences, such as bans. Know Your Meme also has a forum section, blog, and shop. Dr. Sean Rintel, who wrote The Automated Identity blog, described Know Your Meme as "lucrative, self-supporting research that blends the humorous and the serious."[13] As of March 2019, the site is maintained by seven editorial staff members (Don Caldwell, Adam Downer, Matt Schimkowitz, Briana Milman, Sophie Dickinson and Philipp Kachalin) and one developer (Mike Schwab) in conjunction with a group of dedicated moderators. Former staff researchers include Chris Menning, Amanda Brennan, Molly Horan and Ari Spool.[14]

The Know Your Meme website and web series were acquired in March 2011 by

Cheezburger Network for an undisclosed seven-figure amount.[7]

Episodes

Episodes of the Know Your Meme show average a few minutes in length each. In a given episode, the KYM staff describe memes and the history behind them. New episodes appear in irregular intervals of time. Breaking meme episodes started in 2010. Separated in seasons, the videos describe the meme using handy images.

Season 2007

Episode Meme Covered Airdate
1 One Take December 17, 2007
2 Rickrolling December 18, 2007
3 I Like Turtles December 19, 2007
4 Miss Teen South Carolina December 20, 2007
5 LOLCats December 21, 2007
6 Technoviking December 24, 2007
7 Dramatic Chipmunk December 26, 2007
8 Reaction Videos & Piggyback Memes December 27, 2007
9 Chocolate Rain December 28, 2007
10 Crank That (Soulja Boy) December 31, 2007

Season 2008

Episode Meme Covered Airdate
1 Cory's Sunglasses February 6, 2008
2 tinaecmusic August 1, 2008
3 All your base are belong to us August 15, 2008
4 Édgar's fall September 5, 2008
5 O RLY? September 10, 2008
6
FAIL
September 24, 2008
7 Boom goes the dynamite December 22, 2008
8
Bush shoeing incident
December 23, 2008
9 Magibon December 24, 2008
10 The Lipdub December 26, 2008
11 Disaster Girl December 29, 2008
12 Political Memes of 2008 December 30, 2008
13 Project Chanology December 31, 2008
14 Shiba Inu Puppy Cam December 31, 2008

Season 2009

Episode Meme Covered Airdate
1 Star Wars Kid January 2, 2009
2
Boxxy
March 10, 2009
3 Numa Numa March 31, 2009
4 Yo Dawg April 13, 2009
5 Christian Bale Rant April 16, 2009
6 Single Serving Sites April 23, 2009
7
Peanut Butter Jelly Time
May 8, 2009
8 Creepy Chan May 28, 2009
9 Keyboard Cat July 7, 2009
10 Three Wolf Moon July 30, 2009
11 Weegee August 7, 2009
12 Bubb Rubb August 17, 2009
13 David After Dentist September 2, 2009
14 Geddan / Get Down October 1, 2009
15 Where the Hell is Matt? October 8, 2009
16 Auto Tune (with special guest "Weird Al" Yankovic) November 10, 2009
17 Balloon Boy November 18, 2009
18 Om Nom Nom December 18, 2009

Season 2010

Episode Subject Airdate
1 Advice Dog January 29, 2010
2 Phonetic Translations March 4, 2010
3
Epic Beard Man
April 6, 2010
4 Joseph Ducreux / Archaic Rap April 13, 2010
5 Breaking Meme: Standing Cat April 23, 2010
6 Breaking Meme: The Downfall of Downfall? April 29, 2010
7 My New Haircut May 25, 2010
8 Magnets, How Do They Work? June 12, 2010
9
Troll Bait
July 1, 2010
10 Double Rainbow July 9, 2010
11 Lying Down Game / Playing Dead August 3, 2010
12 Antoine Dodson (Bed Intruder) August 27, 2010
13 Leeroy Jenkins September 2, 2010
14 It's Over 9000! October 1, 2010
15 Brother Sharp October 12, 2010
16 Creepypasta October 29, 2010
17 Tenso November 16, 2010
18
GI Joe PSAs
November 23, 2010

Season 2011

Beginning with the 2011 season, the cast of the episodes changed from the original cast (

Jamie
Dubs, Yatta, Elspethjane, Patrick Davison and Mike Rugnetta) to Forest Gibson and Kristina Horner.

Episode Subject Airdate
1
Rage Comics
June 14, 2011
2 Philosoraptor July 6, 2011
3 My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic August 10, 2011
4 Breaking Meme: Chuck Testa September 29, 2011
5 Hipster Memes October 11, 2011
6 Occupy Wall Street October 18, 2011
7 Minecraft November 2, 2011
8 60's Spider-man November 15, 2011
9 Pedobear November 22, 2011
10
Casually Pepper Spray Everything Cop
October 18, 2011
11 Skyrim Catchphrases December 15, 2011
12
First World Problems
December 22, 2011

Season 2012

Kristina Horner left the show in early 2012 and starting with the Ermahgerd episode in August 2012, the cast of internet scientists expanded to Forest Gibson, Sarah Hiraki, Alison Luhrs and Rob Whitehead.

Episode Subject Airdate
1 Supercuts January 12, 2012
2 Protest PIPA/SOPA January 18, 2012
3 Friend zone January 26, 2012
4 Shit People Say February 3, 2012
5 Guile's Theme Goes With Everything February 10, 2012
6 Cinnamon challenge February 17, 2012
7 What People Think I Do March 12, 2012
8 Derp March 19, 2012
9 Slender Man March 27, 2012
10 Nyan Cat April 3, 2012
11 Ancient Aliens April 10, 2012
12 Socially Awkward Penguin April 17, 2012
13 Ridiculously Photogenic Guy April 28, 2012
14 Scumbag Steve May 10, 2012
15 Dolan May 29, 2012
16 Ermahgerd August 9, 2012
17 Girl's Guide to the Internet August 17, 2012
18 Futurama August 23, 2012
19 Homestuck September 7, 2012
20 That Really Rustled My Jimmies September 14, 2012
21 Fan fiction September 22, 2012
22 Troll Science September 28, 2012
23 Intro to Pokémon Memes (Part I) October 10, 2012
24 Intro to Pokémon Memes (Part II) October 24, 2012

Season 2017

In 2017, a new season that was renamed "Know Your Meme 101" began airing. Many episodes star two hosts being two of these four: Brian Colbert Kennedy, Katie Molinaro, Eric Bellows, and Jon Allen. All episodes narrated by Tucker Maloney, written by William Applegate Jr. The pilot up to episode 7 edited by Lindsay Penn, while episode 8 gave the edit credit to Connel Post Production.

Episode Subject Airdate
Pilot Increasingly Verbose Memes April 2, 2017
1
The Mandela Effect
April 5, 2017
2 Rule 34 April 12, 2017
3
Cash Me Ousside
April 27, 2017
4 Shooting Stars May 3, 2017
5 Who Would Win? May 10, 2017
6
United Spicer
May 18, 2017
7 Foodom (Part I) May 31, 2017
8 Foodom (Part II) June 12, 2017

Season 2018

Episode Subject Airdate
1 To Be Fair, You Have to Have a Very High IQ to Understand Rick and Morty February 3, 2018

Season 2023

Episode Subject Airdate
1 How Donald Trump Getting 'Arrested' Became A Prevalent Meme Thanks To AI-Generated Images March 28, 2023

Special episodes

Episode Subject Airdate
N/A The Game Show! Pwn, Win, or Fail! March 25, 2009
N/A KYM Meme Week: Geddan / Get Down December 21, 2009
N/A KYM Meme Week: Yo Dawg December 22, 2009
N/A KYM Meme Week: Auto Tune December 23, 2009
N/A KYM Meme Week:
Boxxy
December 24, 2009
N/A KYM Meme Week: Keyboard Cat December 26, 2009

Reception

Know Your Meme has been praised by numerous publications. Its entries are frequently cited in both journalism and scholarly works covering internet memes.[15][16] The Daily Dot and The Wall Street Journal described the site as "the Encyclopedia Britannica" of memes and internet culture.[3][17] Time included Know Your Meme on its list of the "50 Best Websites 2009" for the web series.[18]

Know Your Meme won a

Webby Award in the Blog-Cultural category in 2012.[19] In June 2014, Know Your Meme was inducted into the Web Archiving Program of American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress.[20] In May 2016, the website was cited as a source for explaining the concept of "dank memes" in regards to the political campaigning in the Australian federal election during a discussion on the ABC television programme Insiders.[21][22]

See also

References

  1. ^ "Literally Media Buys Cheezburger To Reach Millennials". www.mediapost.com. Retrieved June 13, 2019.
  2. ^ "Cheezburger's new owner is Israeli digital-media company". The Seattle Times. April 21, 2016. Retrieved June 13, 2019.
  3. ^ a b c d Morris, Kevin (November 30, 2012). "A day in the office with Know Your Meme—the Web's "Britannica"". The Daily Dot. Retrieved March 13, 2023.
  4. ^ a b c Conti, Allie (May 26, 2016). "A Co-Creator of Know Your Meme Explains What the Hell a Meme Actually Is". Vice. Retrieved March 13, 2023.
  5. ^ a b c d e f Tiffany, Kaitlyn (March 6, 2018). "The story of the internet, as told by Know Your Meme". The Verge. Retrieved March 13, 2023.
  6. ^ Gannes, Liz (April 6, 2009). "Intel Sponsors Rocketboom". Gigaom. Retrieved March 13, 2023.
  7. ^ a b Hustvedt, Marc (March 28, 2011). "'Know Your Meme' Acquired By Cheezburger in Seven-Figure Deal". Tubefilter. Archived from the original on August 14, 2012. Retrieved March 28, 2011.
  8. ^ Rosenblatt, Kalhan (June 11, 2021). "Iconic 'Doge' meme NFT breaks record, selling for $4 million". NBCNews.com. Retrieved May 12, 2023.
  9. ^ "The History of Know Your Meme". Dembot. December 6, 2012. Archived from the original on October 20, 2013. Retrieved October 19, 2013.
  10. ^ "Confirmed Entries". Know Your Meme. Archived from the original on September 15, 2012. Retrieved October 19, 2013.
  11. ^ "Deadpooled Entries". Know Your Meme. Retrieved October 19, 2013.
  12. ^ "NSFW". Know Your Meme. June 17, 2012. Retrieved October 19, 2013.
  13. ^ Rintel, Sean (September 24, 2011). "Know Your Meme "Sean Rintel". Seanrintel.com. Archived from the original on October 22, 2013. Retrieved October 19, 2013.
  14. ^ "About". Know Your Meme. Retrieved August 11, 2015.
  15. S2CID 238660211
    .
  16. ^ Sonnad, Nikhil. "Finally, a scientific list of the most popular memes on the internet". Quartz. Retrieved June 5, 2018.
  17. ^ Winkie, Luke (January 5, 2023). "Behind the Scenes at the Encyclopedia Britannica of Memes". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved March 15, 2023.
  18. ^ Fisher, Adam (August 24, 2009). "Know Your Meme". Time. Archived from the original on August 27, 2009. Retrieved October 19, 2013.
  19. ^ Paul, Sonia (May 1, 2012). "16th Annual Webby Award Winners: The Complete List". Mashable.
  20. ^ "Getting serious about collecting and preserving digital culture | Folklife Today". blogs.loc.gov. June 5, 2014. Retrieved October 20, 2016.
  21. ^ "WATCH: 'Insiders' Had To Explain 'Dank Memes' To Boomers, RIP The Internet". Pedestrian.tv. May 22, 2016. Retrieved February 13, 2018.
  22. The Courier Mail
    . Retrieved February 13, 2018.