Are Memes & Internet Culture Creating a Singularity? | Idea Channel | PBS Digital Studios

Here on the internet, we love us some memes. But where do they come from? Yes we know, they are user generated. But to an internet layman, they seem to just appear, in HUGE quantities, ready for cultural consumption. Are they a sign of a "cultural singularity"? Memes follow rules and code, are varied, self-referential, and seem to multiply at an ever increasing rate. It may seem like science fiction, but we're close to a world where culture automatically and magically creates infinitely more culture.

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[matthewhellmers]

Look up "David Bowie on the internet" in the search bar and there is a video of an interview that The Thin White Duke did in 1999 where he is struggling to find the words to express this same idea. He was always decades ahead of everyone else.

[NexAngelus]

I actually wrote a paper on this subject in college. The thesis was that the over-propagation of memes that the Internet has brought about has resulted in real life occurrences of a fictional socio-cultural phenomena known as the Stand-Alone Complex, or copycat behavior without an original instigator of said behavior. The term comes from the anime series Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex. One instance of said real life occurrence was Project Chanology, that massive protest against by Anonymous against the Church of Scientology from a few years back. Said protest had no leaders. It had no organizers. Instead, thousands of people (mostly) in Guy Fawkes masks independently decided on their own to show up at their local Church of Scientology to protest them. Taking the idea further, I hypothesized that at some point nearly the entire world population will become infected with the exact same set of memes resulting in the entire world becoming a collective of socio-cultural clones, effectively becoming a hive-mind of some sort.

[oversoul]

I realize that I am posting a comment on a video that was uploaded 5 years ago, but this is important for me. This video may have just saved my life... Thank you Mike Rugnetta for giving me something to smile about in the midst of deep depression. Even if you never see this comment, I will know and remember you have helped me.

[FunnyGinMan]

The best part about this show is it encourages intellectual thoughts and responses and actually receives intellectual thoughts and responses.

Thank you for giving people a better place to stop and think on the world at large.

[Deantrey]

I have to disagree that culture was always a product of a desire for profit. I think what we are seeing is a return to the status quo. For a while there, the organ of capitalism made it so that everything became about money.

This is because, it brought about the idea of mass distribution of products. This was not possible before in a pre-capitalist society. The guy that came up with the epic of Gilgamesh couldn't factory produce it, distribute it, and collect profits off that distribution or protect it by way of intellectual property. The cost of distributing art, that distribution being a product of capitalist society, therefore necessitated that the work of art to some degree concern itself with profits to justify the money put into its distribution. Those who could not afford to distribute their product or who were not affiliated with a large publishing firm of some kind, generally never saw their creations see any kind of wide audience.

However, what the internet has really done is a provided a space that is free of the economic constraints of distributing culture. In other words, we have the self perpetuating feature of culture as it was in pre-capitalist society, and the low barriers to entry of pre-capitalist society, with the technologically facilitated distribution channels it provides. So now, all these people that would have in the past been repeating the stories they heard somewhere, oral tradition style, are now creating works of their own or otherwise contributing their own things to culture and the internet allows for the mass distribution of these things that was not possible pre-industrial revolution. What we are seeing is the information age, amplifying the effects of self replicating, mimetic culture that has been present since the beginning, while overcoming the roadblock the industrial age set before it. 

Human beings are naturally creative. We want to create things and to produce things and contribute something of our own to society. The only thing holding us back is that we have to have jobs and so most of us can't afford to spend a lifetime memorizing epic poems or mastering painting or pottery or instruments or things of that nature. But the internet is making it easier than ever before to produce things. How easy is it to produce a meme vs a bronze statue? If the cost of producing a meme and producing the statue were the same, I am willing to bet we would have more statues. That's what the internet is providing us with here, the ability to actualize that aspect of our human nature that for whatever reason some of us might have been discouraged from actualizing in the past. 

[KemeticReign]

Can I just say THANK YOU for bringing to light this concept? I myself had thoughts in the back of my mind thinking, "All these popular memes that pop out, who is the original creator? Was it purely done by a human? How do these successful memes that center around an event pump out so quickly?" The theory you presented somewhat calms those thoughts for the simple fact I thought I would sound like an idiot of what I was trying to convey, so now, it makes a little more sense.

[anabessamonteiro]

honestly, i really like this era of internet culture, it makes for a lot more fun things to enjoy daily, its also a great way to know what people are talking about at the moment, anytime something comes up on the news people are making memes of the biggest discussions and most times making it either a big impact or plain funny, its very enjoyble at least in the way ive been seeing it

[tone]

Wow pretty accurate theory. Especially since this was made around the start of the meme culture explosion

[Jedibob]

"Internet culture exists for... It's really hard to say..."

For the lulz, my friend. It exists for the lulz.

[BrezelCeviche]

it's 2020, the rise and fall of the frogmen seem to have made this video weirdly ominous.

[unstoppableExodia]

internet memes are created purely for lols, that's what determines whether they catch on. The absence of money to be made keeps it democratic and available to anyone who can think of something amusing in the right context at the right time.

[EricLeafericson]

That doesn't seem like a cultural singularity. It sounds like a cultural assembly line.

Humans are still working on that assemble line, they are still in the equation. But what memes do is they simplify cultural expression to a picture. We've dumbed down our culture so it can be expressed faster.

It's mass production of culture, and with it comes certain losses.

[dtrigs]

here from the future, it's worse

[DaThings]

No joke. I had this dream wherein I met Mike working a job at a retail store and told him how much I like PBSideachannel. Like a dvia, he condescendingly and sarcastically said "Oh really. Glad you like it" rolled his eyes and began to walk away. I asked if I could get a quick picture, and (back still turned) flipped me off and said "Yolo!"

I think some kind of Inception should happen wherein Mike re-enters a dream of mine and apologizes.

[rossplendent]

With the increased connectivity of the world, people feel like they have to earn attention, and that things have to earn their attention. When you generate content, like a meme, you are essentially asking people to pay attention to you. Even if they have no idea who you are, and you cannot possibly conceive of the thousands or millions of people who see what you create, it still feels like personal acceptance.

[KeithKeydel]

Increase in quantity, sure. Increase in quality??? You've got to be joking.

[tiffsewcrafty]

I think what also contributes to the fame and popularity of memes is that the Internet is an interactive forum. People can instantly react to the content that they see. This also creates a community. People change, mimic, and share content on the Internet all the time, which allows people to add something of themselves, directly or indirectly, to that content. People couldn't really do that in older mass media culture, in which they were only able to view, listen or read the art available.

[CasualGraph]

So. Culture. Yeah... what I've come here to say is simple. Culture is kinda like the living stuff on the planet. It makes more of itself and, as time goes on, it evolves a lot. It's naturally selective, in the sense that any meme or movie that doesn't meet society's standards get's immediately eliminated from the... meme pool? The collective memory of beloved classics. Why the sudden culture explosion? Because the media, defined as people spreading large quantities of information to other people, has grown with the emergence of technologies that can spread images, art, and ideas over large groups of people. At first it was selective with so very much effort being put in to spread a bit of culture-media-stuff, but now that the internet is here to put the media literally in the hands of ordinary people, internet culture has exploded to phenomenal proportions.

[OnePocketHighlights]

When I see something funny, like a meme, I usually share it via FB or twitter. That is 500 people who may or may not see it, if 10% of them laugh and repost it it will be seen by another 500 people. Now among those people some might be inspired to create their own meme. Anyhow the whole singularity and how people are programmed to make and self generate content that inspires other content is a very valid point and is something that I never really realized.

[rosecityandbeyond]

how do you think Twitch Plays Pokemon relates to this?