February 13, 2012 - 3:36am
Katie Steen: 'U' memes take over the Internet
BY KATIE STEEN
Great timing, guys. It’s the first week of exams and my Facebook is a constant stream of memes specifically catered to self-obsessed Internet addicts like myself. What is a ‘U’ student to do but click through endless one-liners about Bursley and Necto, accompanied by screenshots of Patrick Star, Dwight Schrute and a college freshman wearing a brilliantly Photoshopped TCF-brand University sweatshirt?
This meme explosion is bizarre. Memes have been around for a while. But in a matter of a week, over 7,000 ‘U’ students — and a few MSU trolls — have decided to partake in the addicting world of memes. I’m beginning to hear meme newbies chatter in lecture (“I saw this really funny mee-mee”) and it’s even getting to the point where my thoughts have taken on the two-line sentence-punchline meme format.
I actually haven’t been that obsessed with them. I’ve managed to make a total of zero ‘U’ memes, but only because I’m lazy. Still, they’ve wasted a substantial amount of my life in the past week. There’s something irresistible about the potential for a relatable and, more importantly, quick and visual laugh. Now other colleges have started making memes, including the insecure anti-U of M jokes of MSU and the Detroit-is-scary jokes of Wayne State. Memes have actually infested the entire nation and have seceded from Facebook in the form of campusmemes.com. Want to read fifty versions of the same joke about the price of NYU’s tuition? Now you can!
But memes are experiencing backlash, too. Their production rate seems to be dwindling, and people have been grumbling about their popularity on other social media sites like Twitter and Reddit. Maybe memes will burn out as quickly as they exploded into local popularity. Either way, the distraction has been done. As a ‘U’ Conspiracy Keanu meme wonders, “What if MSU made this page … to distract us from our classes?”
