The older the internet gets, the more it's like a city that keeps building on top of its own ruins. What's is your favorite bit of internet archeology if memes are like artifacts and relics?
this post was submitted on 27 Oct 2026
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They weren’t called memes back then, but probably fgsfds, Mr T Ate my Balls, “for dinner,” is duck, bring back snacks
Ah, Ate My Balls is the one I was going to say. Probably the very first piece of purely internet culture I was ever exposed to. Happy days.
The concept of memes predates the web actually. Might be older than the Internet too, I forget when it was coined.
Correct, the concept existed academically since 1976. However the term didn't enter common usage until a little later into internet culture being a thing.
Wasn't it Dawkins that coined the term?
Yes.
Yus! Absolutely. It wasn’t popularized for internet use until the 2000s, though!
Macros
Those were just image macros, I believe! Before “memes” it was “fads”, around YTMND and SA times.
"viral" is an old term too, easy to forget
“Viral” didn’t really blow up until smartphones became commonplace, as well!
Quick edit: I’m wrong, that one started getting bigger in the 90s/2000s. I feel like I didn’t see it much until normal people stated being online more and news stories started reflecting that.