Two sock puppets pointing at a third leading to an angry expression. From the webcomic “florkofcows”

About

Jesy Nelson’s Jamaican Accent, also known as Balegdah, refers to a viral video in which singer Jesy Nelson of the British pop group Little Mix attempted an impression of a Jamaican accent. Due to the bizarre sound and humorous facial expressions made while performing the impression, the video was widely circulated through Tumblr, YouTube and Vine, where it was often spoofed through remixes and image macros.

Origin

In March 2014, a video of the United Kingdom-based pop group Little Mix attempting various accents as part of a “You Generation” promotion was uploaded to YouTube, in which singer Jesy Nelson attempts to perform a Jamaican accent by blurting out a strange noise. While the original video was subsequently removed, it has been reuploaded several times (shown below).

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On March 11th, 2014, YouTuber Geoff Miller uploaded a slowed down version of the video, which gathered upwards of 1.4 million views and 520 comments over the next four years (shown below, left). On March 30th, YouTuber VicariousPotato uploaded a content aware scaling version of the video (shown below, right ).

On May 2nd, YouTuber Fabibaby100 uploaded a music remix of the video (shown below, left). On December 17th, YouTuber Paul Imm uploaded a remix of the video titled “Balegdah Extreme” (shown below, right). Meanwhile, several news sites published articles about the video, including The Huffington Post^[1], Digital Spy^[2] and Daily Star^[3].

Jesy Nelson’s Response

On October 15th, 2015, BuzzFeed^[4] published an article where they asked Little Mix to Explain Jesy’s accent; she explained “All of us do the same thing, when we’re like stuck on how to do something we go (Jesy makes indecipherable noises). So I was stuck on how to do it and then I was like, did my Jamaican accent, but someone cut off my Jamaican accent!”^[4]

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About

Very Expensive Milkshake is a series of anti-meme image macros with jokes referencing a “very expensive milkshake,” which began circulating on the Exploding Fish Shitposting Weird Facebook meme page in early June 2017.

Origin

On June 5th, 2017, the Exploding Fish Shitposting and Senseless Drivel, Inc.Facebook^[2] page posted a Baton Roue comic in which the bike rider says “i feel the urge for a very expensive milkshake right now,” announcing that “very expensive milkshake” was a “new meme” (shown below).

Spread

On June 6th, the Exploding Fish Shitposting page posted a comic of a man ordering a “very expensive milkshake” at a restaurant (shown below, left).^[1] The same day, the page posted a photoshopped picture of a homeless man holding a sign begging for money to afford a "very expensive milkshake (shown below, right).^[3] Within 48 hours, the posts gained over 4,200 and 1,400 reactions respectively.

In the coming days, several pages dedicated to the meme were created on Facebook, including The Expensive Milkshake Society, Very Expensive Milkshake Memes for Lactose Tolerant Tweens and Expensive Milkshake Memes for Bonehurt Teens (shown below).

Various Examples

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About

“Why I Disagree With My Dad” is quote from first daughter Ivanka Trump’s US Weekly magazine cover in which she describes her issues with President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw from the Paris Climate Agreement. The cover, which features the line, became the subject of image macros where people online posted picture of famous fictional children who had issues with their fathers.

Origin

On June 7th, 2017, US Weekly released the cover (shown below) for the June 19th issue, featuring a profile of Ivanka Trump and her reaction to President Trump’s withdrawal from the Paris Climate Agreement. The headline on the cover reads “IVANKATAKES A STANDWHY I DISAGREEWITH MY DAD.”^[1]

Spread

That morning, Twitter user @bobbyfinger^[2] posted a picture of the cover with the caption “Wow this is nutty,” garnering more than 60 retweets and 300 likes. Shortly after, CNN anchor Brian Stetler^[3] tweeted the cover again with the caption “‘WHY I DISAGREEWITH MY DAD’ is the cover of this week’s @USWeekly.”

That morning, Twitter user @eliotnelson^[4] posted a picture of Tyrion Lannister from the HBO television series
Game of Thrones, who murders his father on the show, and the caption “WHY I DISAGREEWITH MY DAD.” The post (shown below, left) received more than 40 retweets and 100 likes within 24 hours.

Shortly after, @eliotnelson^[5] replied to his tweet with a screenshot of a Google search result for Oedipus, a mythical Greek king who murdered his father to marry his mother. The post (shown below, right) received more than 275 retweets and 1,000 likes.

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Following these tweets, other Twitter users began posting pictures of fictional children who had disputes with their fathers under the caption “Why I Disagree With My Dad.”

Several news outlets covered the “Why I Disagree With My Dad” meme, including Buzzfeed,^[6] Mashable,^[7] Fortune and more.

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About

Kurt Eichenwald is an American political journalist. He is a contributing editor at Vanity Fair, a senior writer at Newsweek, and an MSNBC correspondent. Online, he is most notable for his Twitter presence, as several gaffes there have made him popular.

History

Eichenwald was born on June 28th, 1961, in Dallas, Texas.^[1] After working on news desks for several years in his early career, he was named The New York Times Wall Street reporter in 1988. At the Times, he won several awards for excellence in journalism, particularly related to corruption and corporate scandals. In 2012, he became a contributing editor at Vanity Fair, and in 2013, joined Newsweek as a senior writer.

Shit Account Tournament

On December 23rd, 2016, centrist political commentator won the 2016 Shit Account Tournament, narrowly beating out alt-right author and prominent Pizzagate and #DumpStarWars figurehead Mike Cernovich with 51% of the 8,563 votes cast.

Online, Eichenwald was relatively unknown before the tournament. He was a number 12 seed and known mostly for an article in Newsweek^[2] in which he wrote about nearly assaulting a third-party voter. However, his presence during the tournament helped him get to the finals, beating the tournament’s favorite, Arthur Chu, in the Fuccboi Four. In the weeks of the tournament, Eichenwald tweeted that he was suing a troll who had allegedly given him a seizure by sending him a flashing GIF.^[3] This caused him to quit Twitter in what the tournament organizers dubbed a “breathtaking” meltdown.^[4] The Daily Dot^[5] covered the finale of the tournament. The organizers of the tournament released a video recapping the year’s tournament called “One Shitty Moment,” shown below.

Epilepsy Controversy

During the tournament, a Twitter user sent Eichenwald a flashing image in an effort to trigger his epilepsy and cause him to go into a seizure.

Hentai Tweet

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About

Cockwaffle is a slang insult popularly used online to refer to a stupid person.

Origin

On September 16th, 2007, the definition of “cock waffle” was added to Urban Dictionary by user too-many-grouchy-people (shown below).^[1] The definition notes that it is an example of a popular form of swearing that adds “waffle” to the ends of other swear words.

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Various Examples

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About

Duolingo is an educational application for learning languages. The platform assesses users through a variety of tests, using text and speech, and becoming increasingly more difficult depending on the user’s proficiency.

History

Work on Duolingo began at the end of 2009.^[1] Carnegie Mellon University computer science professor Luis von Ahn, the inventor of CAPTCHA, and Severin Hacker, a graduate student, wanted to create an app that would teach people a new language but also translate simple phrases around the internet.^[2] Ahn also wanted to created a free way for people around the world to learn new languages, something that was very expensive in his home country of Guatemala.^[3]

Funded by a MacArthur fellowship^[4] and a grant from the National Science Foundation,^[5] Duolingo launched a public beta on November 30th, 2011 with a waiting list of more than 300,000, before releasing to the general public on June 19th, 2012. The app hit the iOS App Store on November 13th and the Google Play Store on May 29th, 2013.

Features

Duolingo offers courses in more than 20 languages. The app assesses student proficency through more than 68 courses, which ask the user to read, listen, and speak different languages. To keep students engaged, the developers built Duolingo on a gamification structure, encouraging users through a streak count, which motivates users by tallying how many days in a row they have taken classes, experience points, and hearts -- if all hearts are depleted in a session, the user must retake the lesson.

In Duolingo, users gain "lingot, “a portmanteau of lingo and ingot,” (now called Gems) for good performance. Lingot allows uers to purchase different items in the game.

Highlights

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dhsjd

The Missile Knows Where It Is refers to a segment in a 1997 Air Force guided missile training video describing the process by which a guided missile’s course is obtained. The video clip was posted on Youtube in 2012 by user Jeff7181 and has received over 181,000 views as of June 2017. It has since migrated primarily to the /f/ board of 4chan, where numerous variants of the video have surfaced.

Origin

The Tiny Desk Engineer is a small engineer from the game Team Fortress 2 that dances various taunts such as the Kazotsky Kick (an all class taunt).Its first appearance was in the video “The Engineer Guide”,published on September 8 2015 by Doctor Lalve, when it still wasn’t tiny.The video got over 580k views and the dancing engineer appeared (and still appears) in many videos (for example “Wait your match” where some tiny engies dance around a dead soldier).On September 11 and December 8 2016 were published two videos:“Tiny Desk Engineer” and “Tiny Desk Factory”.

About

The Tiny Desk Engineer is defined “Expensive and Useless” and “Better than a normal engineer”.The original “price” was 79,99 (no currency) and lowered at 69,99. The process of production is really long and strange as explained in the video “Tiny Desk Factory”. The Collector Edition (price unknown) includes a Tiny Desk Dispenser.They appear in many Doctor Lalve’s videos. His enemy is the Tiny Desk Spy.

About

“hey man you see that guy over there” is a meme template created from a webcomic called “Florkofcows”. In the meme it shows two socks with one of them starting the conversation with hey man you see that guy over there", then the first sock points to a third sock and and saying a statement that makes the second sock angry.
Since its creation various parts of the webcomic has been edited, from just the second dialogue to having the sock puppets resemble people or characters from anime, video games, and various other platforms of media.

Origin

On April 25, 2017, Facebook page Florkofcowsofficial posted the original comic^[1] created in MS paint depicting the sock puppets. Since the comic was originally posted, it has amassed over 4,500 likes/reactions on Facebook and 7,691 shares.

Spread

Since its inception, it has spread beyond the official Facebook page and onto various portions of the internet including various Facebook pages including disney celebrities ^[2] and gaming specific pages^[3], 9gag, imgur, and most notably reddit.

He did what?!

On June 6, 2017 Reddit user PapaFreshnez posted in the /r/gaming board ^[4] an edit of the original comic to include Skyrim motifs. Since its creation it managed to reach number one on /r/gaming and has amassed 69,819 up votes with 85% upvoted.

Various Examples

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References

About

Hot Dad is the online handle of musician Erik Helwig, who is best known for creating comedy music videos containing various internet culture references.

Online History

On February 7th, 2015, a music video titled “SpongeBob SquarePants Full Intro HD” was released on Hot Dad’s channel, in which he repeatedly sings the name “SpongeBob SquarePants” over footage from the animated television series (shown below, left). On April 6th, 2016, Hot Dad released a cover of ""All Star"": by Smash Mouth in which the lyrics were inversely rearranged, which gathered upwards of 940,000 views and 2,200 comments within one year (shown below).

On February 8th, 2017, a video titled “I Really, Really, Really Like This Image” was uploaded to the channel, featuring a photo-realistic portrait of a hedgehog (shown below, left). Within four months, the video gained over 330,000 views and 560 comments. On April 11th, Hot Dad released a music video titled “What Means Sex?”, featuring various sexually explicit comments found on Facebook (shown below, right).

Collaborations

On June 16th, 2016, YouTuber FrankJavCee upload a synthwave music video titled “R.I.P. Meme,” in which Hot Dad sings about various fleeting internet memes (shown below). Within one year, the video recieved upwards of 200,000 views and 950 comments. The same day, a song titled “Web Love” was uploaded to Hot Dad’s channel, in which FrankJavCee explains how to make the internet a better place by using the hashtag “#WebLove” (shown below, right).

Social Media Presence

In May 2009, Hot Dad created the @hotterdad^[4] Twitter feed. On February 25th, 2015, the Hot Dad Facebook^[3] page was launched. In November that year, a Hot Dad Patreon^[5] page was created, which gathered upwards of 120 patrons over the next two years. Additionally, Hot Dad regularly releases his music on his SoundCloud^[6] and BandCamp^[7] pages.

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External References

About

Accidental Renaissance refers to a series of modern photographs that happen to be composed in the same way as art associated with the Renaissance.

Origin

The earliest known example of Accidental Renaissance, in which a person pointed out the similarities between a modern photograph and Renaissance art, occurred on August 2nd, 2014. That day, Facebook user Manzil Lajura^[1] posted a series of three images featuring a physical altercation in Ukrainian Parliament, which took place on July 22nd.^[5] In the first image, she posted a photo of the fight; the second, the same photo with the Golden Ratio imposed over the image; and in the third, the picture framed in a museum. Lagjur captioned the post “Pelea en el parlamento Ucraniano convertido en arte renacentista ^^,” which translates to “Fight in the Ukrainian Parliament become Renaissance Art ^^.” The image (shown below) received more than 246 likes and 880 shares.

Four days later, in an article about the photograph, the Guardian^[2] referred to the picture as “Accidental Renaissance.”

Spread

While the Tweet has since been deleted, many articles from the August 2014 reference a post from Twitter user @jamesharveytm, which appears to bear some responsibility for helping the picture go viral. The tweet (shown below) was captioned “Someone took a candid photo of a fight in Ukrainian Parliament that is as well-composed as the best renaissance art.”

Several news outlets covered the photograph, too, including The Guardian, Fast Company,^[3] Mashable,^[4] BuzzFeed^[6] and more.

On August 6th, other people started posting photographs that resembled Renaissance art. Twitter user @dan_sully^[7] posted a photo of three soccer players with the caption “Another renaissance painting is this picture of Lampard after he scored following the death of his mum.” The post (shown below, left) received more than 200 retweets and 200 likes. Twitter user @PaulMac^[8] responded to the post with another soccer-related picture. They captioned the post (shown below, right) “@dan_sully @rosieswash and this one’s like Caravaggio’s Taking of the Christ.”

The next day, on August 7th, Redditor openmindedskeptic launched the /r/AccidentalRenaissance subreddit.^[9] Within two years, the subreddit has amassed more than 222,000 subscribers.

On June 8th, 2017, Redditor mrwrdy^[10] posted the subreddit’s most popular post, a photograph from former FBI Director James Comey’s testimony regarding his firing by President Donald Trump. Within 24 hours, the image (shown below) had garnered more than 64,700 points (86% upvoted) and 1900 comments.

Various Examples

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Overview

The 2017 UK Election refers to a snap election called by Prime Minister Theresa May in England. Though May called the election with the confidence she would gain more support heading into Brexit negotiations, a surprising showing from the Labour Party and its leader Jeremy Corbyn resulted in the loss of a Conservative majority and a hung parliament.

Background

On April 19th, 2017, May called for a snap election to be held on June 8th.^[1] Though the next general election was not due to be held until 2020, May called the election with the intent of gaining more seats in Parliament than the conservative party’s 330. A stronger conservative majority seemed likely as opinion polls at the time showed May with as much as a 20 point lead over her opposition. Major issues discussed in the campaign were Brexit, national security, and social care. May campaigned on generating support Brexit and lower domestic taxes while Corbyn campaigned on public spending and that services such as education were being underfunded.

Developments

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About

Cyberpunk 2077 is an upcoming open world role-playing game developed by the Polish video game company CD Projekt RED for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One systems. The game can be played from both a first-person and third-person perspective, and will take place in the futuristic, cyberpunk metropolis Night City. In early June 2017, CD Projeckt RED announced that early designs for the game had been stolen by a hacker, who demanded ransom to prevent leaking the intellectual property.

History

Prerelease

On January 10th, 2013, the Cyberpunk 2077 YouTube channel released a teaser trailer for the upcoming game featuring the song “Bullets” by Archive, which gathered upwards of 10.5 million views and 22,000 comments over the next five years (shown below, left). On January 17th, the CGMeetup channel posted a behind-the-scenes look at the making of the trailer (shown below, right).

On May 19th, 2015, CD Projekt RED released the game The Witcher 3: The Wild Hunt, in which the character Ciri describes a futuristic universe while discussing her ability to travel between worlds (shown below). Following the release of the game, many speculated that Ciri was hinting at visiting the world in which Cyberpunk 2077 takes place.

Designs Hack

On June 8th, 2017, CD Projekt RED tweeted an announcement that unidentified hackers had stolen “early designs” for Cyberpunk 2077, and were demanding ransom to prevent the files from being publicly released (shown below). Within 24 hours, the tweet received upwards of 48,900 likes and 23,400 retweets.

Shortly after, Redditor RAPiDCasting posted the tweet on /r/gaming,^[6] where it garnered more than 34,900 points (89% upvoted) and 1,900 comments in 24 hours. Meanwhile, The Know YouTube channel uploaded a video reporting on the ransom controversy (shown below).

Online Presence

In September 2012, the @CyberpunkGame^[5] Twitter feed was created. On October 17th, a Facebook^[4] page for the game was launched, which gathered upwards of 137,000 likes over the next five years.

The official website for the game is hosted by CD Projekt RED at Cyberpunk.net.^[3]

Fandom

On October 18th, 2012, the /r/cyberpunk2077 subreddit was launched for discussions about the game. On November 24th, 2015, the subreddit /r/cyberpunkgame^[2] was created.

On April 4th, 2017, YouTuber LegacyKillaHD uploaded a video listing various features expected in the upcoming game, which gained upwards of 490,000 views and 1,300 comments within two months (shown below).

Search Interest

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About

“It’s a Surprise Tool That Will Helps Us Later is a series of image macros featuring a screenshot from the Disney Channel animated television series Mickey Mouse Clubhouse. The meme generally keeps the image of Mickey whispering the line, “it’s a surprise tool that will help us later,” while the caption indicates that the surprise tool is something offensive, violent or outside the realm of the Disney universe.

Origin

“It’s a surprise tool that will help us later” is a line from the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse cartoon series, which premiered on May 6th, 2006.^[1] On the show, a computer generated Mickey Mouse uses a mechanical assistant named the “Mouseketool,” which helps him solve various problems. Because the show is an interactive educational one for early-childhood learning, Mickey often asks the audience what tool should be used. In that vein, he looks at the camera to describe one as "it’s a surprise tool that will help us later.

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About

Porky is a cartoon character from a 1920 Soviet agitprop poster. In the poster and online, the character has been used to represent the bourgeois or ruling class, a literal capitalist pig. He is used in similar way as the Happy Merchant meme without the anti-semitic overtones.

Origin

Porky first appeared in a 1920 agitprop^[2] (a portmanteau of “agitation” and “propaganda”) poster by Vladimir Mayakovsky,^[4] a Soviet poet and artist, for the Russian Telegraph Agency or ROSTA.^[1][2][3]ROSTA was the state news agency in Soviet Russia from 1918-1935, for which Mayakovsky contributed satirical window cartoons, featuring panels that espoused pro-Soviet ideology. The one featuring Porky (shown below) sees the character reacting to a worker being absent from work and performing his duty. The poster translates to “Every absence is the joy of enemies, but hero of labour is a blow against bourgeois.”

Online Usage

Between 2014 and 2015, members of the 8chan messageboard /leftypol/ began using Porky as a symbol for capitalist actors, i.e. bosses, CEOs, politicians, etc. While these threads are no longer available, anecdotal evidence (the formation of /leftypol/ and mentions on 4chan) put Porky’s usage as beginning at this time.

Among the earliest mentions of Porky still available online comes from 4chan’s /pol/ board.^[4] On June 4th, 2015, an Anonymous user posted a picture of Porky (shown below, left) and said, “Where did this picture come from? Are there really communists who post here? I thought all the SJWs hated 4chan.” In the thread, one member mentions Porky by name (shown below, right). The anonymous user, “Actually Porky was originally drawed that way.”

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On September 21st, 2015, Funny Junk user digdogfap posted a two panel meme featuring Porky. The first panel featured Porky and raft of refugees with the caption “We need to worry about our own homeless, we can’t take any more people.” In the second panel, Porky is seen before homeless people sleeping on the streets with the caption “Get a job you lazy fucks.” The post (shown below) received more than 2,800 views as of June 2017 and 33 points.^[7]

A little over a month later, October 31st, a Redditor posted the Porky meme to the /r/FULLCOMMUNISM subreddit. In the thread “Porky on ‘helping our own’ before helping refugees,” they posted a two panel image macro. As of June 2017, the post received more than 1,200 points (99% upvoted).^[6]

On January 23rd, a /leftypol/ user posted four Porky memes and asked users to post “rare Porkies” (examples below).^[8] Some of these examples include Porky guiding a racist with a sign that says “immigrants,” Porky dressed as a member of ISIS and Porky as a Police office.

On March 16th, 2017, the Facebook account Marxist Memes posted a picture of President Donald Trump advisor Roger Stone in a top hat and glasses next to a picture of Porky in a top hat with the caption “Trump advisor Roger Stone vs. Soviet depiction of Capitalist.” As of June 2017, the post (shown below) has received more than 3,000 reactions and 480 shares.^[10] About a month later, Redditor jncdriver posted the image in /r/FULLCOMMUNISM,^[9] garnering more than 1,400 points (99% upvoted).

On June 7th, Twitter user @lil_yenta^[10] posted a meme similar to the window-style of the original Porky poster with the caption “god where has this meme been all my life.” In the first panel, a millennial and baby boomer fighter over who ruined the economy, while Porky watches with delight. In the third panel, they’ve decided “Capitalism ruined the economy,” which terrifies Porky. Within 48 hours, the post (shown below) received more than 9,600 retweets and 23,900 likes.

Various Examples

Search Interest

“Number 6 was submitted by WhoeverReadThisIsGay…You motherfucker.”
-DoopieDoOver

“You Motherfucker.” is a catchphrase DoopieDoOver uses after she reads a username that is, WhoeverReadThisIsGay. It is said during the video, WEIRDTHINGS WE’VE SAIDDURING“THEACT” | Dolan True Stories. The submission that belongs to the anonymous user is Number 6 on the list.
The image she uses in the “you Motherfucker” is the same one used as the first image during her story in CAUGHT“HAVINGFUN” I Dolan True Stories.

About

Yeah, but Solid Snake comes from a YouTube video from Arlo, the video was about the upcoming game Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, and Arlo was trying to avoid all trailers and videos so he could remain “spoiler free”, and was comparing it to when he was a junior in college, and he was talking to a friend about the Super Smash Bros Brawl trailer that came out that day, after telling his friend not to say anything about the trailer, his friend says “Yeah, but Solid Snake”, saying that Solid Snake from the Metal Gear Solid series of games, would show up in the trailer, and presumably be a playable character (which he was).

Origin

February 13, 2017, YouTuber Arlo uploaded the video named Breath of the Wild: The Struggle to Be Spoiler-Free at 3:29 in the video.

Spread

After that video, Yeah but Solid Snake became a joke of the channel (mostly in the comments), usually having something to do with spoilers, or being annoying. Arlo has brought this up multiple times as jokes, and since has become a staple joke on his YouTube channel.