no subject

[taimatsu]

I've been thinking. Memes. A meme is an idea. Here's the first sentence of the definition from the Jargon File (the New HAcker's Dictionary, which you can find via Google with ease.) "An idea considered as a replicator, esp. with the connotation that memes parasitize people into propagating them much as viruses do."

A quiz about dragons, or cartoon characters, finishing with a pretty picture, is not a meme. A list of questions about when you met someone and what you most remember about their pets isn't a meme. For those, I'd prefer the term 'lemming'. Cute idea, everyone does it all at once, then it's forgotten. A real meme would be more something you have to think about.

in terms of LJ, something like someone trying to work out an English sentence that contains all of the 26 letters of the alphabet exactly once, thus leading into a comment-discussion and other people also getting interested and working on the problem - I think that's more like a meme.

If I find more good examples, I'll mention them. I just get slightly miffed when people refer to brainless tests as 'memes'.

Comments

[beingjdc.livejournal.com]

However the dictionary offers 'A unit of cultural information, such as a cultural practice or idea, that is transmitted verbally or by repeated action from one mind to another'. Which seems entirely reasonable.

In addition, it disputes the simple etymology 'analogy with gene', and offers in addition 'mimeme' - something which is imitated. Which seems to me exactly what these are.

See also a post from uon around five weeks ago, positing the need for a new word to mean what what previously meant by 'meme', since clearly these are, now, memes.

[ewx.livejournal.com]

I believe the relevant text is:

We need a name for the new replicator, a noun that conveys the idea of a unit of cultural transmission, or a unit of imitation. `Mimeme' comes from a suitable Greek root, but I want a monosyllable that sounds a bit like `gene'. I hope my classicist friends will forgive me if I abbreviate mimeme to meme.(2) If it is any consolation, it could alternatively be thought of as being related to `memory', or to the French word même. It should be pronounced to rhyme with `cream'.

[raggedhalo.livejournal.com]

*worships at the altar of Dawkins*

[ixwin.livejournal.com]

I agree that little lists of questions etc rarely infect the brain of the journaller strongly enough or long enough to fulfil the original definition of "meme".

But arguably the flurry of a particular form of test could still be regarded as an infection of the journal - a bit like a particular strain of cold virus, that everyone goes down with at the same time and then "develops an immunity" to, so it either dies out, or survives by spreading to an untouched population (i.e. people outside your friends group), or by mutating enough to be sufficiently different that the "immune system" (of the journaller saying "I've already done that one") doesn't stop it. Meme also captures the survival-of-the-fittest nature of the phenomenon - the way that some are much more successful than others in propagating.

Also, it's useful to have a word for this sort of trivia, and unfortunately I think meme is probably too well-established to be ousted by lemming (quite apart from the viral similarities noted above)

[raggedhalo.livejournal.com]

If you want to know about memes, read Susan Blackmore's The Meme Machine. Memes are not parasitic like virii, but rather essential to human-ness, like genes. The popular misconception that memes are like virii pisses me off no end, grr...

[mhw.livejournal.com]

Um.

viruses, not virii, please. Honestly. If you doubt me, take a look here (http://www.perl.com/language/misc/virus.html).

Sorry if I seem pedantic, but given that we're clearing up misconceptions...

[kizzie.livejournal.com]

the quick black fox jumped over the lazy sleeping dog

damn.. nope... too many l's

[mhw.livejournal.com]

an English sentence that contains all of the 26 letters of the alphabet exactly once

*grin* No sooner mentioned than satisfied!

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/alan.pipes/pangram.html

[purplepiano.livejournal.com]

I agree with you, I find it annoying too. Sorry to get all meta, but maybe the usage of the word itself can be considered to be a meme? Seems to me people have gone "ooh look, a shiny new clever word" and started to use it without discrimination, leading to its meaning being subtly mutated. Is there a known actual first usage of the word - is it Dawkins?

Interesting that you mention its definition in the Jargon File - from the very community who are losing the battle to keep the original meaning of "hacker".

[mhw.livejournal.com]

Is there a known actual first usage of the word - is it Dawkins?

http://www.quantonics.com/Level_4_QTO_Concepts_The_Memes.html#Mememe1

[sesquipedality.livejournal.com]

I think that the meaning of the word meme has mutated since Dawkins created it. I think that I view it as a unit of information propagated through society subject to a process of natural selection in an analogous way to genes. This for me "homosexuality is acceptable" is a meme that has survived (so far) and "women are stupider than men" is an example of a meme that has virtually died out (at least in conscious thought).

So by my understanding of the term, LJ tests and quizzes are memes, in the sense that they're ideas that propagate. The idea in question being "it'd be fun to see what this test does". They tend to be short lived in general, although there are some (the personality disorder test springs to mind, or the best example of all, the purity test) that do seem to have an enduring life of their own, Consider however the meme that is the metameme of these tsts "I can create a quiz that will cause people to think about their identity." which is much stronger and more persistent. That probably fits in even with your definition of a meme.

[martling.livejournal.com]

I would say that the overall phenomena (e.g. particular forms of quiz) are memes, and the lemmings themselves are part of the mechanism by which they spread. Calling these 'lemmings' though is a damn good meme in itself, which I shall spread mercilessly at least until I get a good answer to the following question:

If memes are the analogue of genes, what is the closest biological equivalent of a lemming[0]?

[36.livejournal.com]

The Urban Myth community consider urban myths in terms of memes, where by the most compelling ones propogate the furthest. The mutations which succeed are the ones which are more compelling (perhaps implying more irony or more threat to the poor innocent children). In this sense of the meme it's the thing that makes you think the least (ie, suspend disbelief or 'want it to be true' or think it's so important you have to pass it on even if it isn't true) but seems the most important or the most compelling (quite clearly 'survival of the fittest idea'). In this sense of the world, which isn't quite the original useage but which has proved more compelling and spread faster, does fit more closely with the idea that online tests are memetic. Although not really. But calling tests and surveys memes is a very compelling meme (in this sense of the word).

Don't be surprised if this one gets into the dictionaries due to common disuse.

[jonnyargles.livejournal.com]

But language itself is eternally immutable. Off the top of my head:

Nice = precise and exact

Sinister = Left

Dexterous = Right handed

Cybernaut = One who steers a boat

Goth = Resident of Germania during the early part of the First Century

Language belongs to the user, and in the ever changing vocabulary of the Internet user, never pinned down on anything as immutable as paper, many different definitions vie for supremacy and attention. Eventually, some fall out of vogue, but they will always hold some standing as to their meaning.

[momentsmusicaux.livejournal.com]

Being new round her I had just assumed 'meme' was (on top of its Dawkins meaning) LJ slang for 'irritating quizzes and scripts that produce obscure results from the LJ user interest and friends database'.

This was my recent take on one (http://www.livejournal.com/users/momentsmusicaux/2003/05/28/).