AUGUST 28, 2009

What Are Internet Meme Sites Saying About Us?

Today, I was driving to work when a state trooper rammed into my car from behind, because he was on the cell phone and not paying attention. He gave me a ticket for “Failure to control speed to avoid a crash.” FML.

That’s just a sample of the funny tidbits you’ll get at the site fmylife.com. What does the f stand for? Well I can’t really tell you without getting fired, but I’m sure you get the point (and if I am fired for writing this it would probably be an FML.)

The site collects stories and anecdotes from users that illustrate their bad luck and misfortune. The stories are usually comical, in a “I’m glad that didn’t happen to me” sense.

Is your life not so unfortunate? Then maybe you should submit a story to MyLifeIsG, a site that shares the opposite, stories of fortunate events, or general “I’m pimp” tales.

What if you life isn’t G or unfortunate? Don’t worry, there’s a site for you too. It’s called My Life Is Average.

I’ve noticed that the latest in humor sites involve various sharing of personal events. Whether it’s that drunk dial you made last weekend (Texts From Last Night), or a note with a not-so-hidden subtext (Passive Aggressive Notes), or an embarrassing moment involving your parents and Facebook (Oh Crap. My Parents Joined Facebook), it seems like every moment of our lives is worthy of inclusion on some internet meme site.

So what exactly are these sites saying about our pop culture today? First, the limits of what we consider private and public are being stretched to new lengths. Social networking introduced the idea that details about ourselves should be open and shared. Now even our less graceful moments can be shared, as long as they are funny to somebody else.

Does that also mean our sense of what we consider decent and indecent for public consumption is changing? I’m not entirely sure.

I don’t have all the dots connected on this yet but there’s clearly a trend with the rise of these types of internet meme sites.