We need to go back.

Or, as Cory Doctorow put it, “five giant websites, each filled with screenshots of the other four.”

right-winger posts some obscene post.

left-winger replies with a "gotcha" style of reply, disregarding anything else.

Both continue to use the same platform.

I miss the days when the only things identifiable as memes required text drawn in all caps white Impact font with black outlines, over literally any image.

https://yourethemannowdog.com/

Icanhas and Failblog were hilarious back in the day. I think that CEO Ben whatshisname wrecked it by commercializing it.

Haha get fucked old person...oh wait...

Fuck...

I’m old enough to remember this

and

ROFL:ROFL:ROFL:ROFL
         _^___
 L    __/   [] \
LOL===__        \
 L      \________]
         I   I
        --------/

Wasn't this the o rly owl? The one that actually looks like it's saying "oh, really?"

This way sir

!antiquememesroadshow@lemmy.world

-ɯ-(ꞋʊꞋ)-ɯ-
Is older than my grandparents.

The orly owl has always been a personal favorite.

Pretty sure we're all crying these days

Those aren't tears, it's a face tattoo. They were all the rage back then in the before times. Example A:

I have the same question. Is this how my dad feels when he sees an aftermarket part on a classic car?

Those were the days

I tried to show my girlfriend to explain the memes of my heyday, opened that sub and it was all about what bills to vote for or something, like some Americans took it literally and started using advice duck to inform people on political issues or something... what the fuck?

15 years ago I was 40. Time sucks

Way she goes

Yeah, I feel so old. 2011 is 15 years ago. What a simpler time

I too am old friend. I also read The Selfish Gene before the world glommed onto it.

It was the style at the time.

It's the hallmark of the "Advice Animals" category of memes.

Advice Animals [...] are a type of image macro series featuring animals [...] that are accompanied by captioned text to represent a character trait or an archetype that fits the role of a "stock character". While many Advice Animals use a color wheel background, some use unedited versions of the original photo.

It's just how they were. That's like asking "why are they all screenshots underneath plain text on a white background?" re memes now.

Yeah my first thought was that those aren't memes, they are the "guidance" I guess. The words are the message, the background sets the tone. Bad luck Brian isn't the meme, he's what sets the stage that lets you know the tone for the hook.

If someone says: "Toenail needs cutting

Kick a brick wall"

Youd be like okay that's excessive .. but you put chaos wolf behind it and your like, I shouldve expected that

!remindme 10 years "call this guy old"

no no no old people memes is ai slop posted by bots on facebook

Hey, mid thirties isn't old.

All your base are belong to us

Hey, we all come from somewhere.

Here I was thinking these examples were new age memes from the post Reddit era

2006 we weren't posting image macros en-masse like this. They definitely existed but I don't remember seeing a lot of these until at least 2009-2010

Keep in mind the general population wasn't really on Facebook until 2007 and people weren't posting this stuff to myspace

I'm also being nitpicky and autistic about it so feel free to ignore me