How have memes become so much popular on social media?

Memes, something that have become a very integral part of our lives right now. It is funny but a few years back, half the people didn't know how to pronounce the term. But right now, every other person is creating those memes out there and become Social Media sensations. There are pages, twitter accounts where you would see a parody of some popular name running and making those memes. But where did all of this begin in the first place?

You might be curious to know when were the Memes created for the first time. To your surprise, it happened long before social media was even a thing. Graffiti was one of the tools to generate those memes. Remember the very popular author named J.R.R Tolkien of The Lord of the rings trilogy? His phrase "Frodo Lives" was used all over the graffiti, buttons and even the stickers on the cars. Another example of memes happened to occur in 1990 on Usenet. A newsgroup discussion forum conceived "Godwin's law" which happens to be applicable even today. That's how the memes used to work back in the day.

The first meme that went viral on internet was a dancing baby. It was a gif that went berserk all over the world and people acknowledged it very much. It was a baby demonstrating cha-cha-cha. The hampster dance was another popular meme back in 1998.

But the meme culture was never so strong. Sure it had its audience which used to love it but to become a household name, it required a lot more than just that. Social Media happened to be a blessing to the memes. When sites like Reddit, 9GAG, 4chan started spreading the memes time and again, people acknowledged it and started becoming intrigued about how it is really done. This is when Facebook pages, Twitter accounts, Instagram accounts were dedicated specially for making memes.

The difference between the memes that are made today and the memes that were made a decade back is simply that the memes used to have longevity back then. The memes that are made today might get old within a couple of hours, that's the rate at which popular memes are made at right now.

Do you love memes? If yes, do you love making them or reading them? Which platform on social media do you use to read them? Let me know in the comment section!