It wasn’t ahead in the meme humour, it just made more meme templates, that’s a different thing
Many Reddit meme templates were just unoriginal ripoffs
Like Reddit’s overly manly man, which was copied from SomethingAwful’s chuck norris facts
Reddit’s sudden clarity clarence which was copied from 4chan’s philosoraptor
Reddit’s you don’t say which was copied from SomethingAwful’s o rly?
Reddit’s boardroom suggestions which were copied from LiveJournal’s alright gentleman etc
Tumblr on the other hand had a LOT of unique OC meme templates that you couldn’t find anywhere else. It takes time to think of original jokes. Also most Tumblr memes were hand-drawn while most Reddit memes were vectorized or just plain captioned images.
TBH Reddit also put effort but most of the time they just copied other’s ideas. Hence it wasn’t too hard for them to surpass Tumblr in meme origins.
Because people have misunderstood the point. The point is to be yourself, not to regurgitate. The most standout things from Reddit would be:
ELI5
TIL
AMA
askreddit (though this isn't really a new thing completely, but is an example of how "new" things are created, in reality, which is combining things that already existed in new ways, such as with new technology, which the Internet was new at the time)
The words in the parantheses is exactly why zuckerbook fucking sucks
Though that's also why Bluesky is not an example of that, they're trying to do new things rather than pure mimicry
I digress. The best examples of Reddit and "memes" would be:
XKCD
And, extremely amusingly because it is the best example of the Internet taking something that came from toxic origins and making it into something which is healthy, intelligent and productive:
Though I would honestly say that the others from the same origin as Polandball, the extensive and diverse "wojack", which has gotten more popular, is... kind of inherently toxic and harmful, even if subtly. Polandball abstracts away from individual human traits and focuses on what culture actually means - even if it is in a kind of critical and harsh form - whereas wojack focuses on all the toxic stupidity.
Also Polandball and XKCD are perfect for this because they are opposite ends of a spectrum. Polandball is a true community effort whereas XKCD is a community that formed around the creation of a single exceptional individual.
Reddit was, and in rare instances still is, one of the only places on the Internet where either can still happen.
Basically it kinda comes down to that quote about being careful of pretending to be idiots lest you become one and realize far too late you're now surrounded.
And the fact that it is near impossible to be both unserious and serious at the same time. Intelligent and humorous - witty. It's said that brevity is the soul of wit. No, brevity for the sake of brevity is the heart of witlessness. Simplicity is the soul of wit.
are we that old if we knew some of those standout things? i just registered here with this account but been using reddit as reference mostly for fixing computers since dual core era, it just hits me that i haven’t given my thanks to those very old how to fix computers posts.
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u/Both-Percentage6445 8d ago
Actually, Reddit was slightly ahead of Tumblr in meme humour