I’ve long been interested in Image Macros, which are best described as web based images with text superimposed on them. Okay, that’s a poor description. Here’s an example:
Image Macros apparently started as web forum responses — a way to respond to a message with an image containing some embedded textual content (the image at left says “Oh Really?”), rather than typing a response. But, like many things on the web, things get out of hand quickly: there are many subgenres which continue to evolve daily.
This week I’ll explore some common forms of Image Macros. First up: LOL Cats are Image Macros featuring cats, and boy are there a lot of them. In general, they anthropomorphize the cat in the photo, sometimes using purposely bad grammar (conjugation seems to be a real problem for the cats) or web-speak. Here’s an example of a LOL Cat that kicked off its own subgenre:
Many more after the jump.
There are many varieties of LOL Cats (which are themselves a subgenre of Image Macros), and we’ll explore some major forms starting tomorrow. But for now, here’s a selection of classics (at least, classics to me):
Some of these images are snagged from I Can Has Cheezburger, a blog which catalogs all forms of LOL Cats (the blog is named after this image). Many others come from flightpad.net. You’ll see more of the grammar weirdness/web-speak later this week.
This article is part of a series. Read the rest:
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You’ll find a huge number of these if you do a search on “harbl”. Also, there’s an enormous number of examples built around the “I’m in your aaa, bbb-ing your ccc”. As for the fractured English, I think it’s just that pets don’t have a real firm grasp of spelling and grammar.
posted by phil on 4-16-2007 at 12:59 pm
The one with the fridge and the foodz is the best, but the ceiling cat and the invisible bike are pretty good too. Genius.
posted by gosha on 4-16-2007 at 3:29 pm
Ceiling cat is definitely the funniest. I think he watches me!
posted by tommy on 4-17-2007 at 11:30 am
Wow…Be careful where you give credit because the credit for the vast majority of these photos goes to 4chan. More specifically the /b/ forum on 4chan, and those guys don’t take it lightly when people take credit for their creations.
For those that don’t know, 4chan is an imageboard where users are NOT required to register or provide any personal details. They have many forums, but by far the most popular is the /b/ forum which is currently sitting around 30,000,000 posts.
Anyway, back to the cat issue, almost all of these images (from my experience I’d say 70-90% of them) came from there (as well as many other popular internet memes) where its tradition to post “Caturday” pictures every Saturday.
If you are easily offended by ANYTHING, do not go there. There are no rules (other than anything that breaks laws like child porn or terrorist threats), and mixing that with anonimity has created a beast with no shame that can and does post the most horrid stuff you can imagine.
As for the part to be weary about, they are prone to “raid” websites that use their creations without credit. For instance subeta.com started using a version of “longcat” on their avatars and thus started a very long attack on their web servers that brought down the site multiple times and cost the site a lot money in extra bandwidth fees from their provider. The users have also spawned multiple spinoff sites such as 7chan and 420chan that also participate in the “raids”.
For more info read here:
wikipedias article on 4chan and the /b/ forum.
posted by B on 6-27-2007 at 1:07 pm
and the 4chan /b/ guys stole the photos from other people violating THEIR copyrights…
Slapping a caption on a photo is not enough of a change to transmit the ownership.
If it’s not YOUR photo, be sure to get PERMISSION from the photographer.
posted by trinlayk on 8-27-2007 at 7:45 pm
omg i love the fix it one! its so cute!
posted by Sarah on 9-27-2007 at 11:35 am
EMBY: da mew is a mew is a mew is amew is a mew is ameeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeew! arnie isv a mew baby and she mews all day and poos all night YAYAY!
MOLLUSC:Monorail cat…FULL SPEED AHEAD!
BETHBEE:Cute Mews!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
CAZ:…Im surrounded by weirdos!!!!!
cool catz
posted by emby,mollusc,bethbee and caz on 12-9-2007 at 7:25 am
Don’t forget the lolruses! :)
hamsterinthewheel.com/fatalfury/walrus-bucket/
posted by Stephen on 12-31-2007 at 10:23 am
the cats are like LOL to me and i love cats bt i kill them fun and eat them! :)
posted by lasina on 2-17-2009 at 12:07 am
who will put a cat in a trashcan
posted by shawn,melani on 6-5-2010 at 7:25 pm
Ah, these are so cute and hilarious. As a cat lover I enjoy this with special interest.
posted by Nomadic Samuel on 8-4-2011 at 10:49 pm
LOVE the Monorail Cat one!!!
posted by Emilino Emloile on 2-9-2012 at 10:31 pm