10 reasons why I won't do your meme

Reason: It reminds me of chain letters. And I hate chain letters..

They come in so many forms. From youtube comment spam saying if you don't pass a message along to over 9000 friends, you'll die in ten days, to literal letters that someone sends to you in email - riddled with attempted guilt trips about "not breaking the chain."

Pffft.

As for me, I've only been tagged once. Happened just a few days ago. And like a frightened child, I sat in the corner rocking quietly to myself and ignoring it, hoping it would go away.

No offense intended to people that do those type of things; just ain't for me.

I don't mind answering small talk or inane questions -- I just am not really willing to dedicate a whole post to it. Stuff like this is what twitter, chatrooms or being social in the pub is for!

Nice to see you Ben. I didn't see your post in the forums originally and had no idea this was "you" that was dropping on me at first, hehe. Will be strange not seeing your pic in the widget anymore. No matter though, mental note made. :)

Oh dear, memes are the bane of my life. I feel some sort of obligation to post them, but I never, ever tag anyone. If I possibly can, I say that I did something similar and that the answers stand. I find awards equally distressing. The thing is too, they take up more time than you might think. So there you go, another reason, it takes up my precious time.

I too hate memes. Twice I participated in them as favors. You start to wonder if the people check pagerank before tagging you.

I like this series of articles. But as a speaker of the Queens English might I ask what the hell is a MEME? Could it be an acronym of some sort? Like the man said if you haven't got anything worth saying don't say it.

I don't like memes either. The times when I have done them were usually because I felt like I had to, so as not to hurt the other person's feelings.

I've all but stopped doing memes. That doesn't mean I won't offer up a set of questions for my readers that I design myself with them in mind. When someone tags me, I thank them and ignore it. On rare occasions, I'll handpick a meme that I really like (and might even not have been tagged for), but only if I can make it entertaining for my readers. It's all about the readers.

I have witness some big bloggers and corporate businesses do memes, not just those small blogs.



Most of the time, I feel obligated to do one. If I would be doing it, that will be for the reason that I don't want to hurt someone's feelings.



A lot of memes do more harm than good. Like Turnip had mentioned, it can strip off pagerank.



But a well done meme could actually benefit readers - this will just take a bit of creativity to execute such a task.

I'm not a meme fan either. And another thing to avoid at all costs seems to be awards.



On the one hand, it's nice to be recognized as unusual or worthy, but the rules all seem to be "include a link to the originator of the award and to the person who awarded you" and then "pass it on to x# of others".



I succumbed to an award once and it woke me up to the fact that an award is just a graphical version of a meme. Now, if I truly wanted to <i>GIVE</i> an award to someone, it would be a unique one that they couldn't get anywhere else. My "awards" tend to be more (as you do) links to a particular blog or blog post that catches my fancy.



As Kathy said, it's all about readers and what they keep coming back for. Some blogs seem to do pretty good with memes and awards. It's just not my thing...



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There should be a law against these memes. Anyone caught breaking this law should be banned from the Net for ever.



I have recently been the 'lucky' recipient of a few awards. I never pass these things on to anyone. I have a separate page where I show the awards with a link to the donor. These awards and links only stay on the page for a month or so and then I delete them.

I started to love your blog, Ben~! :D



I wonder who invent 'meme' and where does the name come from.



Meme should be done and post in friendster bulletin only. :P

Hahahah I can disprove item # 8 - two of my Meme posts are on my "5 most commented posts" list (until I posted about Halloween)! So there!!



Over all, I agree with you on all of them though - I (and my ego) think that I am a special case.



Oh, and I can also disprove item # 7 because I only tag people I really want to know more about, AND people that I *thought* would participate.



AND Ahem, since you don't want to let everyone know that I am the reason you did this list, I'll tell everyone!



I tagged him in a meme to tell us (all) 7 weird things about him... but since he had previously done a post on 9 things you didn't know about him: http://tiny.cc/9thingsBen he didn't wanna! So he said he'd do this instead.



=P

Sometimes I turn the meme around and post a very bookish meme. More often for memes and also "awards", I may give a brief mention and a link to the sender at the end of an unrelated and on-niche post. But they are definitely Not worth a post of their own.



Alan



my .02, fwiw, #include <std.disclaimers>

I hate those things too. Anyone who knows me already knows the answers, and if they don't then they could pick them up in a conversation.



I like your #4. Its sooooo true. "Do I have a crush on anyone?"..... I usually reply with "Don't most stalkers" or "Why do you think I keep paying her to webcam with me?"

Ok, first I refuse to answer your questions Ben. As it comes to close to being a Meme.



To all those who asked a Meme stands for (Me.Me.) as in...It's all about ME! These things started as a way to promote/talk about yourself on other blogs.(You had to include all the bits written by the originator.) Then it was like a massive chain letter, spreading it's selfishness and vanity onto other tagged bloggers. The logic is "If I do this then the people I tag will be promoting me, too"



I hate them. Well most of them. I've seen some funny ones and a few creepy ones. You could do one if you are in a very select blogging niche, like me. Then only tag bloggers that are also in your niche. That could work. Maybe. No, you still shouldn't do it.

I've done a couple 'cos they came from people I like but I never pass them on.



As a positive aspect, I have found that if you deal with them with humour and positivity then they can serve to add a little touch of personality to your blog but you have to work at it a bit (and you have to have a personality too)



It opens up a bigger question, I think - where does Social Networking end and Blogging begin? This one occupies my mind a bit. Are bloggers generally adding to the wealth of human experience or are we just swapping notes in class in a high-tech fashion?

LOL, #1 had me chuckling out loud!

I do memes if they are interesting or if someone I regularly read tags me with one. I pass on most of them because they are repetitive. It's easy to jump all over memes and be part of the "in" crowd. But my blog is personal and having traffic is interesting but not the reason I keep a blog. I do a meme if I want to. Answering the questions are fun if you don't take them seriously. No one needs to know your first pet's name but you don't have to take it seriously and give a real answer. Instead of writing a pet's name write the name you called your last boyfriend when you played naughty games. That's far more fun than reading anything real or true.



I wrote a confession to being a nose picker once and had loads of comments, most laughing about my post. One posted about how unsanitary that is and blab, blab, blab. It didn't matter. The post was fun to write and it still gets traffic even though it's well buried in my archives now.



@Ken - If the teacher read any of your notes you'd be standing in the corner. But, you'd probably like that.



@Turnip - Anyone who checks pagerank before sending a meme, adding a comment or anything else is just far too snotty for me. If I ever send you a meme (and its hugely unlikely cause you don't have a personal blog) it won't be anything to do with pagrank. More likely it would just be a day I felt like being aggravating. ;)



Last of all, you're making a mistake if you write a blog to please your readers. You lose something when you write for an audience. It's much more interesting to step inside a blog when someone is writing just to please themselves. You take more chances and are far more likely to be unique and original. Anything less is just following the crowd and then you're just one more blog in the swamp.

I'm not sure you know what a meme is. A meme is an idea or theme that spreads culturally, like LOLCats, All Your Base, motivational posters, stuff like that. I think the word evolved as a "unit" of memory. I didn't know that people called those silly questionnaires "memes", but it's a very narrow usage of the word. It took me reading almost your entire post to figure out that you weren't talking about memes in general, but "viral" questionnaires.



How can someone "hate" memes? Maybe you hate one meme, or one form of memes, but as a meme is just an idea, I can't understand someone saying "I hate memes." It doesn't parse.

I don't like mimes either, they taste funnie, on no that's the clowns joke right??



Ok, so this meme walks into a bar and sees this mime........



ah, time to log off

Thanks for the comments everyone. :) So I'm not alone then?!



Gem - actually, Turnip didn't say that a meme can strip off PageRank, he suggested some people may check the PageRank of a blog before tagging them. This would get a link to the other person's blog.



Ken - good point about swapping notes. As for "where does Social Networking end and Blogging begin?" - maybe Turnip should answer that! Or maybe I could do "10 ways you know your blog is just playing to the Gods of social networking"?!



fragileheart - oh well, you saved me the job of calling you out. :) Thanks for the post idea though, it's got some great comments!



estyles - fair point, although I didn't actually say "I hate memes", I just said I hated the word. Still, I probably do hate them. For the purpose of this post, the term refers to the questionnaires that float around various blogs. Maybe it is a narrow usage of the word, but it must be fairly common on my readers' blogs, as they seemed to get the meaning. :) On a different note, I like the cycling colour theme on your blog. Made me look twice!

I could do "10 ways you know your blog is just playing to the Gods of social networking"?!

I'd like to read that one. You really should write it. You can even use my blog as an example of what not to do if you like. :D

Hahaha.. I got that "misinterpreted", sorry.



Some bloggers have some dark things inside memes. I was even tagged with some suspicious tracking code that the originator of the meme had placed (and doesn't want removed). I just took out that one anyway and did the meme.

I do them occasionally ... not very often for a lot of the reasons you listed.

I couldn't agree more with this post. For me, meme's are the same as chain mail letters/emails. It's not quality content and there is little to no value in spreading it around.

I'm a push over, as my boyfriend told me the other night, I feel so bad when I don't do them. Even though the person who gave it to me probably never reads my blog and won't notice.



My biggest pet peeve: I use collapsible posts, and the person didn't awarded me on a post I talked about my awarding after the jump. If you really loved my blog that much, wouldn't you read it?

i do memes in the past (in my blogspots), honestly and sincerely answering the questions and following the instructions. but i noticed that the new ones had become senseless and only serve the purpose of giving a link back to its original creator.



i don't do memes anymore. i haven't seen one in the new blogs i follow.

LOL i have never done a meme and I never will. Granted I have never been tagged with one, but I have often read over them and thought (like you) who really cares all that much.



Like Matt said, it is the modern day chain mail.

Stuart

Not to be rude or anything but would someone please inform me what "meme" actually is?

I see it everywhere but I have no information to link it to in my brain what that actually is! Your help would be so appreciated.

I don't want to get caught in that category if I even knew what it was.
Thanks

Hey SkiTwo - I did mention that in comment #20. In this case, it is a type of blog post where people answer various questions, then "tag" other people to get them to pass it on. It's usually a poor excuse for a blog post.