The first website is about.com, which is a primary source article of a meme known as IcanHazCheezburger. The author of the article is Paul Gin who has written on what IcanHazCheezburger is and provides a photograph of this meme.
The article is current because it dates 2012. The second website is a wsj.com, which is a Wall Street Journal by Aaron Rutkoff and is dated 2012. The website explores the humor created by the IcanHazCheezburger. Lolcats refer to a joke hobby for pet lovers, which has become a globally cultural phenomenon. It is a meme with viral fame also called IcanHazCheezburger.
Lolcat is an abbreviation of LOL and cat, which when combined creates a cat macro. Lol means laugh out. The design of the lolcats is mainly for image boards and photo sharing among other Internet forums. Lolcats are made deliberately idiosyncratic and has bad grammar. The lolcats these are photos with cats and kittens on them and with ridiculous captions which create humor (Gil par. 1).
Anthropomorphism is used for the captions thereby rendering the cats human characteristics. The humorous part is that the captions are ridiculous jabs at human culture and quirks. Lolcats are on cheezburger pages as well as in other competing websites (Gil par. 3). They are humorous because of the idea of cats playing human roles such as hacking, analyzing crime scenes, working in daycares, disgruntled teenagers, and as evil villains.
The sheer absurdity of these photos is guffawing. This is because lolcats are fantastical, irresistible and preposterous. The image of the lolcats can be edited occasionally to create the desired effect. The purpose of the caption is to act as a language balloon including a remark from the cat. Similarly, the caption can describe the depicted scene. The incorrect grammar features verbs are conjugated strangely although they commonly congregate o novel rules in grammar and spelling.
The text distorts the syntax and makes it appear like Internet slang. Lolcats mostly take phrasal templates form. Certain expressions have a recognized origin, commonly a properly identified Internet meme. Sometimes, the language of lolcats resembles baby talk.
Examples of common themes for lolcats are jokes taking the manner of “Im in ur noun, verb-ing ur related noun.” A number of lolcat figures depict cats executing actions, which are characteristic of man or seeming to apply contemporary technology like computers.IcanHazCheezburger qualifies as a meme because it presents one of the bigger Internet’s inside jokes. It is a booming online subculture created around digital images in addition to the use of intentionally poor grammar. Lolcats spread fast like a flu, which travels from one person to another and transmit an idea through the Internet. This lolcat can be imitated, and it is limited just by its followers’ creativity.
Certain orthographies are altered consistently with change of the plural of s to z. The grammar used is improper because of the combined verbs. For instance, the following is on the IcanHazCheezburger, “we has no cheeseburgerz” (Gil par. 1).
Burgerz is supposed to be burgers whereas ‘has’ ought to be have. These are alterations characteristic of bad grammar as used in creation of memes. Notably, IcanHazCheezburger is a famous virus that can be found unexpectedly while browsing. It is LOLspeaking because of the use of “Een old contree” (Gil par. 1). The head of the cat is popping out of a knitted clothe or it is probably tied around its neck thereby giving it human character.
The cat appears to look direct at the camera just as a person does while taking a picture. This is personification, which qualifies the IcanHazCheezburgger as a meme. The IcanHazCheezburger is appealing because it is simultaneously accessible and obscure. This meme is an inside joke narrated in an online lingua franca although with some effort any person can be an insider. The in-joke is very large and shadows the old difference between the normals and Net geeks. Their picture is appealing because it is widely spread.
IcanHazCheezburger is a creative meme because of its appearance. The photograph is taken in a manner that makes the cat appear to be looking at the camera. This is the way people do when taking a photograph. Personification also depicts creativity; the cat is wrapped in a piece of cloth, which covers most of the visible parts and leaves the head open just as people do. Distortion of the language shows creativity because it enhances the humor effect. Anyone in possession of a computer can superimpose text over a cat’s picture.
However, the person must be creative and possess some comprehension of the language and style used to qualify the picture as a Lolcat. Thus, IcanHazCheezburger is creative because of the idiosyncratic language and style used (Rutkoff par. 16). The lolcat can be passed from one person to the other because of the ability to remain in power.
This is possible because of the free evolution of the joke. Individuals react to each other’s efforts and what follows if funny motivates the next. The lolcats are not only cats speaking in distorted English, but also rappers, presidents as well as Star Trek personalities (Rutkoff par. 20). Althougy, lolcats are humorous they have some inner meaning.
Notably, the prefix ‘lol’ may influence the spread because it is a common abbreviation used in text messages and e-mail among others. This is because the prefix means laugh out, and it can be possibly spread through texting.
