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Memes

What difference is there between the terms 'memetic design' and 'the design of memes'?

A Prize for the best answer!

The 'meme' - a vague idea

• One of the problems with the term ‘meme’ is that it has no single agreed definition.
• It emerged from a book (1976) by Richard Dawkins called the Selfish Gene, which defined the meme as "a unit of cultural transmission, or a unit of imitation".

(see other Keyword-Definitions-Index)

• Memetics (not to be confused with ‘mimetics’) is therefore the study of memes.
• The very ambiguity of this term is what is appealing to some designers.
• If government action on environmental reform is too slow, could we create benign and transformative interventions?
• How ambitious is this idea?
• Probably...very ambitious. Many memes are 'naughty but nice'.

Examples of memes

• The bad joke that spreads like wild-fire
• The iPod
• 'texting' on mobile phones
• The new virus that becomes an epidemic
• Harry Potter books
• A word that everyone finds themselves using
• A fad for a particular superstar or celebrity
• Cafe Lattes

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