Everyone has a dream, I guess. Many give up at one point, but I am sure that dream will always be there somewhere in the back of that person's head and pop up in the right moments. Some dreams are just that strong and I too have such a dream.

Ever since I have heard about the concept of mems, I want to create one, a big one that goes viral and everywhere and that lasts forever. The "Meme" as the way I use the term has been "invented" or more described as a concept by Richard Dawkins in his book The Selfish Gene.

But I am not talking about a meme as it is common here on Steemit as well - it even has its own category - but I am more interested in the broader sense of the word as Dawkins meant it.

A meme in the sense of the Age of Social Media.

A Meme Is Anything That Is Non-Physical And Can Be Copied And Passed On As A Behavior

I imagine memes like Lego stones of our cultural and socio-economic fabric. They are small, they can have different shapes and colors (hence properties) - and you can fit them them together and create something new, maybe even a new meme. A word, a habit, a pose, a tradition, a philosophy, an aphorism, a wish or a dream. Anything. If you expand the definition, even a product can be its own meme (just think of Apple products).

Reading Dawkins description of the idea wasn't the starting point. There was always something lurking shortly below the surface of my conscience containing the wish to create something that is getting passed on and used by others on their own. I am not sure why, but I guess, it is just an exciting thought to "manipulate" (in the best sense of the word) someone else's life and rearrange the persons direction, even if it is just a tiny little bit.

Ideally of course is the observing of the meme at a random person without having incepted it before. Because a meme getting passed on without a push means that it is successful and people see it as useful by mimicking and using it.

Another meme machine. I wonder: Will they last or fade like the ones from the Flintstones?

How Do You Create A Meme?

At first of course, you need a lot of creativity - assuming, you have enough determination and see sense in creating a meme. If that is not a given, creativity is just the second condition. You need to know that you want to do something and why you want to it. But I think that is important for most aspects in life and usually, people know about that..

Creating a meme itself is very much like creating a business. The thought process behind it and also the conditions for success are very much the same. Different is that a meme in its narrow sense doesn't cost money and therefore you don't need much of a back office or understanding of how to run a business. You also cannot go bankrupt with memes, except you count running out of time.

Overall, you have to think like an inventor and/or a business man. You intent to create something new that helps people in their life, by making something more productive or easier or cheaper or faster or nicer or funnier or a combination of it. You can also do that with a product or a service and since both areas are so similar, you have to look for most of the same elements:

• The price-value for the consumer: It must be higher with the meme than without it.
• The cost of doing the business at all: As mentioned above, time is critical but it can also your reputation, for example when you want to create a meme that involves putting your penis on a table it might lead to social awkwardness.
• The effects on third parties: How will people react who have nothing to do with the meme or someone who uses it in front of them (for example again, think of the penis lying on the table).
• The marketing: Some people are more accessible for memes than others. Doing an icehockey trick in front of Water Polo players probably won't lead to an imitation by the Water Polo players.

There are surely other aspects to consider just like it is with business models. You can make it a science, but mostly I guess it is just a funny person in the right situation who unintentionally says or does something normal in an unusual situation or manner, which causes the bystanders to copy and immitate it and a new meme has emerged. Depending on greater circumstances, this meme spreads.

But don't think it's easy. Only about 5% make it beyond the specific situation and less than 1% becomes big, just as it is with businesses. The fewest of them grow big.

The similarities between business ideas and memes are so close that one can become the other and vice versa.

Old enough to remember that one?

Successful Memes Come With A Bonus For The Creator

Successful memes can bring the creator a lot of social reputation. There are very funny and imaginative people who just are very spontaneous and creative among others and they leave an impression behind which can sometimes morph into a meme used by a broader audience. I remember for example a school mate of mine coming up with the word perverse to describe anything he saw. After a few weeks everyone did it - and this on all schools in the town. Not bad, I would say.

In some cases the obvious happens and the creator suddenly has a new hot girlfriend. The same can happen for grown-ups, but there are even "bigger trophies" to catch, for example when someone has marketing value. But these instances are rare, I guess, an usually come with a whole package of skills by the person. Arguably, that is how Social Media Stars emerge.

Another way of profiting from a meme is by creating a product or service to a meme or turning a product or service into a meme. An example for the first would be the fidget spinner, which is I think completely useless, but well, a meme on its own making some producers very happy. The textbook example for the latter is of course Apple, but also a couple of other brands that are so much more than the usability of the product that they turn into Giffen goods and people pay any price that is asked. The word cult comes in mind.

In its broader sense, a meme can be just a product that is so important and essential, everyone has to use it. Take Microsoft Windows in the mid 90s for example. Despite a lot, I have a lot of respect what Bill Gates got done back then. Everyone on the planet at home and at work used his product. N matter if you liked it or not, Microsoft managed to literally penetrate the entire planet with its main product and created for some time at least an universal meme that was completely irresistible for everyone and also took a good junk of our attention and lifetime. I am not talking about all the blue screens, solitaire and hourglass, but the mere fact that 15 to 20 years ago, a lot of people used Word, Excel, Power Point, spend the global average of 10 minutes on the Internet and still had to run Windows their system (well 90% had to), when using third party software.

Bill Gates 80 Billion Dollar are equal to about 12 Dollar by every single person on the planet.

From a meme-perspective, Bill Gates as the creator of this Microsoft meme generator was almost religiously bombastic. Despite the blue screen.

There's a right way and a wrong way for everything.

Some Of My Meme Attempts So Far :-)

Usually, I am thinking about business models. Finding profitable solutions for all sorts of situations became kind of an awkward hobby of mine. I have collected quite a lot over the years and some of them actually work - because they have been put into reality by others, not by me. It's like training for my brain to think creatively and look at a problem from all possible perspectives plus figuring out the details (which sometimes includes physics which is a really big challenge for me, but that's a different story).

Here on Steemit I have already published three business ideas. One for Hong Kong, one for cars and one in the form of a question about electricity. I have ideas all the time in all sorts of areas. Actually, they are way to many as that I could write them all down (I am a very, very creative person, not kidding).

But I don't just have business ideas in my portfolio. I can also do memes;-) Here are three examples:

• Blocking A Door With A Cup

I was working for a big anonymous company where there was a big smoking area for everyone outside. To door to it was time-sealed, which means that after a certain time, you couldn't go outside anymore. For smokers that situation is very unnerving, which is why all sorts of solutions have been tried to block the door. Chairs, brooms and what not. Obviously, the security didn't like it and removed it all the time, impart with people trapped outside.

Only one solution worked: A cup. It was big enough to keep the magnets apart, strong enough to resist them, but also small enough that the security didn't see it at dawn. After someone put one there the first, everyone else started using cups, too.

Who put the first cup there? I did..

• Eating Apples

This is a strange one and for a long time, I didn't get that I do it the "wrong" way. Since always, when eating an apple I start in the middle, eat away a ring and leave the top and bottom untouched so that I can hold the apple properly. Only at the end when the middle part is eaten, I eat the flesh away there too.

One day, someone told me that she found it funny how I eat it and asked me why I did it that way. I didn't know why it should be any different, because it's the way it makes sense the most.

At the end and she copied my "technique".

• Horizontal Inflation

I am trying to establish the term Horizontal Inflation, for which I even wrote an article here on Steemit to describe the phenomenon of Bitcoin or generally crypto currencies as not able to inflate in the classic sense given their design, but that they fork easily which has the same effect just that it goes into a different directions. I wrote the article after the fist fork with Bitcoin Cash, but since then I have only been confirmed in my estimation that the forking will go on until a new fork costs more than it brings the money (plus attention) to the ones who run the fork - or until they run out of names to give.

So far the term hasn't caught on, but I'm still convinced about its relevance. See the latest one: "Bitcoin Diamond"...lol

I do have more memes and I am also sure you have willingly or unwillingly created one or the other meme, even though only in rare cases they make it out of the context as I described. Also, I guess it is not "normal" to think about or memorize this kind of behavior. But if you have one..

Tell Me About It In The Comments, I Really Would Like To Know About It!