Meme Research 101: Precision Googling

This is the first article in our new ten-part instructional series Internet Meme Research 101 on the fundamentals of researching, documenting and chronicling the history of an internet meme. Feel free to share your own PROTIP in the comments and we will add them to the article with attribution!

Here at Know Your Meme, one of the most frequently asked questions we get about our day-to-day operation is how does one research the history of an internet meme?

Surely, there are several different ways to go about it. There's the good old-fashioned journalistic approach, tirelessly keeping a log of information as a meme takes its shape, or a programatic approach using clever algorithms that can efficiently mine relevant data about a meme all day, everyday. But for most of us who have just about a working brain and two hands to type with, the answer is pretty simple, straightforward: Googling. like, a LOT of Googling.

As anticlimactic as it may sound, this actually makes a lot of sense. Think about excavation in archaeology, for instance. While the tools and resources at an archeologist's disposal may be constantly evolving, the most essential role in the process still remains the same. Digging by hand. like a LOT of digging. And like an archaeologist brushing through millimeter layers of dirt to retrieve an artifact, researching memes by human intelligence takes a lot of precision-Googling, which begins with using Boolean search, often referred to as "advanced search."

Boolean Search

Named after the 19th-century English mathematician George Boole, it is based on the Boolean logic, a systematic method of defining relationships among multiple sets by using the following conjunctives: AND, OR, NOT. Since most popular search engines incorporate some or all Boolean terms as search operators, you can think of them as the digital equivalent of an archaeologist's shovels and spades. Know Your Meme's search function accepts all five basic boolean expressions:

Using Conditional Operators

• " " searches for exact matches of the keyword/phrase.
• ( ) allows more versatile search by bundling a set of keywords
• NOT or - excludes a specific keyword or phrase from the rest of the search query.
• *AND or + narrows search parameter to matches containing all of the terms in the string.
• OR expands search parameter to matches containing at least one of the terms in the string.
• * symbol, referred to as a wildcard, allows a variable or a "fill-in-the-blank" space within a search query.
• site: confines the search parameter to a particular website. It may be combined with
• @ symbol, when placed before the keyword, highlights matching results from social media accounts first.
• # symbol, when placed before the keyword, highlights matching hashtags before anything else.
• For more search operators, refer to the Google Search Help page and other resources.

Finding Relevant Keywords

Starting your meme research with the most relevant keyword(s) is vital to the process, as it sets a clear parameter for the data set that is relevant to your research task. As mentioned earlier, this is where double quotes comes in super handy.

• A meme may go, or have gone, by many names. While aliases tend to fade away as a meme ages over time, in many cases of fresh dank memes in their early days, there may be two or more competing names or variations of a hashtag. Needless to say, It is immensely helpful to identify all known names before beginning the research of origin and spread.

• When stuck on finding relevant keywords, try using descriptive search queries that contain the keyword "meme" to check if anyone else has inquired about the name of the meme. You never know, until you've looked it up.

Using Advanced Search

• When a website is Google-indexed, use Google Search with the site: operator over its native search function.

• Build a solid timeline of the account in chronological order. Start by rewinding the time range and looking for the earliest matching results on Google. Once the earliest match available has been found, start moving forward in time range, year-by-year, and when necessary, month-by-month.

• Not ever result you see is time authentic, especially when you are combing through results for relevant matches further back in time. Make sure to check the post date and other relevant metadata on the source page.

• When you have all the relevant keywords for a meme at your disposal, always use a string of multiple search terms joint together by search operators, mainly AND, OR and NOT.

• When you are looking for a needle in a haystack, cross-compare the results from two or more different search queries based on the same keyword or phrase to cover maximum grounds.

Using Google Images

• There are two reverse image search functions that are particularly useful when it comes to meme research: searching by all sizes and similar images.

• When you're looking for the original instance of a widely circulated image, search for the image in all sizes and start looking for the match from top left.

• When reverse image search yields little to no matching results, use an image editor to remove proprietary artifacts (watermarks, captions) and search again by uploading the polished version for different results.

• Aside from Google Image Search, TinEye is another powerful reverse image tool that we recommend.

• When you're searching for certain types of photographs with keyword(s) or phrase(s), say, cute cats, make use of equivalent keywords in other languages for more diverse and comprehensive results.