This AI-driven meme generator delivers the avant-garde content you need

I’m going to solve some pretty big things here for you. First off, memes are art. Secondly, computers are capable of creating art.

How do I know this? Easy — because of this AI-driven meme generator. God, that was smooth.

Anyway, the folks over at Imgflip created something called This Meme Does Not Exist, a meme generator powered by a deep artificial neural network.

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I was alerted to its existence when one of my friends (shout out you, Ruby) sent me this magnificent Tweet by K. Thor Jensen:

there’s an AI meme generator now and it’s everything you could have wanted. https://t.co/MqXConOPWo pic.twitter.com/yKEHfgBPUE

— K. Thor Jensen (@kthorjensen) April 28, 2020

And, as I’m sure you’re well aware of by now, it’s amazing.

How does this AI meme generator work?

Well, there’s an in-depth description of how they created this pivotal moment in human history here, but we’ll sum up the salient points for you.

Imgflip has a meme generator on its website where users can easily create pieces of art using popular templates. At the time of writing, there have been over 100M images made using this tool — a huge dataset to work from.

Rather than try and crunch all this at once, the team selected the 48 most popular meme templates, then fed the algorithm 20,000 examples from each. And for you, the reader, this led to our current glorious situation where a computer can generate you a piece of art.

The name of the scheme (This Is Not A Meme) is a reference to the multitude of projects — like This Person Does Not Exist, or This Cat Does Not Exist — that use AI to create new images.

Basically, I just love everything about this AI meme generator project. Something about the borderline nonsensical nature of these examples hits me just right. I almost understand them, but they’re all off-kilter and bizarre, which somehow makes them all the more brilliant.

Ugh, marry me.

Anyway, what’s left to say? Just make sure you’re ready to waste the next few hours of your life and click here. Remember though, you’re witnessing art.

Story by Callum Booth

Callum Booth is a freelance journalist with over a decade of experience. Previously, he was the Managing Editor of TNW, where his reporting (show all) Callum Booth is a freelance journalist with over a decade of experience. Previously, he was the Managing Editor of TNW, where his reporting was cited widely, including in VICE, the FT, and the BBC. Callum’s writing has appeared in The Verge, The Daily Telegraph, Time Out, and many more. He covers the full spectrum of technology, with a particular focus on how it shapes our daily lives. And a lot of regulation stuff too. Outside of work, Callum’s an avid bookworm, a Fisherman’s Friends addict, and resolutely unshaven. Follow him on Twitter @CallumBooth or visit www.callumbooth.net.