- Gamestop and other “meme stocks” beloved by the Reddit community have soared this year
- Their rise was foreshadowed by a popular forum where Redditors ‘trade’ internet memes
It’s a Wednesday afternoon in May and I’m trying to decide whether an image of a startled Pikachu or a screenshot of Matt Hancock running away from a journalist is more likely to go viral.
I’m on r/MemeEconomy, a forum on the social media site Reddit that also serves as a fake stock market for internet memes. When I choose my meme, I will enter “buy” in the comments and a bot that monitors the forum will register my investment. It will also track how many other forum members buy in, assigning the meme a share price that fluctuates according to the level of demand.