Bokete as a meme platform: creative labor and humor in Japan’s online media

Abstract

Abstract Online media provides an interconnected digital world, where boundaries are limited only by users’ creative drive, and in many cases, their sense of humor. In reality, digital space is delineated by economically driven platforms. In Japan, characterized by a dynamic media mix ecosystem, online content has garnered extensive academic research. However, one issue that remains underexplored is the prevalence of internet memes and their impact on online communication, humorous expression, and community building. In particular, Bokete – a popular platform for sharing humorous meme-like content – has yet to be the focus of academic study. This paper aims to clarify how the interaction between the platform Bokete and its users leads to memetic communication. This study situates memes within Bokete by juxtaposing the term “meme” with other terms related to creative production: kontentsu (contents), neta (comedic material), and ōgiri (one-liners). It argues that while all terms are necessary to capture creative production on Bokete, none are sufficient to replace the term meme. Concomitantly, the paper examines how Bokete offers participation for its users. This study argues that Bokete creates self-sustaining memetic communication by stimulating users’ creative labor for making ōgiri iterations. A qualitative multimodal content analysis ( n = 800) reveals the systematic meme production of Bokete in terms of the memetic process, templates, and humorous rhetoric, and introduces a new typology of “memetic nonsense” – derivative silliness .