Icon Memes


Welcome to TWITTER ICON MEMES, where we are creating a guide to current/historical twitter icon memes.

recommended format = [50x50 sample icon] + [clever explanatory txt] + [acknowledgements/source] + [twitter handle of the icon, if different] + [your twitter handle - just THINK how famous you could become!]

'My Yearbook Photo' - paste your mug in some poor suckers face to recreate images as uncomfortable as the originals (via@christydena)
'Labor Party' supporters in the UK could add a Rose to their tw-avatar. (via Sermad Buni, tw-avatar @gemmadoyle1)
'PRO' overlays started with an April Fools joke April 1st, 2009, when jokers overlaid tw-avatars with 'PRO' to designate themsleves as 'PRO-fessional Account' holders. These "premium Twitter account[s] offered an instant 50,000 followers (“so you no longer have to bother writing anything interesting”) as well as 160 character tweets (as opposed to Twitter’s normal 140 character limit)". (@ev)
'PRO-vocateurs': In response to 'PRO' jokers (PRO-kers?) a broad swath of mutant sub-variants arose (thank you @chrismessina), including @kevinmarks with 'AM', for 'AM'-ateurs
'Verified', here sported by @chrismessina (and memorialized here on the Twitter Fan Blog) is an overlay to show folks that you are, in fact, who your handle (or tweets) say you are. This particular variant may be fan hacked :-) in response to @biz' twitter blogpost dated June 6, 2009 about a "Verified Accounts" beta in summer '09 that was to start with a set of people deemed to be most "at risk" for impersonation.
'Unverified' - Since indicating you are 'verified' when you haven't yet been may or may not be in violation of Twitter's TOS,@chrismessina used this icon overlay to warn his 17K+ followers that he may not be who he says he is.
The 'I'm at SXSW' frame, used to show attendance at the 2009 'South by Southwest' festival in Austin, Texas. (captured from this blog post, thanks to @skinny)
The 'I'm not at SXSW' frame (n.b. the little 'home' icon lower left) for bitter twitterers unable to recharge at the 2009 SXSW hivemind (also thanks to @skinny)
The Chinese 2008 "Olympic" supporter meme, saved for us by @rambls, the story here cites the meme originator as @flypig
Lance Armstrong's 'Live Strong' foundation lets you add the yellow band to your tw-avatar and tweet on their behalf with 1-click (thank you @rich_s)
'MADMEN-IZE YOURSELF', 2009 promotional campaign by Deep Focus for AMC's 'Mad Men' (@ischafer)
'Greened' tw-avatar signifying support for the Iranian opposition during the 2009 presidential election dispute - summary posthere on the topic (@bicoastalite)
'Human Rights' overlay, sported by @christydena
Portland, Oregon, USA Eastside vs Westside snarkfest, conducted mostly in 2008. Individual twavatars had an "E", "W", "Eastside", or "Westside" added. Here an Eastside "E" shown as a "gang sign". (@xolotl)
'Obamicon', used by supporters of then-President-elect Barack Obama in early 2009 to demonstrate support and celebrate victory in the 2008 presidential election. Icon style based on artist Shepard Fairey's red, white, and blue Obama poster. (@pdxgene)
'Simpsonize-me' icon, output from the 2008 Simpsonize-me site developed for Burger King by CP+B (@rgleeson)
J-Anime styled avatar, outputted from Faceyourmanga.com. This example is taken from @mrballistic’s avatar. (@brampitoyo)
Internet Explorer 6 Must Die from @hostingsearch (@macfarbt)

Tw-avatar resources:

Twibbon - Tool to create cause-related graphics and overlays

Avartize - Tool built by Sneaker Entrepreneurs to facilitate easy addition of graphic overlays to existing tw-avatars - you can't upload your own when I checked, but they have a pretty decent mix of preset ones (TY @christydena!)