As NEAR’s meme guild, we decided we should outline some guidelines for how we judge good NEAR memes. This is not to step on anyone’s toes in the community or say that we are the only important voice on what quality meme content can be, but we wanted to share this information as a reference for anyone who is wondering how we make/judge content and the standards that we think should be universal when it comes to making memes specifically in the NEAR ecosystem. Below, we address a few topics and standards that we feel are significant to address.
1. Qualifying Topics for NEAR Memes:
- Promote NEAR Protocol
- Promote a NEAR related project
- Promote a NEAR related event
- Educational meme on some aspect of NEAR
- Comparing NEAR to other chain
- Comparing NEAR Project to another Project
- Promote the OWS (if submitting to OWS)
2. Quality memes should:
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Use content (text, images, video, gif) to clearly communicate a complete idea or set of ideas in a humorous way
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Use new/trending language and images OR old meme images in a new, more relevant way, OR use your own found images/content that haven’t been memed yet
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Have some element of originality* (see footnote below)
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Use types of humor that may range from simple to complex - should not be so simple that it isn’t funny (unless that’s part of the humor) but should not be so complex that it’s too hard to understand (unless that’s somehow part of the humor)
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Make meaning that can either appeal to the NEAR community, those who haven’t heard of NEAR yet, or both
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Make sure any displayed information is accurate (unless some kind of dramatization or exaggeration is part of the humor)
3. Quality memes should NOT be:
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So base-level that it has no deeper meaning or cleverness to it (unless that’s part of the humor)
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Extremely illegible/unclear to the point where it’s not sufficiently communicating anything about NEAR or the related subject
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So inappropriate or offensive that it crosses the line and might be extremely offensive to someone (a little edginess is okay, just not too much)* (see footnote below)
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Actually funny… We recognize everyone has different senses of humor and different internet knowledge, so some of our guidelines are going to vary depending on who is judging or making the meme. We recognize the standard for humor is subjective. You, dear reader, can decide the quality or type of the content you want to come from your efforts to serve and engage the community. It helps to base your success in this area on the response you get from your audience.
There are some memes that are more challenging to judge than others, but hopefully these guidelines help. Of course, we are all human, so not everything we make is going to be perfect, but we can always strive to improve our content and our knowledge. Thank you for your support of Swine Guild and the legitimization of our work. Win and help win babes! Oink grunt oink, pig pig pig forever! 
*The traditional definition of an original meme is a meme that is “OC,” or “original content.” OC memes are memes that are created by the user submitting the content. While OC is easy to describe, it is more difficult to identify. At Swine Guild, we give people the benefit of the doubt when it comes to OC. If somebody steals a niche meme from a friend and tries to pass it off as OC, it is very likely we will not be able to tell. Our limitations in adjudication render a hard and fast prohibition of pirated meme material impractical. Therefore, we instead treat OC as an ethos, a moral guideline we encourage all of our collaborators to shoot for.
However, even OC memes can be considered unoriginal if the memer simply reiterates a base, boring, or overused sentiment in an unfunny or uncreative way. Other unoriginal memes include obviously stolen OC, minor changes to OC without any relevant changes to humor or semiotics (in our case, relevant to the topics we listed at the top of this post), and dead memes (memes that have been used so much to the point where it’s not anyone’s original idea anymore and it loses the humor effect it once had). Note: dead memes on can be successfully employed in ironic fashion to great effect, and judging these types of memes might be more subjective.
So clearly, there is no hard and fast rule when it comes to original vs. unoriginal memes, and ultimately the process of evaluation is a subjective one. So do as you please out there in the memesphere, but keep your target audience in mind to avoid being heckled and condemned. Take it from us, there is no more dismal fate than that of being labeled a normie.
*Avoid creating and sharing inappropriate content that might be extremely offensive or trigger someone (for example memes based on racial, sexual, religious or any other discrimination or over-sexualized/graphic/explicit content). Like we said above, edginess is okay, just be extremely aware when you’re sharing content to avoid any memes in which the joke is at someones expense for any discriminatory or inappropriate reason. Making jokes about other cryptos is fine, again, as long as it doesn’t target anyone specifically in an inappropriate manner.