PROPAGANDA / A CRAFT BIBLE · CHAPTER 14
Chapter 14 / 16
Memes and Remixable Forms
A meme spreads because other people remake it. You design the part that stays and the part they change.
Build a form simple enough to copy, open enough to alter, and marked enough that every version still points to your claim.
Why it works
A meme spreads through the people who remake it
Richard Dawkins named the meme in 1976: a unit of culture that spreads by copying from person to person, changing a little each time. A form that people can copy and alter spreads farther than one only you can make, because the audience carries it for you and adds their own version.
Marcus Bösch, studying a 2025 election, described participatory propaganda on short-video platforms through edits, moods, and audio memes: a sound, a cut, or a look that many users recreate. The maker does not produce every piece. The maker produces the pattern, and the audience fills it.
Marloes Geboers and Elena Pilipets described shared story patterns that spread through participation: a pattern that holds many versions because it keeps the same roles, the same enemy, and the same feeling while each person changes the surface. The claim survives the remixing because the recognizable core stays fixed.
When to use it
Use a remixable form when you want spread you cannot buy
- You want spread you cannot buy. Give the audience a form they enjoy remaking.
- You want many voices carrying one claim. Set a pattern others fill with their own examples.
- The audience already shares a format: a sound, a look, a joke shape. Build your claim into that format.
- You want the claim to survive many hands. Fix the part that must not change and open the rest.
How to do it
Design the remixable form
- Decide the recognizable core: the one line, image, sound, or shape that must stay the same in every version. This carries the claim.
- Decide the open part: the place where each person adds their own example, joke, or scene. This is what makes them want to remake it.
- Keep it simple enough to copy in minutes with what people already have. A form that is hard to make does not spread.
- Make several versions yourself first, so the audience sees the pattern and how to fill it.
- Match the format to one the audience already uses, so remaking it feels natural rather than assigned.
- Check that a remixed version still points to your claim. If the core can be dropped without breaking the form, tighten it until it cannot.
What it captures
What the meme captures
A meme captures the work and reach of the people who remake it, so the claim spreads without you. The open part captures their wish to add themselves. The fixed core captures the claim across every version, so a thousand different pieces still say the one thing you set.
Read the studies