We can acknowledge that the Olympics’ presence on social media was incredible during the London games, but that really wasn’t a surprise. It was to be expected, as we’ve seen how everyone goes crazy on Twitter and Facebook, responding to games and events like the Super Bowl, World Cup, and so forth.
For me, though, what was really exciting about these games was how this year’s Olympics made various images and forms of imagery viral nearly every day of competition. It wasn’t just about the best or wittiest tweets people had to say about different events, but more about how we could be creative using GIFs and memes from the games to put on Twitter, Facebook, etc. Which in turn, made social media platforms like Tumblr and Pinterest a dominant force during these past 2 weeks, which I’m completely okay with.
And it wasn’t about the best photos taken either– no one had to be a professional photographer to put together the memes that we saw during these games, and no one had to be famous in order to spread them across the social media universe. It’s something that I found to be the best part, too, because it let us, i.e., the ones watching and routing for the heroes of our countires, to find our own ways to participate in the games.
Without a doubt, it all started during the opening ceremony, with her royal majesty, Queen Elizabeth. Who could forget the world’s reaction to her grand entrance? It was only natural that her appearance aftewards would result in memes like this one, which took the Internet by storm following the opening ceremony:
I’ll be honest. I think with this, the memes surrounding American gymnast McKayla Maroney and her #notimpressed face, and the countless GIFs I came across on Tumblr of any and all of the competitions made the London ’12 Games the best of my lifetime. These images allowed all of us to connect, share, celebrate, and have a little fun with the world’s greatest sports events.
I already can’t wait for Sochi, Russia in 2014, let alone Rio in 2016.
