Welcome to the Internet - Identity, playfulness and conspiracies on the borders of the Web

Abstract

The Internet (as opposed to the Web), is the most peripheral area of the Web, composed by a series of websites dedicated to illegal activities (from piracy to hacking), but also by numerous social networks such as 4chan, the website where the Anonymous group of hacktivists was born. These websites feature all of the characteristics that Lotman attributes to the periphery of the semiosphere: they are extremely productive (in particular they are active in the creation of Internet meme), strongly self-aware, and able to describe themselves (due to their closeness to the boundary) and are situated in a marked opposition towards the centre. This paper aims at investigating this area of the Web, using as staring point the different economies of the Web, with the help of several “memes”, among which a text that is a true constitution of the Internet: the meme The Rules of the Internet. A selection of these rules – together with other memes – will be a valid support to address three questions of particular importance, that are: identity, playfulness and masking on the Internet.