As much as I like the Amazon Firestick and Apple TV, both are missing a killer smart TV feature: the ability to easily make memes from viewed content.

Currently, if you want to make a meme from video content, you need to either screenshot the appropriate frames or capture a section of the video. This can be done somewhat easily on mobile and increasingly so on desktop, but it’s still a chore.

But if you are sitting on the couch and you see something funny on your Smart TV, the process of creating a meme is much higher friction. How likely is it that you will pull out another device, find the same content all-over again, capture it, then edit into a meme? I’m exhausted just at the thought.

Proposed Solution: “Meme It!”

Instead, what if the next time you are watching TV and you see a funny and loop-able moment like this:

Or you see a funny clip of a show like this:

You, as the user, can just speak into your smart TV remote and say “Meme It!”

Later at your convenience, you can edit the desired video into a meme using the smart TV app on your phone. By default, the previous 10 seconds of audio, video, and closed captioning text. But if you want to capture more time just say “Meme It last X seconds.”

And unlike creating memes on mobile or desktop, the “Meme It” server knows that the user is capturing media for the purpose of meme creation as opposed to capturing video or business purposes. As a result, the server can then process the video and create markers with thumbnails for each cut from one camera view to another or moments when the total count of people / entities in-frame changes.

Usages and Applications

Publishing the resulting memes to social networks is table-stakes but a few more interesting applications include:

OTT Social Network

As OTT networks continue to compete for increasingly limited disposal personal income, any strategy that increases stickiness at a lower cost than exclusive content can and should be tried in my opinion. And while I do not think an OTT social network will ever replace the dominant social networks, users could still find value in them if they are integrated into the media consumption. What that would look like would vary by platform: any Disney social features will need to be closely moderated for family friendliness while Adult Swim’s would be a much wilder and woolier place.

Meme-Based Content Discovery

Further, I wouldn’t mind browsing TV content via Memes. It is frustrating to wait and see if one likes a new TV show - maybe it gets funnier in the next episode, or maybe it doesn’t - but seeing a few of the shows greatest moments in meme format could help.

Personal Meme Wallet

Most memes are currently created for distribution in the relatively “big rooms” of social networks. As high friction as it is to create video memes right now, that makes sense in terms of the effort:reward ratio.

But as “Meme It!” drastically reduce the required work, people will create more memes, and I expect, increasingly for smaller audiences, such as families or partners. That 3 second video loop may not be funny to everyone but it might slay in your small group, especially if it was initially viewed together. To facilitate this, any memes created via “Meme It” in a “Meme Wallet” that can be accessed via iMessenger / Hangouts / Whats App / any messaging application.

Potential Blocks and Objections

Content Publishers may not like the idea of more people repurposing their content but I think this is counter-productive. Just like it is largely true that there’s no such thing as bad publicity, having content memed is free advertisement for the original piece of content.

I would go as far as to say that shows that are not memed will have much shorter lifespans than those that are. No-one who is currently 12 years old will be unaware that the TV show “The Office” exists due to the plethora of memes from the show. But “Seinfeld” is far less memed and I suspect it will fade quicker as a result.

Summary

The “Meme It!” Smart TV voice command would let smart TV users easily create memes from recently watched content. Reducing the friction of creating memes would lead to more fun memes and frankly we could all use a little more of that right now. And meme-ing video content is effectively free advertising so hopefully copyright rights holders will give this their blessing.