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Internet Culture Quiz – Printable Version

20 multiple-choice questions with an explained answer key, ready to print.

Print the sheet (or save it as a PDF from the print window), hand it out, then mark it together using the answer page: every answer is explained. Perfect for a party, a birthday, a classroom, a care home or a team activity.

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  1. What does the abbreviation 'LOL', which appeared on 1980s forums, stand for?
    • A. Lots Of Love
    • B. Lost On Line
    • C. Laughing Out Loud
    • D. Level One Leader
  2. What was the very first video uploaded to YouTube, in April 2005?
    • A. A cat playing the piano
    • B. A film trailer
    • C. A Justin Bieber music video
    • D. A co-founder in front of the elephants at a zoo
  3. In 2014, which music video 'broke' YouTube's view counter, forcing the platform to change its code?
    • A. 'Despacito'
    • B. Justin Bieber's 'Baby'
    • C. PSY's 'Gangnam Style'
    • D. Michael Jackson's 'Thriller'
  4. Which word did the Oxford dictionary name 'word of the year' in 2013?
    • A. Hashtag
    • B. Selfie
    • C. Emoji
    • D. Streaming
  5. How much did the very first tweet in history, posted by Jack Dorsey in 2006, sell for as an NFT at auction in 2021?
    • A. About 2.9 million dollars
    • B. About 290 dollars
    • C. About 29,000 dollars
    • D. About 290 million dollars
  6. According to 'netiquette', what does a message written ENTIRELY IN CAPITALS mean?
    • A. That you are whispering
    • B. That you are shouting
    • C. That it is an official title
    • D. That you are in a hurry
  7. For whom did engineer Josh Wardle create the word game 'Wordle' in 2021, later bought by the New York Times?
    • A. His students
    • B. A competition
    • C. His partner, a word-game fan
    • D. Google
  8. Which organisation decides every year on the new emojis added to our keyboards?
    • A. Apple
    • B. The Unicode Consortium
    • C. The UN
    • D. The Académie française
  9. What does 'Godwin's law', formulated in 1990 about online discussions, state?
    • A. The longer a discussion goes on, the closer the probability of a comparison with the Nazis or Hitler gets to 1
    • B. The bigger a forum, the more polite it is
    • C. Every video eventually goes viral
    • D. One message in two is an advert
  10. Which expression, which went viral in 2019, is used by young people to end a discussion with an older person deemed out of touch?
    • A. 'Bye grandpa'
    • B. 'That's the basics'
    • C. 'OK boomer'
    • D. 'Old school'
  11. Why do we say a video 'creates a buzz'?
    • A. From an astronaut's name
    • B. From a defunct social network
    • C. From the sound of a bee, evoking a spreading hum
    • D. From a soda brand
  12. In online games, what does the abbreviation 'AFK' mean?
    • A. All Final Kills
    • B. A Friend Kept
    • C. Access Fully Killed
    • D. Away From Keyboard
  13. How much did Google pay in 2006 to buy YouTube, barely a year and a half after its creation?
    • A. $165 million
    • B. $16.5 billion
    • C. $1.65 billion
    • D. $650 million
  14. What was the name of Microsoft Office's animated paperclip, famous for its unsolicited advice in the late 1990s?
    • A. Cortana
    • B. Siri
    • C. Clippy
    • D. Bonzi
  15. In which year did Facebook introduce its famous 'Like' button?
    • A. 2004
    • B. 2009
    • C. 2012
    • D. 2006
  16. In which year was the collaborative online encyclopedia Wikipedia launched?
    • A. 1995
    • B. 1998
    • C. 2004
    • D. 2001
  17. In an online chat, what does "BRB" mean?
    • A. Bad rubbish bin
    • B. Bravo, really brilliant
    • C. Best regards, buddy
    • D. Be right back
  18. What does "URL", the address of a web page, stand for?
    • A. Universal Real Link
    • B. User Registration Login
    • C. Uniform Resource Locator
    • D. Unique Route Line
  19. What does the very first video uploaded to YouTube, in 2005, show?
    • A. A cat playing the piano
    • B. A baby bursting out laughing
    • C. A skateboard fall
    • D. A co-founder of the site in front of elephants at the zoo
  20. Online, what does the abbreviation 'TL;DR' mean?
    • A. Read later
    • B. Thanks in advance
    • C. Too long; didn't read
    • D. Dead link

Answer key — Internet Culture Quiz

  1. C. Laughing Out LoudSome people long thought it meant 'lots of love'… which led to some very awkward condolence messages.
  2. D. A co-founder in front of the elephants at a zoo'Me at the zoo' lasts 19 seconds: Jawed Karim simply explains that elephants have really, really long trunks.
  3. C. PSY's 'Gangnam Style'The counter was designed for a maximum of about 2.1 billion views, a technical limit thought unreachable.
  4. B. SelfieIts use had risen by 17,000% in a year. In French, Quebec suggests 'égoportrait'…
  5. A. About 2.9 million dollarsThe message simply read 'just setting up my twttr'. A year later, the buyer tried to resell it…
  6. B. That you are shoutingThis convention dates back to the first forums of the 1980s.
  7. C. His partner, a word-game fanThe name is a nod to his own surname. The game went from a few dozen players to millions within months, thanks to the famous coloured square grids shared on social media.
  8. B. The Unicode ConsortiumAnyone can propose an emoji, with a reasoned application. That is how, for example, the dodo and the melting face arrived.
  9. A. The longer a discussion goes on, the closer the probability of a comparison with the Nazis or Hitler gets to 1Its author, Mike Godwin, wanted to encourage people to think before making such comparisons, which trivialise history.
  10. C. 'OK boomer'It targets the baby-boom generation, born after 1945. A New Zealand MP even used it in Parliament to answer a colleague who was interrupting her.
  11. C. From the sound of a bee, evoking a spreading hum'Buzz' is the humming of insects, and then the noise of rumours.
  12. D. Away From KeyboardYou type it to warn teammates you are stepping away for a moment.
  13. C. $1.65 billionThe price seemed crazy for a loss-making site. Today it is one of the best deals in web history.
  14. C. Clippy'It looks like you're writing a letter. Would you like help?' Considered intrusive, it was removed in 2007…
  15. B. 2009It took five years for the thumbs-up to appear. It became the yardstick of popularity across the web.
  16. D. 2001Launched on 15 January 2001 by Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger, it now has tens of millions of articles in more than 300 languages.
  17. D. Be right backLike "AFK" (away from keyboard), "BRB" warns that you are stepping away for a moment.
  18. C. Uniform Resource LocatorA URL gives the protocol (https), the domain name and the page path.
  19. D. A co-founder of the site in front of elephants at the zooTitled Me at the zoo, this 19-second video shows Jawed Karim, one of YouTube's founders, at San Diego Zoo.
  20. C. Too long; didn't readPlaced before a summary, it flags the short version for those who don't have time to read everything.

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