The History of Nyan Cat

Do you remember the glorious days early 00s internet? When YouTube was not run by google and MySpace was the number one hit social site, times seemed more straightforward. The Internet was young, and it did not take much to entertain us for hours on end. This was the prime time for us to take the first step into the emerging meme culture, and cats were already established as the prime candidate for kings of the internet. Nobody knows why but it seems that cats have always been on the web, and people always loved them. Maybe it's because they're cute. Therefore, I want to share an actual part of internet history with you that some of the younger viewers may be witnessing for the first time – Nyan Cat.

What is Nyan Cat?

Nyan Cat is the name of a YouTube video that became an internet meme after being uploaded in April 2011. A Japanese pop song was combined with an animated cartoon cat and a Pop-Tart for a torso floating through space and leaving a rainbow trail behind in this video. The video came in fifth place on the list of the most popular YouTube videos in 2011.

Christopher Torres, 25, of Dallas, Texas, who goes by the pseudonym "prguitarman," posted the cat's GIF animation on his website LOL-Comics on April 2, 2011. "I was doing a donation campaign for the Red Cross and in-between drawings in my Livestream video chat, two different people remarked I should draw a 'Pop Tart' and a 'cat," Torres explained in an interview. In reaction, he produced a hybrid image of a Pop-Tart and a cat, which he turned into an animated GIF a few days later. Marty, Torres' pet cat, died in November 2012 from feline infectious peritonitis, which informed the creation of Nyan Cat.

The Song

On July 25, 2010, user "daniwell" uploaded the original version of the song "Nyanyanyanyanyanyanya!" to the Japanese video site Niconico. Hatsune Miku, a virtual singer from Vocaloid, is featured in the song. The Japanese term Nyan is onomatopoeic, meaning "meow," and it imitates a cat's sound. On January 30, 2011, a user known as "Momomo" uploaded a cover of "Nyanyanyanyanyanyanyanya!" featuring UTAU voice Momone Momo. Momoko Fujimoto, a Tokyo-based Japanese woman, was the vocal source for the Momone Momo character.

YouTube

On April 5, 2011, YouTube user "saraj00n," whose real name is Sara June, merged the cat animation with the "Momomo" version of the song "Nyanyanyanyanyanyanya!" and uploaded it on YouTube, giving it the label "Nyan Cat," three days after Torres had uploaded his animation. After being featured on websites like G4 and CollegeHumor, the film quickly became a hit. "Its original name was Pop Tart Cat, and I will continue to call it that," Christopher Torres stated, "but the Internet has decided to name it Nyan Cat, and I'm delighted with that choice as well." Means TV, a worker-owned video streaming service, took ownership of the YouTube account holding the original Nyan Cat video in March 2019. However, as of 2020, the channel's name has been altered to simply "Nyan Cat," and all Means TV material has been erased.

The Fame and Profit

With 7.2 million total views, the Nyan Cat music video was ranked ninth in Business Insider's top ten viral videos of April 2011. As of August 5, 2020, the original YouTube video had over 180 million views. Nyan Cat won the Webby Award for "Meme of the Year" in 2012. Many additional remixes and cover versions have been created due to the video's popularity, some of which are several hours long. There are also ringtones, wallpapers, and applications available for Windows, iPhone, iPad, Symbian, Android, Windows Phone, and HP WebOS, among other operating systems and devices. 21st Street Games' "Nyan Cat Adventure" is an officially licenced game. In January 2014, an officially sanctioned cryptocurrency called "Nyancoin" was created with the domain name nyanco.in, later nyan-coin.org. Chris Torres, the gif's original developer, made an upgraded version in February 2021 and sold it as a non-fungible token for 300 Ether, equal to $587,000 USD at the time.

I don't know about you, but writing this post has brought back some fond memories. I find myself waking up weekly with new viral content that, unfortunately, I struggle to keep up with. Nyan Cat represents a particular time in our cyber history, and it made way for more incredible things in meme culture. If this is the first time you have witnessed Nyan Cat, then you're welcome – it is a treasure that needs to be kept safe. It has gone through tremendous changes and continues to fight the test of time. Whatever the next meme will be, nothing will ever come close to the influence, and cuteness, of Nyan Cat.

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