Listicle: 10 viral photos and videos that tried to break the internet

In 2014, Ellen DeGeneres gathered a bunch of famous faces at the Academy Awards’ seating area for a quick photo. She ended up taking the most epic group selfie of the time. Jennifer Lawrence, Julia Roberts, Meryl Streep, DeGeneres, Brad Pitt, Kevin Spacey, and Bradley Cooper (who took the photo on DeGeneres’s phone) all in one frame. She released the shot on Twitter. The internet went crazy, retweeting it more than three million times. We somehow survived.

The fashion and pop culture magazine tried so hard, their winter 2014 cover literally said, “Break the Internet”. Two covers were released. One features her in a sparkly black gown, popping Champagne that somehow lands right into the flute she’s balancing on her butt. The other has her taking off said gown, exposing a very large, very shiny butt. It was viral on all platforms, discussed on talk shows, became a meme. Kardashian mentions that her back hurt for a week. It wasn’t enough. Paper laid off its entire editorial staff earlier this year.

When a Scottish man posted a (terribly taken) photo of the sparkly bodycon dress his mother-in-law planned to wear to his wedding in 2015, he didn’t mean to start a war. Was it black-and-blue or white-and-gold? Internet users took sides, they couldn’t believe what their friends were seeing. Science nerds worked overtime to explain the optical illusion: Your brain auto-subtracts the blue wavelength if you see white and gold, apparently. The dress is blue and black. But suspicions persist.

Some time in 2016, an image of a ten-rupee note showed up online with those words scrawled on them in Hindi. No one knew Sonam or whom she had been unfaithful to. But the message quickly became touchpoint for relationship drama. Jokes were made, memes were shared. Sonam was forgotten, until she resurfaced that November. A pink ₹2,000 note, introduced after demonetisation, carried that infamous line again. And all hell broke loose.

Robert Kelly, a political science professor in South Korea, shot to fame in 2017 on a live BBC show, of all places. Mid-interview, his daughter dances into his home office, assuming he’s on a video-chat with grandpa. He stays calm. Then, his toddler, wheels in to join the party. He looks panicked. Seconds later, his nonplussed wife, Jung-a Kim, rushes in to pull the kids away and it gets even more hilarious. Who knew this is how remote-work calls would look in 2023.

Another one from Paper vault. Singh was the cover star in July 2022, shot in the nude and driving the Brown world nuts. Memes photoshopped him into Michelangelo’s The Creation of Adam. A woman lawyer in Mumbai filed an FIR, claiming that the actor had “crossed all limits”. Maybe he just wasn’t her type?

Even as the world celebrated the defeat of Donald Trump in January 2021, someone else almost stole the show during US President Joe Biden’s inauguration ceremony. Former presidential candidate Sanders, in the audience, fighting the cold in cute, fluffy mittens and a grouchy-grandpa expression, was the unplanned, uncensored moment we all needed. Sanders and his mittens were photoshopped on to everything. He fit in everywhere like a glove.

Gangnam was just a posh district in Seoul, South Korea. Then, chubby local rapper Psy (a novelty act, really) made it the title of his song, adding a catchy beat and a dance move so easy to copy, it sort of blew up in days. Clips of Psy, looking gangsta in an electric blue tuxedo, black sunglasses, bouncing on his feet like he was riding a horse were the obsession of the season. It became the first video on YouTube to hit one billion views.

A core memory from 2020, even for those who are trying hard to forget. Music producer Yashraj Mukhate took a minute-long clip from the Hindi soap, Saath Nibhana Saathiya, and gave it a sick rap beat. It’s the perfect whodunit. A livid Kokilaben interrogates her daughters-in-law about the empty pressure cooker on the stove. Gopi bahu confesses that it was the evil Rashi bahu as the beat drops. Cringe genius.

Was that Pope Francis strolling down a sunny road, looking dapper in a white Balenciaga puffer jacket in March this year? Turns out, those photos on Twitter weren’t really him, but deepfakes created by a shroom-tripping dude from Chicago. The image took no prisoners. Even Chrissy Teigen was duped. People dissed the Church for its lavish spending. Those who caught on said it was blasphemous to fool around with His Holiness. Either way, he did look quite cool, right?