When the Internet isn't providing access to crucial information (Jennifer Love Hewitt is dating Jamie Kennedy? Do tell!) or dishing out hours of endless entertainment (ah, Garfield Minus Garfield, will you ever get old?), it's also ver
y effective at something else: making people feel stupid for not being aware of various pop cultural trends.
To that end, you may have seen or received a link to Greg Rutter's Definitive List of the 99 Things You Should Have Already Experienced on the Internet Unless You're a Loser or Old or Something, a pretty comprehensive list of the viral Web phenomena that have dominated the online world during the past decade or so. (Who is Greg Rutter? He's a New York ad writer, blogger and, evidently, a guy who relishes the challenge of making definitive lists.)
Some of you may read this thing and recognize every reference on here. (Many of the videos -- like the Dancing Baby and the Star Wars Kid -- are indeed pretty solidly embedded in the public consciousness.) Others may scan it and feel like a clueless loser. Or old. Or something.
But if you're a parent, you may be particularly interested in the number of kid-related features that earned a spot: more than 10, by my count. If you don't have time to peruse all of them, here are five of the more compelling child-oriented Internet Things on the list, each of which I have highlighted because they a. are slightly more obscure than some of the others, b. really funny, or c. both.
I Like Turtles
The three words guaranteed to stop a reporter's questioning right in its tracks.
Baby Breakdancer
If he had been born a few decades earlier, perhaps he, too, could have starred in "Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo."
Laughing Baby
It's exactly what it bills itself as: video of an infant giggling. But if you can watch it without smiling, it's official: you have no soul.
Bert and Ernie Rap
I always knew those two Sesame Street roommates were hardcore!
Charlie Bit Me
A baby biting his big brother? Kinda funny. When the kids are British? High-larious!
Bonus Item: Boom Goes the Dynamite
This last one doesn't have much to do with kids, really. I include it only because it's a classic, it's appropriate for college basketball season and my son recently learned how to say this phrase. Although his version is more like, "Boom goes the dynamint." Hmmm, maybe someday he too can go viral.
