I’ve been seeing memes like the one above circulating around Facebook and I thought I’d explain how they work. I’m sorry if I’m bursting any bubbles by explaining this, but no—your cell phone doesn’t really have a name. 

The secret to the meme is a little hack in Facebook’s commenting and reply system. When normally tagging someone in a Facebook post, the user types “@Firstname Lastname” to find the user. This little trick—and others like it—instructs Facebook to look up the user mentioned in the @reply by a profile’s identification number, resulting in the name of a random Facebook user when you type in the code. 

Thanks to a variety of factors the presence of all kinds of memes has exploded on Facebook—if you’ve noticed an upswing in cute baby animal pictures, politically charged sentiments and funny gags on your feed, you’re not alone nor are you going crazy. Facebook has become a place where media can go viral. It’s a departure from the way Facebook photos and photo albums were used when the service first started—it’s definitely not solely for baby pictures and college exploits anymore. 

Filed Under: Lollipop Lollipop 

Just in time for Halloween, Take This Lollipop uses the Facebook API to create a horrifying and disturbing experience that you shouldn’t watch alone—or in the dark. 

(Source: carlovely)