The Internet has long been a resource for the circulation of humorous ideas and jokes. Countless web-sites are devoted to the collection of Internet humor, and every day e-mail crosses the world, containing the text of humorous articles, or jokes about current events.

"Internet humor" is distinguishable from "Humor on the Internet" through the concept of ownership. There are definite examples of humor restricted by copyright law on the internet; examples include the cartoons of Dilbert or the newspaper columns of Dave Barry. "Internet humor" is regarded as that which belongs to the public domain.

Internet humor may also be regarded as humor that specifically relies on characteristics belonging to the Internet, such as "geek" or "hacker" humor (i.e, humor that would not exist if not for the Internet).

Generally, this type of semi-institutionalized humor starts as a specific group's in-joke, and grows until it reaches a significant portion of Internet users, gaining popularity, "rules" and mythos.

Longstanding and widely recognized examples of such humor are:

The Computer Glossary terms at funnyemails.uni.cc Internet Humor

The Internet Oracle (formerly The Usenet Oracle) at cgi.cs.indiana.edu/~oracle/index.cgi

The Jargon file (also known as The (New) Hacker's Dictionary)

The cult of Kibology

The Darwin Awards at www.DarwinAwards.com

The Bonehead Of The Day awards at www.BoneheadOfTheDayAward.com

The Something Awful Forums at forums.somethingawful.com

The concept of authorship with regard to Internet humor is very difficult to define. Frequently a "list" type joke may get started but within a few generations of distribution it evolves beyond recognition. A classic example is the well-known "you have two cows" joke - after circulating in more primitive media throughout the 1980s, it seems to have first appeared on the Internet in 1993 with simple descriptions of communism, capitalism, and socialism. However, it was later expanded to include all forms of government, regional variations, philosophical systems, and even art movements. Attempting to define an "author" of the joke hence becomes impossible, and it becomes a publicly owned resource, simply because no one could validly claim legitimate ownership.

Though the Internet has allowed the global explosion of collectively-authored comedy, its precursors existed on bulletin boards, corporate messaging systems, and even through such low-tech mechanisms as the facsimile since at least the 1970s.

Daily jokes

The internet now has many resources where new jokes are available each day. There are literally hundreds of web pages whose authors will post a new joke or perhaps many jokes on a daily basis. Many internet users will visit the same site for their daily dose of humor. Emails containing a new joke can be subscribed to in many cases. The growing popularity of weblogs (weblog also called blog) has contributed to this. There are now many weblogs which have the sole purpose of posting new jokes regularly. Weblog readers often comment on jokes they find particularly original and amusing.

Internet forum humor

Internet forum humor somewhat differs from general Internet humor. Varying from different communities, Internet forum humor often involves image macros, Internet memes, random objects and people, and sarcasm.

Examples