Mocking SpongeBob: AlTeRnAtInG cApS (2017)

In May 2017, an episode of SpongeBob SquarePants showed SpongeBob mockingly imitating Squidward by bending his body and making a chicken face. A user on Twitter paired the screenshot with text written in AlTeRnAtInG cApS to indicate a mocking tone. The format exploded.

Mocking SpongeBob became the internet’s favorite way to sarcastically repeat something someone else had said. “oH yOu ThInK yOuR oPiNiOn MaTtErS?” The format worked because it captured vocal sarcasm in pure text form — something the internet had been missing since the beginning. It was so effective that linguists began citing it as an example of how digital text evolves new grammar. A children’s cartoon accidentally gave the internet a new punctuation mark.