Zynternet

About

Zynternet is a concept coined by culture writer Max Read in mid-2024 (but presaged and echoed by others), which describes a zone of largely American internet culture invested in sports betting, traditional gender roles, Zyn nicotine products, a largely apolitical worldview and media brands like Barstool Sports. Read and others have connected memes like Hawk Tuah to the Zynternet and credited online sports betting as the financial basis that supports and sustains the Zynternet as a cultural entity.

Online History

The idea of the Zynternet was coined by Max Read on his Substack^[1] "Read Max" on June 28th, 2024, in the wake of the increasing popularity of the Hawk Tuah Girl meme and the appearance of Haliey Welch on a Barstool Sports podcast episode, mirroring the appearance of the TMFINR meme woman on an earlier Barstool show in late 2023 following her viral fame. Read described the Zynternet using these terms:

Over the last ten years or so, a broad community of fratty, horndog, boorishly provocative 20- and sometimes (embarrassingly) 30-somethings--mostly but by no means entirely male--has emerged to form a newly prominent online subculture. This network is adjacent to the “sports internet” of 40something dads and the “hustle internet” of Miami crypto bullshit and the “reactionary internet” of trad influencers, but is its own distinct community with its own distinct cultural referents--college sports, gambling, light domestic beers, Zyn nicotine pouches--and influential personalities and media outlets, among them Dave Portnoy, Pat McAfee, Antonio Brown, and Call Her Daddy, in addition to dozens of minor podcasters and hey-fellow-kids content creators who nearly all work for sports-betting concerns…You could probably communicate the basic contours of this community simply by calling it “Frat Internet” or “Barstool Internet” or “Dumbass Parlay Bet Internet” or “Internet Made Up Of Guys Who Send Annoying Whiny Replies to AOC Or Whoever And When You Click On Their Profiles It’s Like 1000s Of Retweets Of Stories About The LSU Football Program.” But you don’t become one of the top 16 “Technology” newsletters on Substack by leaving neologisms like “The Zynternet” on the table.

Earlier, culture writer Ryan Broderick, in the wake of Baby Gronk and Livvy Dunne memes, sketched out a similar idea of the same increasingly influential internet, writing in his blog Garbage Day^[2] on June 7th, 2023:

It feels like, just beneath the surface of our normal base reality, there is another layer of American culture. I’ll call it Barstool reality. It’s a place where niche Instagram personalities, OnlyFans models, college athletes, and that guy Hasbulla all intersect. Everyone has the sort of bad tan you get from spending too much time on a lake boat or the golf course or at a midwestern college football tailgate. The only food you ever see is fast food or big salads. Everything is written in a font that I can only describe as Mobile Game Sans. And no one ever blinks. This reality is always trying to figure out what the new drink of the summer is -- it was White Claw, then it was ranch water, now it’s those big jugs of vodka and flavor packets, I think. That’s where this video is from. And every time a piece of content like this breaks containment everyone on Twitter loses their minds. But, honestly, all of the weirdly shiny and orange guys with zoomer middle parts wearing soft, over-sized T-shirts in these videos seem very at peace mindlessly jabbering about going to see Diplo at Red Rocks and I’m starting to think I would like to live in this world, as well.

Online Presence

The Zynternet's origins aren't strictly defined but can be dated back to the early 2010s via humor sites such as The Chive, which published bro-oriented content and nourished a broad and notable online community.^[3]

A more recent precursor and institutional home is considered to be Barstool Sports and its broad media products of associated podcasts such as Call Her Daddy, online communities and brands. Sports fans have always had a large online presence and produced memes as well (example shown below).

In 2018, the Supreme Court overturned a federal ban on sports betting in the United States after decades of prohibition, leaving it up to states to decide. In the years after this ruling, a vibrant online ecosystem for sports betting emerged, and by the mid-2020s, the practice was widespread and popular.^[4] Sportsbetting sites are the advertisers behind many Zynternet-related influencers and sites, and online discussions around the practice nourish many of the online communities that comprise the Zynternet.

Major figures in the Zynternet include Dave Portnoy, the founder of Barstool Sports, Alexandra Cooper, co-host of the Call Her Daddy podcast and h00pify (examples seen below).

Related Memes

Hawk Tuah

The Hawk Tuah Girl, also known as the Spit On That Thing Girl or Spit On That Thang Girl, refers to a woman who was interviewed in a viral TikTok video in June 2024 and was asked, "What's one move in bed that makes a man go crazy every time?" to which she responded in a Southern accent, "Oh, you gotta give him that hawk tuah and spit on that thang," resembling a spitting sound amid oral sex. Instagram user and YouTubers Tim & Dee TV posted the original video filmed in Nashville, Tennessee. The blonde girl seen with her friend was dubbed the "Hawk Tuah Girl" (sometimes written "hock tuh" or "putuh"), leading to memes, fancam edits and humorous romanticization from male internet users who found themselves attracted to her. A green-screen CapCut template also surfaced as an exploitable meme with the Hawk Tuah Girl used by meme creators who added her overtop backgrounds, inserting her into different scenarios. The phrase also inspired variants like, "If She Don't Hawk Tuah, Then I Don't Wanna Talk Tuha." The identity and name of the Hawk Tuah Girl is Haliey Welch.

Search Interest

External References