Culture Jamming, or sniggling, is the act of using existing mass media to comment on those very media themselves, using the original medium's communication method. It is based on the idea that advertising is little more than propaganda for established interests, and that there is little escape from this propaganda in industrialized nations. Culture jamming differs from artistic appropriation (which is done for art's sake), and from vandalism where destruction or defacement is the primary goal.
The word, "culture jamming" comes from the idea of radiojamming: that public frequencies can be pirated and subverted for independent communication, or to disrupt dominant frequencies. The Situationist International first made the comparison to radiojamming in 1968, when it proposed the use of guerrilla communication within mass media to disseminate confusion within hegemonic cultural discourse. (Kalle Lasn, the founder of AdBusters magazine, wrote a book entitled Culture Jam, but the term predates his title.)
Billboard modifications, done in the style of the original billboard.
The appropriation of corporate logos for evangelical purposes. Christian groups have appropriated the 'Cover The Earth' logo of the Sherwin-Williams paint company, and modified the Coca-Cola trademark to read, 'Jesus, he's the real thing.'
Modifying slogans to create political statements. For example "Just do it... or else!" was used as a modified slogan to comment on Nike's alleged sweat shop practices.
Google bombing, a widespread effort to purposely influence the automated association of specific keywords with results produced by internet search engines, especially Google. One practice of this has been associate the names of public figures and public institutions with humiliating and denigrating keywords, such as the phrase, 'miserable failure ,' which, when typed into Google, yields the White House biography of U.S. President George W. Bush. Also notable from the search link is what appears to be a google bomb in progress (6-7-2004) of Fahrenheit 9/11 by Michael Moore; it is the third on the google listing. Technically, this works because the hyperlink has the address of the target with the text being the keyword that the googlebomber wants to have associated with the target. An example would be Miserable Failure
The band Negativland's Dispepsi album, in which recordings related in some way to soft drinks are used to comment (in a negative way) on the beverage industry and its marketing practices.
