Almost a year ago, I took the reins as co-host of ICYMI. I’d been covering internet culture on and off for 10 years, and my brain was filled with some of the most unexpected—and unnecessary—facts. I know the names of all of Trisha Paytas’ children, for instance, and what Grumpy Cat’s fur felt like. I’ve had dinner in Caroline Calloway’s West Village apartment and am on an email basis with Club Chalamet.
I was prepared for my new role to be filled with similarly ridiculous internet antics. But this year, things were different. That’s not to say there weren’t antics (trying MomTok’s favorite “dirty soda” live on mic and calling in an exhausted teacher to explain “six-seven” come to mind), but they were no longer the norm. They were a reprieve.
From my very first episode, we were dealing with a changed world. Donald Trump had been elected as president for the second time, and we were watching everything we thought we knew about American politics and culture rapidly unravel. The internet changed too. It’s not just a crucial part of how we process the world it is the world, and that made the task of covering it on ICYMI even more significant.
Everything we need to understand about what happened IRL this year is explained by what happened online. In today’s episode of ICYMI, internet culture reporter Kat Tenbarge and I talk through the most important online moments of 2025. Here are the first five:
The TikTok Ban That Never Was
After the Supreme Court in 2024 upheld the decision to ban TikTok, the app finally went down on Jan. 19, 2025. And then, less than 15 hours later, it was up again but no one was celebrating. Returning users were greeted with this message: “Welcome back! Thanks for your patience and support. As a result of President Trump’s efforts, TikTok is back in the U.S.!” Trump had not yet been sworn in for a second term, but this message was a clear sign that this time things would be different. TikTok was just the first of many major apps and tech companies who would publicly align themselves with Trump, complying with his agenda in advance by loosening restrictions on hate speech, for instance, or donating to his inauguration fund. These digital town squares were no longer for the people but openly under the discretion of Trump’s agenda.
Adolescence Unmasking the Manosphere
To be clear, journalists have for years been raising the alarm about the manosphere (the online communities that radicalize young men against women and toward male supremacy). But when the limited series Adolescence premiered on Netflix on March 13, the conversation finally went mainstream. It tells the story of Jamie (Owen Cooper), whose arrest on suspicion of killing his female classmate appears wrongful until his father (Stephen Graham) and the police learn more about his online activity. The series is powerful in not just its performances but the way it illustrates how young men can fall prey to this rhetoric in private without anyone, not even their parents, noticing in public. The series didn’t just draw 24.3 million viewers in its first week it also appears to have inspired England to introduce training for teachers to help spot misogyny in the classroom and a scheme to send high-risk pupils on behavioral courses.
