Pre Internet Meme: Blinkenlights

[lumberjim]

Originally Posted by wikipedia

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This term derives from the last word of the famous blackletter-Gothic sign in mangled mock German that once graced about half the computer rooms in the English-speaking world. One version ran in its entirety as follows:

ACHTUNG!ALLES TURISTEN UND NONTEKNISCHEN LOOKENPEEPERS!DAS KOMPUTERMASCHINE IST NICHT FÜR DER GEFINGERPOKEN UND MITTENGRABEN! ODERWISE IST EASY TO SCHNAPPEN DER SPRINGENWERK, BLOWENFUSEN UND POPPENCORKEN MIT SPITZENSPARKEN.IST NICHT FÜR GEWERKEN BEI DUMMKOPFEN. DER RUBBERNECKEN SIGHTSEEREN KEEPEN DAS COTTONPICKEN HÄNDER IN DAS POCKETS MUSS.ZO RELAXEN UND WATSCHEN DER BLINKENLICHTEN.

This silliness dates back to least as far as 1955 at IBM and had already gone international by the early 1960s, when it was reported at the University of London's ATLAS computing site. There are several variants of it in circulation, some of which actually do end with the word blinkenlights.

Michael J. Preston recites the gem as being posted above photocopiers in offices as a warning not to mess with the machine in the first print reference from 1974.[2] The sign is also reported to have been seen on an electron microscope at the Cavendish Laboratory in the 1950s. Such pseudo-German parodies were common in Allied machine shops during and following World War II, and an example photocopy is shown in the Jargon File.
The Jargon File also mentions that German hackers have developed their own versions of the blinkenlights poster, in fractured English:[1]

ATTENTION
This room is fullfilled mit special electronische equippment.
Fingergrabbing and pressing the cnoeppkes from the computers is allowed for die experts only!
So all the “lefthanders” stay away and do not disturben the brainstorming von here working intelligencies.
Otherwise you will be out thrown and kicked anderswhere!
Also: please keep still and only watchen astaunished the blinkenligh

Is this the oldest meme? Or does a meme have to travel faster than that? What's the oldest internet meme?