In today's evolving media landscape, traditional and online media have faced a decline in influence, posing challenges for professional journalists in reaching audiences, particularly younger generations. These demographics are often vulnerable to disinformation, showing a preference for lighter, more entertaining content on social media while avoiding hard news. This study seeks to explore whether Internet memes can make hard news more appealing to young adults compared to traditional journalistic content. Conducted directly on Instagram, the research employs an experimental approach with parallel randomized AB tests through Meta Ads. It assesses the effectiveness of memes versus traditional journalism in informing social media users, measuring responses in terms of attention (views), interest (clicks for more information and time spent on content), and engagement (likes, shares, comments). The primary hypothesis suggests that presenting the same news story as an Internet meme will yield a better response. Recognizing memes as particularly favored by younger cohorts, the study compares their impact across different age groups, including Gen Z, Millennials, and non-digital natives. Additionally, it examines whether user familiarity with the content source influences behavioral responses. Sponsored content will be delivered via the AQTR account, a prominent Italian meme page that comments on daily political news. The study will include AQTR followers and users with similar socio-demographic characteristics who do not follow AQTR. To enhance reliability, the design will be replicated three times across different weeks, featuring various news/memes. In summary, this research consists of a factorial online field experiment (pre-registered) conducted on approximately 350,000 Instagram users. The data have already been collected and are currently being analyzed; the results should be available by the end of February 2024. Besides the methodological innovation, its relevance lies in the exploration of a new communication tool that can bridge the information gap among the younger generations and bring them closer to news, politics, and the public sphere in general.