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New entries added to the Internet Meme Database

08/18/13--16:21: Mah Nigga

About

Mah Nigga is a reaction image used to express agreement with someone.

Origin

The phrase originates from the 2001 film, Training Day. The film is about two LAPD narcotics detectives who enforce the law in the ganglands of Los Angeles. At one point in the film, Denzel Washington’s character and Ethan Hawke’s character are in a car, and are having a conversation about something. During the conversation, Washington’s character says to Hawke’s character, “Mah Nigga,” and puts what appears to be a marijuana joint in his mouth.

Spread

It is unknown where the meme first began to take off, however, according to Google Insights, the meme first surfaced around February 2012.

Search Interest

03/14/15--13:17: /r9k/

About

/r9k/ is a forum dedicated to anonymous sharing of personal anecdotes on the image board site 4chan. The /r9k/ community is most well-known for its greentext stories that antagonize social norms and celebrate singledom.

History

In 2008, /r9k/ was first introduced as an experimental forum powered by Robot9000, a special script programmed by xkcd artist Randall Munroe that would filter reposts from showing up. The purpose of the experiment was to see if a board could develop its own subculture if memes and copypasta were heavily discouraged. However, as the community evolved, the board transformed into a sharehub for greentext stories, or original anecdotes of social awkwardness or mishaps as told by users who refer to themselves as “robots.” On January 17th, 2011, /r9k/ was then deleted as it no longer served its original purpose^[2], but on November 10th, the board^[3] was resurrected, followed by the removal of the Robot9000 script altogether on July 30th, 2014.

Highlights

The board is famous for its stories of social awkwardness and nostalgia of the simpler times, as well as discussion of abnormal social behaviour. It is heavily used by NEETs^[4] (Not in Education, Employment, or Training) who regret their life decisions and hold anger and disdain over males with active social and sexual lifes. it also containts Constant discussions about relationships with females and family. Dispite all of this, the board holds heavy pride in its own nature, with heavy hate over normies or “Normalfags” who do not understand their culture as well as constant calls for a “Beta Uprising”. this has spawned different memes.

Spaghetti Stories

Spaghetti Stories refers to a series of greentext copypastas that recall socially awkward moments, mostly with females, that always end up with the protagonists having spaghetti falling out of his pockets, r9k consists of a lot of these stories

Normies

Normies or Normalfags is a term used by Robots to refer to individuals who in their eyes are deemed as traditionalist or boring, normally the stereotype of a socially active and fitting person that easily blend with society, being the archetype of hipsters.

Tendies Stories

Tendies Stories are green text stories featuring a twenty-something man who lives at his mother’s home and constantly demands “tendies” (chicken tenders) in exchange for “good boy points” he has earned by doing chores and taking care of himself. The stories are often accompanied by images of Smug Pepe.

Angry Pepe

Angry Pepe is a reaction image commonly used on r9k that features a hostile-looking version of pepe the frog which is commonly accompanied by expressions of rage and frustation.

its commonly used in r9k to express hate against Normies, and its accompanied by the expression “REEEEEEEE” to signify hostility.

Search Interest

External References

^[1]xkcd – ROBOT9000 and #xkcd-signal: Attacking Noise in Chat

^[2]Wikipedia – 4chan

^[3]Tanasinn – Complete History of 4chan

^[4]Wikipedia – NEET

09/20/11--11:54: Warhammer 40k

About

Warhammer 40,000 (a.k.a. Warhammer 40K, WH40K or simply 40K) is a tabletop miniature wargame produced by Games Workshop^[1], set in a dystopian science fantasy universe of the 41st millennium.

History

The game was created by Rick Priestley and Andy Chambers in 1987 as the futuristic companion to Warhammer Fantasy Battle, sharing many game mechanics. Expansions for Warhammer 40K are released from time to time which give rules for urban skirmishes, planetary siege, and large-scale combat. As of 2013, the game is at its sixth edition, which was published in 2012. The background and playing rules of the game’s factions are covered in the game’s rule books and supplemental army ‘Codexes’, along with articles in the Games Workshop magazines, White Dwarf^[2] and Imperial Armour^[3].

In Popular culture

The game has become widespread due to the fatalistic and bloody nature of the game, being the prime example of grimdark. It is common for such things as entire solar systems being eaten by evil gods, or daemons to consume the minds of psychic humans. The game is sometimes made fun of it’s nature, due to being so over the top.

The game has an expansive universe, prompting hundreds of books based on the universe, most notably by a company named Black Library^[4], and a fair share of video games, mostly made by Relic Entertainment^[5].

Presence Online

The franchise has a large presence on the Internet. There are many forums devoted to it including 40KForums^[8], DakkaDakka^[9], Warseer^[10], and 4chan’s /tg/ board. Over the years, tons of fanon have been created, from fan-created characters, to the entire chapters of Space Marines. There is a Wiki^[11] specifically dedicated to it. Much of the fanon can be found at 1d4chan^[12], which also details the lore behind the many factions of the series and discusses several strategies that players can employ. Fans of the franchise are traditionally very devoted, and huge amounts of fan fiction and fan art can be found in various sites, such as DeviantArt^[6].

Sub-memes

Metal Bawkses

“METALBAWKSES!” a catchphrase spawned from the video game “Dawn of War: Soulstorm”. It is said during an assault on the stronghold of the Blood Ravens chapter of Space Marines when playing the Chaos Space Marines. In a cutscene describing the Blood Raven’s use of “Rhino” Armored Transports, the Chaos Lord refers to them as “metal boxes”. However, due to the nature of Dawn of War voice acting, it is often spelled as it sounds: METALBAWKSES.

Spess Mehrens

Another voice acting joke from Dawn of War: Soulstorm, “SPESSMEHRENS” refers to the leader of the Blood Ravens chapter of Space Marines. When the stronghold of the team is attacked, a cutscene occurs in which the Force Commander, Indrick Boreale, delivers a “rousing” speech. However, because of the odd accent Boreale was given, his words come off oddly pronounced with unusual emphasis.

“Blood For The Blood God!”

“BLOODFORTHEBLOODGOD! SKULLSFORTHESKULLTHRONE!” is an extremely common battlecry amongst the Chaos Space Marines faction. The phrase roots itself at one of the Four Gods of Chaos, Khorne. Khorne is the God of War, Murder, Anger, Hate, and general Bloodshed, hence blood for the blood god. His private realm in the Warp is said to be filled with rivers of blood and that he sits upon a throne of skulls, made from all who die in battle, hence, Skulls For The Skull Throne.

Heresy

In the game, Humanity has come to worship The Emperor of Mankind, who led the Great Crusade to restore humanity to the stars, as a one true god. The violent nature of the universe, coupled with blind faith, has led to a church rule of mankind. As a result, Heresy and blasphemy are the worst crimes a person can commit. It is common for “Heretics” to be used as living fuel, burned alive, have their soul shredded, or as the case is on the battlefield, summarily executed.

Ursarkar E. Creed

Ursarkar E. Creed (more commonly known as Creed) is the leader of the Imperial forces of Cadia. He is known for having a unique rule called “Tactical Genius”. The rule allows him to infiltrate nearly any unit under the Scout-Special Rule. However, many of the things he can infiltrate make no logical sense, such as divisions of vehicles, Titans, and many other things. The cry “It must have taken some sort of tactical genius-CREEEEED!” comes from a combination of the name of the rule, along with a piece of fan fiction^[7].

Angry Marines

The Angry Marines are a popular custom army created by 4chan’s /tg/ (Traditional Games) board. The chapter members are known their red trimmed, bright yellow armor, unorthodox fighting style, and being constantly angry. Their battlecry is “ALWAYS ANGRY! ALLTHETIME!”. Lots of fanon have been created around this chapter^[13].

Other

Just as Planned / Not as Planned– a phrase associated with everything being a plot by Tzeentch, which involves lots of dickery and nasty trolling.
Drive Me Closer! I Want To Hit Them With My Sword!– originates from a picture of a Commissar in a Leman Russ Battle Tank holding his sword high, mocking the fact that in a setting with tanks and machine guns, people still try to charge the enemy to hit them with a sword
The Emperor Protects– a popular quote, showing The Emperor’s godlike authority in the Imperium.
More Dakka– “Dakka” is an Ork term for high rate of fire. Often used in pictures with gigantic rapid-fire weapons.
WAAAGH!– the Ork word for war. Its a word that in order to say properly must be shouted. The word gains more power the more orks shout it.
Red Ones Go Fasta!– Orks have a strong belief that a red vehicle moves faster than one that isn’t. This being Orks, this is true for them. It is considered comedic because it doesn’t make logical sense.
Thin Your Paints– an advice to novice painters to avoid obscuring model details with globs of paint. A formulation of 60-66% paint 40-33% water is optimal.
Extra Heretical– often aimed at an example of extreme heresy.
“Ere we go, ’ere we go, ’ere we go!”– can often be heard at Warhammer 40,000 tournaments, particularly when an Ork player is doing well, but also as a sort of general rallying cry for the entire hobby.
Matt Ward– One of the codex writers for 40K. His codexes are infamously known to be broken in the metagame due to ludicrously overpowered rulesets and bastardization of lore.
Bloody Magpies– a fan nickname for Blood Ravens, who have a reputation of stealing (getting “gifted”) various wargear, relics and anything that isn’t bolted down.
Abaddon the Armless Failure / Failbaddon– started from a picture of Abaddon’s miniature with its arm parts missing and the fact that he started 13 black crusades and still hasn’t managed to destroy the Imperium.
Exterminatus– Similar to “HERESY!” or “Orbital bombardment: It’s the only way to be sure.”. It’s a reaction image/phrase to signify one’s extreme hate or dislike to something that you want it destroyed and obliterated from the face of the planet.

Search Interest

External Links

^[1]Games Workshop – Official Website

^[2]Wikipedia – White Dwarf magazine

^[3]Wikipedia – Imperial Armour

^[4]Black Library – Official Website

^[5]Relic Games – Official Website

^[6]DeviantArt – Warhammer 40K

^[7]1d4chan – Creed.

^[8]40KForums – Home Page

^[9]DakkaDakka – Main Page

^[10]WarSeer – Forums

^[11]Warhammer 40K Fanon Wiki – Main Page

^[12]1d4chan – Main Page

^[13]1d4chan – Angry Marines

07/14/16--07:46: The Nutshack

About

The Nutshack is an American animated sitcom which aired on Myx TV in the United States and Myx in the Philippines. The first animated series geared towards a Filipino American audience, the show received negative reception and is known for its poor quality, juvenile humor, and repetitive theme song. The show gained a minor recognition after the end of GiIvasunnerARG,^[4] along with an ironic fandom after the ARG.

History

The Nutshack was created by Ramon Lopez & Jesse Hernandez. It was the first animated televsion series aimed at a Filipino-American audience. It first aired in 2007, with its second season airing in 2011. The show follows Filipino American San Francisco native Phil, whose cousin Jack flies in from the Philippines to live with him in the Tenderloin district of the city.^[1]

Reception

The show received negative reviews from critics and is widely considered the worst animated series ever produced, with a 1.4/10 rating on iMDB from 101 users. Many online reviewers such as Pan-Pizza and The Mysterious Mr. Enter have voiced their disapproval of the show, with the latter describing it as the worst cartoon of the 2000s.^[3]

Related Memes

The Nutshack Theme

The Nutshack Theme refers to edits of and videos that use clips from the Nutshack’s opening theme. They often are word replacement remixes, videos where certain words or other aspects of a video are replaced with other things.

Search Interest

External References

^[1]Wikipedia – The Nutshack

^[2]IMDb – The Nutshack

^[3]Youtube – Top 10 Worst Cartoons of the 2000’s

^[4]Wikipedia – ARG

09/16/15--14:17: Pokémon GO

About

Pokémon GO is an augmented reality game for mobile devices developed and published by Niantic in which the player can capture, train and battle digital avatars of Pokémon characters in real-world locations using a GPS-enabled and camera-equipped smartphone. Upon its release in July 2016, Pokémon GO quickly became one of the most downloaded mobile apps to be ever released.

History

The concept for the game was originally conceived by Satoru Iwata of Nintendo and Tsunekazu Ishihara of The Pokémon Company as an April Fools’ Day collaboration with Google Maps^[8], which released a Pokémon-themed easter egg update for its mobile app under the name “Pokemon Challenge” on April 1st, 2014. The limited time-only feature allowed Google Maps users to track and capture virtual Pokémon characters using the smartphone’s GPS technology.

Release

On July 6th, 2016, Pokémon GO was officially released for iPhone and Android device users in the United States, Australia, New Zealand and Japan, followed by its release across Canada and Europe between July 13th and July 17th (with the exception of France) and in Japan on July 22nd. The game was made available in France on July 24th, followed by Hong Kong on July 25th.

#PokemonGO is now available in the US! Who’s ready to catch Pokémon in the real world? https://t.co/9S8QGxxJfy https://t.co/qkk73DXb5b
— Pokémon (@Pokemon) July 7, 2016

Official Teams

During the San Diego Comic-Con held on July 24th, 2016, Niantic Labs introduced the three leaders for the Pokémon GO teams: For Team Valor, the character Candela was revealed, who is depicted wearing a white jacket with red accents (shown below, left); for Team Mystic, a character named Blanche wearing a blue trenchcoat was announced (shown below, middle); for Team Instinct, the character Spark was unveiled, wearing a gold-colored hoodie and black jacket (shown below, right).

Immediately after they were announced, various fan illustrations of the characters began appearing on Twitter and Tumblr (shown below). In many of the depictions, Candela and Blanche are often shown as a mature pairing, while Spark is portrayed as an obnoxious meme enthusiast. In the coming days, several news sites published articles about the online reaction to the team leaders, including Kotaku,^[31] Dorkly^[32] and The Verge.^[33]

Reception

Pre-release

On September 9th, 2015, the The Official Pokémon Channel YouTube channel released a trailer for Pokémon GO, featuring live-action footage of young people interacting with augmented reality Pokémon characters with their mobile devices (shown below). Within one week, the video gained over 13.6 million views.

It was revealed that the game was slated for release in 2016 along with the Pokémon Go Plus, a wearable device that connects to a smart phone using Bluetooth and sends notifications when a virtual Pokémon is nearby.

The same day, several posts about the announcement trailer reached the front page of Reddit, including submissions on the /r/pokemon,^[1] /r/android^[2] and /r/gaming^[3] subreddits. On September 10th, a 4chan user replied to a thread about the game joking about threatening kids with violence to obtain their rare Pokémon (shown below). That day, a screenshot of the reply was posted in the /r/pokemon^[6] subreddit, where it received upwards of 5,400 votes (96% upvoted) in the first six days.

On September 14th, Tumblr user delacroix911^[5] posted a web comic in which a Pokémon Go player battles Pope Francis at the Vatican in Italy for the Pokémon Arceus (shown below). That day, Redditor Doomherald3000 reposted the comic on the /r/pokemon^[4] subreddit. Within 48 hours, the Tumblr post gathered more than 42,600 notes and the Reddit post received over 5,100 votes (94% upvoted).

Release

Within the first 24 hours of its release, Pokémon GO topped the “top grossing” and “free” mobile app charts on Apple’s App Store, while Google estimated that the Android version of the game was downloaded between 50,000 and 100,000 times. Meanwhile, the mobile game itself has been largely met with lukewarm reviews from the fans of the Pokémon video game franchise, with the users of Nintendo Life giving it an average score of 6.6 out of 10 and a Metacritic rating of 5.7 out of 10 based on 26 user reviews. By July 11th, five days after its release, the Android version of the mobile game app had been downloaded more times than popular online dating app Tinder, while its daily active users had measured up to par with that of Twitter, according to web analytics firm SimilarWeb. Within one week of release, the game became the most downloaded app of all time on Apple’s App Store, with over 10 million downloads. By July 26th, the game had been downloaded an estimated 75 million times worldwide and generated upwards of $75 million, with approximately $1.6 million per day from iOS users.^[34]

Technical Issues

Due to the sudden and massive influx of people attempting to download and play the game at the same, the launch of the game was also marred by several technical issues, including login problems, server outages, in-game glitches, heavy battery usage and unexplained crashes, which led many users to take their grievances to the social media.

Commercial Impact

A day after the game’s release on July 7th, Nintendo’s share price rose 10%, and continued to 50% by the following week. By July 22nd, Nintendo had accumulated $17.6 billion in market capitalization. That day, Nintendo released a statement^[35] pointing out that they did not make or own Pokémon Go, and that the game was “developed and distributed by Niantic, Inc.” Following the release of the statement, Nintendo’s share prices dropped 17%.^[36]

Fandom

Professor Willow

That day, many internet users began posting about the in-game character Professor Willow, with many noting that they found him physically attractive (shown below). Additionally, the tech news blog The Verge^[13] published an article titled “Who is Pokémon Go’s Professor Willow and why is he such a daddy?”

In-Game Screenshots

Meanwhile, Redditor ReallyBadCafe posted an in-game screenshot of a Magikarp found on a frying pan in a kitchen in Pokémon GO to the /r/pokemon^[12] subreddit (shown below, left). On July 7th, Redditor kbzero submitted a screenshot of a Diglett Pokémon rising out of a toilet in the game’s augmented reality viewfinder to /r/pokemon^[10] (shown below, middle). Meanwhile, Redditor wastedjoel posted a picture of the Pokemon Gastly discovered in a hospital room in the game to /r/funny^[11] (shown below, right).

DABIRDINDANORF

DABIRDINDANORF, also known as The Bird in the North, is a catchphrase used by some members of the Pokémon GO Mystic team to identify each others. The slogan originated from a crossover ode to the Game of Thrones and Pokémon universes on Reddit’s /r/PokemonGo community in July 2016.

Controversies

Public Safety

The real-life exploratory nature of the game has also raised some safety concerns and incidents in various regions.

On launch day, a Northern Territory police station in Australia issued a statement via its Facebook page advising the public that players do not need to enter the Darwin Police Station in order to capture the Pokemon stationed near the site.

Incidents

On July 8th, Shayla Wiggins, a 19-year-old teenager and resident of Riverton, Wyoming, inadvertently discovered a dead body floating in a river while using the app to try to catch a Water-type Pokémon, prompting a local police investigation.

On July 9th, Gabriel Loyola, a resident of Holland Township, Michigan, found a female driver unconscious behind the wheels at a cross section while playing Pokemon Go on his smartphone in the area. Upon arriving at the scene, the police investigators arrested the woman in the car after determining that she had passed out in the car under the influence of alcohol.

On July 10th, four Missouri teenagers ranging from age 16 to 18 were arrested by police in St. Louis on charges of robbery for allegedly using the game’s “beacon” feature to lure in unsuspecting Pokemon Go players to a specific location

On July 11th, a Virginia woman filed a police report after three male teenagers on bicycle stole her cell phone while she was playing Pokemon GO.

On July 12th, several University of Maryland students were robbed by an unknown assailant while playing the game, prompting the University of Maryland Police Department to issue a public statement with a list of safety tips for the campus residents.

On July 13th, two men in their early 20s were rescued by firefighters after falling from a sandstone bluff while playing the game in Encinitas, California. According to San Diego County Sheriff’s Department, they had crossed over a fence in order to capture a Pokemon near the edge of the cliff, unaware of the signs that said “No Trespassing” and “Do Not Cross.”

On July 13th, David Wallace and his friend were robbed and carjacked at gunpoint while driving around after work to play the game near Lone Oak Park in Antelope, California. According to the local news reports, the gunman took their cellphones, cash and fled the scene in Wallace’s SUV.

On July 16th, two teenagers were shot at by a 37-year old man after being mistaken for burglars while driving around a residential neighborhood to play the game after midnight in Palm Coast, Florida. According to the police, the man decided to investigate a suspicious vehicle parked right outside of his home at around 1:30 a.m., and upon confronting them with a gun, the teenagers fled the scene, at which point he fired several rounds at the vehicle.

Terms of Service

On July 14th, The Consumerist^[18] reported on the app’s terms of service (ToS), which includes a clause stating that the user gives up any right to sue Niantic Labs or to take part in a class action lawsuit for any reason. As the article writes, in cases like a large data breach where many people would have reason to mount a lawsuit “rather than have to answer for the totality of the error, the company would only have to face those few users who take the time -- and have the resources -- to bring a case before an arbitrator.” Users may opt out of the arbitration clause, but must do so by direct email within 30 days of creating their account.^[19]

Search Interest

External References

^[1]Reddit – Pokemon Go announced

^[2]Reddit – Pokemon Go coming to Android in 2016

^[3]Reddit – Pokemon Go coming to Android and iOS in 2016

^[4]Reddit – Pokemon Go will bring the best quests for Pokemon!

^[5]Tumblr – delacroix911

^[6]Reddit – With the new Pokemon Go game 4chan user has a scary idea

^[7]Reddit – /r/pokemongo

^[8]Google Maps Blog – April 1st Google Maps Pokemon Feature

^[9]Wikipedia – John Hanke

^[10]Reddit – The wonders of Pokemon Go

^[11]Reddit – Playing Pokemon Go in hospital

^[12]Reddit – Just started playing Pokemon GO

^[13]The Verge – Who is Pokemon Gos Professor Willow

^[14]Metacritic – Pokemon GO

^[15]IGN– Pokemon GO

^[16]Nintendo Insider – Pokemon GO

^[17]Forbes – The Five Biggest Problems with Pokemon GO

^[18]The Consumerist – Pokémon Go Strips Users Of Their Legal Rights; Here’s How To Opt Out

^[19]Boing Boing – Pokemon Go players: you have 30 days from signup to opt out of binding arbitration

^[20]County 10 – Sheriff: No foul play suspected in this morning’s river death

^[21]NBC4i – Pokemon Go player finds unconscious woman behind the wheel

^[22]Facebook – O’Fallon Missouri Police Department

^[23]CBS6 – Pokemon GO crime: Teens take Richmond woman’s phone

^[24]University of Maryland Police Department – Update to 7/12/16 Armed Robbery Incidents on Campus

^[25]LA Times – 2 California men fall off edge of ocean bluff while playing ‘Pokemon Go’

^[26]LA Times – Two men reportedly robbed and carjacked while playing ‘Pokemon Go’ at Northern California park

^[27]Orlando Sentinel – Deputies: Man shot at teens playing ‘Pokemon Go’

^[28]Facebook – Northern Territory Police, Fire and Emergency Services’ Post

^[29]Rolling Stone – Is ‘Pokemon Go’ Really Driving a Crime Wave?

^[30]NPR– Holocaust Museum, Arlington National Cemetery Plead: No Pokémon

^[31]Kotaku – The Internet Reacts To Pokémon Go’s Team Leaders

^[32]Dorkly – 20 Hilarious Internet Reactions to Pokemon Go’s New Team Leaders

^[33]The Verge – Everyones making fun of Pokémon Gos Team Instinct leader

^[34]Wall Street Journal – Pokémon Go May Leave Rivals Hunting for Gamers Attention

^[35]Nintendo – Notice Regarding the Impact of Pokémon GO

^[36]The Guardian – Nintendo shares plummet after it points out it doesn’t make Pokémon Go

12/20/11--16:59: 9gag

About

9gag is a meme-sharing website set in Hong Kong but hosted in the United States. It was launched in 2008. The site’s content is mainly a common repetition of many popular memes; most commonly rage comics. The site uses the same style of image sharing that sites such as 4chan, reddit, and Funnyjunk do, but allows people to post with their Facebook accounts, and has a “like” system (similar to those found on reddit and Funnyjunk) on individual posts. 9gag is infamous on the Internet due to allegations of stealing content from other sites. It is also known as being a scapegoat for the various escapades of /b/ and Anonymous, similar to Ebaumsworld.

The 9 Rules of 9GAG

There are certain rules 9GAG strictly enforces which resemble both “The Rules of the Internet” and forum rules.
1. 9GAG is just for FUN.
2. 9GAG is JUST for fun.
3. Get Involved.
4. If you’re funny, you get Likes.
5. Play Nice.
6. Respect originality and creativity.
7. Moderate your content.
8. No repost.
9. Report Abuse.

Traffic

9gag “Memes”

9gaggers, in response to allegations that their site only steals existing memes, have begun an effort to bring their own memes to light. The main three are: Sad Frogman / Sad Bear Guy,The name is: Tadá! and If you know what I mean, Mr. Bean. These are for the most part only used on 9gag, although they have seen some spread beyond it via Facebook.

Feud with 4chan

In late 2011, 9gag came into conflict with users of 4chan. The conflict was provoked by 9gag users claiming to be the creators of memes originating on 4chan. 9gaggers also began referring to themselves as a “legion”, which was a blatant copy of Anonymous. The noticeable watermark at the bottom of every image taken from 9gag was also a factor, as it implied that 9gag had created the image.

Operation: 9gag

^[1]

On December 21st, 2011 4chan members, furious over 9gag’s antics, planned a raid on the website. The planned raid included the posting of gore, porn and other such materials to the newest uploads section of the website, while another team was to perform DDoS attacks on the web server. 9gag, hearing of the attack, was quick to retaliate, forming what they called “The 9gag army”. They responded to 4chan’s threat with the following message: “The 9gag army is coming for you 4chan.” This only further angered the 4chan members. Many threads appeared on /b/ to spur on the operation. On 9gag, multiple posts went up in defense of themselves.

Operation Deepthroat

^[2]
On December 20th, 2011, one day before the raid, 4chan members launched another op, known as Operation Deepthroat. The operation was to be a three part take down plan, involving some of the largest memetic sites on the internet: reddit, tumblr, and funnyjunk. Within hours, the message had been spread all across the 4 participating websites.

The Raid

On December 20th, the raid officially started. Hundreds of fake accounts took to the newest uploads section, uploading gore and pornography, some of it involving children. Each entry was quickly downvoted, and then removed by the moderators. However, for as fast as the moderators could work, posts continued to fill up the newest uploads page, until they ultimately had to shut down all site services, including voting, new account creation, commenting, submitting content, and viewing the newest uploads. This period of high alert lasted for over 40 hours, well into the specified raid day.
Meanwhile, as the spam raid continued, the clock had struck midnight on the 20th, signaling the beginning of the DDoS attacks. The attacks had already begun earlier on the 20th, but not to full effect. Within hours, 9gag was knocked offline in some areas, for unknown amounts of time. For several locations, 9gag was unreachable, and in other places, unusably slow. However, many servers continued to function, preventing the massive black-out the op had intended.

^[4]

9gag’s Retaliation

Nearly a day before the 4chan raid, 9gag had discovered their intentions through several posts that had surfaced on the website’s “Hot page”. The posts were in fact, set up by 4chan users, in an attempt to confuse 9gaggers. One such post was apparently written by a 4chan member acting as a 9gag member, inciting a DDoS attack on 4chan. However, the coordinates given to them were actually 9gag’s. Unaware of this, 9gag members fired upon the given coordinates, and DDoS’d themselves. Due to the servers’ massive capacity, little effect was had. 9gag, having discovered their mistake, launched a DDoS attack on 4chan’s main page, shutting it down for a small amount of time.

^[5]

While the homepage was down, all the boards continued to function, allowing for continued raid coordination.

Cyber-Bully Attack

In early January 2012, users of 4chan attacked memorial pages dedicated to a 15 year old suicide victim, and promptly blamed 9gag. The trolls posted offensive and mocking materials to the page, bringing 9gag under fire from the family. This was the first instance of 4chan blaming 9gag for doing insensitive things, and was not the last.

The German Burger Contest

On January 16th, 9gag user schierer posted a picture to try to gain votes for a “9gag burger” that he had created for the McDonald’s burger contest. The 9gag burger quickly gained around 32,000 votes, putting it in first place by nearly 29,000 votes. Not to be out done, 4chan users concocted their own burger, named after moot, 4chan’s creator. The McMoot fell far behind the Mc9gag in its early stages. However, a Twitter user by the name of Matheusavs28 created a votescript for 4chan to use. Within days, the McMoot had surpassed the Mc9gag by well over 100,000 votes. The contest clearly stated that the top 20 burgers would be chosen and then tested, so for 4chan to insure dominance, they created 20 new burgers. Each burger surpassed the 9gag burger by about 20-30 thousand votes.

Batman Shooting Hoax

On July 19, 2012, during a premier of the third film in Christopher Nolan’s Dark Night trilogy, a gunman burst into a theater, firing into the crowd and killing 14 people. Soon after the attack, reports surfaced that the man had posted about the attack some weeks prior on 9gag, and that 9gag users had egged the poster on. The image that circulated has been confirmed as a fake, and the rumor was spread by /b/tards and other anti-9gaggers.

Search Insights

Sources

markwins.blogspot.com
firstsearchblue.com
firstsearchblue.com
imgur.com
gstatic.com]
9gag.com]
gstatic.com]

02/17/11--18:09: Everybody Walk the Dinosaur

About

Everybody Walk The Dinosaur is a copypasta meme originating from 4chan. The point of it is to be telling a really raunchy or interesting story and then abruptly end it with “OPENTHEDOOR / GET ON THEFLOOR /EVERYBODYWALKTHEDINOSAUR.” Thus, the expectant reader is trolled by the lack of a climax to what could have been full of win. The preceding lines are the (incredibly catchy)[citation needed] chorus of the song “Walk the Dinosaur” by the band Was (Not Was). A number of other artists have done covers of the song, the most notable of which are by George Clinton for the Super Mario Bros movie and Queen Latifah for Ice Age 3. It is possible that this is one of the reasons that this phrase became so popular. It is not used as much nowadays but was once feared as much as the dreaded Bel Air.

Origin

“Walk the Dinosaur” is a hit single recorded and released by the band Was (Not Was) in 1987, later featured on What Up, Dog?, their hit 1988 album. The song peaked at the position of #7 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.

In 2009, the animated movie Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs featured a cover version sung by Queen Latifah^[1], who was the voice actor of the mammoth Ellie. However, Queen Latifah’s cover for the movie never made it onto the official soundtrack.^[2]

Search Interest

Google Trends show a rise in popularity starting shortly before 2010, which after Ice Age 3, let the song’s popularity grow, eventually reaching 4chan and turning into a

External References

^[1]Wikipedia – Ice Age

^[2]Wikipedia – Ice Age Soundtracks

03/07/17--14:37: Blue Whale Challenge

About

Blue Whale Challenge, also known as the Blue Whale suicide game, is an online game in which participants are purportedly assigned a curator who provides various acts of self harm to be committed over the course of 50 days. On the final day, participants are urged to win the game by committing suicide. While over 100 teen suicides have reportedly been linked to the game, no direct evidence has been found.

Origin

On May 17th, 2016, the Russian news site RT^[7] reported that groups on the Russian social network VK were linked to “130 teen suicides in Russia” (shown below).

Spread

On November 16th, 2016, the Russian news site RBTH^[8] reported that a VK group administrator had been detained by police for urging children to commit suicide. On February 20th, 2017, YouTuber Sasho Panchuk uploaded a video titled “The guy plays Blue Whale jump from roof,” in which a Russian teenager pretends to jump off a roof (shown below).

On February 21st, the news site RadioFreeEurope^[9] published an article, reporting that the “Blue Whale” suicide game had become a “shadowy online phenomenon” across Russia and Central Asian countries. On February 27th, The Sun reported that police were investigating the deaths of Russian teenagers Yulia Konstantinova and Veronika Volkova (shown below, right), who were suspected of committing suicide after communicating with a “sinister social media group.” That day, Snopes^[10] published an article, labeling the claim that the “Blue Whale” game was “responsible for more than 130 in Russia” as “unproven.”

On March 3rd, The Sun^[4] reported that the Blue Whale “suicide game” was linked to 130 teen deaths in Russia. That day, YouTuber Fame Magazine released a video about the Blue Whale game (shown below). On March 6th, The Sun^[2] published a follow-up article about the challenge, On March 6th, Redditor -WATAFAK- submitted a post asking “What are the exact 50 challenges in the ‘blue whale challenge’?” to /r/morbidquestions,^[1] to which Redditor jeanclauder replied with a translated list from a game.

That day, Redditor Normalguy112 submitted a post asking “What is the blue whale game?” to /r/OutOfTheLoop,^[5] where it gathered upwards of 1,600 points (89% upvoted) and 300 comments within 24 hours. In the comments section, many Redditors expressed skepticism, speculating that the game may be a viral hoax. The following day, the Australian news site News.com.au^[6] published an article reporting that the Russian police investigation of the suicide game.

Search Interest

External References

^[1]Reddit – /r/morbidquestions

^[2]The Sun – What is the Blue Whale online suicide game

^[3]Reddit – What is the blue whale game?

^[4]The Sun – Blue Whale suicide game linked to 130 teen deaths

^[5]Iheartintelligence – Heres How The Blue Whale Suicide Game Is Killing Teens On Social Media

^[6]News.com.au – Blue Whale suicide game

^[7]RT – Report links VK groups to 130 teen suicides

^[8]RBTH– VKontakte group admin detained for promoting child suicide

^[9]RadioFreeEurope – Teen Suicide Games Send Shudders Through Russian-Speaking World

^[10]Snopes – Was a Game Called Blue Whale Responsible for Dozens of Suicides in Russia

11/12/14--11:51: Eyebrows on Fleek

About

“Eyebrows on Fleek” is a memorable quote uttered by Viner Peaches Monroe in a selfie video to show off her stylishly groomed eyebrows.

Origin

On June 21st, 2014, Viner Peaches Monroee uploaded a video in which she speaks to the camera while sitting in a car and announces that her eyebrows are “on fleek” (shown below). In the first five months, the video gained over 20 million plays, 492,000 likes and 411,000 revines.

“We in this bitch. Finna get crunk. Eyebrows on fleek. Da fuq.”

Etymology

The earliest known definition of the term “fleek” was submitted by Urban Dictionary user Dan Blue on October 2nd, 2003, defining the term as “smooth, nice, sweet.” On December 1st, 2009, Urban Dictionary^[7] user Alycyn submitted another entry for “fleek,” defining it as a synonym for “awesome.”

Spread

The following day, Peaches Monroee uploaded a new Vine in which she yells “My eyebrows on fleek bitch!” (shown below).

On July 29th, YouTuber^[1] Kevin Gadsden Jr. reuploaded the original “eyebrows on fleek” video, which received upwards of 1.1 million views and 1,000 comments in the next four months. On August 17th, 2014, Viner Ariana Slays uploaded a clip of singer Ariana Grande with a musical rendition of Peaches Monroee’s video dubbed over the original audio (shown below). In one month, the video gathered more than 83,000 likes and 49,000 revines.

On September 9th, the Ariana Slays Vine was listed as one of the “25 Best Vines of Summer 2014” by Complex.^[2] On October 21st, the International House of Pancakes Twitter^[4] feed tweeted the phrase “Pancakes on fleek,” which accumulated over 27,300 retweets and 18,500 favorites in the next three weeks (shown below).

On November 4th, model Kim Kardashian posted a photograph of herself with bleached eyebrows on Instagram^[5] with the hashtag “#EyebrowsOnFleek” (shown below). On November 5th, the shopping blog Racked^[3] published an article about the spread of the “eyebrows on fleek” meme.

Search Interest

External References

^[1]YouTube – Eyebrows on Fleek

^[2]Complex – The 25 Best Vines of Summer 2014

^[3]Racked – A Brief History of Fleek

^[4]Twitter – @IHOP

^[5]Instagram – kimkardashian

^[6]Urban Dictionary – fleek

^[7]Urban Dictionary – fleek

02/07/17--09:33: Shooting Stars

About

Shooting Stars is a song by Australian electronic duo Bag Raiders first released in 2008, then again in 2009 as a single. Several years after its release, the song began appearing in remix videos employing a synthwave aesthetic, particularly of people falling.

Origin

“Shooting Stars” was originally released as the B-side to Bag Raiders’ “Turbo Love” EP in 2008,^[2] and made its first appearance on YouTube on October 1st, 2008 when an instrumental version was played in a game of Audiosurf (shown below).

Bag Raiders released “Shooting Stars” in as a single in 2009, which would later be put on their self-titled album in 2010. The song peaked at number 62 on the ARIA singles chart. On July 22nd, 2009, Modular People uploaded the song’s video to YouTube. The video, shown below, is heavily influenced by retro synthwave aesthetics. It has over 13 million views.

After the song was used by Australia’s Got Talent in 2013, the song shot into the Top 40.^[1]

Spread

The first known use of the track in a meme context was of a crude animation uploaded to YouTube by Glaceygirl on December 29th, 2015 (shown below).

The track appeared in some less popular YouTube mixes until July of 2016, when it began gaining more traction. On July 30th, 2016, the track was paired with a video of CGI gorillas dancing as a parody tribute to Harambe and uploaded to YouTube by TheN00bNinja. It has gained over 150,000 views as of February 2017 (shown below).

After that, the song grew more established as a meme, appearing in several popular remixes before spiking in popularity in late January 2017 following an upload by All Ski Casino on the 23rd that paired the song with a video of a fat man diving (shown below). That video gained over 530,000 views and gained over 1,600 upvoted on /r/videos^[3] the same day.

This started a trend of videos where the song is paired with footage of people falling edited to look as though they are falling through space.

Bag Raiders’ Response

On February 14th, 2017, Pedestrian.tv^[4] interviewed Bag Raiders on the spread of the meme. The duo said they found the meme amusing, though are unsure what caused the sudden meme-spread of their song. They also described being “chuffed” that the meme exposed the song to so many people who would have otherwise never heard it. Some of the favorites they mentioned include a video that pairs the song with Lady Gaga’s Halftime Show.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References

^[1]Wikipedia – Bag Raiders

^[2]Discodemons – Turbo Love EP

^[3]/r/videos – Fat man does amazing dive – Shooting Stars

^[4]Pedestrian.tv – BAGRAIDERSARECHUFFED‘SHOOTINGSTARS’ IS A MEME, BUTHAVE NO CLUEWHY

11/22/09--10:59: Super S Stussy

About

The Super S Stussy or simply “Super S” or “Stussy” is a symbol consisting of 14 lines that forms a stylized “S”. The symbol is typically drawn by children, usually on notebook paper during school hours.

Origin

It is unclear when or where the symbol originated, but many believe it is based off a logo for Stussy^[1], a clothing company based in Irvine, California. However, others question that claim since there’s no irrefutable evidence that the symbol ever appeared on any of Stussy’s clothing lines and the symbol itself is believed to date back as far as the late 1950’s. Some believe the symbol was created by unknown graffiti artists in the past.

Spread

The Super S symbol became very popular in the 1980’s and 1990’s, and is considered a staple of the latter decade among those who grew up in that time period. However, many schools didn’t like students drawing the symbol and some schools would later ban it all together, usually in the belief that it was associated with gangs and was an distraction in class. To this day, the “Super S” can be seen drawn on notebook paper by children.

Notable Examples

Internet Spread

Reddit post on January 7th, 2011
Reddit post on February 16th, 2011

External References

^[1]Stussy – Official Website

08/14/11--07:30: Scientology

About

Scientology is a belief system created by science fiction author L. Ron Hubbard in 1952, inspired by his earlier self-help system Dianetics. Scientologists believe that humans are limited by traumatic past events that keep them from realizing their immortality. The Church of Scientology is devoted to promoting the belief system, which has been known for suing critics who claim that the organization abuses and extorts finances from its members.

Beliefs

Scientologists believe that humans are immortal beings that have been infected with the souls of dead aliens, which are the root of humanity’s problems. Founder L. Ron Hubbard referred to the historical events causing the alien soul infection as a “space opera”, which included the story of an evil galactic ruler named “Xenu.” According to the story, Xenu transported billions of frozen aliens to the planet Earth 75 million years ago, dropped them in volcanoes and destroyed them with explosives. After the aliens died, their souls (known as “Body Thetans”) lost their sense of free will and began inhabiting the bodies of humans.

Online History

Scientology and Usenet

The Usenet newsgroup alt.religion.scientology^[1] was created by Scientology critic Scott Goehring on July 17th, 1991. According to Wikipedia^[2], the group sparked many debates about the organization’s practices for several years until December 24th, 1994, when several high-level secret Scientology documents, which included the Xenu story, were leaked on to the newsgroup by an anonymous poster. The Church of Scientology reacted by hiring lawyers to have the documents removed. On January 11th, 1995, the Scientology lawyer Helena Kobrin sent a message to Usenet servers to delete the alt.religion.scientology newsgroup from Usenet, but the request was ignored. Scientologist lawyers then went after newsgroup participants. On February 13th, 1995, federal marshals raided the homes of Arnaldo Lerma, Lawrence Wollersheim, Robert Penny, Karin Spaink, Zenon Panoussis and former Scientologist minister Dennis Erlich on grounds that the newsgroup participants posted copyrighted materials. In 1998 and 1999, the newsgroup was hit with several spam attacks flooding the group racist articles with forged message headers to appear as if they were sent by members of alt.religion.scientology. The attacks were referred to as “sporgery”, a combination of “spam” and “forgery.”

Online Campaigns

On July 15th, 1998, Salon^[3] published an article titled “A Web of their own”, which reported that the Church of Scientology was distributing starter kits for members to launch their own Scientology websites. The article went on to report that the source code of the pages contained long lists of Scientology-related keywords, which were criticized as an attempt to drown out Scientology critics in web search results. In addition to site-building software, the starter kits contained a censorship program known as Scieno Sitter, which blocked sites critical of the organization.

On YTMND

In June 10th, 2006, YTMND^[4] founder Max Goldberg announced that he had received a cease-and-desist^[5] letter from Scientology lawyers requesting the removal of several pages that mocked the organization. After Goldberg refused to take down the sites, YTMND users responded by creating more Scientology-related sites. In the month of June alone, over 550 YTMND pages were created mocking Scientology.

On Wikipedia

On August 15th, 2007, MSNBC^[6] published an article titled “New online tool traces Wikipedia edits”, which reported that a tool called the Wikiscanner revealed that PCs from the Church of Scientology were removing criticism from the church’s Wikipedia entry. On May 29th, 2009, The Huffington Post^[9] reported that the Wikipedia Arbitration Committee ruled to ban access to the website from IP addresses coming from within the Church of Scientology and had restricted several anti-Scientology editors from certain topics as well.

Project Chanology

On January 14th, 2008, a video was leaked on YouTube of the Scientologist actor Tom Cruise extolling the virtues of the Scientology belief system. The video began spreading after it was posted on the image board 4chan, which resulted in the Church of Scientology sending a take down request to YouTube for copyright infringement.

In retaliation, ad-hoc group of Internet users known as Anonymous started Project Chanology, which initially consisted of prank calls and faxes to Scientology centers, and denial-of-service attacks against Scientology websites. In February, the first wave of protests occurred outside Scientology churches around the world.

Reception

Since its inception in 1954, Church of Scientology has been involved in a series of public scandals and legal battles, from criminal convictions of its members in Operation Snow White and allegations of financial frauds to various accusations of mistreatment and cult-like oppression of members within the community. The Wikipedia entry describes the Church of Scientology as “one of the most controversial new religious movements to have arisen in the 20th century.”

News Media Coverage

The organization’s lack of transparency and secretive or mythical practices have drawn scrutiny from the news media since its early years after the foundation. In the 1960s, Church of Scientology made the headlines in the United States after Food and Drug Administration’s 1963 raid and seizure of the Church’s E-meter devices as illegal medical devices and also received attention in Australia after an official investigative report about the Church titled “Anderson Report” was published on behalf of the Australian state government in 1965.

In the 1970s, public scrutiny over the legitimacy of Scientology intensified with the exposure of Operation Snow White, the Church’s conspiracy to infiltrate and steal from more than 136 government agencies in 30 countries to purge unfavorable records about the organization and its founder. As a result, eleven senior members associated with the Guardian’s Office were convicted of federal crimes and also led to the launch of an investigation into Operation Freakout.

Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, investigative reports and allegations regarding the Church’s commercial activities continued to surface from the news media as well as governmental bodies and courts, including a TIME magazine article published in 1991 which describes Scientology as “a hugely profitable global racket that survives by intimidating members and critics in a Mafia-like manner.” In addition, scandals about the Church have been covered by a number of major U.S.-based news publications and programs, including NBC Dateline, Wall Street Journal, New York Times and the ASsociated Press among others.

Criticisms

While the criticisms of the Church remain widespread in the news media, Scientologists have also made themselves infamous for their counterattack tactics against the detractors or critics of the church, oftentimes dismissing their assertions as having an alternative agenda to misrepresent its beliefs. The Church’s combat against its critics became highly publicized for the first time in 1967 after the FBI discovered its covert plot known as Operation Freakout which sought to have one of its prominent critics imprisoned or committed to a mental institution in revenge.

Operation Clambake

Operation Clambake is one of the most prominent anti-Scientology websites hosted at Xenu.net and founded in 1996 by Andreas Heldal-Lund. The site regularly publishes criticism of the Church of Scientology, including texts of petitions, news articles, exposés, and primary source documents. The online publication came into spotlight in 1996 after it became one of the first websites to host secret documents pertaining to Xenu and OT III and at the peak of its popularity, the site was ranked as high as the second place in Google PageRank for the term “Scientology.” However, many Xenu.net pages have been removed from Google’s indexes after the Church issued DMCA takedown notices against the documents.

External References

^[1]Google Groups – alt.religion.scientology

^[2]Wikipedia – Scientology and the Internet

^[3]Salon – A Web of their own

^[4]YTMND– down with downvoting

^[5]YTMND– Cease and Desist

^[6]MSNBC– New Online Tool Traces Wikipedia Edits

^[7]Wikiscanner – Wikiscanner

^[8]Fox News – Wal-Mart, CIA, ExxonMobil Changed Wikipedia Entries

^[9]The Huffington Post – Wikipedia Bans Scientology From Site

^[10]Wikipedia – Sporgery

^[11]alt.religion.scientology archive – name the spam!

^[12]The Australian – Gibbering clones the future of Usenet? (hosted at holysmoke.org

^[13]Holy Smoke – The Attack Against A.R.S. Via Forged Article Flood: The Volume

^[14]Holy Smoke – Church’ of Scientogy’s Plan for alt.religion.scientology

^[15]Holy Smoke – Has one of the spogers been identified?

^[16]Wikipedia – Scieno Sitter

^[17]The Silicon Alley Reporter Magazine – The “Cult” of Many Personalities

^[18]Salon – A Web of Their Own

^[19]YouTube – A&E Inside Scientology 1- 12

^[20]YouTube – $cientology Documentary – “The Bridge” – Part 1

^[21]Wikipedia – Operating Thetan III: The Wall of Fire

^[22]Discord – SCIENTOLOGY v. the INTERNET: Free Speech & Copyright Infringement on the Information Super-Highway

^[23]Straight Dope – How did L. Ron Hubbard claim to have learned about Xenu?

^[24]Yahoo! Answers –

^[25]Matador Network – 6 Wacky Creation Myths Around the World

^[26]Faith Fighter

^[27]Wikipedia – Trapped in the Closet (South Park)

^[28]MTV– Isaac Hayes Wants Out Of ‘South Park’ Due To Religious Jokes

^[29]YouTube – What Mormons Actually Believe

^[30]YouTube – What Christians Actually Believe

^[31]YouTube – What Creationists Actually Believe

^[32]Los Angeles Times – The Courting of Celebrities

^[33]Wikipedia – Celebrity Centre

^[34]Wikipedia – Scientology and celebrities

^[35]Wikipedia – Tom Cruise and Scientology

^[36]Why We Protest – Anonymous vs. Scientology

^[37]YouTube – Church0fScientology’s channel

^[38]Xenu TV

^[39]NPR– ‘Anonymous’ Wages Attack on Scientologists

^[40]YouTube – Search results for “anonymous and scientology”

^[41]Tumblr – Posts tagged “chanology”

07/13/11--16:24: Operation Antisec

Overview

Operation Antisec (a.k.a Operation Anti-Security, #antisec)is an international hacktivist campaign launched by a coalition of Anonymous hackers including former members of Lulzsec. The operation officially began with the attacks against UK’s Serious Organized Crime Agency on June 20th, 2011 and still continues with high-profile targets in private business, government and even military sectors.

The groups involved claim that the operation aims to protest government censorship and monitoring of the internet. LulzSec members also mentions ending what they believe are corrupt racial profiling and copyright laws as a goal of the operation.

Background

Long prior to the launch of Operation Antisec, the broader concept of Anti Security Movement^[1] was conceived in 1999 as a counter-measure against the cyber-security industry and their tendency to disclose security vulnerabilities as a scare-tactic to drive sales profit in computer security programs.

According to Wikipedia, most of anti-security attacks started sometime between 1999 and 2000, targeting websites like SecurityFocus, SecuriTeam, Packet Storm, and milw0rm, as well as mailing lists like “full-disclosure”, “vuln-dev”, “vendor-sec” and Bugtraq, as well as public forums and IRC channels.

The term “Anti Security Movement” was first introduced in the manifesto document available as an indexed page on the website anti.security.is^[2]:

The purpose of this movement is to encourage a new policy of anti-disclosure among the computer and network security communities. The goal is not to ultimately discourage the publication of all security-related news and developments, but rather, to stop the disclosure of all unknown or non-public exploits and vulnerabilities. In essence, this would put a stop to the publication of all private materials that could allow script kiddies from compromising systems via unknown methods.

More recently in 2009, several security communities like Astalavista^[3] and milw0rm^[4], as well as the popular image-hosting site ImageShack^[5] have been targeted by Anti-Security associates. The group behind Operation Antisec has claimed that it aims to protest government censorship and monitoring of Internet usage. In addition, various digital rights-related issues like corrupt racial profiling, hardline copyright laws and the War on Drugs have been also cited as grounds for launching particular attacks.

Notable Developments

June 20th: Lulzsec and Anonymous Join Efforts

On June 20th, 2011, Lulzsec announced via Twitter it has formed a partnership with the mysterious hacking collective Anonymous under the banner of “Operation Anti-Security” or “Operational Anti-sec.” Between June 20th, and 26th, the newly formed coalition released several packets of confidential information obtained from various sectors, including government and private businesses.

June 26th: Lulzsec Disbands

Though LulzSec disbanded as a group on June 26th, 2011, members have been reported to be continuing the operation from within Anonymous.

June 27th: Homeland Security Department & The Sentinel Program

On June 27th, Anonymous released sensitive information obtained from the Cyberterrorism Defense Initiative’s Sentinel program, a network security initiative designed to provide anti-cyberterrorism tactics for workers in public safety, law enforcement, state and local government, and public utilities. Administered by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the Federal Emergency Management Agency to “educate technical personnel in cyberterrorism response and prevention,” the released information contains resources on publicly available hacking resources and counter-hacking tools, as well as form letters that could be used to obtain user information from Internet service providers.

June 28th: Brazil, Anguilla, Zimbabwe and Tunisia

On June 28th, the group released a large set of private, user-related information obtained from government sources in the countries of Anguilla, Brazil, Zimbabwe as well as the Municipality of Mosman council using the method of SQL injection. On Twitter, Anonymous accused Brazil of data manipulation and Zimbabwe for the controversial 2008 presidential election. In addition, Anonymous hackers also gained control of a Tunisian government website under the name of Operation Tunisia, replacing the webpage with a propaganda flyer.

July 11th: Military Meltdown Monday

On July 11th, Anonymous hacked into systems belonging to U.S. defense contractor Booz Allen Hamilton, thereby gaining unauthorized access to nearly 90,000 personal accounts from a number of U.S. government and military agencies under the banner “Military Meltdown Monday.” Some of the targeted victims include the United States Central Command, United States Special Operations Command, the United States Marine Corps, the United States Air Force, the United States Department of Homeland Security and the United States Department of State. AntiSec also includes an “invoice for our audit of your security systems,” for a total of $310, for four hours of work.

July 13th: Operation Green Rights

On July 13th, Anonymous issued an announcement of a new campaign entitled “Operation Green Rights,” which would target any and all companies it perceived as harming the environment.

In a related video released via YouTube on the same day, the group named several corporations like Exxon Mobil, Conoco Phillips, Canadian Oil Sands, Imperial Oil and the Royal Bank of Scotland as companies that are especially responsible for the world’s current environmental problems.

July 14th: Monsanto Employee Contacts

On July 14th, the agricultural biotech company Monsanto confirmed that its network had been infiltrated by the hacker collective Anonymous. In a statement provided to CNET news, the firm’s Director of Corporate Affairs Tom Helscher explained:

“Last month, Monsanto experienced a disruption to our Web sites which appeared to be organized by a cyber-group. In addition, this group also recently published publicly available information on approximately 2,500 individuals involved in the broader global agriculture industry.”

According to the CNET report, the hackers allegedly obtained the contact details of 2,500 people in protesting the company’s lawsuits against organic dairy farmers who have used labels stating their products don’t contain growth hormones, a product Monsanto used to make. Monsanto currently make genetically engineered seeds and pesticides. It was also one of the seven company’s to supply the U.S. military with Agent Orange during the Vietnamese War.

The attack was publicized through a tweet posted by Anonymous earlier in the week, which stated: “#Anonymous hacks Monsanto computers; posts employee info http://on.msnbc.com/qhqs1m #OpMonsanto goes #AntiSec.”

July 19th: FBI Arrests 14 suspects of Anonymous Hacks

On July 19th, cable news outlets CNN^[7] and Fox News^[8] reported at least 14 people were arrested in New York, New Jersey, Florida and San Francisco Bay Area as part of an ongoing FBI investigation of the notorious “Anonymous” collective, citing a senior federal law enforcement official. In New York City alone, federal agents executed the search warrants in a half dozen locations in Long Island, Brooklyn and the Bronx, where they seized computers and other digital records.

The federal authorities have yet to reveal the specific charges of the arrested individuals, but all are believed to have been involved in carrying out distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks on numerous high-profile corporate and government websites.

August 7th: Shooting Sheriffs Saturday

On August 5th, members of the Antisec hacking group posted an official statement via Pastebin^[9], releasing 10 gigabytes of confidential data allegedly obtained from over 70 U.S. sheriffs’ offices and law enforcement agencies. The leaked information reportedly contains over 300 e-mail accounts associated with law enforcement officers and agencies, home addresses, social security numbers, credit card numbers, police training videos and identities of anonymous tipsters. The group also claimed to have used the stolen credit card information to place donations to the Bradley Manning Support Network, ACLU, Electronic Frontier Foundation and several other digital rights advocacy groups.

Codenamed “Shooting Sheriffs Saturday,” the mass infiltration of law enforcement databases was served in retaliation to recent arrests of Anonymous associates, including the British teenager Jake Davis (also known as Toipary) who’s been identified by the U.K. police as a key member of Anonymous operations and the spokesperson of the mysterious hacking group Lulzsec.

Most of the targeted law enforcement sites were hosted by Brooks-Jeffrey Marketing Servers and they were successfully hacked within the first 24 hours of launch,according to the TIME Magazine Blog^[10]. Furthermore, not long after Antisec’s initial intrusion and data heist, the group also claimed it was able to hack their replacement servers and deface all 70+ domains.

We have no sympathy for any of the officers or informants who may be endangered by the release of their personal information. For too long they have been using and abusing our personal information, spying on us, arresting us, beating us, and thinking that they can get away with oppressing us in secrecy. Well it’s retribution time: we want them to experience just a taste of the kind of misery and suffering they inflict upon us on an everyday basis. Let this serve as a warning to would-be snitches and pigs that your leaders can no longer protect you: give up and turn on your masters now before it’s too late.

August 19th, 2011: Vanguard Defense Hack

On August 19th, 2011, Antisec released a gigabyte of private documents and 4,713 emails obtained from Vanguard Defense Industries (VDI), the Texas-based firm best known for its development of U.S. military weapons like ShadowHawk, an unmanned helicopter capable of handling aerial surveillance, as well as security consulting services with U.S. government agencies.

Antisec also revealed that after breaching the company’s website, they extracted thousands of published e-mails from an account associated with Vanguard’s senior vice president Richard Garcia. He is also a board member at Infragard, an FBI program designed to facilitate cooperation between public and private cybersecurity initiatives.

The Tech Herald reported that Antisec targeted Vanguard due to their affiliation with a number of state and federal law enforcement agencies, including the Texas State Police, FBI, Department of Homeland Security and U.S. Marshals Service. According to their interview with an Antisec associate, they were able gain access to Garcia’s e-mail account through VDI’s website, though the source wouldn’t specify what method was used.

The VDI data leak will have a searchable index, and its own website. Within the leaked messages, there were emails to several government agencies, as well as law enforcement agencies in Arizona, Illinois, and Ohio, each one wanting to purchase or gather information on VDI’s unmanned vehicle. There were several memos, some Confidential, most classified as For Official Use Only, related to intelligence gathering for various business sectors. One such memo, several months old, warned that a group calling itself Rising Tide were planning “protest and possibly civil disobedience” activities against oil and natural gas interests in Pennsylvania and Texas.

Back in June 2011, AntiSec affiliate LulzSec hacked the Web site of InfraGard Atlanta, releasing passwords and other sensitive information.

September 2011: Texas Police Chiefs Association

Following the arrest of Topiary and several members allegedly linked to Operation Antisec, Anonymous launched retaliatory attacks against the websites of the Texas Police Chiefs Association and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. On September 1st, the Texas Police Chiefs Association website was defaced by the group and various documents marked “sensitive” and “for official use only” including police officers’ personal phone numbers were released in public.

October 2011: International Association of Chiefs of Police

On October 21st, Anonymous dumped 600 megabytes of information obtained from various law enforcement agencies including the International Association of Chiefs of Police, Boston Police Patrolmen’s Association, and the Sheriff’s office of Baldwin County in Alabama in support of the Occupy movement.

Leaked information included membership rosters, internal documents, and social security numbers from the International Association of Chiefs of Police; nearly 1000 names, ranks, addresses, phone numbers, and social security numbers of police officers in Jefferson County, Alabama and Birmingham, Alabama; 1000 names and passwords of members of the Boston Police Patrolmen’s Association; and the financial information and client list of web developer and marketing company Matrix Group, a business with several law enforcement clients.

In addition to the leaks, Antisec claimed that at least 40 law enforcement-run websites were targeted by the hacktivist group, many of which had their content replaced with an anti-police rap video.

November 2011: California Department of Justice

On November 18th, 2011, Anonymous published 38,000 email messages that were obtained from the Gmail account of Alfredo “Fred” Baclagan, a special agent supervising computer crime investigations with the California Department of Justice and the Computer and Technology Crime Hightech Response Team. According to the group’s statement, obtained information included exchanges among forensic experts discussing techniques for tracing cybercriminals and coordinating requests filed by law enforcement agencies. In addition to official correspondences, Anonymous announced it had gained access to Baclagan’s home address and phone number, as well as his text messages and his voicemail. The group also claimed that they used his Google Voice account to reach Baclagan’s friends and family members and purchased a camera using his Google Wallet account.

December 2011: Strategic Forecasting E-mail Hack

On December 24th, 2011, members of Anonymous had stolen e-mails and credit card data from the website of Strategic Forecasting Inc, a United States-based global security think tank group commonly known as Stratfor. Claiming to have retrieved over 200 gigabytes of data, the hackers criticized Stratfor in a Pastebin statement^[11] for being “clueless when it comes to database security,” noting that the passwords were unencrypted and many of them were simply the name of the company.

After the hacking incident was reported in the news, the group posted two sets of credit card information, one containing 3,956 items and the other with 13,191 items. On the following day, they posted a set of over 30,000 items. The hackers also stated the credit card data was used to make donations to several charity organizations, including the Red Cross, Save the Children and CARE, though it remains in doubt whether the payments were ever processed to the groups.

February 2012: Wikileaks Publication of Global Intelligence Files

On February 27th, 2012, Wikileaks began publishing more than 5 million e-mails^[12] from Strategic Forecasting Inc. that were allegedly obtained by Antisec-affiliated hackers in December 2011. According to the statement accompanying the leaked documents, the e-mails dubbed “Global Intelligence Files” reveal the inner workings of the intelligence publisher and its affiliations with large military defense contractors such as Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon and various government agencies.

Stratfor, a self-described publisher of geopolitical analysis based on private intelligence, released a statement via its Facebook page on the same day, describing Wikileaks’ decision as “deplorable” and “illegal.” The firm further asserted that some copies of the e-mails may have been forged or altered to include inaccuracies, though they refused to validate the authenticity of any documents. Following the leak, numerous Anonymous-affiliated Twitter feeds including @AnonOps, @AnonyOps and @YourAnonNews posted links to the Wikileaks page along with warnings about future leaks. According to the Wired article^[12] citing an anonymous source with ties to Anonymous, the hackers decided to turn the information over to Wikileaks because the site was deemed more capable of analyzing and publishing the data.

“Basically, WL is the ideal partner for such stuff. Antisec acquires the shit, WL gets it released in a proper manner.”

August 2012: Wikileaks Exposes TrapWire

On August 9th, 2012, Wikileaks began releasing a new batch of documents regarding a governmental surveillance program known as TrapWire, a predictive software designed by the U.S. security firms Stratfor and Abraxas Corp to detect early signs of impending terrorist plots. Due to the covert nature of its operations prior to the release of the documents, the news was quickly met by baseless speculations and sensational headlines in the blogosphere as well as mainstream news outlets. Shortly after the Wikileaks’ release in August, the news site became targeted with a series of distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks allegedly launched by a group calling itself “AntiLeaks,” rendering it virtually inaccessible for nearly a week.

September 2012: Millions of Apple ID Leaked

On September 3rd, @AnonymousIRC tweeted a link to a Pastebin post^[18] allegedly containing more than one million Apple Unique Device Identifiers (UDIDs), a 20-digit hex value code that is used by Apple developers and mobile advertising networks to track user behaviors. In the following hours, the announcement of the data dump became widely reported in the tech news blogosphere^[15] and picked up by major U.S. news outlets^[16] as well.

1,000,001 from a total of 12,000,000 iOS devices, courtesy of FBIpastebin.com/nfVT7b0Z #Anonymous #AntiSec
— AnonymousIRC (@AnonymousIRC) September 4, 2012

According to the communique, AntiSec hackers obtained the data during the second week of March 2012 after gaining access to the Dell laptop computer belonging to FBI special agent Christopher K. Stangl, who has been actively involved with the agency’s cybersecurity recruitment efforts in the FBI Regional Cyber Action Team and New York FBI Office Evidence Response Team. Shortly after the breach, Stangl’s laptop yielded a spreadsheet file with sensitive user information of more than 12 million Apple devices, ranging from UDIDs, user names, names and types of devices to mobile phone numbers, mailing addresses and zip codes linked to the UDIDs. Furthermore, the group explained that the hack was intended to raise public awareness surrounding the FBI’s intelligence gathering and monitoring of millions of Apple user information.

In addition to the release of Apple device-related data, the group specifically addressed journalists and reporters that it will not reveal any further information until Gawker staff writer Adrian Chen was featured on the front page of the news site with a huge picture of him dressed in a ballet tutu and shoe on the head. On the following day, Chen jokingly complied with the request by writing an article titled “Anonymous Demands to See Gawker Writer In Ballet Tutu For More Information On Massive FBI Hack”^[17] featuring a photo of a pug wearing a tiara and a pink ballet tutu.

On Twitter

Search Interest

External References

^[1]Anti Security Movement – Anti-Sec Movement

^[2]WebArchives – anti.security.is

^[3]Kotrotsos – Astalavista Hacked and Torn Apart

^[4]SecLists – Ant-Sec – We are going to terminate Hackforums.net and Milw0rm.com

^[5]ImageShack – ImageShack hacked by anti-full disclosure movement

^[6]International Business Times – AntiSec: Biotech Company Monsanto Confirms Anonymous Hacker Attack

^[7]CNN– Source: At least 14 arrested in operation targeting Anonymous

^[8]Fox News – EXCLUSIVE: 16 Suspected ‘Anonymous’ Hackers Arrested in Nationwide Sweep

^[9]Pastebin – Shooting Sheriffs Saturday | Official Release Statement

^[10]TIME– Anonymous and LulzSec Fire Back at Police with Lethal Data Dump

^[11]Pastebin – On Stratfor

^[12]Pastebin – WikiLeaks begins publishing 5 million emails from STRATFOR

^[13]Wikileaks – The Global Intelligence Files

^[14]Wired – Wikileaks Pairs with Anonymous to Publish Intelligence Firm’s Dirty Laundry

^[15]ZDNet – FBI hack yielded 12 million iPhone and iPad IDs, Anonymous claims

^[16]CBS News – Anonymous hackers claim to have obtained 12 million iPhone and iPad IDs from FBI computer

^[17]Gawker – Anonymous Demands to See Gawker Writer In Ballet Tutu For More Information On Massive FBI Hack

^[18]Pastebin – SPECIAL #FFFEDITION– ANONYMOUS

04/23/13--15:24: University of Maryland Sorority E-Mail Rant

Overview

Sorority Girl’s E-Mail Rant was an e-mail sent by University of Maryland student Rebecca Martinson to her fellow Delta Gamma sorority sisters, in which she berates them for being “boring” and “awkward." The e-mail was subsequently leaked online and reblogged via internet news sites, even inspiring the creation of celebrity dramatic readings.

Background

On April 18th, 2013, Gawker^[1] published the transcript of an email that was forwarded from an anonymous tipster and originally addressed to the University of Maryland chapter of the Delta Gamma sorority (shown below). Written by a senior member of the club, the e-mail scolded sorority sisters’ behavior at recent events, threatening them with violence if they did not improve their social skills with members of the brother fraternity Sigma Nu. Within five days, the article received over 420,000 views and 2,600 comments.

If you just opened this like I told you to, tie yourself down to whatever chair you’re sitting in, because this email is going to be a rough fucking ride.
For those of you that have your heads stuck under rocks, which apparently is the majority of this chapter, we have been FUCKING UP in terms of night time events and general social interactions with Sigma Nu. I’ve been getting texts on texts about people LITERALLY being so fucking AWKWARD and so fucking BORING. If you’re reading this right now and saying to yourself “But oh em gee Julia, I’ve been having so much fun with my sisters this week!”, then punch yourself in the face right now so that I don’t have to fucking find you on campus to do it myself.

I do not give a flying fuck, and Sigma Nu does not give a flying fuck, about how much you fucking love to talk to your sisters. You have 361 days out of the fucking year to talk to sisters, and this week is NOT, I fucking repeat NOTONE OF THEM. This week is about fostering relationships in the greek community, and that’s not fucking possible if you’re going to stand around and talk to each other and not our matchup. Newsflash you stupid cocks: FRATS DON’T LIKEBORINGSORORITIES. Oh wait, DOUBLEFUCKINGNEWSFLASH: SIGMA NU IS NOTGOING TO WANT TO HANGOUTWITH US IF WE FUCKINGSUCK, which by the way in case you’re an idiot and need it spelled out for you, WE FUCKINGSUCK SO FAR. This also applies to you little shits that have talked openly about post gaming at a different frat IN FRONT OF SIGMA NU BROTHERS. Are you people fucking retarded? That’s not a rhetorical question, I LITERALLY want you to email me back telling me if you’re mentally slow so I can make sure you don’t go to anymore night time events. If Sigma Nu openly said “Yeah we’re gonna invite Zeta over”, would you be happy? WOULDYOU? No you wouldn’t, so WHYTHEFUCKWOULDYOU DO IT TO THEM?? IN FRONT OF THEM?!! First of all, you SHOULDN’T be post gaming at other frats, I don’t give a FUCK if your boyfriend is in it, if your brother is in it, or if your entire family is in that frat. YOU DON’T GO. YOU. DON’T. GO. And you ESPECIALLY do fucking NOT convince other girls to leave with you.

“But Julia!”, you say in a whiny little bitch voice to your computer screen as you read this email, “I’ve been cheering on our teams at all the sports, doesn’t that count for something?” NO YOUSTUPIDFUCKINGASSHATS, IT FUCKING DOESN’T. DO YOUWANNAKNOWFUCKINGWHY?!! IT DOESN’T COUNTBECAUSE YOU’VE BEENFUCKING UP AT SOBERFUCKINGEVENTSTOO. I’ve not only gotten texts about people being fucking WEIRD at sports (for example, being stupid shits and saying stuff like “durr what’s kickball?” is not fucking funny), but I’ve gotten texts about people actually cheering for the opposing team. The opposing. Fucking. Team. AREYOUFUCKINGSTUPID?!! I don’t give a SHIT about sportsmanship, YOUCHEERFOROURGODDAMNTEAMANDNOTTHEOTHERONE, HAVEYOUNEVERBEEN TO A SPORTSGAME? AREYOUFUCKINGBLIND? Or are you just so fucking dense about what it means to make people like you that you think being a good little supporter of the greek community is going to make our matchup happy? Well it’s time someone told you, NO ONEFUCKINGLIKESTHAT, ESPECIALLYOURFUCKINGMATCHUP. I will fucking cunt punt the next person I hear about doing something like that, and I don’t give a fuck if you SOR me, I WILLFUCKINGASSAULTYOU.

“Ohhh Julia, I’m now crying because your email has made me oh so so sad”. Well good. If this email applies to you in any way, meaning if you are a little asswipe that stands in the corners at night or if you’re a weird shit that does weird shit during the day, this following message is for you:

DO NOT GO TO TONIGHT’S EVENT.

I’m not fucking kidding. Don’t go. Seriously, if you have done ANYTHING I’ve mentioned in this email and have some rare disease where you’re unable to NOT do these things, then you are HORRIBLE, I repeat, HORRIBLE PR FORTHISCHAPTER. I would rather have 40 girls that are fun, talk to boys, and not fucking awkward than 80 that are fucking faggots. If you are one of the people that have told me “Oh nooo boo hoo I can’t talk to boys I’m too sober”, then I pity you because I don’t know how you got this far in life, and with that in mind don’t fucking show up unless you’re going to stop being a goddamn cock block for our chapter. Seriously. I swear to fucking God if I see anyone being a goddamn boner at tonight’s event, I will tell you to leave even if you’re sober. I’m not even kidding. Try me.

And for those of you who are offended at this email, I would apologize but I really don’t give a fuck. Go fuck yourself.

Notable Developments

Author’s Response

The same day, Gawker updated the post with a follow-up e-mail sent from the Delta Gamma chapter president, who asked for the website to remove the offending e-mail or the names “Delta Gamma” and “Sigma Nu.”

“My name is [redacted] and I am the current president of Delta Gamma at the University of Maryland. It has been brought to my attention that you recently published an unsavory email that was sent out over my chapter’s list-serve. Is it possible for you to either remove the article or just remove the names “Delta Gamma” and “Sigma Nu” from your article? This email absolutely does not reflect our chapter’s values nor Sigma Nu’s and any assistance you can give us is greatly appreciated."

Identity Revealed

The same day the e-mail was leaked on Gawker, the author of the e-mail was identified as University of Maryland student Rebecca Martinson. Photographs of Martinson were subsequently posted on the Total Frat Move Forums^[2] (shown below), where members discussed her attractiveness and speculated about her sexual interests.

In the coming days, screenshots from her now-deleted Twitter^[6] feed (shown below) began circulating on various news sites, including Scallywag And Vagabond,^[3] The Frisky,^[4] Bro Bible^[5] and Jezebel.^[7]

Dramatic Readings

On April 18th, 2013, the Pophangover YouTube channel uploaded a video in which actress Alison Haislip performs a dramatic reading of the email (shown below, left), which received over 268,000 views and 600 comments in the next five days. On April 22nd, Funny or Die released a dramatic reading by actor Michael Shannon (shown below, right), gaining more than 27,000 up votes and 71,000 Facebook likes within the first 24 hours.

Delta Gamma’s Response

On April 22nd, the Delta Gamma sorority president Laurie Petrucce Roselle issued a statement via Facebook^[8] announcing that Martinson will be reprimanded for her “inappropriate” and “profanity-laced” e-mail.

We want to make it clear that this letter in no way reflects the values of Delta Gamma as an International Fraternity or our chapter at the University of Maryland. The processes by which Delta Gamma handles member discipline are confidential, but we have a team of women working with the chapter to take all appropriate action including protecting, educating and supporting the chapter members in the aftermath of this event.

Two days later on April 24th, Delta Gamma released a statement on its Facebook page^[9] announcing that Martinson has resigned from her post in the aftermath of the e-mail leak.

Delta Gamma has accepted the resignation of one of its members whose email relating to a social event has been widely distributed and publicized through social media and traditional media channels.

Search Interest

External References

^[1]Gawker – The Most Deranged Sorority Girl Email You Will Ever Read

^[2]Total Frat Move – Rebecca Martinson

^[3]Scallywag and Vagabond – Idnetity of Delta Gamma sorority girl

^[4]The Frisky – Rebecca Martinson The Rabid Sorority Sister of Delta Gamma

^[5]Bro Bible – Author of Now Infamous University of Maryland Sorority E-mail Tweeted Things Before Deleting Account

^[6]Twitter – becca_martie

^[7]Jezebel – Crappy Tweets From the Deranged Sorority Girl’s Deleted Twitter Account

^[8]Facebook – Delta Gamma Fraternity

^[9]HyperVocal – You Won’t Have That DG Sorority Girl to Cunt Punt Around Anymore

04/15/13--13:57: 2013 Boston Marathon Bombings

Overview

2013 Boston Marathon Explosions refer to the deadly bombings that took place in Boston, Massachusetts during the annual Patriots Day race on April 15th, 2013. Due to the close proximity of the detonations to the finish line, the moment of the blasts and the immediate aftermath were captured on footage and instantly shared online.

Background

On April 15th, 2013, at approximately 2:50 pm (ET), two bombs exploded during the Boston Marathon on Boylston Street near Copley Square, killing three people and injuring at least 176 others. Later that day, law enforcement officials said that the bombs appeared to have been homemade, with at least one of them identified as a pressure cooker filled with shrapnel and planted on low grounds for lethal impact.

Casualties

As of April 16th, three people have been confirmed dead, including an 8-year-old boy named Martin Richard. According to hospital employees, at least 10 of the injured suffered severed limbs and 15 remained in critical conditions.

Online Reactions

Within minutes, numerous photographs and video footage of the explosions and the aftermath from the site began circulating on Twitter and YouTube. A total of six real-time discussion threads were created within 24 hours of the explosion, with many Redditors updating each others with the latest developments and links to helpful resources such as the temporary housing registry for displaced marathon attendees, live scanner feeds, Google’s Person Finder and the #bostonbombing IRC channel.^[9]^[10]^[11]^[12]^[13]^[14]

#PrayForBoston

Immediately following the explosions, many people turned to Twitter as a way to share photos, report news and check on loved ones attending the event. On April 15th, the phrase “Boston Marathon” was tweeted 2,910,316 times.^[16] Approximately an hour after the bombing, USA Today^[17] compiled a chronological series of tweets from news media outlets as well as attendees showing how the event unfolded via Twitter.

Explosion at coply twitter.com/Boston_to_a_T/…
— Boston to a T (@Boston_to_a_T) April 15, 2013

Tweeted messages of sympathy from celebrities, politicians, journalists and athletes were compiled on the NY Daily News^[18], Fox Nation^[19] and the Huffington Post.^[20] Additionally, the hashtag #PrayForBoston^[21] began trending on Twitter minutes after the bombing.^[22] The hashtag was ranked #1 globally until 9 PM EST that night^[23] and was used a total of 2,828,464 times on April 15th.^[24]

In the hours following the explosion, Twitter became a soundboard for people to discuss conspiracy theories surrounding the event^[25], attributing it to North Korea or the Tea Party. Simon Rickettes, a reporter from The Guardian^[26], noted at least 12 pieces of unverified information that were traveling through Twitter as if it was confirmed news.

Random Acts of Pizza

For people who were not in the Boston area and wanted to help out people affected by the blasts, many turned to the Random Acts of Pizza subreddit^[4], offering to send pizzas to hospitals, people housing stranded runners and police departments. Around 5 p.m. (ET), Moderator iamnotevenperturb launched a general Boston Marathon thread^[6], garnering nearly 600 comments within 18 hours. Many of the orders were made through Anytime Pizza, who called in their entire staff the make and deliver pizzas, completely emptying their kitchen. Four local hospitals eventually had to stop accepting deliveries and Redditors were encouraged to donate to other places in need.^[5]

Patton Oswalt’s Status Update

At about 5 p.m. (ET), American comedian Patton Oswalt posted a Facebook status update^[27] detailing his initial reaction to the news. Praising those who ran towards the detonation site to help others and reassuring that the good will always outnumber those who stand in the darkness, Oswalt’s message was met by positive responses from his fans and followers on Facebook. Within the first 24 hours of posting, the status update received at least 298,000 likes and 224,000 shares.

Shelter Finder Google Doc

At approximately 5:30 PM EST, two Google Document forms began circulating the web, the first for displaced runners who needed a place to stay and the second^[7] listing contact information for people offering their spare beds or couches. Though it is unclear who began these Google Docs, Allston resident Chris McCartney-Melstad was the first person to use the form to offer a place in his apartment. As of 1:30 p.m. (ET) on April 16th, hundreds of people in the area have added their names to the list.

Google Person Finder

Immediately following the explosions, Google launched a Boston Marathon Person Finder page,^[15] which allows users to search for or add information about specific individuals. To address privacy concerns, Google allows users to set expiration dates for each record added and announced they will be removing all records from the database several months after the crisis. Google had previously deployed Person Finder pages following the Haiti earthquake (January 2010), the Chile earthquake (February 2010), the Pakistan floods (July 2010), the Christchurch earthquake (February 2011), the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami (March 2011) and the Van earthquake (October 2011).

/r/FindBostonBomber

On the day after the attacks, British Redditor oops777 launched the /r/FindBostonBombers subreddit as a hub site for community members to collect and analyze photographs and videos that have been captured from the scene.

Hoaxes

The Family Guy Episode

Later that same day, a YouTube video of an episode clip from Family Guy^[31] began circulating online, which showed main character Peter Griffin triggers explosions with his cell phone and driving over injured victims at the Boston Marathon. First uploaded online by conspiracy talk radio host Alex Jones, the video was soon revealed to be an edited clip from an episode titled “Turban Cowboys” that aired on March 17th, 2013, in which Peter Griffin becomes a Muslim and discovers that he is part of a terrorist plot to blow up a bridge. Shortly thereafter, FOX removed the original episode from online streaming services in the light of the tragic real-life event.

Man in the Red Shirt

Another image from the scene that went viral on Facebook depicted a man in a red shirt embracing an injured woman on the ground with an emotional backstory suggesting that the man had planned on proposing to his girlfriend after crossing the finish line.^[32] It was soon debunked as a hoax based on a photograph taken by John Tlumacki for Boston Globe and Getty Images, the original description of which read: “A man comforts a victim on the sidewalk at the scene of the first explosion near the finish line of the 117th Boston Marathon.”

Mystery Man on the Roof

Within hours of the bombings, a particular photograph^[29] of the second explosion taken by Suffolk University student Dan Lampariello began drawing attention from conspiracy theorists after a viewer spotted a hazy figure of a man standing on rooftop at the time of the detonation. By 5 p.m. (ET), the image had been retweeted at least 5,000 times^[30] and sparked a debate regarding its authenticity and significance in connection to the bombings.

Blue Robe Guy

On April 17th, F.B.I officials released a photograph of one of the backpacks believed to be linked to the bombings (shown below, left) , which quickly spread across the front pages of daily news sites and blogs. Within hours, amateur investigators on Reddit and 4chan began analyzing photographic evidence gathered from the site shortly before the detonations in an attempt to identify of potential suspects matching the description provided by the authorities.

By 8:30 a.m. (ET), several individuals who were seen in photographs with backpacks moments before the explosions had been marked as persons of interest, particularly one man who became known as the “Blue Robe Guy” for wearing a blue fleece and a black backpack that faintly resembled the one shown in the FBI image (shown above, right). At least 57 photographs brought up during the discussion were subsequently compiled into an Imgur gallery post, gaining more than 1.6 million views in less than 24 hours.

Investigation

On April 18th, F.B.I. released the first surveillance photos and videos of two main suspects being sought after. In one of the photos posted on the F.B.I website, both suspects were seen wearing black jackets, khaki fatigues and black backpacks. Shortly after, Redditor SPAtreatment posted an image identifying the hat as a Bridgestone golf cap, while many others searched for additional photos matching the official description.

Online Speculations

In the early hours on April 19th, a Redditor submitted a link to a Huffington Post article^[36] about Brown University student Sunil Tripathi who had been missing since mid-March, implicating that the student might have played a role in the attack. The post^[37] soon reached the front page of Reddit and the speculation continued to spread elsewhere as users on Twitter began reporting that they had heard Tripathi being named as one of two possible suspects via police scanner.^[38]

However, by the next morning, the rumor was debunked as pure speculation after the deadly shootout between the suspects and the police. In response, the moderator of /r/FindBostonBombers issued a statement apologizing for the misimplication of Tripathi in the case and cautioning people to refrain from doxing personal information until official confirmation.

Manhunt Operation

Later that same day, the investigation saw its first breakthrough in the case when a violent shootout erupted on the campus of Massachusetts Institute of Technology, leading to the death of Boston police officer Sean Collier and a wild police chase in Cambridge.

During the course of the explosive-ridden standoff, one of the main suspects, Tamerlan Tsarnaev, was fatally wounded and later pronounced dead at the hospital.

Ruslan Tsarni’s Plea

On April 19th, as the manhunt for the second suspect continued amidst a city-wide lockdown, the uncle of the two bombing suspects appeared in a local news interview to publicly denounce the nephews for their alleged involvement and called them “losers” for shaming the entire people of Chechnya. Furthermore, when asked if he had any advice for the younger Tsarnaev at large, he asked Dzhokhar to turn himself in and ask for forgiveness.

The uncle’s emotional address towards his nephews quickly made his name rise to a trending topic on Twitter, where his remarks were highly praised by many viewers as patriotic and heartfelt. The viral takeoff of Tsarni’s interview statement was picked up that same day by The Washington Post^[45], Gawker^[46], New Yorker^[47] and TIME Magazine among many other publications. Meanwhile on Reddit^[48], Tsarni was hailed as an unforgiving patriot through the impromptu advice animal series “Uncle Ruslan.”

Aftermath

The Arrest

The manhunt came to its fruition on the evening of April 19th, when a resident of Watertown, Massachusetts found a body laying in a pool of blood inside a boat stationed in his backyard, suspected to be Dzhokhar Tsarnaev. The authorities subsequently surrounded the boat and used a thermal imaging device to verify that the body was still moving (shown below). After exchanging fire with the suspect for more than an hour, Tsarnaev was taken into custody and transported to the hospital, suffering from multiple gunshot wounds.^[49]

On April 22nd, after being treated for severe injuries at the hospital, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was charged with “using and conspiring to use a weapon of mass destruction resulting in death” and “malicious destruction of property resulting in death” in connection to the bombings. In addition, Tsarnaev was also charged with four counts of murder. On July 10th, 2013, Tsarnaev made his first public appearance at the arraignment for a total of 30 charges, to all of which Tsarnaev pled “not guilty.” On January 30th, 2014, United States Attorney General Eric Holder released a statement revealing that the federal government will seek the death penalty against Dzhokhar Tsarnaev.

#FreeJahar Movement

Similar to the online fandom that grew out of support for Aurora, Colorado theater shooter James Holmes, the arrest of the younger Tsarnaev was met by supporters who rallied around him on Twitter with the hashtag #FreeJahar,^[50] inspired by Tsarnaev’s Twitter handle^[51] that was exposed by Gawker^[52] the previous day. Throughout the third week of April, the hashtag was mentioned by several news sites including The Blaze,^[70] Wired^[71], the Week^[72], Gawker^[73], the Huffington Post^[74] and Heavy.^[75] As of July 2013, the hashtag has been used on Twitter more than 140,000 times^[69], with both serious and mocking sentiments.

I truly believe that Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was set up. The gov't don't have enough proof to back up their story so, #PrayingForJahar #FreeJahar
— ChaeAmora (@Amora_0x) April 21, 2013

In addition to the Twitter hashtag, the support spread to Tumblr^[76]^[77] where at least three single topic blogs claiming his innocence have launched since April. The movement saw a renewed interest in July 2013 when a group of supporters assembled in front of the Moakley Federal Courthouse for Tsarnaev’s first public hearing, chanting “Free Jahar.”^[81] Two days later, The Atlantic^[82] published a piece investigating the reasons why women have gotten involved in actively supporting the alleged bomber.

Rolling Stone Cover Story

On July 16th, 2013, Rolling Stone magazine revealed that Dzhokhar Tsarnaev^[53] would be featured on the cover of the upcoming August 1st issue, along with an editorial piece about Tsarnaev’s transformation into a suspected terrorist, based on interviews with dozens of his friends, teachers and neighbors. In less than 24 hours of online publication, the feature article accrued more than 1,900 comments. Rolling Stone also shared the cover on their Facebook page^[54], generating more than 4,500 shares and nearly 15,000 comments. The post also generated thousands of tweets criticizing the magazine for treating Tsarnaev like a rock star (shown below). On the 16th, “Rolling Stone” was mentioned on Twitter more than 165,000 times according to Topsy Analytics^[55], a 3,126% increase in volume from the previous day.

New Rolling Stone cover turns the Boston bomber into Jim Morrison. A comparison: pic.twitter.com/UJKhAMJSGO
— Judd Legum (@JuddLegum) July 16, 2013

Between the evening of the 16th and morning of the 17th, the impassioned response to the Rolling Stone cover photo was picked up by dozens of news outlets, including Huffington Post^[60], Buzzfeed^[61], CNN{62], Business Insider^[63], USA Today^[64], CBSNews^[65] and Boston.com^[66] On the morning of July 17th, the hashtag #BoycottRollingStone^[56] began to trend, drawing endorsement from Arizona Diamondbacks pitcher Brad Ziegler^[57] as well as newsmagazine distributors including CVS and Tedeschi’s Food Shops.^[59] Within hours, the hashtag was used more than 1,800 times.^[58] According to a tweet from Fox 25 reporter Catherine Parrotta^[67], Boston mayor Thomas Menino called the cover a “disgrace” and plans to contact the publisher. Meanwhile, supporters of Tsarnaev also slammed the cover^[68] for calling him “The Bomber” without being proven guilty (shown below).

Lawyers Jahar should file a lawsuit against the RollingStone</a>. After all, Jahar is innocent until proven otherwise! <a href="https://twitter.com/search?q=%23Justice4Jahar&src=hash">#Justice4Jahar</a></p>— SupporterJahar! (mariatmqsil) July 16, 2013

On the afternoon of July 17th, Rolling Stone editors responded to the outcry on their Facebook page^[83] stating that their thoughts are with the victims of the bombings but they were standing by the story. As Tsarnaev fell into the age group of many of their readers, they found it necessary to examine all of the layers of his character to gain a better understanding of how a tragedy like this one happened.

CBS The Good Wife

On November 24th, 2013, CBS’ legal procedural drama The Good Wife ran an episode titled “Whack-A-Mole,”^[84] in which an ad-hoc investigation launched by a group of online vigilantes on the fictitious social news site “Scabbit” inadvertently leads to the racial profiling of an American professor of Middle Eastern descent and false accusations of a bombing in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, fueled by the heated discussions of conjectures, theories and circumstantial evidence (shown below).

On the next day, Redditor Kneeco28 started a discussion thread about the episode on /r/television^[85], where it garnered more than 654 up votes within the first 24 hours, while similar articles comparing the episode plot to the timeline of /r/findbostonbombers soon followed on Entertainment Weekly, Huffington Post, Wall Street Journal, AV Club, TechPresident and Vulture,^[86] just to name a few.

Trial and Verdict

On March 5th, 2015, the trial began for Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, with charges on 30 separate counts, including multiple murders and uses of explosives for the purpose of murder; since the act was deemed one of terrorism, the trial was a federal and guilty verdicts could potentially carry the death penalty as a sentence. Massachusetts does not apply the death penalty to its own trials in the state, and because of this difference, it was substantially more difficult to find potential jurors willing to serve the death penalty.^[87]

The trial lasted until April 7th, 2015, and the defense admitted Tsarnaev’s guilt while simultaneously attempting to portray him as acting under the influence of his older brother, Tamerlan. The prosecution portrayed him as “an equal partner in the carnage.” On April 8th, after less than two days of deliberation, the jury found Tsarnaev guilty on all counts. ^[88]

On May 15, in a unanimous vote, the jury handed down a death sentence in six of the 17 counts Tsarnaev had been found guilty of.^[89] Following the announcement of the verdict, US Attorney General Loretta Lynch released a statement praising the decision:

Dzhokhar Tsarnaev coldly and callously perpetrated a terrorist attack that injured hundreds of Americans and ultimately took the lives of three individuals: Krystle Marie Campbell, a 29-year-old native of Medford; Lingzi Lu, a 23-year-old Boston University graduate student from China; and Martin Richard, an 8-year-old boy from Dorchester who was watching the marathon with his family just a few feet from the second bomb. In the aftermath of the attack, Tsarnaev and his brother murdered Sean Collier, a 27-year-old patrol officer on the MIT campus, extinguishing a life dedicated to family and service.

We know all too well that no verdict can heal the souls of those who lost loved ones, nor the minds and bodies of those who suffered life-changing injuries from this cowardly attack. But the ultimate penalty is a fitting punishment for this horrific crime and we hope that the completion of this prosecution will bring some measure of closure to the victims and their families. We thank the jurors for their service, the people of Boston for their vigilance, resilience and support and the law enforcement community in Boston and throughout the country for their important work.^[90]

Search Interest

External References

^[1]CNN– Explosions Near Finish of Boston Marathon

^[2]Wikipedia – 2013 Boston Marathon Bombings

^[3]ABC News – Three Dead, Including Child, in Boston Explosions

^[4]Reddit – Random Acts of Pizza

^[5]Reddit – /r/random_acts_of_pizza: UnfortunatelyMacabre’s comment

^[6]Reddit – /r/random_acts_of_pizza: Boston Marathon

^[7]Google Docs – Need a place to stay – Boston Marathon explosion

^[8]Google Docs – I have a place to offer – Boston Marathon explosion

^[9]Reddit – Live Update Thread 1

^[10]Reddit – Live Update Thread 2

^[11]Reddit – Live Update Thread 3

^[12]Reddit – Live Update Thread 4

^[13]Reddit – Live Update Thread 5

^[14]Reddit – Live Update Thread 6

^[15]Google Person Finder – Boston Marathon Explosions

^[16]Topsy – Tweet Statistics for “Boston Marathon”

^[17]USA Today – Horrific details from the scene of the Boston Marathon explosions

^[18]New York Daily News – Boston Marathon explosions elicit outpouring of grief, anger, information on Twitter

^[19]Fox Nation – Condolences – and Grief – on Twitter for Boston Marathon Explosion Victims

^[20]The Huffington Post – Athletes React To Boston Marathon Bombing (TWEETS)

^[21]Twitter – #PrayForBoston

^[22]Viral Read – #PrayForBoston Begins Trending Immediately After Boston Marathon Explosions

^[23]Twee.co – #prayforboston Statistics

^[24]Topsy – Tweet Statistics for #prayforboston

^[25]International Business Times – Boston Marathon Explosions: Knee-Jerk Twitter Rumors Run The Gamut From North Korea To The Tea Party

^[26]The Guardian – How the Boston Marathon explosions reveal the two sides of Twitter

^[27]Facebook – Patton Oswalt’s Status Update

^[28]YouTube – YouTube Spotlight – Explosions at the Boston Marathon\

^[29]ABC News – Mystery ‘Man on the Roof’ Sparks Boston Marathon Chatter

^[30]Topsy – Tweet Results for Mystery Man

^[31]Los Angeles Times – Fox pulls ‘Family Guy’ episode after Boston bombings

^[32]CNN– 5 viral stories about Boston attacks that aren’t true

^[33]Reddit – /r/FindBostonBombers

^[34]Imgur – 4chan Think Tank

^[35]Gawker – Your Guide To The Boston Marathon Bombing Amateur Internet Crowd-Sleuthing

^[36]Huffington Post – Sunil Tripathi, Brown University Student, Is Missing As Search Expands In Northeast

^[37]Reddit – Is missing student Sunil Tripathi Marathon Bomber #2?

^[38]Daily Dot – Sunil Tripathi is innocent, still missing

^[39]Salon – The Biggest Internet Manhunt Ever

^[40]FBI– Updates on Investigation Into Multiple Explosions in Boston

^[41]TIME Magazine – FBI Releases Photos of Suspects: Let the Crowdsourcing Begin

^[42]Reddit – [Mod Note] Despite what was allegedly overheard on a police scanner, Sunil Tripathi was misidentified and is innocent.

^[43]Forbes – Boston Marathon Bomber Suspect Dzhokar Tsarnaev’s Twitter Account Shows Discontent

^[44]The Onion – Internet Comes Up With 8.5 Million Leads On Potential Boston Bombing Suspect

^[45]The Washington Post – Uncle Ruslan’s inspiring words -- a moment we needed

^[46]Gawker – Bombing Suspect’s Uncle Makes Raw Emotional Plea, Goes Viral

^[47]New Yorker – The Suspect’s Uncle

^[48]Reddit – Search Results for Uncle Ruslan

^[49]CNN– ‘CAPTURED!!!’ Boston police announce Marathon bombing suspect in custody

^[50]Twitter – Tweet Results for #FreeJahar

^[51]Twitter – @J_tsar

^[52]Gawker – ‘Stay Safe People’: Here Is The Fugitive Boston Marathon Bombing Suspect’s Twitter Account

^[53]Rolling Stone – Five Revelations From Rolling Stone’s Boston Bomber Cover Story

^[54]Facebook – Rolling Stone’s Photo

^[55]Topsy Analytics – Tweet Statistics for “Rolling Stone”

^[56]Twitter – Tweet Results for #BoycottRollingStone

^[57]Twitchy – #BoycottRollingStone: MLB pitcher slams mag for terror-glorifying cover

^[58]Topsy – Tweet Statistics for #boycottrollingstone

^[59]Gawker – CVS Will Boycott the Dzhokhar Tsarnaev Rolling Stone Cover

^[60]Huffington Post – Rolling Stone Boston Bomber Cover Story: Dzhokhar Tsarnaev Image Stirs Controversy, Boycotts

^[61]Buzzfeed – Dzhokhar Tsarnaev Covers New Issue Of Rolling Stone

^[62]CNN– Rolling Stone puts Boston bombing suspect on cover, ignites firestorm

^[63]Business Insider – Rolling Stone Portrays Alleged Boston Bomber As Dreamy Teen Heartthrob

^[64]USA Today – ‘Rolling Stone’ Tsarnaev cover stirs firestorm

^[65]CBS News – Rolling Stone cover featuring Boston Marathon bombing suspect stirs online backlash

^[66]Boston.com – Tsarnaev makes cover of Rolling Stone, draws outrage, boycotts

^[67]Twitter – @CParrottaFox25: Mayor Menino calls Rolling Stone cover a disgrace. Says it should’ve been about 1st responders. Plans to contact publisher #fox25

^[68]Twitchy – Not dreamy enough? #FreeJahar terror groupies shriek about Rolling Stone cover

^[69]Topsy – Tweet Statistics for #freejahar

^[70]The Blaze – #FREEJAHARHASHTAGHITSTWITTER AS PEOPLESYMPATHIZEWITHBOSTONTERRORSUSPECTWHOALLEGEDLYPLACEDBOMBTHATKILLED 8-YEAR-OLD

^[71]Wired – #Freejahar Hashtag Rallies Emerging Cult of Boston Bomb Suspect

^[72]The Week – ‘Free Jahar’: The online push to exonerate Dzhokhar Tsarnaev

^[73]Gawker – #FreeJahar: When Conspiracy Theorists and One Direction Fans Collide

^[74]The Huffington Post – Dzhokhar Tsarnaev Fan Club: Boston Bombing Suspect Gets Support From Girls, #FreeJahar Following

^[75]Heavy – #FreeJahar Trending on Twitter: 20 Tweets You Need to Read

^[76]Tumblr – Posts tagged “free jahar”

^[77]Tumblr – Posts tagged “freejahar”

^[78]Tumblr – jahar-t

^[79]Tumblr – freejahartho

^[80]Tumblr – supportingthelionjahar

^[81]CBS Boston – ‘Free Jahar’ Chant As Boston Bombing Suspect Heads To Court

^[82]The Atlantic – Dzhokhar Tsarnaev’s Female Supporters Are Not ‘Fangirls’

^[83]Facebook – Rolling Stone: Our hearts go out to the victims of the Boston Marathon bombing

^[84]CBS– The Good Wife / Whack-A-Mole

^[85]Reddit – The Good Wife s5e9 on Reddit post Boston bombing

^[86]Google News – News Articles about ‘The Good Wife’ and ‘Whack A Mole’

^[87]New York Times – Times Topic: Boston Marathon Bombing

^[88]WBUR– Dzhokhar Tsarnaev Convicted On All 30 Counts In Boston Marathon Bombing

^[89]Huffington Post – Dzhokhar Tsarnaev Sentenced To Death

^[90]Mediaite – Loretta Lynch on Tsarnaev: ‘The Ultimate Penalty is a Fitting Judgment’

03/09/16--11:28: #TheTriggering

Overview

#TheTriggering is a hashtag-based activist campaign launched by Canadian conservative political commentator Lauren Southern to challenge the contemporary values of political correctness and the radical faction within the social justice movement by sharing provocative message that would be deemed as triggers for the aforementioned group in defense of free speech on March 9th and 10th, 2016.

Background

On September 18th, 2015, Southern posted a tweet calling for the creation of a day named “The Triggering,” during which participants would post “offensive” statements on social media in defense of free speech (shown below, left).^[1] Over the next six months, the tweet garnered upwards of 980 likes and 730 retweets. The following day, Southern announced that the hashtag campaign “#TheTriggering” would take place on March 9th, 2016 (shown below, right).^[2]

Notable Developments

On March 7th, 2016, the Internet culture blog Age of Shitlords^[3] published an article about the upcoming social media campaign. The following day, a post promoting the hashtag was submitted to the International Skeptics Forum,^[8] which called for readers to stand up for free speech “like Socrates would.” On March 9th, Twitter users began posting the hashtag “#TheTriggering”^[5] along with various statements criticizing political correctness (shown below).

That morning, Twitter user @MartinDaubney posted a screenshot of Twitter search, accusing the platform of “suppressing” the hashtag (shown below). Meanwhile, Redditor pl0x submitted a post about the campaign to the /r/KotakuInAction^[7] subreddit.

During much of the day, the #TheTriggering remained a worldwide trending topic on Twitter. Meanwhile, YouTuber Fem Fighter uploaded a satirical response video titled “#TheTriggering is Triggering,” in which she feigns outrage over the hashtag campaign (shown below). In the coming days, several news site published articles about the hashtag campaign, including Infowars,^[6] The Mary Sue^[4] and WeHuntedTheMammoth.^[9]

Search Interest

Not available.

External References

^[1]Twitter – @Lauren_Southern

^[2]Twitter – @Lauren_Southern

^[3]Age of Shitlords – The Triggering 2016

^[4]The Mary Sue – Internet Jerks Pledge to Make Internet Even Worse in #TheTriggering

^[5]Twitter – #TheTriggering

^[6]InfoWars – #TheTriggering – Safe space cry babies

^[7]Reddit – Happening TheTriggering Raise Awareness

^[8]International Skeptics – Standing up for freedom of speech

^[9]We Hunted the Mammoth – Internet jerks pledge to be extra jerky

12/11/16--02:28: TheLegend27

About

TheLegend27 is a fictional character appearing on an online ad for the mobile video game Game of War: Fire Age, where several players start talking about the legendary player and their feats. The ad’s transcript inspired a copypasta, which gained traction in middle December 2016.

Origin

On October 5th, 2016, the Game of War official channel uploaded an ad named “Campfire Stories”. In the ad, four players gather around a campfire in order to talk about TheLegend27, a player that keeps defeating them; at the end, one of the players is revealed as TheLegend27. In the following two months, the video gained over 43 million views.

What are you guys playing?
I’m supposed to be playing Game Of War™ but this one player keeps kicking my ass.
Is it TheLegend27?!
Yeah, TheLegend27.
Who is the legend 27?
Some say TheLegend27 is the first Game Of War™ player ever.
Born from fire.
I heard, TheLegend27 can hurl a boulder farther than a catapult.
I heard TheLegend27 once defeated an entire army with a single blow.
But the worst part is, just when you think you’re safe, just when you think you might escape…
WHAM!!! Just like that!
collective gasps
Iphone Notification
What? No, no no no, no no no!
Iphone Notification
That’s impossible!
“TheLegend27” has captured my hero!
Mine too!
Aw you guys, I’m sure it’s not that bad.
You have no idea what just happened.
I might have some idea.
Woman turns around, and powers her device’s screen, showing she is in fact TheLegend27

Spread

In the following days, the commercial inspired several copypastas on Reddit, while the original had begun appearing in CollegeHumor and YouTube comments sections.^[1] Redditor ohrules^[2] submitted an inquiry about TheLegend 27 to /r/OutOfTheLoop on December 11th, 2016. The commercial also inspired several video remixes, which were compiled and posted by EenGamer on the 11th.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References

^[1]r/copypasta – TheLegend27

^[2]Reddit – Who is the legend27?

04/26/16--11:41: Nut Button

About

Nut Button refers to an image of a hand going to hit a blue button, badly edited to have the word “NUT” on it. The image often has text above it, usually “When you’re hitting it from behind and she turns around and moans ‘X’”, or something similar. Over the course of 2016, it evolved such that “nut” was replaced with different words and the captions were applied to several different, not always sexual subjects.

Origin

On December 6th, 2015, Tumblr user zakk.lol^[3] posted the original image as a joke reply to a Smash the Like request from user browningtons. In the original image, the button said “LIKE.” The post, shown below, has gained 129,729 notes as of January 12th, 2016.

Spread

On January 26th, 2016, Tumblr user kuma-dot-net posted the template with the title “when u see da anime bae and she thicc”, and the caption “BOY” (below).^[1] It obtained about 7,000 notes in 3 months.

On April 6th, 2016, Dolan Dark posted an edit of the image (below) on Twitter with the phrase “Don’t ever nut to me or my son ever again”, referencing Don’t Talk To Me Or My Son Ever Again. In 3 weeks, it garnered over 200 retweets and 800 likes.

Over the course of the year, many more edits were made, with some changing the text on the button to fit different jokes. On January 11th, 2017, memearchives^[4] reblogged zakk.lol’s original post, after he had added “This is it. The original use of this image. I created this with pure intentions, and now it’s known only as the Nut Button.”

Various Examples

Multiple Button

The Multiple Button variation of the series features a red, green and blue button placed above the Nut Button, indicating that the blue button’s caption is selected over the other two options. On March 10th, Redditor Pm_Me_Ur_Ricecooker posted a multiple button image which selects preventing water from splashing during a bowel movement over ending world hunger and poverty to /r/dankmemes^[7] (shown below, left). On March 11th, Redditor DankMemesBestMemes submitted a post announcing that “Multiple choice button memes on the rise!” to /r/memeeconomy.^[6]

On March 12th, 2017, Redditor ImAGod47 uploaded an image in which the ”Meet Herobrine in Minecraft button is selected (shown below, top, left). Within 48 hours, the post gained over 2,400 votes (98% upvoted) on /r/dankmemes.^[5] In the coming days, many additional variations were submitted to /r/dankmemes (shown below).

Search Interest

External References

^[1]Tumblr – when u see da anime bae and she thicc by kuma-dot-net / January 26th, 2016

^[2]Twitter – Don’t nut to me or my son ever again by Dolan Dark / April 6th, 2016

^[3]Tumblr – DIDYALLHEAR ME I SAYWHO IS UP

^[4]Tumblr – memearchives

^[5]Reddit – Some day

^[6]Reddit – Multiple choice button memes on the rise

^[7]Reddit – Some decisions dont require thought

12/12/15--02:44: Cummies

About

Cummies is a term which typically refers to a submissive woman who enjoys the orgasm of her dominant male partner, typically reffered to as her “daddy”, within the BDSM relationship type known as “DDLG” (short for Daddy Dom / Little Girl). The phrase became widely popular after an emoji spam copypasta featuring a girl in the aforementioned relationship asked for “cummies” (semen shots from oral sex).

Origin

The term “cummies” has been used in a variety of different communities (mostly BDSM related) to refer to semen. One of the earliest known uses was in a post to a cuckold dedicated Tumblr blog from a user identifying themselves as “missy”, on September 22nd, 2013.^[1] The earliest known use of the phrase in reference to a DDLG relationship was in a post by Tumblr user littlemermaidvirginprincess on or shortly before December 31st, 2013.^[2]

Spread

The term gained widespread use both in the DDLG and other BDSM-realted communities in late 2013 and into 2014. By late 2014 the term was a staple term in the DDLG community. On October 21st, 2014, the online news site The Daily Dot reported on a story about a condom being filled with spaghetti.^[3] In the article the author mentions cummies as an offshoot of the DDLG community and claims that “French Toast is involved somehow”. On December 10th, 2014, a YouTuber by the name of cyberspacebabe uploaded a video in which several people are shown saying “cummies” in a confused manner (shown below).

On March 4th, 2015, a copypasta about a DDLG relationship by Tumblr user studip,^[3] was submitted. The post including several emojis, and various references to cummies. In 9 months, the post gained over 25,300 notes.

On August 5th, 2015, a YouTuber by the name of Smokin’ Beer uploaded a video titled The Cummies Song (Original) in which a young woman in a kigurumi sings about cummies (shown below).

Search Interest

External References

^[1]Tumblr – NSFWLovely Clit

^[2]Tumblr – NSFWDaddy wanted me to share my rules

^[3]The Daily Dot – A condom filled with spaghetti is going viral on Tumblr

^[4]studip.tumblr – IM DELETINGYOU, DADDY!

^[5]/r/copypasta – IM DELETINGYOU, DADDY!

08/17/16--08:40: "This Is the Ideal Male Body"

About

“This is the ideal male body,” also known as “This is the ideal ‘make’ body,” refers to a series of jokes parodying a tweet posted by Canadian-American conservative media personality Steven Crowder that highlighted a picture of Russian heavyweight MMA fighter Fedor Vladimirovich Emelianenko as an example of the ideal male physique.

Origin

On January 13th, 2016,^[1] Crowder tweeted the picture of Emelianenko along with a short caption describing it as “the ideal make [sic] body.” (shown below).

However, Crowder’s tweet didn’t draw any major attention until August 16th, 2016, when popular video-editing comedian Vic Berger IV mocked a tweet by Crowder that said “There is an epidemic of young, very portly girls dressing quite whorish. Unsettling.” Twitter user @playazball^[2] replied to Vic Berger IV’s tweet with screenshot of Crowder’s “ideal male body” tweet captioned “and for you men, take note of what Steven feels is the ideal body,” inspiring the spread of the joke (shown below).

Spread

Joke variations where Crowder’s original text is applied to different images began spreading rapidly through Weird Twitter, to the point where “The Ideal Male Body” was a Twitter moment^[3] by the end of the day. Popular variations included Graham, ^[4] Toad crossed with Bayonetta, ^[5] Homer Simpson,^[6]Shrek, ^[7] Frasier,^[8] and many more. The meme was covered by The Daily Dot,^[9] New York Magazine,^[10] College Humor,^[11] and The Verge.^[12]

Various Examples

Search Interest

Unavailable

External References

^[1]Twitter – @scrowder

^[2]Twitter – @playazball

^[3]Twitter – The ‘ideal make body’ meme is so hot right now

^[4]Twitter – @FanSince09

^[5]Twitter – @corcrane

^[6]Twitter – @ralphdouthat

^[7]Twitter – @CrushingBort

^[8]Twitter – @pattymo

^[9]The Daily Dot – Twitter savagely mocks conservative bro with ‘ideal male body’ meme

^[10]New York Magazine – This Is the Ideal Male Body

^[11]College Humor – Twitter is Trolling a Dude’s Claim That This Is “The Ideal Male Body”

^[12]The Verge – Watch a precious meme be birthed in real time

11/03/15--08:14: Bob Ross

About

Bob Ross (1942 – 1995) was an American painter best known for his instructional television show The Joy of Painting, which aired on Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) stations from January 1983 to May 1994.

Background

The Joy of Painting was an American half-hour instructional television show hosted by Ross. During each episode, Ross would complete an imaginary landscape using a variety of tools and brushes while using the wet-on-wet oil painting technique; instructing viewers regarding the techniques so anyone could follow along.

Prior to his painting career, the Florida-raised Ross was a member of the United States Air Force which brought him to Alaska, inspiring the first snow and mountains that would become a theme in his artwork. Ross also had an affection for small animals, which he raised and set free; occasionally bringing them with him in the show. He was known for several catchphrases coined on his show, including “happy little trees” and “there are no mistakes, only happy accidents”;^[1] alongside his afro haircut and soothing voice became notable characteristics associated with him.

Online History

The Joy of Painting is still frequently syndicated by PBS stations nationwide, and there have been several events of online newsworthiness featuring the painter and his show. Clips of Ross frequently show up in YouTube Poop and montage parody videos (see below video parody section), and even PBS’ own Digital Studios has remixed Ross videos to create a viral hit, entitled “Bob Ross Remixed” (shown below, left). Since its original posting in July of 2012, this video has acquired over 8.92 million views. In addition, the online series “Epic Rap Battles of History” featured a Bob Ross vs. Pablo Picasso battle (shown below, right); since it’s posting in November of 2013, that video has gained over 26 million views.

On April 14th, 2014, the popular statistics blog FiveThirtyEight released an analysis they’d created of Bob Ross’ painting catalog. They found that Ross painted trees, mountains, and clouds more frequently than any other types of objects, and used the painter’s oeuvre to explain several statistical methods.^[3] This analysis proved to be a viral hit for the site, and the work was covered by mainstream press outlets like The Verge,^[4] Laughing Squid,^[5] and the AV Club.^[6]

Twitch Marathon

To celebrate the launch of their new channel called Twitch Creative,^[10] the streaming site Twitch streamed every episode of The Joy of Painting in a 400 hour, 8.5 day marathon, complete with their traditional chat structure.^[7] The stream, which began on October 29th, 2015, averaged about 40,000 views at any given time, and as of November 3rd, 2015, had acquired over 2.3 million total views and over 314,000 followers. The stream was controversial both because of the mainstream, non-gaming community that were pulled to the site,^[8] and also because of the mainstream’s reaction to the Twitch chat group, which, for instance, reacted negatively when Ross had a female guest on to paint.^[9]

During the stream, various phrases gained memetic usage during notable sections in the show: Such as viewers saying “RUINED” whenever Bob Ross painted over an earlier done section and saying “GG” at the end of each episode. Twitch itself also appealed to the site’s memes by introducing KappaRoss, a variation of Twitch’s highly popular Kappa emoticon edited to have Ross’ characteristic afro; likewise the stream’s introduction image also featured an image of Josh DeSeno, the face of Kappa, as Bob Ross (shown below).

The first stream ended on November 6th with over 180,000 viewers. Following this, the stream started to feature a countdown leading to November 9th; where Twitch introduced the Bob Ross Mini Monday Marathon, a weekly monday stream featuring one season of The Joy of Painting from 3pm PST to 9:30pm PST.^[11] Alongside with the new stream, several emoticons were also added to the Twitch chat; including bobrossCloud and bobrossTree, based on Ross’ popular comments towards painting them; and several of Ross’ brushes and phrases. During the first monday stream, the channel managed to surpass over over 445,000 likes and reached nearly 4 million total views; viewers averaged out at around 50,000, being higher at the start of the stream but gradually dropping over time.

Related Memes

Photoshop Bob Ross

Photoshop Bob Ross is a photoshop meme using an image template of the celebrity painter standing in front of a blank canvas. Taken from a promotional photograph for his instructional television program The Joy of Painting, it is most often used as an exploitable to frame various images in the blank canvas as if they were drawn by Ross.

Video Parodies

In addition to the photoshop meme, there are several video parodies and tributes to Ross’ show, The Joy of Painting. This can be attributed to the show’s continued syndication on public access television networks.

Search Interest

External References

^[1]Washington Business Journal – Happy accidents and the legacy of Bob Ross

^[2]YouTube – Search: Bob Ross YTP

^[3]FiveThirtyEight – A Statistical Analysis of the Work of Bob Ross

^[4]The Verge – The joy of statistically analyzing Bob Ross’ happy little trees

^[5]Laughing Squid – Five Thirty Eight Breaks Down the Statistics of Bob Ross Paintings

^[6]The AV Club – Study the happy little numbers with a statistical analysis of Bob Ross’ Joy Of Painting

^[7]Twitch – The Joy of Painting Marathon – Celebrating the official launch of Twitch Creative! #painting #oilpaint #bobross

^[8]Forbes – How Dead Painter Bob Ross Is Bringing Positivity To The Internet’s Most Cynical Community

^[9]The Verge – The internet is so toxic it can’t even appreciate The Joy of Painting

^[10]Twitch – Introducing Twitch Creative

^[11]Twitch – Monday Night is Bob Ross Night

10/30/12--08:32: The Irate Gamer

About

The Irate Gamer is a YouTube personality portrayed by Chris Bores who is known for his series of ill-tempered video game reviews. His YouTube series has been frequently compared to Angry Video Game Nerd (AVGN, also known as James Rolfe), leading some fans of AVGN to proclaim Bores to be a ripoff, dislike all of his videos and leave an excess of hateful comments and parody response videos on his uploads.

Online History

Chris Bores released his first Irate Gamer video on his YouTube channel^[1] on April 28th, 2007, in which he played the Back to the Future video game for the original Nintendo Entertainment System. In the seven-and-a-half minute video, Bores combined clips from the movie with the gameplay, while he gave a relatively hostile overview of his playthrough. Many fans initially compared this video to the AVGN’s review of the same game uploaded nearly a year earlier, as Bores raised many of the same points Rolfe had made in his production. As of October 2012, the comments have been disabled on the video due to the controversy it caused.

In July 2007, Bores launched the official website at irategamer.com^[2], and later that year, launched two additional web series. In October 2007, Bores uploaded a Ghost Hunters-inspired video (shown below, left) in which he and a group of people explored the Patterson Tower^[3], a supposedly haunted Ohio landmark. This video evolved into a supernatural exploration series called Haunted Investigators^[4] in which Bores and friends visit local places known for being spooky. The next month, Bores launched Irate Gamer NEO^[5], a show dedicated to reviewing modern games (shown below, right). In 2008, Bores further expanded his channel adding the series Irate the 80s^[6] in which he reviews food, drinks and toys popular in the 1980s.

In 2009, Bores began compiling a documentary style show called History of Video Games^[7], chronicling the growth of both arcade and console games over the years. As of October 2012, there are five episodes of this show, reaching the release of the console Fairchild Channel F in 1976. In 2011, he began refilming the videos in high definition for a potential DVD release. Also in 2011, he launched a Facebook profile^[8] for himself, where he has nearly 1500 friends and publishes updates publicly for people to follow.

Reputation

Silent Rob’s Criticism

On September 11th, 2007, a YouTuber known as Silent Rob uploaded a video comparing the Irate Gamer to the Angry Video Game Nerd. Rob accused Bores of plagiarism and predicted that his next video, scheduled to be a review of the Teenage Mutant Ninja TurtlesNES game, would be a near copy of Rolfe’s review.^[9] Since Rob used footage from Irate Gamer episodes, the original video was taken down due to a copyright claim by Bores, but has since been reuploaded by Angry Video Game Nerd fans.

Commentary from Other YouTube Reviewers

In 2008, Doug Walker, the Nostalgia Critic, released a video that was part of a faux feud with the Angry Video Game Nerd in which he claims that Rolfe has become the “Irate Gamer” in respect to the Critic’s videos after an extremely long series of vulgar insults (shown below, left). This is followed by canned booing, and Walker apologizing, saying that this comment was going too far. Rolfe acknowledged the Irate Gamer for the first time a year later at a convention (shown below, right) where he stated “he pretty much pretends that I don’t exist so why would I even need to say anything about him?”

Parody Videos

There are several mean–spirited parodies of the Irate Gamer Show on YouTube, including several accounts dedicated solely to hating on Chris. These videos exaggerate the flaws of his videos to ridiculous proportions, like the “Isuck Gamer Show” (shown below, left). Many other videos depict the feud between the Angry Video Game Nerd and the Irate Gamer (shown below, right). That Guy With The Glasses reviewer Linkara has also parodied Bores’ videos, reviewing an issue of the Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers comic in the style of the Irate Gamer, exaggerating his perceived flaws. As of November 2012, there are 600 search results for “irate gamer parody.”^[10]

Related Memes

Bores n’ Doors

In late 2008, Bores uploaded his review of the obscure NES cult game “Monster Party”^[11] while appearing upset that he has not been invited to a Halloween party occurring across the street from his home. Multiple times throughout the episode, the Irate Gamer’s doorbell rings and he is greeted with people who believe the party is happening at his house. These scenes spawned the “Bores n’ Doors” video fad, in which various characters from other works, such as SpongeBob SquarePants, are depicted visiting Irate Gamer during episodes.

Breakfast is Ruined!

Chris Bores posted a video unaffiliated with any of his series in 2007 featuring a rant about the cereal Lucky Charms, noting that the shapes and colors of the marshmallows had changed since his youth. To summarize this frustration at this, Bores proclaims “Face it. Breakfast is ruined!” This line is often used in parody videos as a quintessential example of complaints by the Irate Gamer that could be considered irrelevant, exaggerated nitpicking.

Search Interest

External References

^[1]YouTube – The Irate Gamer’s channel

^[2]The Irate Gamer – Home

^[3]Weird Ohio – Witches’ Tower

^[4]Haunted Investigators – Home

^[5]Irate Gamer – Irate Gamer NEO

^[6]Irate the 80s – Home

^[7]The Irate Gamer – History of Video Games

^[8]Facebook – Chris Bores

^[9]Encyclopedia Dramatica – Irate Gamer | In the year 2007, lulz was beginning

^[10]YouTube – Search results for “irate gamer parody”

^[11]Wikipedia – Monster Party

12/12/12--16:48: The Fine Brothers

About

The Fine Brothers, made up of Benny and Rafi Fine, are YouTube producers best known for their React series in which different groups of people are filmed watching viral videos.

Online History

On September 21st, 2004, the brothers released their first YouTube video titled “GI Joe The Epic Saga,” featuring action figures for characters from the children’s cartoon series G.I. Joe (shown below). The series gained a fan following online,but were subsequently taken down due to cease and desist orders from Hasbro in 2006.^[10] The videos were subsequently reuploaded on YouTube on alternate accounts.

On June 4th, 2007, the Fine Brothers Entertainment YouTube channel was launched. The first video uploaded to the channel was titled “Burger King Safety Dance,” in which a man wearing a Burger King mask dances to the 1982 new wave song “The Safety Dance” by Men Without Hats (shown below).

React Series

On October 16th, 2010, the React series was launched with the episode “Kids React to Viral Videos #1,” featuring various children reacting to various viral videos, including Double Rainbow and “2 Bunnies 2 Cups” (shown below, left). On November 17th, 2011, a “Teen React” series premiered, which followed the same premise but contained more mature videos (shown below, right).

On May 24th, 2012, the series “Elders React” was created, featuring seniors watching viral videos on YouTube (shown below, left). On December 2nd, the first “YouTubers React” video was uploaded, in which various notable YouTube vlogger are filmed watching YouTube videos (shown below, right).

MyMusic

On April 15th, 2012, the brothers launched the mockumentary comedy show MyMusic, based around a cast of characters working at the fictional MyMusic production company. Originally created as a TV show, it grew into a web show after $100 million funding from Youtube, as part of their Original Channel Initiative^[3].

React World and Trademark Controversy

On January 26th, 2016, Fine Brothers Entertainment revealed plans to trademark the brand name “REACT” and provide licenses to those who wished to make their own Fine Brothers-style reaction videos. In a video about the new “React World” licenses, the brothers claimed they only require ad revenue sharing and no upfront fees to license holders (shown below, left). On January 28th, the video reached the front page of /r/videos,^[11] where many expressed displeasure with the YouTube producers for attempting to license their reaction video format. Within four days, the post gained over 9,400 votes (95% upvoted) and 6,400 comments.

In the following days, several well-known vloggers on YouTube began sharing their reactions to the Fine Bros’ announcement. On January 28th, YouTuber Cr1tikal posted a video reacting to the announcement, which criticized it as an overreaching attempt at copyrighting reaction videos on YouTube (shown below, left). On January 29th, YouTuber Boogie2988 posted a video expressing apprehension toward the idea of licensing the reaction video format (shown below, right).

On January 31st, the brothers released an update video in which they attempted to address many concerns about their “React World” licensing program. In the video, they claimed they were not attempting to copyright “reaction videos” but were merely trying to license to those who wished to use their exact format (shown below).

On February 1st, Kotaku^[5] published an article about the controversy, noting a similarity to the Sony’s unsuccessful trademarking of “LetsPlay”. The same day, the Guardian^[6] published an article explaining the backlash and the mentioning how the Fine Brothers YouTube channel was losing a significant number of subscribers. Additionally, the article reported that the Fine Brothers had previously submitted takedown requests for videos on YouTube, including “Seniors React” and “British Kids React.” Meanwhile, several YouTubers created livestreams highlighting the rapidly decreasing subscriber count, including Sabconth^[7] and SCRUFFY JC^[8]. Many critics circulated the only statistics website Socialblade^[9], providing real-time updates of the Fine Brothers’ subscription count. From January 26th to February 1st, the channel lost over 100,000 subscribers per day.

The evening of of February 1st, Fine Brothers Entertainment published an open apology letter on the blogging platform Medium,^[12] noting they would be rescinding the trademark for “React,” end the “React World” program and release all past content takedowns on YouTube.

Search Interest

External References

^[1]Youtube – FineBros’ channel

^[2]Wikipedia – MyMusic

^[3]Wikipedia – YouTube Original Channel Initiative

^[4]Medium.com – Fine Bros Anouncement Blog Post

^[6]The Guardian – Network Plan Sparks Backlash

^[7]Youtube – Sabconth

^[8]Youtube – SCRUFFY JC

^[9]Socialblade.com – The Fine Bros Real-Time

^[10]SciFiStorm Hasbro shuts down GI Joe Epic Saga

^[11]Reddit – The Fine Bros From YouTube

^[12]Medium – A message from the Fine Brothers

08/12/14--09:51: Robin Williams

About

Robin Williams was an American actor and comedian who starred in dozens of notable films and TV shows over the course of more than four decades, during which he rose to international fame for portraying a wide range of memorable characters, from his memorable comedic roles in Mrs. Doubtfire and Good Morning, Vietnam to the more serious roles in Good Will Hunting and The Dead Poets Society. On August 11th, 2014, at age of 63, Williams committed suicide at his home in Paradise Cay, California.

Acting Career

Williams began his acting career in 1977 guest starring on TV shows such as The Richard Pryor Show and Eight Is Enough. His break-out role was the alien Mork on the TV show Mork & Mindy which ran from 1998 to 1982, which he won a Golden Globe for Best TV Actor (Musical/Comedy) in 1979. His first big screen role was the starring role in Popeye in 1980. He starred in a several comedic dramas in the 1980s including The World According to Garp (1982) and Good Morning, Vietnam (1987). He starred in several family and children’s comedies in the 1990s including Aladdin (1992), Mrs. Doubtfire (1993) and Flubber (1997). In the early 2000s he starred in several dark films including One Hour Photo (2002), Death to Smoochy (2002) and World’s Greatest Dad (2009).

Online History

Social Media Presence

As of August 2014, Williams’ Twitter account^[2] has gained over 1.3 million followers and his Facebook account^[3] has gained over 6.5 million likes. His Instagram account^[4] has gained over 320,000 followers

Kim Kardashian Tweet

On May 7th, 2013, Williams tweeted out a side by side picture of Kim Kardashian in the dress she wore at the Met Gala next to a picture of Williams in Mrs. Doubtfire in a similar dress. Within a year the tweet gained over 320,000 retweets and over 220,000 favorites. Several websites covered the tweet the next day including The Huffington Post^[13] and The Daily Mail.^[14]

Google Search Queries

Upon the breaking news of his death from suicide in August 2014, millions of internet users searched for information relating to Robin Williams. According to Google Trends, “the impact of his death was so great that it prompted people to seek information about mental health. Searches for ‘depression’ increased by 3x, followed by ‘depression symptoms’ and ‘depression test.’” In December 2014, Google Trends recognized “Robin Williams” as the fastest rising search term (for any individual) of the year.

Related Memes

What Year Is It?

What Year Is It is the caption of an image macro featuring a photo of Robin Williams’ disheveled-looking character from the 1995 film Jumanji. In rage comics, it is often used in similar fashion to the my face when reaction faces to convey the disoriented sense of time experienced when waking up.

Reputation

Williams was most well known for his exceptional fluency in ad libitum, improvisational acting and impersonation skills, both on-screen as an actor and on-stage as a stand-up comedian, as well as his distinct style of delivering jokes in rapid-fire succession.

Accolades

Williams received his first Academy Award nomination in 1988 for his performance in Good Morning, Vietnam. He received three more nominations, winning one for Best Actor in a Supporting Role in 1998 for Good Will Hunting. He received 11 Golden Globe nominations, winning five. He also received the Cecil B. DeMille Award in 2005.

Personal Life

Williams was born on July 21st, 1951, in Chicago, Illinois. He briefly attended Claremont McKenna College and Juilliard School.

Death

Robin Williams died^[6] on August 11th, 2014, with police suspecting his death to be caused by suicide through asphyxiation. That day several websites posted retrospectives of his work, including The Huffington Post^[7] and Buzzfeed.^[8] The same day, Mashable posted a video retrospective for Williams, within 24 hours it gained over 340,000 views.

On the following day, several websites published a collection of celebrities reacting to his death on Twitter, including ABC News^[11] and Mashable.^[12]

Zelda Williams’ Response

On the night of the announcement of Williams’ death, Zelda Williams, the late actor’s only daughter, tweeted a message of gratitude to everyone who sent their condolences, along with a quote^[16] from Antoine De Saint-Exupery’s classic children’s book The Little Prince in remembrance of her father:

That same night, Williams also issued a brief statement sharing her own memories of her father via her Tumblr blog^[15], while addressing the issue of negative messages she had received from trolls on Twitter.

Then in the early hours of August 13th, Williams tweeted another message urging her followers to report two Twitter users, @PimpStory and @MrGoosebuster, who had apparently sent her photoshopped images depicting her father supposedly after his death.

“Please report @PimpStory @MrGoosebuster. I’m shaking. I can’t. Please. Twitter requires a link and I won’t open it. Don’t either. Please."

Shortly thereafter, Williams deleted the tweet and issued another statement via her Twitter^[17] and Instagram^[18] accounts that she will take a hiatus from social media activities.

Susan Schneider statement

Several days after Williams’s suicide his wife, Susan Schneider, released a statement revealing for the first time that Williams had been suffering from Parkinson’s disease for some time prior to his death. She also confirmed that “his sobriety was intact” at the time of his death.^[20]

Henry Rollins Rant

On August 21st, 2014, LA Weekly^[23] published an opinion piece by Henry Rollings titled “Henry Rollins: Fuck Suicide.” The piece explains Rollins does not think anyone with children has the right to kill themselves, explaining his thought process:

" I think as soon as you have children, you waive your right to take your own life. No matter what mistakes you make in life, it should be your utmost goal not to traumatize your kids. So, you don’t kill yourself."

The article begins with Rollins referencing Williams’ suicide and goes on to explain Rollins thinks less of people, and if they are artists, their work, if they commit suicide.

The piece immediately sparked a backlash from other writers accusing Rollins of not understanding depression.

Also on August 21st, UpRoxx^[21] published a post titled “Henry Rollins Wrote A Confusing Rant About Robin Williams, Depression And Suicide” which featured celebrities on Twitter criticizing Rollins’ piece.

On August 22nd, Flavorwire^[24] published an opposition essay titled “Fuck Suicide? No, Henry Rollins, Fuck You.”

Search Interest

External References

^[1]IMDB– Robin Williams

^[2]Twitter – Robin Williams

^[3]Facebook – Robin Williams

^[4]Instagram – Robin Williams

^[5]CNN– Robin Williams leaves behind four films to be released

^[6]The Huffington Post – Robin Williams Dead: Beloved Actor Dies In Apparent Suicide

^[7]The Huffington Post – Robin Williams Quotes That Will Stay With Us

^[8]Buzzfeed – 29 Great Performances By Robin Williams

^[9]Mashable – Remembering Robin Williams: His Best Appearances on TV and Film

^[10]ABC News – Ben Affleck, Nathan Lane Pay Tribute to Robin Williams

^[11]ABC News – Ben Affleck, Nathan Lane Pay Tribute to Robin Williams

^[12]Mashable – Entertainers React to the Death of Robin Williams on Twitter

^[13]The Huffington Post – Robin Williams, Kim Kardashian: Who Wore It Better

^[14]The Daily Mail – ‘I wore it better!’ Funnyman Robin Williams weighs in on Kim Kardashian’s floral horror by comparing her outfit to Mrs. Doubtfire

^[15]Tumblr – Zelda Williams’ Post

^[16]Twitter – Zelda Williams’ Tweet

^[17]Twitter – Zelda Williams’ Tweet

^[18]Instagram – Zelda Williams’ Photo

^[19]BuzzFeed – Zelda Williams Leaves Social Media After Receiving Abuse Over Her Father’s Death

^[20]Salon – Robin Williams’ wife reveals beloved actor had Parkinson’s

^[21]UpRoxx – Henry Rollins Wrote A Confusing Rant About Robin Williams, Depression And Suicide

^[22]The Daily Dot – Henry Rollins says ‘f**k suicide,’ Internet says ‘f**k Henry Rollins’

^[23]LA Weekly – Henry Rollins: Fuck Suicide

^[24]Flavorwire – Fuck Suicide? No, Henry Rollins, Fuck You

^[25]Google Trends – Robin Williams

05/20/16--14:33: Polygon

About

Polygon is a video game site owned by Vox Media, which publishes news, reviews and video content.

History

On October 4th, 2012, Polygon^[1] was launched as the third web property by Vox Media out of the company’s tech news blog The Verge.

Controversies

GamerGate

In the wake of the Zoe Post that spawned the GamerGate movement, many criticized Polygon editor Ben Kuchera for donating to the Patreon page of video game developer Zoe Quinn prior to reviewing her game. On August 26th, Polygon released a statement announcing that all writers must disclose any contributions they have made to developer’s Patreon accounts.

Rock Band 4 Review

On June 1st, 2015, Polygon^[2] published an article about the game Rock Band 4. The following day, TotalBiscuit posted a dramatic reading of the article on SoundCloud, in which he mimics the accent of a wealthy aristocrat (shown below).

Doom Gameplay Footage

On May 12th, 2016, Polygon uploaded a 30-minute video containing footage from the recently released reboot of the Doom video game series (shown below). In the video, the player is shown moving erratically and repeatedly missing targets while shooting various weapons. After many viewers left comments on the video pointing out the player’s lack of first-person shooter experience, the comments and ratings were disabled for the video. That day, the video was mocked on the /r/gaming^[3] and /r/KotakuInAction^[4] subreddits.

On May 16th, Redditor Tac_Reso uploaded an animated GIF of two police officers in Family Guy wildly shooting while running titled “Polygon trying to play Doom” (shown below, left). In five days, the post gained over 860 votes (96% upvoted) and 120 comments on the /r/pcmasterrace^[7] subreddit.

On May 18th, Markus Persson posted a tweet^[6] mocking the Polygon video, which received more than 7,000 likes and 2,300 retweets in 72 hours. The following day, TotalBiscuit criticized Polygon’s video production team for creating poor content (shown below, right).

Traffic

As of May 2016, the site has an global rank of 2,361 and a United States rank of 835 on the traffic analytics site Alexa.^[5]

Search Interest

External References

^[1]Polygon – Polygon

^[2]Polygon – Rock Band 4 is doing a lot of the fun things you want it to do

^[3]Reddit – Polygons first thiry minutes of Doom

^[4]Reddit – Polygons first thiry minutes of Doom

^[5]Alexa – polygon.com

^[6]Reddit – Polygon trying to play Doom

^[6]Twitter – @notch

^[7]Reddit – Polygon tries to play Doom

10/06/16--08:36: Retrowave Text Generator

About

The Retrowave Text Generator is a web application that allows users to create graphic images with custom texts in bright neon colors reminiscent of ’80s science-fiction film posters and production logos, a style of visual art that has been also referred to as neon-noir. In October 2016, the image generator gained widespread attention with the growing popularity of retrowave aesthetics on the internet, in a similar vein to the Stranger Things-themed title sequence generator Make It Stranger.

Origin

On July 16th, 2016, generator site PhotoFunia announced on its Instagram^[1] that it had introduced a new text effect generator^[2] it dubbed Retro Wave.

Spread

In the coming months, images using the generator appeared on Flickr,^[3] but it did not gain widespread popularity until October 5th, 2016, when images using the generator began spreading very quickly through Twitter, to the point where it was a Twitter moment the following day.^[4] Most users used the generator to post popular memes. Popular examples include J. Cole Went Platinum With No Features, ^[5]Actually, It’s About Ethics in Gaming Journalism, ^[6]Smooth, ^[7] and many more. The spread was covered by The Daily Dot,^[8] The Mary Sue,^[9] The Next Web,^[10] and more.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References

^[1]Instagram – photofunia_app

^[2]PhotoFunia – Retro Wave Generator

^[3]Flickr – retro wave

^[4]Twitter Moments – This retro wave meme turns everything into a video game

^[5]Twitter – @derekdil

^[6]Twitter – @Pattymo

^[7]Twitter – @anchorlines

^[8]The Daily Dot – Everyone’s going crazy for this totally rad ’80s text generator

^[9]The Mary Sure – Everyone Is Playing With This 80s-Inspired Text Generator, Including Us

^[10]The Next Web – Why this funky 80s graphic generator is taking over Twitter

12/17/12--13:15: Change.org

About

Change.org is an online petition platform which allows anyone to launch and participate in crowdsourced petitions. In 2012, the site surpassed more than 20 million users in 196 countries.

History

After two years of development, Change.org^[1] was launched in February 2007 by the San Francisco-based for-profit organization Change.org, Inc. In its first year, the site allowed users to search for nonprofits and politicians that are in need of support based on their political orientations, in addition to social networking functions such as adding friends, sharing photos and joining groups for various social issues and nonprofit organizations. On the day of the site’s launch, it was featured on TechCrunch^[2], which likened the site’s original design to that of a social network.

The site was also featured on VentureBeat^[3] and the Nonprofit Technology Network^[4] in spring 2007 and by July, the site launched a Facebook application^[5] where users could easily access the site through their Facebook account. After President Obama’s election in 2008, Change.org partnered with social networking site MySpace to create a platform where users could submit policy ideas for Barack Obama (shown below).

News Media Coverage

Following the attention Change.org recieved from the Trayvon Martin case, the site began appearing in the media more frequently with mentions on NPR^[21], the Huffington Post^[22], Mashable^[23], Forbes^[24] and the Wall Street Journal^[25], among others. Many of these articles touch on the for-profit aspect of the site, by generating revenue from the email addresses of users who sign petitions.

Features

Petitions

In November 2009, Change.org introduced their petition tool^[12], integrating non-profit organization Democracy in Action’s government data with social media share buttons and embed codes. After transitioning away from its original social network setup, the site saw its first major spike in traffic after a petition was made in July 2011 to create a law to make it a felony for a parent or guardian to not notify authorities after a child has been missing for 24 hours. As of December 6th, 2012, the site hosts more than 350 thousand petitions, with 40,000 being created every month, which are browsable by popular topics, amount of signatures and most recent submissions.

The site has staff in twenty countries that provide translations in eleven different languages. Change.org maintains a presence on other forms of social networking including Facebook^[9] and Twitter^[10], where it has more than 102K likes and 415K followers respectively as of December 2012.

Highlights

Since its launch, a number of petitions^[14] have resulted in real-life changes, including a petition ensuring health care for victims affected by contaminated water at a military base^[15] and another urging schools to remove LFTB, a mixture of beef scraps and connective tissue, from school food.^[16]

Caylee’s Law

Following Casey Anthony being found not guilty for the murder of her two-year-old daughter Caylee in July 2011, a handful of petition launched calling for governors to make not reporting a child missing after 24 hours a felony for parents or guardians. One in particular, written by Oklahoma resident Michelle Crowder^[17] gained more than 1.2 million electronic signatures within 14 days. In response, lawmakers in eleven states have proposed bills of this nature and as of December 2012, seven of those have been approved.^[18]

Bank of America’s Debit Card Fee

On October 1st, 2011, 22-year-old nanny and Washington D.C. resident Molly Katchpole proposed a petition^[26] demanding Bank of America to drop its $5 / month banking fee for debit card customers. By the end of October, more than 300,000 signatures had been collected on the site, including one from President Barack Obama, ultimately leading the bank to withdraw its plan.

Lorax Petition Project

In December 2011, a fourth-grade class in Brookline, Massachusetts submitted a petition titled “Lorax Petition Project,”^[27] which requested Universal Studios to promote an environmental message on its website and trailer for the 2012 3D-animated musical comedy film Dr. Seuss’ The Lorax, which chronicles the adventures of the Lorax as he fights against the greedy villain the Once-ler to save the environment from its plight. Throughout December, the petition accumulated more than 57,000 signatures, to which Universal Studios responded by updating the website with the environmental message per request.

Trayvon Martin

On March 8th, 2012, Tracey Martin and Sybrina Fulton launched a petition^[19] seeking justice for their son, Trayvon Martin, after he was fatally shot by the neighborhood watch captain George Zimmerman in Sanford, Florida. In less than two weeks, it became the fastest growing petition on the site, at one point gaining 1000 new signatures per minute.^[20] More than 2.2 million people virtually signed the petition before it was announced that a Florida State Attorney would charge George Zimmerman with second degree murder. The trial is scheduled to begin in June 2013.

Traffic

As of December 2012, Change.org has a Quantcast^[7] score of 1024 in the United States, seeing 1.6 million monthly users, and a global Alexa^[8] score of 1395. In September 2012, the site had surpassed 20 million total users^[11], breaking 25 million in December.^[13]

Search Interest

External References

^[1]Change.org – Home

^[2]TechCrunch – Social Networking For Change(.org)

^[3]VentureBeat – Change.org, the network for political change

^[4]NTEN– Will Change.org change…well, anything?

^[5]Mashable – Change.org Application Now Live on Facebook

^[6]Wired – Change.org Crowdsources An Agenda For Incoming Administration

^[7]Quantcast – Change.org

^[8]Alexa – Change.org

^[9]Facebook – Change.org

^[10]Twitter – @Change

^[11]Gigaom – Change.org: 20M users but not a single server

^[12]Future:Media:Change – Road to Petition: Is Change.org’s new tool really the ‘Most powerful petition tool on the web’?

^[13]PR Web – Change.org Hits 25 Million Users, Becomes World’s Largest Petition Platform

^[14]Change.org – Victories

^[15]Change.org – Health Care Now for Military Families Poisoned at Camp Lejeune

^[16]Change.org – Tell USDA to STOP Using Pink Slime in School Food!

^[17]Change.org – Create Caylee’s Law

^[18]Wikipedia – Caylee’s Law

^[19]Change.org – Prosecute the killer of our son, 17-year-old Trayvon Martin

^[20]LA Times – Trayvon Martin case gives Change.org a boost -- and vice versa

^[21]NPR– Petitions Are Going Viral, Sometimes To Great Success

^[22]The Huffington Post – Change.org Petitions Targeting Restaurants Gain Steam

^[23]Mashable – How Change.org Is Revolutionizing Internet Activism

^[24]Forbes – The Business Behind Change.org’s Activist Petitions

^[25]Wall Street Journal – Change.org Tests the Line Between Activism, Profits

^[26]Change.org – Tell Bank of America No $5 Debit Card Fees

^[27]Change.org – Universal Pictures, Let the Lorax Speak for the Trees!

02/03/12--11:18: pixiv

About

pixiv (site domain: www.pixiv.net^[1]) is a popular social network for illustrators in Japan, a sort of equivalent of deviantART in the English web.

History

pixiv was launched by the Japanese programmer Takahiro Kamitani who hit upon the idea by Flickr on September 10th, 2007 as a beta test. The website went under a renewal on December 18th, 2007 into basically what is offered now.

pixiv has support for multiple languages including Japanese, Chinese, English, Korean, Russian, French and Thai.

As of January 28th, 2012, the site consists of over 4 million members, over 24 million submissions, and receives over 2.8 billion page views monthly.^[2]

Features

High Affinity with Doujin

Many Doujin circles register the accounts and post promoting illustrations for their books released in Doujin market. Thus, trend in pixiv is much affected by that of Doujin market. For exapmle, Touhou Project fan art account for 5.8% of all illustrations.

pixiv Encyclopedia

pixiv Encyclopedia is an internet encyclopedia section in pixiv.^[3] It has been enhanced to offer information of many memes/fads relevant to illustrations.

Project

In pixiv, Project (企画, Kikaku) means user-generated events of posting illustrations in the same themes proposed by inventors. To run projects, a common tag “Project Catalog” (企画目録) is used for presentation, and the special page for the catalogs is prepared by the official.^[4] A few projects represented by Pixiv Fantasia are really grandiose, but most of them are user-generated casual events which just utilize template images and the illustration response feature as described next.

Illustration Response

Illustration Response (Japanese: イメージレスポンス) is a sort of trackback feature in weblog tools. It was implemented on September 15th, 2008 for the purpose of encouraging more smooth collaborations among users. However, users have usually used this feature not for sending completed illustrations as response, but for publishing exploitable templates to enjoy drawing together in specific themes. On pixiv, those are called “Illustration Response Project” (イメレス企画, Imeresu Kikaku). Expression Practice and Bottle Meme are famous successful illustration response projects.

Related Memes

For the complete listing of memes that pixiv is contributed, check out KYM Collection – pixiv.

Search Interest

External References

^[1]Online community for artists[pixiv]

^[2]Pixiv Announcement – pixiv Users Broke 4 Million! / 01-28-2012

^[3]pixiv Encyclopedia

^[4]pixiv – 企画目録

07/02/13--05:56: Samurai Jack

About

Samurai Jack is an animated action TV series created by Genndy Tartakovsky on Cartoon Network. The story follows a lone Samurai trapped in the future called Jack who seeks to defeat the evil being known as Aku and return to his timeline.

Premise

Long ago, a great evil known as Aku awakened from his temporary slumber and began his evil conquest to take over the world. To stop this evil, a Japanese lord sent his son away to train across the world and inherits him a mystical Katana that was forged by the Gods as the only weapon that can defeat Aku. Returning as a proud Samurai, the man that would later be known as Jack faces off against Aku, nearly defeating him. But before Jack could deliver the final blow, he was banished by Aku into the distant future where his reign of terror has become absolute. Determined to save the world, Jack embarks on a quest to defeat Aku and find a means to return back to his timeline.

History

Samurai Jack was first announced during a Cartoon Network press conference on February 21, 2001. The series ran from August 10th, 2001, to September 25th, 2004, with a total of 4 seasons or 52 episodes. On October 2013, IDW Publishing began to publish the Samurai Jack comic books series which takes place right after the end of episode 52. The comic was written by Jim Zub and drawn by Andy Suriano. The comic series ran on a monthly schedule that ended on May 2015, with a total of 20 issues. On December 2nd, 2015, Cartoon Network’s adult programming block, Adult Swim, announced via YouTube that Samurai Jack would return for a new season in 2016 (shown below, left). After delays, the first episode of the 5th season began airing on Adult Swim on March 11th, 2017.

Reception

Upon airing, Samurai Jack was met with positive acclaim, being nominated and winning in a number of award shows including the Annie, OIAF, Primetime Emmy, and TCA Awards between 2002 to 2005. The show currently holds an 8.3 user rating on IMDb^[1] and an 8.8 user rating on tv.com.^[2]

Online Presence

Discussions regarding Samurai Jack can be found on a number of websites including reddit,^[3] 4chan,^[4] and Tumblr.^[5] On March 28th, 2004, Urban dictionary user Dave submitted an entry regarding the show.^[6] The Samurai Jack Wiki has 223 pages regarding the series as of September, 2015.^[7] A Facebook page dedicated to the series has gathered over 167.200 likes as of September 2015.^[8] On February 21st, 2012, the Samurai Jack subreddit was launch which has gathered over 740 readers in 3 years.^[9] On Youtube, typing the keyword “Samurai Jack” would yield more than 84.500 results.^[10] On the art sharing site DeviantArt, typing the keyword “Samurai Jack” would yield more than 14.200 results worth of fanart.^[11]

Related Memes

Long Ago in A Distant Land

Long Ago in A Distant Land refers to the monologue uttered by the antagonist Aku during the intro of every episode in Samurai Jack. The monologue summarizes the events of the first episode leading up to Jack’s banishment to the future. The monologue has since become popular among fans the series, evolving into a copypasta with several derivatives replacing Jack and Aku with characters from various other media.^[11]

Extra Thicc

In the beginning of episode 48, “Jack vs. Aku,” Aku is shown ordering what sounds like a pizza over the telephone. The audience can only hear Aku’s part of the conversation. Towards the end, he demands that his order be “extra thick” (shown below).

The “extra thick” line later became fodder for remix, YouTube Poop style videos, playing on Thicc. One of the more popular examples with over 77,000 views was posted by Nepeta Leijon on October 9th, 2016 (shown below, top left).

Search Interest

External References

^[1]IMDb – Samurai Jack

^[2]tv.com – Samurai Jack

^[3]reddit – Search For Samurai Jack

^[4]archive.moe – Search For Samurai Jack

^[5]Tumblr – Search For Samurai Jack

^[6]Urban Dictionary – Samurai Jack

^[7]Samurai Jack Wiki – Home

^[8]Facebook – Samurai Jack

^[9]reddit – r/samuraijack

^[10]Youtube – Search For Samurai Jack

^[11]archive.moe – search for long ago in a distant land

02/07/15--06:28: Boku no Hero Academia

About

Boku no Hero Academia (translated as My Hero Academia) is a manga series created by Kōhei Horikoshi and published in the magazine Weekly Shounen Jump. The story is set on a world where people with superpowers (known as “quirks”) are commonplace; following the life of Izuku Midoriya, a boy born without a quirk who wants to become a superhero.

Premise

Boku No Hero Academia takes place in a universe where each person is born with a superhuman power, or “quirk”, following the exploits of Izuku Midoriya, who finds himself having no useful quirk, until he meets the strongest hero All Might. As Midoriya discovers the secret behind All Might’s quirk, he is determined to train into gaining All Might’s power and to enroll to Yuuei, the academy where all heroes apply to.

History

The first version of the manga series was published as a one shot manga in the magazine Jump Plus in 2008. Although it already had the concept of a superhero world and a main character who wants to became a hero, the oneshot has many differences respect the serialized manga, the main ones being the main character working for a gadget company and the heroes not having powers but using special gears.^[6] Boku no Hero Academia’s serialization began in the 32nd issue of Weekly Shounen Jump on July 7th, 2014, as part of “a special project.”^[1]

2016 Anime Adaptation

On October 27th, 2015, a possible anime adaptation was hinted after Kōhei Horikoshi published a screencap of a Shonen Jump’s cover announcing the green-light of an anime adaptation (shown bellow), being consequently reported on some news sites after its deletion.^[16] The anime adaptation was announced on the 49th issue of Weekly Shounen Jump, setted for release on November 2nd, 2015.

Reception

The first volume was released on November 4th, 2014, selling over 71,000 copies in its first week.^[4] A series of vomics (video comics) was announced, the first one being released on January 11th, 2015 and the fourth being released on January 31st,^[5] adapting the first chapter of the series with voice acting.

Online Relevance

Starting from the apparition of English scanlations in November 2014, Boku no Hero Academia quickly garined a fan following in the English net. In December 2014, a dedicated subreddit was created, gaining over 4,000 subscribers in the following 10 months,^[11] being also a wiki^[9] and a MyAnimeList page^[12] created during that time. As October 28th, 2015, searching the keyword “僕のヒーローアカデミア” on the Japanese artist community Pixiv leads to over 4,000 results,^[17] while searching “boku no hero academia” on the artist community deviantART leads to over 520 results.^[13] The series has also gained a significant presence on websites like Tumblr^[10] and 4chan’s /a/ board.^[14]

Asui Tsuyu / Frog Girl

Asui Tsuyu, also known by her fan given name Frog Girl, is a supporting character from the series whose quirk gives frog powers. Due her unique appearance and other character traits, she quickly gained a fan following on pages like 4chan’s /a/^[2]^[3] or Tumblr.^[15] Her popularity has also resulted in Asui getting a large quantity of fanart on image boards such as Pixiv^[7] or Danbooru,^[8] especially in comparison to the rest of the supporting cast.

Search Interest

External References

^[1]Anime News Network – Shonen Jump to Launch 4 Manga Series in Next 3 Issues

^[2]archive.moe – What does her voice sound like?

^[3]archive.moe – I don’t know how I missed this before but, wow.

^[4]MyAnimeList . Japan’s Weekly Manga & Light Novel Rankings for Nov 3 – 9

^[5]Shueisha – Official Vomic page

^[6]Imgur – Boku no Hero (One Shot) RAW

^[7]Pixiv – Search for 蛙吹梅雨

^[8]Danbooru – Frog girl

^[9]Boku no Hero Academia Wiki – Main Page

^[10]Tumblr – Search for’boku no hero academia

^[11]Reddit – /r/BokuNoHeroAcademia/

^[12]MyAnimeList – Boku no Hero Academia

^[13]DeviantArt – Search for ‘boku no hero academia’

^[14]Archive.moe – Search for ‘boku no hero academia’

^[15]Tumblr – Search for asui tsuyu

^[16]AnimeNewsNetwork – My Hero Academia Superhero Manga’s TV Anime Briefly Listed

^[17]Pixiv – Search for 僕のヒーローアカデミア

05/04/15--07:04: Yooka-Laylee

About

Yooka-Laylee is an upcoming platformer video game in development by the studio Playtonic Games. The project, run by former developers of the Banjo-Kazooie series, became the fastest video game to reach $1 million in pledges on Kickstarter in May 2015.

History

In 1998, the video game development company Rare released the game Banjo-Kazooie for the Nintendo 64.^[1] Several sequels for the game were subsequently released until 2008, when the final game Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts was released for the Xbox 360. In February 2015, several former Rare employees formed the video game studio PlaytonicGames and announced plans to develop a “spiritual successor” to Banjo-Kazooie. On February 16th, the @PlaytonicGames Twitter feed replied to YouTuber Jon Jafari that he would be voicing a character in the upcoming game (shown below).

On April 30th, Rare announced that the game would be titled Yooka-Laylee. On the following day, a Kickstarter^[3] campaign for the game was launched, which accumulated upwards of £1 million in funds in the first 24 hours, becoming the fastest video game in Kickstarter history to pass US$1 million. The game has an expected release date of October 2016.

JonTron Termination

In February of 2015, Playtonic invited famous YouTuber and notable fan JonTron to do some voice-acting for a minor role in the game. However, on March 23rd, 2017, Playtonic^[7] announced that they had removed JonTron’s voice acting following his recent controversial comments on race in his Destiny Debate.

Online Presence

The same day the game was announced, the /r/YookaLaylee^[5] subreddit was launched for discussions about the game. Also on April 30th, 2015, YouTuber GameXplain uploaded a video containing commentary about the game’s characters and gameplay (shown below).

Fan Art

As of May 2015, the keyword “Yooka-Laylee” yields over 270 search results on DeviantArt.^[6]

Reception

Early reviews of Yooka-Laylee were mixed. Some praised the game for its tone and faithful recreation of the Nintendo 64 aesthetic. The Escapist,^[8] in a 4.5/5 review, wrote that it was visually very pleasing and its humor was in line with its predecessor, Banjo-Kazooie. Still, others knocked it for its technical issues and dated gameplay. Polygon,^[9] in a 5.5/10 review, knocked it for its laborious challenges and “busy-work” feel. As of April 4th, 2017, the game has a score of 72/100 on Metacritic.^[10]

Search Interest

References

^[1]Wikipedia – Banjo-Kazooie

^[2]Wikipedia Yooka-Laylee

^[3]Kickstarter – Yooka-Laylee – A 3D Platformer Rare-vival!

^[4]Playtonic Games – Introducing Yooka-Laylee

^[5]Reddit – /r/YookaLaylee

^[6]DeviantArt – Search: Yooka-Laylee

^[7]Playtonic – Playtonic removes controversial YouTuber JonTron from Yooka-Laylee

^[8]The Escapist – Yooka-Laylee Review – Banjo-Threeie

^[9]Polygon – Yooka-Laylee review

^[10]Metacritic – Yooka-Laylee

02/25/12--14:58: South Park

About

South Park is an American animated TV sitcom created by Trey Parker and Matt Stone for the Comedy Central television network. The storyline revolves around four boys--Stan Marsh, Kyle Broflovski, Eric Cartman and Kenny McCormick--and their adventures and exploits in the fictional small town of South Park, Colorado. Intended for mature audiences, the show has gained both mainstream recognition and critical acclaims for its use of crude language and satirical humor to explore a wide range of current events and topical issues.

History

The show concept was originally developed by Trey Parker and Matt Stone from two animated shorts they created during their college years in the early 1990s, Jesus vs. Frosty (1992) and Jesus vs. Santa (1995), which came to be collectively known as The Spirit of Christmas. The latter of the two was initially distributed to less than a hundred people via e-mail, before bootleg copies of the video began circulating online.

The film eventually captured the attention of Comedy Central producers, who hired Parker and Stone to develop the pilot episode of the series. Titled “Cartmen Gets an Anal Probe,” the episode was produced using cutout animation techniques and most of the characters were voiced by the duo.

Since its premiere in the United States on August 13th, 1997, the show has grown into one of the highest rated shows in the network as well as of any basic cable programs throughout the late 1990s and 2000s. South Park is Comedy Central’s longest running program to date; a total of 230 episodes have aired and the series is slated to run through at least 2016.

Reception

The pilot episode was positively received and the series quickly began generating buzz among college students. By the time the eighth episode “Starvin’ Marvin” aired in November 1997, the show’s ratings and viewership had tripled and by the second episode of season two “Cartman’s Mom is Still a Dirty Slut” in April 1998, the ratings peaked at a score of 8.2 out of 10 with 6.2 million viewers, making South Park the highest-rated non-sports show in basic cable history.

Awards

The show has received numerous critical acclaims and accolades as well, including Time Magazine’s “100 Best TV Shows of All Time” list and Rolling Stone’s honorable mention as the “funniest show on television” in 2007, Entertainment Weekly’s recognition of the “12th Greatest TV Show of the Past 25 Years” and AOL’s “16th Best TV Comedy Series of All Time” in 2008 among many others. Since its debut in 1998, South Park has been nominated for the Emmy’s nine times and won the award for Outstanding Animated Program three times.

Related Memes

???? PROFIT!!!!

???? PROFIT!!!! comes directly from season 2, episode 17 which aired on December 16th, 1998. In this particular episode, the children’s underwear are being stolen from them by gnomes for the purpose of “profit.”
The meme is mostly used in troll science saying "Step one: X, Step two: X, Step 3: ???, Step 4: Profit.

Derp

“Derp” is an expression associated with stupidity, much like the earlier forms of interjections like “duh” and “dur,” that became quite popular through its recurring usage in South Park, most notably by a a character named Mr. Derp, who briefly serves as the chef’s replacement in an episode titled “The Succubus.”

“They Took Our Jobs”

“They Took Our Jobs!” is a meme which comes from season 8, episode 7 which aired on April 28th, 2004. The episode itself was a parody of the increasing illegal immigration problem in America, with illegal immigrants coming from the future, Terminator-style, instead of Mexicans crossing the border. Due to the influx of these immigrants, who were willing to work for a lower wage, many a person in South Park were fired, and replaced with one of these immigrants. This caused the redneck population of the town to declare the memetic phrase “THEYTOOKOURJOBS!”, which multiple people yelled in a succession of ever-decreasing sensibility. How it works is, if someone yells “They took your job!”, someone else then yells it in a more slurred manner, and this continues until it becomes four syllables that are completely unable to be comprehended.

This meme has shown up as a running gag in the show since then, specifically twice in season 13 (Episodes 10 & 13), either to make fun of the economic downturn, or just to highlight the idiocy of the stereotypical redneck.

Gingers Do Have Souls

“Gingers Do Have Souls” is a catchphrase associated with YouTuber CopperCab, who gained his online following with an emotional rant about how he has been bullied in school because of his red hair color. The phrase is believed to have originated from a South Park episode titled “Ginger Kids,” in which Eric Cartman gives an alarming class presentation on the subject of red-headed children and “Gingervitis,” a made-up disease supposedly associated with red hair.

Sarah Jessica Parker Looks Like a Horse

“Sarah Jessica Parker Looks Like a Horse” is a catchphrase primarily associated with images that compare Sarah Jessica Parker’s face to that of a horse. The joke is believed to have originated from an episode of South Park titled “The Tale of Scrotie McBoogerBalls” aired on March 17th, 2010, in which the Sex and The City actress is compared to a horse.

Captain Hindsight

Captain Hindsight is an image macro series based on the eponymous superhero character originally featured in Season 14, Episode 11 titled Coon 2. Inspired by the character, image captions generally present various types of predicaments and then lecture on what could’ve been done differently to avoid the situation altogether.

Super Cool Ski Instructor

Super Cool Ski Instructor is an advice animal image macro series featuring a picture of the ski instructor Thumper from episode Asspen. The macros are accompanied by captions advising against risky or impetuous behaviors followed by the warning “you’re gonna have a bad time.” In the episode, Stan, Cartman, Kyle and Butters are given ski lessons by an instructor named Thumper who repeatedly warns about dangerous skiing practices saying “you’re gonna have a bad time.” The episode aired on March 20th, 2002.

And It’s Gone

And It’s Gone! (also known as “Aaaand It’s Gone”) is an advice animal image macro series featuring a picture of a bank teller from episode “Margaritaville”, which first aired on March 25th, 2009. The phrase is used by a teller at South Park Bank Savings and Loans while informing customers that their money has been lost. The macros are often accompanied by captions describing lost opportunities or items, ending in the titular phrase “And it’s gone”.

Oh, I’m Sorry, I Thought This Was America

Oh, I’m Sorry, I Thought This Was America is an image macro featuring Randy Marsh from the episode “The Losing Edge,” which first aired April 6th, 2005. The phrase comes from the scene where Randy is trash talking the other kid’s baseball team, and thus starts a fight with the other team’s parents. The cops show up to arrest him and Randy starts ranting “I thought this was America.” The macros are often derived from the phrase and are used as a blanket excuse for one’s own action or statement in response to a backlash or criticism.

Search Interest

External References

^[1]Wikipedia – South Park

^[2]Wikipedia – The Spirit of Christmas

^[3]Wikia – South Park Fanon

^[4]South Park Studios – Homepage of South Park Studios

^[5]South Park Scriptorium – Welcome to the South Park Scriptorium

^[6]Facebook – South Park

^[7]Fanfiction.net – South Park Fanfiction Archives

^[8]Tumblr – Fuck Yeah South Park Fan Art

^[9]South Park Studios – Avatar Creator

^[10]South Park Fan – De Nedderlandse South Park Fansite

^[11]South Park Fan Forum – Kyle Fan Club

^[12]Google Groups – Alt.tv.southpark Newsgroup

07/16/12--16:31: Sonic Original Characters

About

Sonic Original Characters (Sonic OCs) are fan-made characters from the Sonic the Hedgehog universe. Whereas their large quantity has made them a notable popular part of the Sonic Fandom, elsewhere on the internet they are common targets of mock due to the overall low quality of some characters and their association with the younger audiences.

Origin

In 1991, the character Sonic the Hedgehog^[1] was introduced as the titular character for the franchise. As additional games were released in the series, various allies and enemies were added to the games, including Tails the fox and Knuckles the echidna. Fans then began creating their own anthropomorphic animal characters in the Sonic universe using similar art styles.

Spread

Over time, Sonic OCs have become a popular genre for fan-made characters. On DeviantArt, several groups dedicated to sharing Sonic OCs have been created, including Sonic OC Universe^[3], FanCharactersOfSonic^[4] and Sonic OC Riot^[5]. On June 6th, 2008, the Sonic Fanon wiki was launched, gathering upwards of 9,600 pages over the next 10 years, many of
which feature information about Sonic OCs. The Sonic Character Designer^[7] also offers people to quickly create their own character. Similar to various character designers on DeviantArt (shown below).^[10]^[11] Additionally, the Tumblr blog FYeahBadSonicArt^[8] commonly features lower quality original characters and the blog Terrible Sonic the Hedgehog OCs^[9] even focusses on them.

Usage in Online Forum Games

Sonic OCs have frequently been used in online forum games requiring participants to post their reactions to various fan-made characters discovered on the web. In one game, players must Google their name and the word “the Hedgehog” to discover relevant Sonic OCs.

Sonic Forces Trailer

On May 16th, 2017, the GameSpot YouTube channel uploaded an official trailer for the upcoming game Sonic Forces, showcasing how players will be able to create their own custom heroes to play in the game (shown below). That day, Redditors began discussing the custom heroes in the context of original characters in a thread posted to the /r/Games^[12] subreddit.

Meanwhile, Twitter user @TheLazyShyGuy^[13] posted a photoshopped screecap of Sonic Forces trailer featuring Coldsteel the Hedgeheg (shown below). Within 24 hours, the tweet gained over 1,000 likes and 700 retweets. Also on May 16th, the gaming news site Polygon^[14] published an article titled “Sonic fans celebrate original characters – and memes – becoming canon in Sonic Forces.”

Notable Examples

As of May 2017, search queries for the keywords “sonic oc” yield upwards of 129,000 results on DeviantArt.^[2]

Sonichu

Sonichu is a Sonic OC and webcomic series created by infamous vlogger Chris-chan, featuring an amalgamation of Sonic the Hedgehog and Pikachu from Pokémon.

Coldsteel the Hedgeheg

Coldsteel the Hedgeheg is a fan-made character from the Sonic the Hedgehog universe. The character is widely mocked online as a stereotype of an edgy teenager, which is full of grammar errors and 4th wall breaking descriptions.