Cookie Clicker is a click-based online browser game in which the player must create as many cookies as possible by repeatedly clicking the oversized cookie placed in the center. As the game progresses, the player may trade in their cookies for upgrades to increase the output without additional clicks. Once users reach certain cookie milestones, the message on the top of the page changes. The game contains two versions, the original experimental version[1] and the later-released actual game.[25].
Origin
Cookie Clicker was created by video game designer Orteil[2] on August 10th, 2013. The game began drawing online attention after Orteil shared a link to the game on 4chan’s /v/ (Video Games) board[3] on August 8th, describing it as “the best vidya ever."
Spread
On August 9th, Orteil shared a link to Cookie Clicker via his Twitter feed.[4] Also on that day, a Wiki[6] for the game was created and the link was submitted to Reddit for the first time, where it gained 216 upvotes, 173 points overall and 73 comments on /r/Gaming.[5] Meanwhile, similar discussions about Cookie Clicker appeared on numerous other message boards throughout the day.[7] By August 10th, Cookie Clicker had been submitted to two additional subreddits, /r/WebGames[8] and /r/InternetIsBeautiful[9] while videos of gameplay footage began surfacing on YouTube (shown below).[13]
Also on August 10th, threads about the game popped up on more message boards including Heroes of Newerth[10] and the Blockland Forums.[11] On the following day, the /r/CookieClicker[12] subreddit was created, gaining 85 subscribers in 8 days. On August 13th, the game was featured on The Maine Edge[14] and two days later, Little Cookie Clicker Things[15] launched, marking the first single topic Tumblr dedicated to the game. Over the next several days, the game was discussed on HardcoreGamer[16], MetaFilter[17] and A Lonely Life.[18] On August 18th, DEElekgolo uploaded a video on Youtube entitled “cookie.avi” and a series of GIFs on his Tumblr, the latter which gained more than 21,000 notes in 48 hours.[19]
On August 18th, Orteil announced on his blog that he was working on a mobile app[20] version of the game. He also noted that the game had been receiving an average of 200,000 players per day. On August 22nd, an article about Cookie Clicker was created on TV Tropes,[34] which was subsequently shared by Orteil on his Tumblr on the 29th.[35] On August 24th, the first Cookie Clicker related fan art[31] was submitted to Pixiv, a Japanese art website similar to deviantART, which over the following weeks continued to grow as more and more Japanese discover the site.[32] This was subsequently confirmed by Ortiel on September 16h, when he reported a huge influx of visitors from Japan to his website.[33] On September 19th, the figure company Kaiyodo announced on its Twitter that it would be making a Cookie Clicker Grandma figurine (shown below, right).[45]
On September 8th, a Minecraft player named sethbling recreated Cookie Clicker within Minecraft and posted a video demonstration of it on Youtube.[44] On September 23rd, Vinesauce posted a video on Youtube of a Cookie Clicker inspired Super Mario Bros. level created by ChaosAurion.[46]
Update
The first major update for the game was released on August 24th, 2013. Otherwise known as “Version 1.0”, the update brought new sprites, more detailed graphics, and upgrades for buildings, cursors, and the cookie itself.[25] Orteil had been hinting at this new update for a while now, by releasing the sprites on Tumblr.
The game is still being updated and it’s progress can be found on the site’s “Updates” tab. On August 26th, achievements were announced and was implemented the next day along with a new feature involving milk and cats. On August 31st, the different varieties of grandmas that were on the experimental version were reintroduced as purchasable upgrades along with the return of the infamous “Grandmapocalypse” albeit with an overhauled game mechanic. Both of which received new and updated graphics.
On September 9th Orteil created a forum for Cookie Clicker for fans to discuss the game, make suggestions, report any bugs and announce new updates and future updates.[30]
On September 15th the Antimatter Condenser building along with its upgrades were added and replaced the Time Machine for the status of being the highest end-tier level building available.
Additional Features
Orteil planned to add a dungeon system into the game. On September 13th Orteil shared a link[36] to an experimental dungeon generator he has created along with information regarding it on his Tumblr.[37]
On September 16th, Orteil shared a teaser W.I.P. of a girl scout icon. The first one was a rough sketch followed[38] by a pixelated version.[39] He then later stated that he wasn’t trying to cater to the Japanese audience due to the picture’s anime-esque style despite some claims and was planned to be implemented into the game a month before.[40] On September 17th Orteil released character the sprite of the girl scout along with 2 new girl scouts and a few monster and enemy sprites, stating that there are 2 to 3 more girl scouts planned.[41] On September 18th he released the character icons for the two new girl scouts alongside the first one and added that the one in the middle with some cookie skin got involved in a tragic baking accident when she was younger.[42] On September 23rd Orteil released a screenshot of a populated dungeon along with a new girl scout with green hair and dark skin.[43]
Notable Examples
Additional screenshots and fan art of the game can be found on Reddit[22], the Tumblr tags #cookie clicker[23], #cookie clicker game[24] and #cookie game[27], “cookie clicker” on deviantart[28], #cookieclicker on Twitter’s photo search[29] and “cookieclicker” on Pixiv.[32]
Project Chanology is a series of protest movements launched against the practices of the Church of Scientology by members of Anonymous. The project was started in response to the Church of Scientology’s attempts to remove video clips from a highly publicized interview with Scientologist Tom Cruise from the Internet in January 2008.[1]
Background
On January 14th, 2008, a video produced by the Church of Scientology featuring an interview with Tom Cruise was posted on YouTube. In the video, Cruise makes various statements including saying that Scientologists are the only people who can help after a car accident,and that Scientologists are the authority on getting addicts off drugs. According to news reports, the video featured Cruise “extolling the virtues of Scientology”.[2]
Notable Developments
Formation
Project Chanology was formulated by users of the English-speaking image boards 711chan and 4chan, in addition to several other websites. The members all considered themselves part of Anonymous , on January 16th, 2008 after the Church of Scientology issued a copyright violation claim against YouTube for hosting material from the Cruise video. The project was publicly launched via a video uploaded to YouTube on January 21st, 2008 entitled “Message to Scientology” on the channel Project Chanology.[13] The video states that Anonymous views Scientology’s DMCA action as Internet censorship, asserting the group’s intent to “expel the church from the Internet.”
On January 26th, the Church responded to the pressure from Anonymous to CNET[9], stating that the removed video featured “selective and out-of-context excerpts with the intent of creating both controversy and ridicule.” The next day, a second video entitled “Call to Action” was uploaded by Anonymous members, calling for protests outside of Church of Scientology centers on February 10th, 2008.
February 10th, 2008: First Wave of Protests
On the scheduled date, over 7000 Anonymous members from 100 cities across the globe came together in protest in front of Scientology churches. These protests marked the first time Anonymous organized an action that took place off the internet.[3] Many news outlets covered the protests including the Boston Globe[4], the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette[5], Scotland’s the Scotsman[6], Australia’s News.com.au[7] and the Tampa Tribune.[8]
During the protests, Anonymous members chose to constantly record their actions to both protect themselves from legal backlash, but also to have more control over how the protests were presented in the media: something that has persisted in later protests[10], especially Occupy Wall Street
March 15th, 2008: Second Wave of Protests
After the success of the first protests, Anonymous organized another set to take place on March 15th, L. Ron Hubbard’s birthday. Also referred to as The Ides of March[11], these protests drew another 7000 Anonymous members together across the globe.[12]
October 2013: Craigslist Ads
Since as early as February 2010, Scientology members have been posting classified ads on Craigslist to secretly recruit new members.[14] for recruitment of new members, the majority of them planted under the pretext of a group therapy session for people seeking spiritual guidance.[14] By December that year, the true color of the ads had been exposed by Operation Clambake[16] forum member RadioPaul, who managed to connect the dots between the ads on Craigslist and other local classified sites. In August 2012, a discussion thread dedicated to finding and reporting these sneaky ads (shown below) was created on the Anonymous message board Why We Protest[15] as part of an anti-Scientology project known as ClearCraig.
Throughout November 2012, posters continued to use the thread to share links to Scientology messages on their local Craigslist sites so other users could help flag the posts as spam. However, Scientology’s propaganda campaign remained under the radar until September 22nd, 2013, when Scientology blogger Tony Ortega[17] leaked several pages from a local Scientology chapter’s guide to writing such advertisements on his blog. That same day, Ortega’s blog post was linked to the forum thread on Why We Protest, breathing new life into the counter-propaganda initiative. In less than two weeks, the thread went on to generate more than 520 responses from other forum members, most of whom volunteered to support the ClearCraig campaign by sharing a list of relevant key words and phone numbers associated with Scientology’s classified ads, while others contributed by drafting counter advertisements (shown below) to raise awareness of the Scientology propaganda on Craigslist. A Why We Protest user emailed a tip about the thread to Business Insider[19], who posted an article about these counter ads on October 1st, 2013. The same day, similar stories were featured on The Daily Dot.[20] Over the following days, additional stories appeared on ZDNet[21], Salon[22], Softpedia[23] and Betabeat.[24]
YouTube[1] is a video hosting and sharing website created in February 2005. With eight hundred million unique visitors a month, it is one of the most trafficked websites on the internet along with Facebook and Google.
History
Although YouTube is often considered one of the early trendsetters in the social media game, other video-hosting platforms like Metacafe and Vimeo had been in existence prior to the launch of YouTube in 2005. According to one of the co-founders Jawed Karim, YouTube was originally envisioned as the video version of the beauty rating site Hot or Not, which has been also credited as the source of inspiration for the social networking service Facebook.
The site was founded by three former employees of PayPal, Chad Hurley, Steve Chen, and Jawed Karim on February 14th, 2005 and the first YouTube video titled “Me at the zoo” was uploaded on April 23rd, which featured one of the co-founders Jawed Karim in front of elephants at the San Diego Zoo. The beta version of the site became publicly available in May of that year, followed by its official launch in November 2005.
The registered userbase continued to grow rapidly in the following months. By July 2006, the company revealed an impressive record of 65,000 new uploads and 100 million video views per day. In October 2006, Google announced that it had acquired YouTube for $1.65 billion in Google stock; the deal was finalized in mid-November.
Redesigns
On March 31st, 2010, the YouTube website launched a new design, with the aim of simplifying the interface and increasing the time users spend on the site.
In November 2011, the Google+ social networking site was integrated directly with YouTube and the Chrome web browser, allowing YouTube videos to be viewed from within the Google+ interface (shown below, left). In December 2011, YouTube launched a new version of the site interface (shown below, right), with the video channels displayed in a central column on the home page, similar to the news feeds of social networking sites.
On June 5th, 2013, Google rolled out the new “One Channel” interface for YouTube, enabling all users to customize their channels with a cover photograph and an introductory video. According to Google’s official blog post, the “One Channel” could lead to an increase in getting new subscribers and channel visits.
YouTube Music Awards
On October 1st, 2013, Google announced its plan to host the first YouTube Music Awards, a live-stream ceremony event to recognize and highlight the most influential musicians of the year. The event, which is to be held at Pier 36 in New York City on November 3rd, will be co-hosted by actor-musicians Jason Schwartzman and Reggie Watts and feature live performances by Lady Gaga, Arcade Fire and Eminem, as well as five music events that will be simulcast from Seoul, Tokyo, Moscow, London and Rio de Janeiro. On October 22nd, YouTube unveiled the list of nominees in six categories for the inaugural event, along with an introductory video in which the co-host Reggie Watts asks the viewers to vote for the winning acts (shown below).
Video of The Year
Epic Rap Battles of History – “Obama vs Romney”
Demi Lovato – “Heart Attack”
Girls’ Generation – “I Got a Boy”
Justin Bieber (ft. Nicki Minaj) – “Beauty and a Beat”
On September 24th, 2013, the YouTube Official Blog[28] announced the beta launch of an improved commenting system that is more closely integrated with the Google+ social networking service, which was subsequently implemented across-the-board on November 6th. Upon its release, YouTube’s new commenting system was instantly met by criticisms and backlash from the community, mainly for requiring a Google+ account to comment on any video and prioritizing the visibility of comments made by friends on Google+ without having established a significant user base.
On November 7th, YouTube co-founder Jawed Karim posted his asking why the Google social networking service was required for commenting.
Throughout the day, a number of video bloggers uploaded their own response videos to address the intergration issues in the new commenting system, most notably YouTubers Cr1TiK (shown below, top, left), somegreybloke (shown below, top, right), Jon (shown below, bottom, left) and Gopher (shown below, bottom, right).
Meanwhile, some YouTubers created short animations to vent their frustration with YouTube’s Google+ commenting system (shown below).
Features
The basic features of YouTube consists of uploading videos, watching videos uploaded by other users and interacting with other users via comments and response videos. Unregistered visitors can watch videos without ever signing up for an account, but the registration is required for uploading videos and commenting on other uploads. YouTube initially allowed users to upload long-format videos, but later implemented a ten-minute length limit on all uploads in March 2006 after learning that the majority of videos exceeding the ten minute mark were unauthorized or copyright-infringing materials such as TV show episodes and films.
Playback
In addition to the basic functions of a video-streaming platform, YouTube offers a variety of optional tools to improve the viewing experience, such as closed captioning services, automatic speech recognition, in-video annotations and 3D anaglyphic playback.
Embeddable Videos
The near-ubiquitous presence of YouTube videos on the Internet can be credited to its easy video embedding feature, which allows users to copy and paste the video player object into almost any blog or website that supports HTML.
Interactions
Registered users (sometimes referred to as YouTubers) of the site can interact with others through a number of different channels, from private messaging and wall posts on the channel page to comments in the video pages and response videos that can be linked to the referenced video. Users can also rank a video or a video comment through an upvoting / downvoting system.
Shows & Rentals
YouTube also runs a section called “Shows,” which allows major U.S. entertainment studios and distributors to upload full-length films and TV episodes to the site with advertisement options. In January 2010, YouTube introduced an online film rentals service offering more than 6,000 films, which is available only to users in the US, Canada and the UK as of July 2012.
Easter Eggs
Snake Game: In July 2010, YouTube released an easter egg feature with its new video player which enables users to launch an impromptu game of Snake by holding down the left and up arrow keys during pause and playback. This feature only works on YouTube video pages without any annotations or advertisements.
Snowflake Animation: In December 2011, YouTube added a snowflake button as a holiday special easter egg on its video player. Upon clicking, the feature would trigger animated snowflakes to fall from the top of the video.
500 Error Message: In 2010, YouTube began displaying a 500 Internal Server Error message that read “500 Internal Server Error: Sorry, something went wrong. A team of highly trained monkeys has been dispatched to deal with this situation. If you see them, show them this information” followd by a random code.
Nyan Cat Progress Bar: In June 2011, YouTube temporarily enabled a custom flash player for the original Nyan Cat video page, which displayed an animated miniature Nyan Cat flying across the progress bar with a rainbow trail during playback.
The Wadsworth Parameter: In October 2011, YouTube employee and Redditor newtuber enabled the new video URL parameter “&wadsworth=1,” which can be suffixed to any YouTube video URL to load the video at 30% of the total length in reference to The Wadsworth Constant.
Self-Subscription: In 2012, YouTube began displaying a mouseover error message that read “No need to subscribe to yourself!” when a user attempted to subscribe to one’s own channel.
Psy Character Sprite: In December 2012, YouTube added an animated character sprite of Psy doing the horse dance on the Gangnam Style video page to commemorate the unprecedented milestone of passing 1 billion views on the site.
Harlem Shake Search Results: In March 2013, YouTube introduced an easter egg for the search option in which typing in “do the harlem shake” would trigger various components of the search results page to wobble in the style of Harlem Shake dancers.
VHS Tape Mode: In April 2013, YouTube enabled a VHS tape emulator button on a limited selection of videos in homage to the 57th anniversary of the first commercially available videocassette recorder (VCR). Upon clicking, the video quality would be downgraded to match the aesthetics of VHS image resolution, such as white static lines, fuzzy grains, occasional vertical holds and even distortion of images when in pause mode.
Premium Channels
On January 29th, 2013, the advertising industry news blog AdAge[21] published an article reporting that YouTube has a plan to launch paid subscriptions for a select few channels in April. The article included a quote from a Google spokesperson, who stated that the company believed certain types of content require alternative payment models. On the following day, YouTuber PrettyMuchIt uploaded a video in support of the idea, asserting that paid subscriptions could provide users with more options and better content (shown below, left). Also on January 30th, YouTuber Lamarr Wilson uploaded a video in which he criticized the paid subscription model (shown below, right), arguing that no one should have to pay for content on the video-sharing site.
On May 9th, YouTube launched the pilot program for its paid subscription service,[15] offering its users free trial access to premium content published by more than 50 channels for the first two weeks, after which a monthly fee ranging from $0.99 to $7.99 would be charged per subscription.[16] In the coming days, the new service was reported on by Yahoo,[17]CNN,[20] The Wall Street Journal[19] and CNET[18] among many others. As of May 10th, there are 54 paid channels available, including Sesame Street, National Geographic, Rap Battle Network, Recipe.TV and the Ultimate Fighting Championship.
Impact
Since its launch and subsequent rise to prominence, YouTube has played an essential role in the creative process of internet memes in a multitude if ways, foremostly as the ground zero site of countless viral videos and spawning pool of user-generated videos, and secondly as the primary exchange ground for social commentaries and discussions on topical events. The site’s strong affinity with both amateur videobloggers and mainstream media outlets also gave rise to an uncharted era of citizen journalism, public discourse and internet stardom, thus establishing itself as a hubsite of user-generated content.
2013 YouTube Study
In June 2013, undergraduate media students at Columbia College in Chicago, Illinois released a 175-page report[22] on YouTube’s most popular content creators and their contributing factors. Conducted over the course of the Spring semester in 2013, the study analyzed the statistical data of YouTube’s 241 most viewed channels to deduce a number of commonly observed practices that may contribute to their online popularity. Among its key findings[23][24] were:
All but one of YouTube’s top channels focus on producing non-serial, episodic videos, with MachinimaPrime being the sole exception that serializes its content with a consistent storyline.
The 58 percent majority of YouTube’s top channels do not use introductory clips or credit rolls in their videos. The median frequency of jump cuts is at around 9 cuts per minute, the median pace of narrative speech is 150 spoken words per minute, while the median word count in video description stands at around 56.5 words per video. All of these findings suggest the importance of brevity and search engine optimization.
Approximately 34 percent of the analyzed videos feature at least one other collaborator in the description; comedians have the higher rate of peer collaboration with 43 percent of videos being co-hosted or co-produced, while gamers rarely team up with only two percent of gaming videos produced as a result of collaboration.
The median video length for YouTube’s top channels is 4 minutes and 19 seconds (4:19); comedy videos have the shortest median video lengths at 3 minutes and 25 seconds (3:25), while fashion/beauty, news commentary and gaming videos have the longest median video lengths at 7 minutes, 44 seconds (7:44), 8 minutes and 55 seconds (8:55) and 9 minutes and 36 seconds (9:36) respectively.
The median number of subscribers for YouTube’s top channels is measured at around 1.23 million subscribers and the majority of the top ten channels are run by independent video-bloggers.
The median frequency of new release is at 1.25 videos per week, while the average number of videos uploaded in a week period is just short of three videos per week. Among the top content creators, gaming-related channels have the highest number of 8.31 videos uploaded per week, while comedy channels have the lowest cout of 1.23 videos uploaded per week.
Twitter is the primary means of distributing new video content for YouTube’s top channels. On average, YouTubers tweet 7.11 times a day and garner around 4.28 mentions per day.
Related Memes
Largely due to the broad range of content hosted on the site and its virtual monopoly over video hosting services, the scope of this section is limited to internet memes that have emerged as a result of interacting with other users or using a specific feature on the site. For more comprehensive listings of viral videos and catchphrases that have originated from YouTube, check out KYM Tag – Origin:YouTube. For an index of notable YouTube video bloggers and celebrities, browse KYM Tag – Origin:YouTube Category:Person.
The 301 Phenomenon
One of the longest enduring mysteries of YouTube features has been the seemingly arbitrary view counter that gets stuck at 301 or 302, which soon became regarded as a positive sign that the video is undergoing a significant lift in viewership. The number 301 displayed under a video can be read as the minimum threshold of view-counts required to initiate a new counting method or “a statistical verification process” designed to filter out any counterfeit or invalid view counts from being taken into account.
YouTube Automatic Caption Fails
YouTube Automatic Caption Fails are the humorous, incorrect captions produced by Google’s automatic speech recognition technology for videos on YouTube. Both real and fake screenshots of particularly absurd automatic transcriptions are often posted on various sites.
Operation YouTube
Operation YouTube (also known as “YouTube Porn Day”) is a series of porn spamming raids launched by Anonymous which took place on the video sharing site in early June 2009.
I’m 12 Years Old and What is This?
“I’m 12 Years Old and What is This?”, also known as “I’m 12 and what is this?”, is a catchphrase typically used to react to something that is considered vulgar or outlandish, such as x-rated media. The comment was posted in a video titled “Jonas Brother Live On Stage” during Operation YouTube in May 2009, when 4chan users flooded the site with x-rated clips under the guise of popular teen idols like Lazy Town, Jonas Brothers and Miley Cyrus.
The Wadsworth Constant
The Wadsworth Constant is an Internet axiom which states that the first 30% of any video can be skipped because it contains no worthwhile or interesting information. This observation was named after Redditor Wadsworth, who defined the term in a discussion thread about how to properly fold a bed sheet.
X People Missed the Like Button
X People Missed the Like Button is a type of comment usually found on YouTube, in which the “x” represents the number of dislikes the video has accumulated at the time of the commenter’s viewing. The phrase can also be modified to take on a biased tone as to criticize the viewers who chose to dislike the video.
Am I Ugly?
“Am I Ugly?” is a YouTube trend in which adolescents upload videos of themselves asking for commenters to rate their physical attractiveness. In February of 2012, the phenomenon rose in visibility after news media began criticizing the trend as an unhealthy means of seeking approval.
Reply Girls
Reply Girls, often spelled “reply girl”, is an Internet slang term used to identify female YouTubers who mainly upload videos as a “reply” to an already popular or trending video in an attempt to capitalize on the high view counts. They typically use sexually suggestive thumbnails, often with prominently exposed cleavage, to gain views. Reply Girls seek to gain YouTube partnerships through high view counts, and then make/steal money for every video they produce.
Traffic
As of January 2012, YouTube has a Quantcast[2] US score of 3, Alexa[3] Global and US rank of 3, and Compete[4] rank of 4. On January 23rd, 2012, YouTube announced[5] that it was receiving an average of more than four billion views a day on both computers and mobile web, as well as an hourlong worth of footage uploaded per second. To better illustrate the vast numbers and statistics associated with YouTube videos, YouTube launched the site One Hour Per Second[6] in December 2011.
Search Interest
Search queries for YouTube began to increase visibly in February 2006 and the total volume of online interest has been steadily on the rise ever since.
Anita Sarkeesian is a pundit, videoblogger and media critic best known as the host of Feminist Frequency[1][2], a web series in which Sarkeesian reviews and analyses common tropes in popular culture from a feminist viewpoint. In 2012, she was introduced to a larger audience after launching a Kickstarter campaign to fund a new web series exploring the negative tropes surrounding women in video games.
Online History
Anita Sarkeesian’s first Feminist Frequency video was uploaded to YouTube on May 20th, 2009. Titled “Dollhouse Renewed? Why not Terminator: Sarah Connor Chronicles?,” the video discusses Fox’s decision to renew the “Dollhouse” series and cancel “Terminator: Sarah Connor Chronicles,” comparing the misogyny found in the former to the empowered female characters found in the latter. Sarkeesian’s YouTube video was later reposted to the Feminist Frequency blog[11] on June 22nd, 2009.
In March 2010, Sarkeesian launched a Facebook fan page[17] for Feminist Frequency, which has gained more than 24,000 likes as of January 2013. In March 2011, Feminist Frequency paired with Bitch Media[13] for a six-part series titled “Tropes vs. Women”[12] in which Sarkeesian analyzes different tropes found in pop culture and the negative female stereotypes they perpetuate. In the premiere video, Sarkeesian analyzed the trope Manic Pixie Dream Girl.
Reputation
Criticism
Sarkeesian has seen strong opposition online, as many viewers have criticized her feminist viewpoint as being too radical. On October 23rd 2011, YouTuber TheAmazingAtheist released a video titled “Everyone’s a Cry Baby” (shown below), in which he argues Sarkeesian’s viewpoint as extremist. Other bloggers have shared criticism of the series on their personal blogs as well as in comments on gossip blog Oh No They Didn’t[15] and Yahoo! Answers.[16]As of January 2013, there are nearly 50 search results on YouTube for “Feminist Frequency criticism.”[14]
Kickstarter and Harassment
On June 4th, 2012, Sarkeesian announced a spin-off series that would focus specifically on video games, along with a Kickstarter fundraiser[3] to finance the series. The proposal of the series instantly elicited hateful responses, with Sarkeesian receiving death threats and hate mail from angered members of the video game community and other anti-fans. On June 7th, she published a selection of the thousands of hateful comments left on her Kickstarter video.[18] Three days later, she documented the vandalism that appeared on her Wikipedia page[19], which was defaced with pornographic images.
Throughout June, the overwhelming amount of hateful comments and harassment targeted at Sarkeesian was documented by the Daily Dot[20], Carbon Games[21], Destructoid[6], the Mary Sue[22], Wired[23], 16×9[8], the New Statesman[24] and Kotaku.[7][25] On July 5th, 2012, Newgrounds user Bendilin Spurr[4] posted a flash game titled “Beat Up Anita Sarkeesian”[5], however the game was taken down from the site on the following day. Despite all the negativity, the Kickstarter proved to be a success, raising $158,917 over the course of a month. Sarkeesian was then invited to video game studio Bungie[9], as well as TEDxWomen 2012[10] in support of the project.
On September 4th, 2012, a Redditor submitted an image to /r/Gaming[26] pointing out the fact that the Kickstarter-funded web series didn’t launch on time and accusing Sarkeesian of soliciting backers for information relating to games using damsels in distress, which the poster perceived as doing the ground work for her. The post generated more than 1,200 comments regarding the web series as well as the the general failure of Kickstarter projects launching on time as originally promised. On the following day, the gaming news site Gameranx[27] responded to the Reddit post, noting that the series was still in production and that Sarkeesian anticipated the launch of the first video in late fall or early winter. However, by mid-January, none of the videos had been released. A discussion of the Kickstarter’s failure to follow through appeared on the Escapist forums[28] on January 17th, 2013.
2010 Lecture Video Leak
On September 15, 2013, the Youtube channel Flying Turkeys[33] uploaded a video detailing and showing a lecture that Anita Sarkeesian gave at Santa Monica College in California in early 2010. In the video, Anita states that “She isn’t a fan of video games” and that she “actually had to do research”. This was met with outrage from people who questioned and criticizes her. The same day, YouTube uploader MundaneMatt[35] uploaded a video where he asked why Anita “keeps getting a free pass”. On September 16, 2013, Youtube uploader InternetAristocrat[34] uploaded a video where he criticizes her defenders and fans for still supporting her after learning this information.
Death Threats
On August 25th, 2014, Sarkeesian released the second episode of “Woman as Background Decoration” in her web series Tropes vs. Women in Video Games which focuses on the recurring portrayal of women in defenseless roles, such as sex workers or victims of hostage crises, as plot devices to keep the narrative interesting and little more. Similar to the previous episodes in the series, many viewers and critics of Sarkeesian began harassing her on Twitter and some even threatened her via phone, while one individual created a fake Twitter account under the handle @kevindobsont to send a series of threats against Sarkeesian. In response, Sarkeesian says she contacted law enforcement and is staying with friends.
Personal Life
Anita Sarkeesian was born in Toronto and grew up in California. She holds a bachelor’s degree in communication studies and a master’s degree in social and political thought, during which she completed a thesis titled “I’ll Make a Man Out of You: Strong Women in Science Fiction and Fantasy Television.”[29] In 2011, Sarkeesian coauthored an essay comparing the main female characters in Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Twilight for an anthology titled Fanpires: Audience Consumption of the Modern Vampire.[30] She maintains a personal Twitter account[31] and Flickr account.[32]
Occupy Wall Street is an ongoing series of protests in New York City and elsewhere across the United States that seek to resolve socioeconomic inequality and influence of corporate lobbying on Washington politics, as well as a number of other social injustices. Mostly coordinated via social networking services like Twitter and Facebook without a central organizer, the flash-mob demonstration began on September 17th, 2011 and its participants have since set up base in Zuccotti Park (formerly known as “Liberty Park”) near Wall Street.
Background
On July 13th, 2011, Adbusters[1] posted an article titled #OCCUPYWALLSTREET, which called on 20,000 people to assemble in lower Manhattan on September 17th, 2011 and occupy Wall Street for indefinitely to demand that President Barack Obama ordain a Presidential Commission tasked with ending the influence of money in Washington politics.
According to the blog post, Adbusters’ flash mob campaign was inspired by the successful turnout of Tahrir Square protests in Egypt under Hosani Mubarak’s regime in January 2011:
“The antiglobalization movement was the first step on the road. Back then our model was to attack the system like a pack of wolves. There was an alpha male, a wolf who led the pack, and those who followed behind. Now the model has evolved. Today we are one big swarm of people.”
-- Raimundo Viejo, Pompeu Fabra University in Barcelona, Spain
Pre-Demonstration
Hundreds of readers chimed in with comments supporting the occupation of Wall Street. Adbusters continued to bring updates on logistics through their campaign news page and custom Google Map[2], while numerous websites in support of the occupation emerged within days of the announcement, including OccupyWallStreet.com[5] and OccupyWallStreet[6] Tumblr blog among others.
Organization
On Facebook, Adbusters launched an online poll[6] asking people to vote for one agenda that will be put forth as the peoples’ demand. “Revoking Corporate Personhood” is currently in the lead with over 2,000 votes and the official Facebook event[5] has been RSVP’d by at least 6,800 people (as of September 8th, 2011).
On Reddit, a subreddit thread called “OccupyWallStreet”[6] was created to "discuss ideas, strategies, tactics and logistics related to the popular occupation of Wall Street in New York City. On July 18th, Redditor Midnight818 posted a link to a custom Google Map titled “Collaborative Map of Points of Interest”:
Beginning on July 26th, hashtag #OCCUPYWALLSTREET began trending on Twitter and @OccupyWallStNYC[3] was launched to provide news and details of the occupation plan. @USDayofRage[4], which had been previously involved with Operation BART in San Francisco, also adopted the campaign via Twitter.
On August 23rd, the single topic Tumblr “We Are the 99%”[12] was launched to curate inspirational messages submitted by those planning to attend the September 17th protests.
Anonymous Endorsement
On August 10th, an Anonymous-affiliated bulletin blog AnonOps Communications posted two fliers for the event, which was subsequently picked up and retweeted by @AnonOps on Twitter.
On August 23rd, Anonymous uploaded a video communique endorsing #OCCUPYWALLSTREET, featuring its trademark computerized voice and the Guy Fawkes mask. The video called on protesters to participate in the mass occupation of lower Manhattan starting on September 17th, 2011:
“flood into lower Manhattan, set up tents, kitchens, peaceful barricades and occupy Wall Street for a few months … Once there, we shall incessantly repeat one simple demand in a plurality of voices.”
International Support
According to Adbusters, a group of Spanish demonstrators known as Los Indignados (The Angry Ones) joined the campaign and set up their own camp outside the Madrid Stock Exchange. Since its launch, the off-shoot movement in Spain has become associated with its own Twitter hashtag #TOMALABOLSA. Throughout the month, the news of the campaign quickly spread overseas via social networking services and blogs, inspiring similar initiatives of peaceful occupation in the financial districts of major cities like London, San Francisco, Sydney, Tokyo and Toronto among others.
Related Twitter Hashtags
#TOMALABOLSA in Madrid, Spain
#TOMALABOLSA in Valencia, Spain
#OCCUPYFDSF in San Francisco, USA
#usdorLosA in Los Angeles, USA
#TakeTheSquareWI in Madison, USA
#OCCUPYBAYSTREET in Toronto, Canada
#OCCUPYBANKOFENGLAND in London, UK
#ANTIBANKS in Lisbon, Portugal
#ANTIBANKS in Athens, Greece
#OCCUPYMARTINPLACE in Sydney, Australia
#OCCUPYBÖRSENSTRASSE in Stuttgart, Germany
#OCCUPYMARUNOUCHI in Tokyo, Japan
#OCCUPAZIONEPIAZZAAFFARI in Milan, Italy
U.S. Law Enforcement Prepares
On September 1st, a small group of demonstrators were met with New York Police Department’s confrontation after attempting to begin a sit-in protest on Wall Street’s public sidewalk for a whole night. As a result, nine participants were arrested for disorderly conduct but later released without any charge.
On September 2nd, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security issued an unusual bulletin from its National Cybersecurity and Communications Integration Center[10] warning financial institutions about possible risks of attack during the planned #OccupyWallStreet protest on September 17th.
At a press conference on September 15th, New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg addressed the upcoming weekend protest in downtown:
“People have a right to protest, and if they want to protest, we’ll be happy to make sure they have locations to do it. As long as they do it where other people’s rights are respected, this is the place where people can speak their minds, and that’s what makes New York, New York.”
Orientation
On September 15th, the official campaign news site OccupyWallStreet.org published an Orientation Guide[11] for those planning to attend the event. The guide provides information on pre-protest training sessions and tactical meetings, legal advices as well as suggestions of things to bring like sleeping bags, reusable water bottles, ice coolers, signs and folding chairs. It also offers information on how to avoid police confrontation and how to exercise your civil rights once encountered.
The official meet-up for #OccupyWallStreet is scheduled to take place at 12pm (EST) in the Bowling Green Park in lower Manhattan and the main event at Manhattan Plaza is planned to begin at 3pm (EST). In addition, New York culture magazine Time’s Up announced that it will be hosting critical mass rides though the Wall Street area on the night of September 17th.
Protests
September 17th: Occupy Wall Street
On the night of September 16th, 2011, a leaked bulletin from the New York Police Department (NYPD) estimated at least 5,000 people were expected to show up on Wall Street. By noon on September 16th, 2011, hundreds of people and press members had gathered in lower Manhattan amidst heavy police presence and barricades around the plaza of New York Stock Exchange. Throughout the day, demonstrators marched around Wall Street and Broad Street chanting, “All day, all week, occupy Wall Street.”
The protests are currently being broadcast online via LiveStream[14] in real time. According to an AFP[13] article, about 700 protesters with backpacks and sleeping bags had shown up at Trinity Place by noon. Bloomberg Businessweek[15] also reported on the public gathering with an estimate of up to 1,000 protesters.
CNN[16] also reported on the September 17th protests, describing the event as a campaign inspired by the Tarhir movement in Egypt and boosted by the Anonymous endorsement. The article also included excerpts from an interview with Kalle Lasn, a co-founder of Adbusters that started the campaign:
“In Tunisia and in Egypt, the Internet was used to organize surprising numbers of people to get out into the streets and start a radical, democratic movement for regime change,” Lasn said. “Of course, the situation here in America and many European countries is quite different. We’re not living under a torturous dictatorship, for one. Nonetheless, there’s a feeling that the global financial system, the heart of which is in the U.S., in New York, that this system is somehow having its way with us,” he said. “There’s a feeling that we need a revolution in the way that our economy is run, the way that Washington is run.”
September 23rd: Sotheby’s Auction House Protest
On September 23rd, Occupy Wall Street disrupted a Sotheby’s art auction to display their solidarity with the 43 union art handlers who have been locked out of their jobs in the middle of contract negotiations since early August.
In the middle of the auction, Occupy Wall Street protesters stood up one by one and announced statements condemning Sotheby’s attempts to de-unionize their art handlers. According to the renowned art auction house, each member of the group was quickly escorted of the auction floor.
September 18th: Protesters Arrested
On September 18th, two masked protesters were arrested by NYPD officers after allegedly trying to enter a building used by Bank of America Corp (BAC) in the vicinity.
On September 19th, four demonstrators were arrested for wearing masks in violation of a New York law barring two or more participants form doing so. Another protester was arrested for jumping a police barrier and resisting arrest, which was confirmed in an e-mail statement released by NYPD spokesman Paul Brown. Another woman, identified as Jessica Davis, was arrested on graffiti charges after drawing with sidewalk chalk on the scene. Numerous reports via Twitter[21] later suggested that the mask in question was the Guy Fawkes mask commonly worn and used by hacker collective Anonymous.
By September 20th, the third day into the protests in downtown Manhattan, at least seven demonstrators have been reported as being taken into custody by the police and the size of the gathering had dwindled from 1,000 people on Sunday to about 200 on Tuesday, according to Bloomberg News[20]. Meanwhile, Anonymous’ communication line @AnonOps also tweeted reports and a video clip of alleged arrests involving two members of the #OccupyWallStreet media team and one unnamed individual who tried to use a tarp to protect the equipments from rain.
September 24th: Protesters Maced in Union Sq
On the eighth day of Occupy Wall Street protests on September 24th, the gathering in the financial district marched up north towards Union Square. The demonstraters were reportedly confronted by NYPD officers near University Place and 12th Street, leading to dozens of arrests.
Numerous protesters and @OccupyWallSt reported via Twitter that at least 50 demonstrators have been arrested and targeted by tear gas and mace during the afternoon march towards the United Nations building. The number of arrests have increased to at least 80 protesters, though it hasn’t been confirmed by NYPD. According to Twopcharts, tweets with hashtag #occupywallstreet were being counted 9,729.7 per hour as of 3:19pm ET).
@OccupyWallStNY[22] reported that press members and media crew were specifically targeted and arrested by NYPD, including the livestream team Global Revolution. In addition, two female demonstrators were maced with pepper spray after protesting NYPD’s mass arrests near Union Square and the YouTube video has been mentioned in a number of news reports and blog posts.
According to Village Voice blog[23], NYPD’s Public Information spokesperson denied the use of tear gas and the report was later retracted in a follow-up post[24] by @OccupyWallSt news site.
September 26th: Anthony Bologna
On September 26th, 2011, the police officer who was recorded pepper spraying a corralled group of female protesters unprovoked was identified as Deputy Inspector Anthony Bologna. NY Mag[25] reported that Anonymous was responsible for identifying the officer, and posted his personal information in a pastebin file.[26]
The Internet vigilantes, using photographic evidence of Bologna on the scene and a close-up of his badge, wasted no time in putting together a file on the officer, including a possible phone number, addresses, and the names of his family members, warning ominously, “Before you commit atrocities against innocent people, think twice. WE AREWATCHING!!! Expect Us!”
The Atlantic Wire[28] reported that the NYPD have defended the officer’s actions.
As for Bologna, police spokesman Paul J. Brown on Monday called his use of pepper spray “appropriate,” but Councilman Peter F. Vallone commented to the paper that the incident “didn’t look good.” He said, “If no prior verbal command was given and disobeyed, then the use of spray in that instance is completely inappropriate.”
According to an article in The Guardian[27], Bologna was accused of misconduct in 2004 at the Republican national convention protests for “false arrest and civil rights violations.”
On October 18th, New York Times reported that the Deputy Inspector Bologna was disciplined by losing 10 vacation days after the pepper spraying incident was reviewed by the NYPD Internal Affairs Bureau. According to an official statement by the chief spokesman Paul J. Browne, the investigation determined that Bologna used the pepper spray outside departmental guidelines, which doesn’t allow for its use in “disorder control.”
The news of the punishment came as a group of demonstrators marched on Manhattan District Attorney’s office to demand termination of Bologna’s job and an in-depth investigation into police brutality.
September 29th: Celebrities & Musicians Support
Rapper Lupe Fiasco was one of the first celebrity figures to vocally support the protests by donating camping equipment and visiting the site on September 19th. By the end of September, several celebrities have come out in support of #OccupyWallSt, including Roseanne Barr, Michael Moore, Susan Sarandon[29], Tim Robbins, and Penn Badgley[32] who all visited the area to talk to and encourage the demonstrators. Musicians Jeff Mangum (Neutral Milk Hotel)[33] and Talib Kweli[34] have both done performances for the protestors.
Many celebrities have expressed their solidarity online, including author Margaret Atwood[30], Noam Chomsky[31], Yoko Ono[35], and Alec Baldwin.[36] The Board of Directors of Ben & Jerry’s[48] ice cream also have issued an official statement of support.
September 30th: Labor Unions Join the Protests
The largely leaderless demonstration has gained support and pledges of alliance from a number of established local unions and other veteran activist organizations like The United Federation of Teachers, Workers United and Transport Workers Union Local among others.
On September 30th, #OccupyWallStreet reached a new milestone when New York City’s Transit Workers Union joined the coalition of protesters, receiving mentions from several local and national news publications. Other nationwide political groups that have expressed support and solidarity include the anti-war umbrella organization MoveOn.org, Center for American Progress and members of the House Progress Caucus, as well as community groups like Make the Road New York, the Coalition for the Homeless, the Alliance for Quality Education and Community Voices Heard among others. On October 1st, it was reported that troop members of the U.S. Marines and Army will join the upcoming protests on Wednesday.
October 2nd: Mass Arrests on Brooklyn Bridge
On October 2nd, 2011, at least 1,000 to 1,500 protesters attempted to cross the Brooklyn Bridge as part of their continuing weekend march around the city. As the protesters began making their way across the bridge, they were met by a large group of NYPD officers, who arrested more than 700 demonstrators violation of the law against occupying the roadway.
The police spokesperson explained that Saturday’s arrests came as a result of some demonstrators wandering off the sidewalk zone into the road, which was allegedly warned against by the NYPD officers on the scene:
“Protesters who used the Brooklyn Bridge walkway were not arrested,” Paul J. Browne, the chief spokesman for the New York Police Department, said. “Those who took over the Brooklyn-bound roadway, and impeded vehicle traffic, were arrested.”
However, several news articles have reported that many protesters felt they were tricked into an arrest trap on the bridge as the police initially allowed them onto the bridge and even escorted them across partway before besieging the contingent in orange netting. Since the arrests, both #OccupyWallStreet protesters and NYPD have released video footage of Saturday’s arrests on the Brooklyn Bridge and claimed that their actions were lawful.
October 7th: #OccupyTogether
Occupy Wall Street has actively spread to over 200 cities in the United States.[36] Organized via Facebook groups, Twitter hashtags, and Meetup.com[37], similar protests are taking place in Boston[38], DC[39], Philadelphia[40], New Jersey[41], Minneapolis[42], Austin[43], and Seattle.[44] Across the globe, there are protests occurring in four cities in Australia[45] as well. The offshoot protests across the United States and overseas in solidarity with Occupy Wall Street movement have been unofficially dubbed “Occupy Together” by the news media and a “hubsite” for protest-related information was launched at OccupyTogether.org.[49]
October 7th: Occupied Wall Street Journal
On September 29th, 2011 a group calling themselves the 99% started a Kickstarter[46] to fund a project they called the Occupied Wall Street Journal.
We want to be the people’s media. Our first project is The Occupy Wall Street Journal, a four-page broadsheet newspaper with an ambitious print run of 50,000. It’s aimed at the general public. The idea is to explain what the protest is about and profile different people who have joined and why they joined. We will explain the issues involved and how the general assembly process operates at Liberty Plaza. It will also offer resources and ways to join.
The original monetary goal for the project was $12,000. They had over 500 backers with nearly $24,000 pledged in under two days. On October 7th, 2011, the fundraiser came to an end with pledges from 1696 backers and $75,690 in total. The first edition of the newspaper became available at Zuccotti Park on October 1st, 2011 and the second edition in English and Spanish were released on October 7th, 2011. A PDF version of the paper was made available shortly after on Scribd.[47]
October 13th: #wallstcleanup
On October 13th, New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg announced he would be forcing protesters to vacate the Occupy Wall Street camp at Zuccotti Park for cleaning.[49] The same day, a Reddit thread titled “ALLOUTCALLFORHELPFROM #OCCUPYWALLSTREET”[50] reached the front page with over 19,000 up votes within the first 24 hours. The thread outlined a plan for protesters to clean up the park themselves, so that there would be no reason to vacate.
The hashtag #wallstreetcleanup was subsequently used on Twitter to coordinate cleaning efforts by demonstrators. American business mogul Russel Simmons tweeted that he would pay to clean the park so that the protesters would not have to leave. The Huffington Post[52] reported that the cleanup had been postponed by the park owners Brookfield Office Properties on October 14th.
Dear <a href="https://twitter.com/MikeBloomberg">MikeBloomberg</a> -- I will pay for clean-up of Zuccotti Park to avoid confrontation. I don't wanna go to jail but I will be there ready!</p>— Russell Simmons (UncleRUSH) October 14, 2011
October 15th: Occupy Time Squares
On October 15th, which was designated as the global day of protests, tens of thousands of demonstrators staged Occupy X rallies and marches in over 900 cities around the world. In New York, thousands of Occupy Wall Street protesters assembled in Times Square and occupied the plaza for several hours. At least 70 protesters were arrested by NYPD officers during Saturday’s demonstration, mostly from the occupation of Times Square past the curfew.
October 18th: Hipster Cop’s Identity Revealed
In the beginning of October, a photograph of a well-dressed police officer in plain clothes began to circulate on Twitter with the nickname Hipster Cop. The man was first brought to attention by Gawker editor Adrien Chen in an article about the Radiohead show hoax posted via his personal blog[57] on September 30th. Since then, a number of New York City blogs and mainstream news outlets like Gothamist[54], Gawker[55] and The Atlantic[56] reported on the curiously fashion-conscious police officer who has been regularly seen at Zucotti Park and even chatting with political activist / guitarist Tom Morello during his visit on October 14th.
On October 18th, New York Times[53] published an article revealing his identity as the 45-year-old NYPD Detective Rick Lee, who serves as the Community Affairs officer in the 1st Precinct. In the interview with the New York Times, Detective Lee acknowledged that he was aware of his local fame amongst the prostesters and in the New York City blogosphere:
“I think it’s funny,” said Detective Lee, who lives on Staten Island. “I’m not a blog guy, so I haven’t really seen a lot of the hipster mentions.”
November 7th: New York City – Washington D.C. March
On November 7th, 2011, a small group of Occupy Wall Street protesters set off on an interstate march from New York to Washington D.C. in an attempt to stop the legislation of tax cuts which they say benefit the richest Americans. During the 20 miles-a-day journey en route to the nation’s capital, the marching group will pass through other occupations in the cities along the east coast, including Occupy Baltimore, Occupy Philadelphia and Occupy Wilmington among others.
Dubbed “Occupy the Highway,” the idea of marching from New York to Washington D.C. has been circulating within the protest circles since the first week of protests, according to the protesters. The plan was finally organized in early November to coincide with the Congressional deficit reduction meeting to be held on November 23rd. The Wordpress blog[58] and the official Twitter feed @NYCmarch2DC[59] were launched on November 5th and 7th respectively to provide the latest news and updates. The stories about the march has been also picked up by major news outlets and syndicated through affiliated Occupy movement websites as well, including OccupyWallStreet.org.
November 15th: Eviction
On Monday, November 14th, the Village Voice[62] published leaked information from the NYPD ordering the creation of a plan to mobilize 432 police officers if needed, suggesting that this was in preparation for an encounter with the protestors. Around midnight, the police informed the park owner Brookfield Office Properties that they were intending to clear out the park, merely an hour before the operation began. In a preliminary official statement, Brookfield’s spokeswoman made it clear that the choice was the mayor’s, not theirs. However, several hours later, a letter[64] sent from Brookfield to Bloomberg was posted on the NY Daily News website expressing its concern over the health and safety of the protestors, causing the eviction.
At approximately 1am the morning of November 15th, NYPD began a raid on the Zuccotti Park campsite.[60] Police evicted demonstrators from the area while members of the press were barred from entering the campsite[65][69], some even physically pushed and shoved away.
It was later revealed on the 15th in a BBC interview[77] with Oakland mayor Jean Quan that there had been group conference call of officials from 18 U.S. cities to discuss the Occupy movements in their areas. While not definitively connected, this admission coincides with raids happening in a matter of days in Oakland, New York, Albany, Denver, Salt Lake City and Phoenix.
Arrests & Damages
The protesters tents were removed as well as the People’s Library[75], whose 5554 books were seized[79] and a medical tent where a woman with a heart condition was being treated[78] at the time of the raid. Approximately 200 people were arrested[68], including New York City Council member Ydanis Rodriguez[63], and journalists from the Associated Press[66], NPR, the New York Daily News and DNAInfo.[67]
Reaction On Twitter
Twitter response to the raid was immediate, with journalists in the area tweeting[70] about the media blackout, keeping readers abreast not only of the NYPD-imposed media blockade but also of their colleagues getting beaten and arrested. Mashable[71] featured a compilation of tweets from journalists, news sites, celebrities, and normal Twitter users using the #OWS hashtag. Wall Street Journal[76] featured a similar celebrity response collection.
Restraining Order on NYPD
Around 6:30 AM, lawyers on the Occupy side contacted[61] NY State Supreme Court Justice Lucy Billings[74] to sign an order to show cause and temporary restraining order[73] against the city of New York for the NYPD to allow demonstrators to return to the park with their possessions including tents and sleeping bags.[72] Around 4:30pm, NY State Supreme Court Justice Michael Stallman ruled not to extend this restraining order.[80] The document[81] states that, while the court respects their First Amendment rights, the law sees the rules of the Park, set forth by Brookfield, are reasonable time, place and manner restrictions that the First Amendment allows for.
Recovery of People’s Library
As part of the eviction, the Occupy Wall Street Library, also known as the People’s Library, was removed from Zuccotti Park. The library was started the same week as the protest[82], consisting of donations from occupiers in the park. By the second week of OWS, several volunteer librarians had begun cataloging the books on LibraryThing[83] to keep track of incoming donations.
After the eviction, the official Twitter account for the NYC Mayor’s Office tweeted out a photo[84] of confiscated books from the People’s Library, stating that they were being stored at the 57th Street Sanitation Garage and could be picked up the next morning. When librarians arrived at the garage, they found between 2000 and 4000 books were missing[85], including five boxes of Reference books. Also missing were their uncataloged magazines and newspapers, tables, lamps, bins, posters, library stamps and personal belongings of the librarians.
Angry NYPD Cop
During the clash between the evicted protesters and the police, a picture of one NYPD officer scuffling with protesters received much spotlight on the web for his raw expression of anger and the raised fist suggesting an attempt at physical assault.
The image quickly became symbolic of police brutality that has been consistently reported throughout the two months of protest in New York City. The photoshopped images began to emerge on the same day via Memegenerator and Tumblr, which has been since dubbed “Angry NYPD Cop” and “Rage Face Cop” by various internet humor blogs like Uproxx, BuzzFeed and Wall Street Journal among others. The identity of the officer has yet to be identified.
November 17th: Mass Non-Violent Direct Action
After the eviction, Occupy Wall Street’s official site published a call for action for protestors to occupy several places throughout Manhattan, using the Twitter hashtag #n17[88] to coordinate events and aggregate news.
Live streaming of the events was covered by The Other 99[86], who caught NYPD blocking sidewalks and asking people trying to access the subways for identification. A link to the stream with this information was posted to the Politics subreddit[87], where it made it to the front page in three hours, with 4124 upvotes and 2103 downvotes. Live feeds of tweets and news from the day’s events were collected by Mother Jones[89] and Gawker.[90] Over 275[94] people were arrested[91] that day, including Ray Lewis[92], retired captain of the Philadelphia police force, and NY City Councilman Jumaane D. Williams.[93]
December 8th: #Mockupy
On December 8th, 2011, @OccupyWallSt received information that a tent city was set up in Foley Square as a set for a Law and Order episode.[102] The protestors were called to occupy the set at midnight with news spreading via Twitter hashtags #Mockupy[95] and Fauxcotti.[96]
When protestors showed up to the set, they found a faux People’s Kitchen and People’s Library.[97] Protestors were seen talking to cops saying that they were just extras for the episode and commenting on how real the officer’s costumes were.[97] The NYPD pulled the permit for the set around 1 AM and raided it, shutting it down.[98] Mainstream news including the Huffington Post[99], Mother Jones[100] and MSNBC[101] covered the event, hosting pictures and video from the occupation.
January 3rd, 2012: Anti-NDAA Flashmob Protest
On the morning of January 3rd, 2012, around 200 Occupy protesters coordinated a flash mob at the main concourse of New York’s Grand Central Terminal, in protest against President Obama’s signing into law of a defense act that the protesters perceived as detrimental to civil liberties. It was reported that three people were arrested for disorderly conduct during the event and videos from the scene were uploaded via one of Occupy-affiliated YouTube channels OccupyNYTV on the same day.
January 17th: Occupy Congress
Over 2000 people attended a protest on the West Lawn of the Capitol Building for an event called “Occupy Congress,” which had been coordinated through online hubsites like OccupyTogether and Reddit. Throughout the day, the protesters occupied the steps of three congressional office buildings in attempts to meet with representatives and the day concluded with an impromptu march to the steps of the Supreme Court.
January 25th: Adbusters Call for Protest in May 2012
In late January 2012, Adbusters, the Canadian anti-consumerist magazine credited with launching the Occupy movement, published another advertisement calling for fifty thousand protestors to show up at the G8 summit in Chicago, Illinois scheduled for May 2012, using visual references recalling the 1968 Chicago protests.
January 31st – March 12th: Occupy Protesters’ Twitter Accounts Subpoenaed
On January 31st, Occupy protester and freelance writer Malcolm Harris posted a link to a copy of a subpoena letter he received from Twitter’s legal team via his Twitter account. According to the Reuters report[101], the subpoena sought Harris’ account information for his Twitter handle @destructuremal and three months’ volume of tweets he posted between September and December 2011. Back in October, Harris was one of many dozens of Occupy Wall Street protesters who were arrested by NYPD on the Brooklyn Bridge.
On March 12th, Jeff Rae, another activist who was taken into police custody during the October 2nd mass arrest on the Brooklyn Bridge, posted a similar subpoena notice letter he received from Twitter. According to the letter[102], the subpoena issued by the Manhattan District Attorney’s office sought access to all of Rae’s account and contact information, as well as his tweets posted since mid-September through October 2011. The faxed document published via Rae’s Twitter account further revealed that the law enforcement subpoenaed four additional Twitter user accounts, which may be linked to other Occupy defendants who were arrested on the Brooklyn Bridge.
March 17th: Six-Month Anniversary Protest
On March 17th, over 600 protesters gathered around Zuccotti Park in Manhattan to commemorate the inception of the Occupy encampment six months ago in September 2011. The clash with the police began around 11 p.m. on Saturday night when the NYPD ordered protesters to dissemble and exit the park; 73 people were arrested during the forceful evacuation, according to the Wall Street Journal.[103] Soon, videos of the physical confrontation between the police and the protesters were uploaded onto YouTube, including footage of a female protester who was allegedly tackled by the police:
March 18th: NYPD Investigates “Cop Killing” Tweets
On the following day, NYPD began investigating an Occupy protester who made alarming comments about “killing police officers” via Twitter and Ustream during the clash in Zuccotti Park the night before. Originally posted by @Smackema1 at 11:39 p.m. on March 17th, the tweet in question contained a link to the real-time stream of the Occupy Wall Street protest site with a message that read:
It was also revealed that the District Attorney of New York filed a subpoena to help the police discover the identity of @Smackema1, who was identified as a 23-year-old Florida resident Rusty Braxton later that same day. The screen capture of @Smackema1’s tweet was subsequently posted on numerous Occupy-related blogs and New York local news sites. According to the news reports, Smackema1 apparently informed the NYPD upon finding out about the investigation that he is a Florida resident and has no intention of harming police officers.
During an impromptu interview with The Daily Caller via Twitter, Braxton explained the situation as harmless:
“It’s not like I meant anything of it. Who takes anything like that seriously? I’m in Florida, what am I going to do?”
September 17th, 2012: One Year Anniversary Protest
In September 2012, the core organizers of Occupy Wall Street staged a weekend march protest in remembering the one year anniversary of Occupy Wall Street. The weekend began with an assembly of about 200 protesters in the Washington Square Park on September 15th, which proceeded in peace for the most part until the protesters attempted to march down Broadway all the way to Zucotti Park, the birth ground of the Occupy movement. According to various news reports, about 25 protesters were arrested by the end of the night.
The protest continued on Monday morning with several hundreds of demonstrators parading in downtown Manhattan, dressed in festive costumes and holding picket signs with familiar Occupy movement slogans. As of 2:30pm (ET) on September 17th, 2012, as many as 100 protesters from the protest site have been reportedly arrested by the police.
September 17th, 2013: Two Year Anniversary Protest
On September 17th, 2013, about 100 students and political activists affiliated with the Occupy Wall Street movement gathered near Zuccotti Park in New York City’s downtown Manhattan to celebrate the two year anniversary of the protests.[107][108] In the afternoon, the demonstrators split up in smaller groups and staged peaceful marches across the city, including an “assembly for the 99 percent” at Zuccotti Park and another gathering at Washington Square Park, during which three protesters were reportedly arrested for blocking 2nd Avenue near the United Nations headquarters located in Midtown, Manhattan.[109]
“Coaxed Into a Snafu” refers to a series of poorly drawn rage comic and advice animal characters that are captioned with variations of popular Internet catchphrases. The illustrations typically mock the way Internet memes are incorrectly used on sites like 9gag and Reddit.
Origin
On October 7th, 2012, the “Princess Bubblegum” Facebook[3] page posted an image featuring a variety of poorly-drawn trollfaces to the “Hipster High Five Ghost” Facebook page (shown below). On the top row of illustrations, the third face from the right featured a caption which read "you have been coaxed / into a snafu).
Spread
On October 13th, 2012, a Facebook[5] page titled “You have been coaxed into a snafu” was launched. On October 20th, Redditor kurtss submitted a gallery of additional trollface variations titled “You have been coaxed into a snafu” to the /r/4chan[1] subreddit (shown below). Prior to being archived, the post gained over 1,700 up votes and 50 comments.
On November 5th, FunnyJunk[4] user iMagnet submitted many of the illustrations to the Internet humor site, where it received more than 53,000 views and 700 up votes in the following two years. On January 31st, 2013, the /r/coaxedintoasnafu[2] subreddit was launched by Redditor ashanmaril.
“Hail Hydra” is a catchphrase taken from the motto of the fictional terrorist organization Hydra (alternative spelling: HYDRA) in the Marvel Universe. While the quote has appeared in a number of Marvel franchises since 1965, it spawned an image macro series of two characters, one whispering to the other, shortly after the release of Captain America: The Winter Soldier in April 2014.
Origin
“Hail Hydra” is the salute used by the fictional terrorist organization of the Marvel Universe named Hydra and the opening line of the group’s official motto, which reads: “Hail Hydra! Immortal Hydra! We shall never be destroyed! Cut off one limb and two more shall take its place! We serve the Supreme Hydra, as the world shall soon serve us!” It was first used by the organization’s members in the very same issue of Hydra’s debut appearance, Strange Tales #135 published in August 1965, which also marked the introduction of S.H.I.E.L.D., the counter-terrorist organization nemesis of Hydra.
(Hydra soldiers from Captain America (Vol. 6) #5, February 2012)
On April 4th, 2014, the film Captain America: The Winter Soldier[1], part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe franchise and sequel to Captain America: The First Avenger (2011), was released. In the film, Captain America discovers that S.H.I.E.L.D. had been infiltrated by Hydra decades ago. The scene parodied by this meme features the reveal to the audience that the character of Senator Stern (portrayed by Garry Shandling) is a Hydra member when he whispers to fellow agent Jasper Sitwell (portrayed by Maximiliano Hernández) the Hydra salute after a meeting.
(Garry Shandling portraying Senator Stern in Iron Man 2)
On April 6th, Twitter user Kevin M[2] tweeted out the first image macro, which shows Sesame Street character Ernie whispering “Hail Hydra,” to Bert.
In less than 24 hours, the hashtag #hailhydra[3] was tweeted out over 2,200 times. On April 6th actor Clark Gregg[9], who plays Phil Coulson, a big fan of Captain America in several Marvel films, retweeted an example of the meme featuring “My Little Pony.” On April 7th, MTV[4] published an article titled “‘Hail HYDRA’ Is The Best Meme From ‘Captain America: The Winter Soldier’” which explains the meme and collects some of examples. On Tumblr, users tag their examples as well,[8]with one popular post[7] featuring the original Sesame Street example gaining over 2,000 notes in less than 24 hours. The same day AMC’s official Twitter account[5] tweeted out examples of the meme including ones featuring stills from Rise of the Planet of the Apes, The Lion King and The Dark Knight Rises.
Luigi’s Death Stare, not to be confused with Weegee, refers to the odd facial expressions worn by the character of Luigi during gameplay in the eighth installment of Nintendo’s Mario Kart franchise. Upon the release of the game in late May 2014, the character’s creepy gaze quickly became the butt of many jokes and parodies among the fans of Mario Kart.
Origin
Luigi’s illusive stare was first picked up by a video titled “Waluigi vs Luigi” (shown below, left), which was posted to Youtube by YouTuber Rizupicorr[1] on May 30th, 2014, which shows a section of a highlight reel in which Luigi knocks out Waluigi using a green shell, before giving him an uncomfortable stare as he continues to drive past, and gained over 60,000 views. Another video, titled “Mario Kart 8 – Luigi’s Death Stare” was also posted to Youtube the same day by user Mega Beardo[2](shown below, right), featuring Luigi attempting to overtake Mario, gaining over 5,000 views.
Spread
His stare did not grow in popularity until May 31st, when Youtuber CZbwoi[3] posted a parody of the video using the original clip (shown below), which shows the scene alongside the 2006 song Ridin’ by Chamillionaire. As of June 2nd, the video has over 400,000 views and over 11,000 likes.
Luigi’s “death stare” further grew in popularity after a post titled “Luigi Death Stare” featuring a GIF of the scene was posted to Reddit’s r/gaming board on June 1st[4]. The post received a positive reception from the community, garnering over 3,000 upvotes and over 800 comments, enticing other users to post parodies of their own. The topic was soon brought up on a number of different gaming forums and news sites, such as The Independent[5], IGN[6], Polygon[7] and Pixelitis[8]. On the same date, Tumblr user Scarfydog posted a video on Tumblr[10] featuring the same clip made into a Dear Sister Parody (shown below). Within 48 hours, the post managed to gain more than 95,000 notes.
Mentos Commercial Parodies are spoofs of the 1990s TV advert campaign for the scotch mint brand Mentos.[4] The original commercials illustrated a series of escapades involving youthful characters as they find their way out of complicated situations through quick thinking after eating a mint.
Origin
The Mentos campaign launched in the early 1990s with the slogan “The Freshmaker,” depicting young people solving problems in a quirky manner.[3] The campaign was incredibly successful, helping sales rise from $20 million to $40 milion in three years.[5] Rock band Foo Fighters was the first to parody these commercials in their 1996 music video for the song “Big Me” (shown below), poking fun at the campaign’s overwhelming optimism.[6]
Spread
The commercials were parodied online as early as November 17th, 2000, when Newgrounds member wisemanofearth uploaded a flash-animated parody of a Grand Theft Auto character carjacking an elderly woman. The animation was subsequently highlighted as a Daily Feature on the following day and voted the Weekly User’s Choice. In 2003, another parody was posted to the gaming site Game Daemons.[8] Additional video parodies began appearing on YouTube in February 2006, with an upload from FullSwingActor and FND Films (shown below).
Between 2006 and 2008, additional parody videos appeared on Newgrounds[11], College Humor[12], Funny or Die[13], Break[14] and eBaum’s World.[15] In March 2009, a selection of Mentos commercial parody videos were featured on Buzzfeed.[10] A second list of parody videos was featured on Crave Online[1] in May 2012.
Notable Examples
As of April 2014, there are more than 50,000 search results for “mentos parody” on YouTube.[9]
Avatar: The Last Airbender (known in Europe as Avatar: The Legend of Aang) is an American animated television series created by Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko that aired for three seasons on Nickelodeon from 2005 to 2008. The series follows the adventures of Aang, a spiritual defender of Earth known as “The Avatar”, and his friends. On 2012, a sequel of the original series, named The Legend of Korra premiered on Nickelodeon, following the adventures of the next Avatar, Korra, and her friends. Because of the franchise’s past success and fame, the show was quickly picked up and became a popular subject on many sites, including Tumblr in many of its blogs.
Premise
Avatar: The Last Airbender takes place in a world where human civilization is divided in four nations: the Water Tribes, the Earth Kingdom, the Fire Nation, and the Air Nomads, having a distinct society and people known as benders, who can control the element of their nation. The only who can control all elements is the Avatar, who serves as an international arbiter, and reincarnates into the next one of the four nations in the Avatar Cycle: the Fire Nation, Air Nomads, Water Tribe, Earth Kingdom, in order. One hundred years before the story takes place, the Fire Nation planned a world war to expand its influence and territory, but was prevented from it by the Avatar Roku. After his death, and knowing the Avatar Cycle, Sozin, the ruler of the Fire Nation, carries a genocide against the Air Nomads, being Aang (voiced by Zach Tyler Eisen), the next Avatar, the only survivor, who gets encased into an iceberg in suspended animation for one hundred years. During that time, the Fire Nation continued the war and also chased Aang, “The Last Airbender”. A hundred years after, Aang gets revived by Katara (voiced by Mae Whitman) and his brother Sokka (voiced by Jack DeSena), from the South Water Tribe, attracting the attention of prince Zuko (voiced by Dante Basco), the exiled son of Ozai, the current ruler of Fire Nation. To end the war, Aang must master all the forms of bending, gaining some allies on his journey, like Toph (voiced by Jessie Flower), a blind tomboy and Earthbending prodigy who wants independence from her upper-class family, and Zuko, who joins Aang.
Avatar: The Legend of Korra takes place 70 years after the original series, following the next Avatar, Korra (voiced by Janet Varney). After going to Republic City, founded by Aang, to learn airbending from his son Tenzin (voiced by J. K. Simmons), she meets Bolin and Mako (voiced by P. J. Byrne and David Faustino), two brothers who practise Pro Bending, a popular game involving bending abilites, and Asami Sato (voiced by Seychelle Gabriel), daughter of the president of the automotive industry Future Industries, and the local police leader Lin Beifong (voiced by Mindy Sterling), Toph’s daughter. Meanwhile, she fights against a mysterious organisation named Equalists and their leader Amon, who wants to remove the benders from Republican City.
History
The Avatar franchise was co-created by Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko, two animation directors, in Burbank, California, and was animated by JM Animation, DR Movie, and Moi Animation, all studios from South Korea.
Avatar: The Last Airbender uses a mixture of cultural influences to create its universe, all from Asian culture and history. The show uses traditional Chinese for any writing in-universe, and draws from Chinese and Japanese mythology for its plot. The series also draws heavily from anime. In an interview on Nickelodeon’s website, the creators said that they employ numerous consultants on the show – including ones for cultural representation, martial arts, and calligraphy.[6]
The Legend of Korra runned for four seasons and ended in 2014. Part way through its third season, Nickelodeon pulled the series from television, airing the remaining episodes exclusively online.
Reception
The Last Airbender has received positive reviews from both audience members and critics. It has won 5 Annie awards and 1 Emmy, and is currently the 15th highest rated show of all time on IMDb, with a score of 9,2.[5] The Legend of Korra has a score of 8,7 on IMDb.[18]
Comics
The Avatar series has produced two sets of canonical comics. The first are short stories published in Nickelodeon Magazine and the Nickelodeon Comics Club. These were at one point available online through the Nickelodeon website, but were taken down in 2010 when Nickelodeon Magazine ended its run. The other set are a series of graphic novels published by Dark Horse Comics which chart the events that took place immediately after the end of The Last Airbender, and are functionally a prequel series to The Legend of Korra. These comics serve to fill in empty plot points left by the original series (like the ultimate fate of Zuko’s mother), and to show the changes that the end of the war brings to the world (such as the events that lead to the founding of Republic City). A complete list of all the comics, along with plot synopses, are available on the Avatar wiki.[7]
Movie
On 2010, a live-action film based on the first season of “The Last Airbender” was released. The movie, directed by M. Night Shyamalan, received an extremely poor reception, scoring only a 6% positive on Rotten Tomatoes.[3] The movie also received a novelization.[11] The film also failed to earn back its $150 million budget, managing to make only about $131 million at the box office.[4] Though sequels were planned, no specific release dates have yet been announced. In an interview with the show creators, Shyamalan described what attracted him to what he expected to be a trilogy of films about two hours each. He also said that, in the face of the large number of material contained in each season, he would aim for a “selective adaptation” similar to what happened with the X-Men films.
The film was also the subject of a online controversy called Racebending in response to its cast. Though the main characters in the cartoon all come nations based on an amalgam of Asian and Inuit cultures, all three of the protagonists (Aang, Katara, and Sokka) were cast with white actors, with only the villain (Zuko) cast with a person of color. The controversy created a massive backlash that included satirical fan art, tee-shirts, and a fan-fiction contest.
Fandom
The series gained a substancial following. As April 17th, 2015, the art sharing website DeviantArt has over 141,700 submisions under the keywords “avatar the last airbender”,[1] and over 79,300 submisions under the keyword “the legend of korra”.[2] Avatar The Last Airbender currently has the largest amount of fan fictions in the cartoon category of Fanfiction.net at approximately 39,600 fanfictions.[24] The Legend of Korra is ranked at tenth place of the cartoon category with roughly 12,700 fan fictions.[25] Series fans are also well represented on 4chan,[22][23] Tumblr[8][9] and Reddit, its main sub-reddit having over 138,000 subscribers.[10] The official Facebook page for Avatar The Last Airbender received approximately 4.7 million likes.[29] The official Facebook page of The Legend of Korra (yet to be verified) has roughly 1.7 million likes.[30]
Shipping
The presence of shipping is strong in the Avatar fandom, characterised for having “shipping wars” or conflicting ships. On the original series, the most relevant ships were Zutara (Zuko x Katara)[12] and Kataang (Katara x Aang),[13] and on The Legend of Korra were Makorra (Mako x Korra),[14] Borra (Bolin x Korra)[15] and Korrasami (Korra x Asami).[16]
Korrasami
Korrasami became a heavily talked about topic once the finale of The Legend of Korra strongly hinted at a relationship between Korra and Asami. The possibility of Korrasami being one of the more well-known canon lesbian couples in children’s television generated a huge controversy. Korrasami stopped being a matter of interpretation once the show creators Michael DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko explicitly stated in their personal tumblr accounts on December 22, 2014 that Korrasami is canon. Both posts garnered 76,719[20] and 123,434[21] notes from fans, respectively. Bryan Konietzko also uploaded his own fan-art of Korrasami, which gained 77,040 notes (shown below).[22] A sub-reddit dedicated to discussing Korrasami and posting fanart and fanfics has over 6,400 subscribers as of May 19th, 2015.[17]
On Febuary 11, 2015, PBS Idea Channel uploaded a Valentine’s Day Episode revolving around Fan Fiction, homosexual relationships, and Korrasami. The video currently has 184,890 views. The development of Korrasami and its officialness also received much coverage from various sites such as The Mary Sue[26] Screen Crush[27] and IGN[28].
Aside from the usual fan-art of fictional couples being romantic with one another, the hype korrasami has built up also generated humorous deviations as well.
Related Memes
Creepy Katara
Creepy Katarais the name of a photoshop exploitable, featuring an image of Katara in a rather somber and very blank stare. It’s used in similar fashion to Weegee. The image is a screenshot from the episode “The Day of Black Sun, Part 1: The Invasion.”
Cactus Juice
Cactus Juice comes from a scene in the tenth episode of season two, in which Sokka hallucinates after drinking juice from a cactus while travelling through the desert. Uses of the meme are often jokes based around Sokka’s incoherent speech and LSD-like hallucinations.
Comedian Amon
Comedian Amonis a series of vertical comics that feature Amon, the antagonist of The Legend of Korra’s first season, acting like a stand-up comedian. Usually the jokes involve Amon making some kind of pun or cultural reference with the last panel of the comic being him pausing for applause that, presumably, shall never come.
Crying Bolin / Kissing Korra
Crying Bolin and Kissing Korra are a pair of related memes that derive from a scene in episode 5 of The Legend of Korra’s first season, in which Bolin runs away crying after seeing Korra kiss his brother Mako.
Inappropriate Timing Spongebob Banner
Inappropriate Timing Spongebob Banner is an exploitable image series based on a Nickelodeon bumper banner featuring the cartoon character Spongebob Squarepants laughing with the caption “Up Next.” The popup banner is typically juxtaposed with emotional scenes from various films and television shows to mock poorly timed cross-promo ads displayed in the lower thirds during broadcast. The banner was first shown in a scene from the sixth episode of The Legend of Korra’s first season.
Then Everything Changed When The Fire Nation Attacked
Then Everything Changed When The Fire Nation Attackedis a catchphrase from Avatar:The Last Airbender’s opening narration. It is often used as a caption in the final panel of multi-panel comics as a humerus all-purpose ending. As a catchphrase, it is often added on to the end of sentences in a similar fashion to the quote I took an arrow in the knee.
Cabbage Man
Cabbage Man is a background character from Avatar: The Last Airbender. In the series, it is a running gag that a chase scene will involve the main characters running over the cart of cabbages that he was trying to sell, at which point he will shout “my cabages!” in despair. In the legend of Korra, one major company that works on new technology is called Cabbage Corp, and was founded by the merchant. The line is often used in image macros.
Zuko’s Honor
Zuko’s Honor is a series of jokes that poke fun at the main character Zuko, who was dishonored after losing an Agni Kai, a fight between Fire Benders, against his father. The jokes normally despict Zuko trying to recover his honor, or crying over his lost honor, or anything that includes the word “honor”.[19]
“Anime Was a Mistake” is a troll quote misattributed to Hayao Miyazaki, one of the most popular and influential Japanese artists and film directors in anime history, that conveys a strong sense of disdain towards the art of anime and its fanbase at large, including those who identify themselves with weeaboo and otaku subcultures.
Origin
The troll quote stems from the transcript of Miyazaki’s interview with the Japanese news site Golden Times[2], published on January 27th, 2014. During the interview, Miyazaki expressed skepticism regarding the current state of anime as an art form and a cultural industry, particularly how little the new generation of animators are seeking inspiration from actually observing human behaviors and interactions in real life. On January 30th, a translation of the original interview was provided by English-language Japanese news site RocketNews24.[1]
You see, whether you can draw like this or not, being able to think up this kind of design, it depends on whether or not you can say to yourself, ‘Oh, yeah, girls like this exist in real life. If you don’t spend time watching real people, you can’t do this, because you’ve never seen it. Some people spend their lives interested only in themselves. Almost all Japanese animation is produced with hardly any basis taken from observing real people, you know. It’s produced by humans who can’t stand looking at other humans. And that’s why the industry is full of otaku!.
Spread
On January 26th, 2015, Imgur user Ondaheightsofdespair submitted two animated GIFs of Miyazaki captioned with made-up quotes expressing extreme dissatisfaction with the state of anime and otaku culture in a post titled “Old sage drops some wisdom.” It quickly reached the front page of Imgur, receiving over 8,800 points.[3]
“Into The Trash It Goes!” is a phrase associated with a picture of an American illusionist Penn Jillette. It’s often used to discredit a person’s viewpoint or opinion.
Origin
The phrase first originated from /pol/ (Politically Incorrect) board of 4chan and over time, it became widespread on other boards[1]. On boards such as /tv/[2], /a/[3], and /sp/[4], the image of Penn Jillette’s mugshot with accompanied greentext and the phase “Into the trash it goes.” has been around since February 2013.
Originally it was used in the context of an employer reading someone’s resume when applying for a job. In time, the meme evolved from job related context to overall trashing one’s opinion.
Spread
The meme is most widespread on 4chan, and over time many variations of the image have arisen. Due to its origin, the meme is often paired with Doom Paul, by using similar filters and photoshop effects. Around April 30th and May 1st, first posts with the phrase accompanied by the likeness of Penn Gillette had appeared on Tumblr[5][6][7].
Opinion Discarded
One of the more widespread variations of the meme features Penn Jillette standing near a trashcan filled with 4chan posts, with a caption “Opinion Discarded” (as pictured at bottom left). In November 9th[8], a similar image had appeared in response to the original, featuring Kyoko Toshino from an anime YuruYuri, wearing a tomato suit (as pictured at bottom right). Eventually, more derivatives of the image had arisen, each featuring characters from a variety of different franchises.
You Dense Motherfucker is an expression used to insult someone’s intelligence or decision making ability. The phrase is most often iterated in the form of a reaction image based on a panel from KC Green’s webcomic series The Anime Club or alternatively, a screen capture of the villain character Syndrome from the 2005 Pixar short animation film Jack-Jack Attack.
Origin
On July 15th, 2009, K.C. Green released the eighth issue of his webcomic series The Anime Club,[1] which featured a panel showing the character Mark calling his friend Mort a “dense motherfucker” for purchasing an infected anime DVD (shown below).
Spread
On July 15th, 2010, a 4chan user replied to another poster’s praising of High School of the Dead as a “god tier animation” in a thread on /a/ (Anime & Manga) board[3] with the illustrated panel from The Anime Club (shown below).
On February 24th, 2011, Tumblr[4] user claudiaruckus posted the two-pane webcomic illustration. On March 25th, Redditor internetor submitted the same panel to the /r/pics[2] subreddit, presenting the quote as his internal monologue while interacting with “stupid people.” On September 9th, 2012, RedditorRED-fucking-rocket posted a reaction image[5] featuring the villain character Syndrome from the 2005 CGI-animated short film Jack-Jack Attack as a commentary on those who resume relationships with former partners who have cheated on them (shown below).
On April 3rd, 2013, FunnyJunk[6] user escott submitted a screenshot of a Facebook argument wherein the original poster mistakenly asks friends to “call or text” if they find his lost cell phone, only to correct himself later by responding to his own post with the reaction image of Syndrome. Within one month, the post accumulated upwards of 77,000 views and 2,200 up votes.
On April 6th, a Facebook[7] page titled “You Dense Motherfucker” was launched, receiving over 250 likes in the first month. On April 28th, YouTuber HoboWITHGuns uploaded a gameplay video titled “You Dense Motherfucker” for the flash game “Give Up”[8] (shown below).
Stop Bullying Comics is an online comic series that began as a collaborative project between Cartoon Network and Bitstrips for School in October 2011. Part of the social media campaign against bullying in school, the comics share some similarities with the Law For Kids PSA parodies, both being humorous spoofs of educational webcomics.
Origin
On October 3rd, 2011, Cartoon Network teamed up with the online comic software company Bitstrips for Schools[1] to launch its anti-bullying campaign “Stop Bullying: Speak Up!” This social media campaign was meant to raise awareness about the dangers of bullying by encouraging visitors to illustrate their own scenarios using Bitstrips’ comic generator. Once submitted to the site, each user contribution was showcased in the official gallery page[3] where members could vote for their favorite instances.
Spread
The Huffington Post[4] covered the campaign on October 4th, 2011. On October 6th, a link to the comic creator was posted to the forums on the YouTube poop related website YouChew.[6] A thread titled “Cartoon Network lets you make comics to stop bullying…this is what my friend did”[7] was posted to the r/funny subreddit by Redditor dantecd on October 8th, 2011. The post eventually managed to reach the front page with more than 1,300 up votes. On October 10th, the unofficial single topic blog for curating the best parodies was launched on Tumblr, although the site hasn’t been updated since March 2011. In the following months, people began sharing their own parody comics through Reddit’s /r/bitstrips[8] and the Tumblr tag[5]“#stop bullying.” The Facebook[3] page, which was created months prior to the campaign’s launch in August 2011, has received more than one million likes as of June 2012. The first volume of the Stop Bullying: Speak Up Comic Anthology[9] was eventually made available as a downloadable PDF document in May 2012.
Kamina Glasses (sometimes referred to as Kamina shades or Gar glasses) are a pair of orange, triangle shaped glasses used as a photoshop item added to a person or object, based on the pair worn by Gurren Lagann character Kamina. The idea of the meme is to take something plain looking and instantly make it look cool by adding the glasses. Although this is mainly done through Photoshop, they can also be used in a drawing or even as a real prop.
Origin
The glasses are named after the character Kamina from the anime Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann. Kamina is known for his manliness and wearing his signature sunglasses (often used as as an example of GAR). Although Kamina is not the first person in anime history to wear this type of glasses, the glasses style themselves do not have an official name; thus the glasses have become synonymous with him, even going as far as to mount a giant pair of them on his personal Gunmen mecha Gurren), and is now known as a symbol of epicness.
Spread
On October 8th, 2007, LiveJournal user nubs[1] created the Tengen Toppa Gurren Glasses page which hosted user submitted images of various characters that have been edited with the Kamina Glasses on[2]. Various discussions and photoshop threads regarding the glasses can be found in sites such as Naruto Forums[3], Rune Tips[4], Youchew[5], AnimeSuki[6], 4chan[7], and Tumblr[8]. On Deviantart, typing the keyword “Kamina Glasses” would yield more than 1.330 results with the earliest fan work dating back to mid 2007[9].
On August 26th, 2010, TVtropes submitted an entry regarding Triangle Shades which uses Kamina’s Glasses as one of its prime examples[10].
4chan User’s Suicide Attempt refers to a livestreamed video in which a 4chan user known as “Steven” sets his college dorm room on fire in a self-professed attempt to take his own life in November 2013.
Background
On November 30th, 2013, an anonymous 4chan user started a thread claiming he would be ending his own life on a live video feed.
Tonight I will be ending my own life. I’ve been spending the last hour making the preparations and I’m ready to go through with it. As an oldfag who’s been on 4chan since 2004, I thought I would finally give back to the community in the best way possible: I am willing to an hero on cam for you all.
The user subsequently joined a video chatroom on the website Chateen, which quickly filled up to 200 viewers. In front of the online audience, he swallowed several unidentified pills with vodka and set a fire in the corner of the room before crawling under his bed. At the end of the video,[1] firefighters can be seen entering the room and pulling him out to safety.
Notable Developments
Identity Speculation
On November 30th, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette[4] published an article that a man had been pronounced dead at the scene of a fire in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. On the following day, the @YourAnonNews Twitter feed posted a link to the article, speculating that the deceased man was the suicidal 4chan user.
Suicidal 4chan user killed himself yesterday by setting his room on fire. Event streamed online. 200 people watched http://t.co/vYgi9lFlw5
Also on December 1st, the Guelph Mercury[2] reported that a 20-year-old man had been injured in a dorm room fire at the University of Guelph campus in Ontario, Canada. The same day, CBC News[3] published an article about the incident, quoting the university’s vice president of student affairs who revealed the fire had been deliberately set by the injured student.
News Media Coverage
In the coming days, several news sites published article about the livestreamed suicide attempting, including The Daily Dot,[5] The Independent,[6] The Daily Mail,[7]Gawker,[8]IBI Times[9] and Complex.[10]
User Identity
On December 4th, 2013, The Daily Mail confirmed the identity of the user to be Dakota Moore, a 21 year old student at the University of Guelph, Ontario, Canada who was taking a degree in Criminal Justice and Public Policy. Friends of the user have express their sadness regarding the tragedy and condemn the 200 viewers who witness the event[11].
“John is Kill” refers to a copypasta story that is meant to survey what people were doing at the time of the Beatles singer-songwriter John Lennon’s death on December 8th, 1980. The story, which is marked by improper English grammar and spelling errors, has inspired a number of variations featuring other deceased celebrities and musicians in substitute of the English rock star.
Origin
On January 10th, 2012, an Anonymous 4chan user posted a thread on /tv/ – Television & Film board, apologizing for his “poor English” and asking other users “when were you when heat legend dies”, a misspelling of deceased actor Heath Ledger.[14]
On the same day, Body Building Forums member HITSTICK53 posted a thread titled “when were you when heat legend dies?”.[12] On August 22nd, 2012, a version of the copypasta featuring the deceased Beatles musician John Lennon was posted to 4chan.[15]
apology for poor english
when were you when john lenin dies?
i was sat at home eating smegma butter when pjotr ring
‘john is kill’
‘no’
Spread
On the same day, Redditor Petryz submitted a screenshot of the original 4chan thread to the /r/4chan subreddit, where it gained over 3,000 up votes and 50 comments prior to being archived.[7] On August 28th, 2012, the screenshot was reposted on FunnyJunk, accumulating upwards of 127,000 views and 1,500 comments in the following two years.[1] On September 17th, a thread was created on 4chan urging users to post comments on Skrillex YouTube videos suggesting that the electronic music producer had died. Two days later, a compilation of hoax YouTube comments titled “When was you when Skrillex die?” was highlighted on FunnyJunk.[9]
On October 23rd, Newgrounds Forums user Slint posted the “John is kill” copypasta in a thread titled “when were you when”.[6] On November 22nd, the copypasta was reposted to the /sp/ (sports) board on 4chan.[4] On April 2nd, 2013, YouTuber TheStolken uploaded a dramatic reading of the original copypasta (shown below).
On November 30th, a variation of the copypasta with deceased actor Paul Walker substituted for John Lennon was posted on 4chan. On December 1st, Redditor KINGcjb55 submitted a screenshot of the Paul Walker thread to the /r/4chan subreddit, where it gathered more than 2,100 up votes and 45 comments in four months.[8] On January 8th, 2014, Urban Dictionary user OLPZach submitted an entry for “john is kill,” citing 4chan as the origin of the copypasta.[5]
If You See This Image, also known as If You See This Image While Scrolling or You Have Been Visited, is an exploitable consisting of images of various internet celebrities and other characters with a variation of the message “If you see this image while scrolling the first page…” superimposed. Used in forums like 4chan, the exploitable promises the viewer some sort of happiness if they reply with the keyword provided below the image. The exploitable is similar to the ASCII copypastas you have been visited by the spooky skeleton and Le Toucan.
Origin
The first known example of the meme was created after the death of popular bodybuilder and model Aziz “Zyzz” Sergeyevich Shavershian. A character, “The Zyzz Bird Of Happiness” was created on the 4chan board /fit/, dedicated to fitness and bodybuilding.[1]
The exploitable featuring Zyzz bird was created and posted on /fit/ and other weightlifting boards, like Bodybuilding.com], sometime in the beginning of the summer of 2012. The Zyzz Bird of Happiness fan page was created on August 1st, 2012.
Spread
On December 3rd, 2012, the first known instance of the image without a picture of Zyzz Bird was posted on the gaming forums of IGN.com[4]. The photo had been swapped to feature “Big Richard”, with a new reward for scrolling.
The convention spread throughout 4chan and other forums, including on /b/, for which archives are unavailable.
Gardevoir (サーナイト, known as Sirknight in Japanese) is a third-generation Pokémon character originally introduced as a Psychic type creature in Pokémon Ruby / Sapphire and re-introduced as a Psychic / Fairy dual type with a mega evolution in Pokémon X / Y. Due to Gardevoir’s conspicuous resemblance to a female humanoid, the character has gained an unusually large fan base online, mostly on 4chan’s /vp/ (Pokémon), /v/ (Video Games) and /b/ (Random) boards.
Origin
Gardevoir, whose name is derived from a combination of the French words Garde (‘guard’) and voir (‘see’), made its debut appearance as the 282nd official character in Pokémon Ruby and Sapphire versions of Nintendo’s video game series, which were released in Japan on November 21st, 2002 and elsewhere overseas between March and July 2003.
The Character
According to the canonical profile, Gardevoir is one of Ralt’s final two forms of evolution, the other being Gallade, that can be manifested after evolving into its second-level form Kirlia, and it is most notable for its ability to read the future and a heightened sense of concern for and loyalty towards its Pokémon trainer. In Pokemon X and Y, they introduced to mega evolutions for certain Pokemon that can gain a powerful final form of themselves in battle. Gardevoir is one of the certain Pokemon who can mega evolve to a Mega Gardevoir.
Upon detecting danger to the trainer, Gardevoir can unleash its psychic energy to protect him or her by distorting dimensions and creating a small black hole, and sometimes, even at the expense of its own life. While the Pokémon appears in the games as both male and female at a 1:1 spawning ratio, the character is often presumed to be of female gender due to its outer appearance.
Spread
Since its debut in the 2003 title Pokémon Ruby / Sapphire, Gardevoirhas received some mentions on video game review sites for its popularity among the fans, including IGN’s profile articles for the Pokémon as featured in both of the paired titles, as well as GamesRadar and Screw Attack. On January 31st, 2004, Urban Dictionary user Gopi. D submitted the earliest known entry for “Gardevoir,” humorously defined as a synonym for an “attractive woman.”
In January 2006, Fanfiction.net user Renegade Zero submitted the earliest known Pokemon fanfiction featuring Gardevoir as a central character in a story titled “A Girl and her Gardevoir.”[15] As of November 2014, Fanfiction.net[16] hosts more than 80 non-canonical stories featuring the Pokemon, while DeviantART[12] offers more than 16,000 instances of fan art illustrations tagged #gardevoir. In addition, hundreds of archived discussion threads and fan-made posts about Gardevoir can be found on 4chandata,[14] Reddit[10] and Tumblr.[13]
Related Memes
Gardevoir Use Flash
Gardevoir Use Flash is a mixed of image macros and fanart that involves Gardevoir using the HM skill Flash. The results always shows Gardevoir sexually flashing her breasts or even her full body with a caption saying “It’s super effective!”.
Gardevoir Used Attract
Gardevoir Used Attract is another of a mixed of image macros and fanart that involves Gardevoir using the skill Attract. It’s mostly about Gardevoir being lusty with a caption that says “It’s super effective!”.
Supernatural is an American paranormal drama television series created by Eric Kripke that premiered on the now-defunct television station The WB in September 2005. The show follows two brothers as they hunt demons, ghosts and other supernatural figures. Since its debut, the series has aired eight seasons, with a ninth in the works. The show has also developed a dedicated following online.
History
Supernatural was conceived by writer and director Eric Kripke and premiered on The WB on September 13th, 2005. After The WB dissolved in 2006, the show moved to The CW. Supernatural follows the lives of brothers Dean Winchester (played by Jensen Ackles) and Sam Winchester (played by Jared Padalecki) as they hunt for supernatural creatures, a practice taught to them by their father following the paranormal death of their mother when they were children. Originally slated to be three seasons, popular demand prompted the series to be extended for five. Its fifth season concluded on May 13th, 2010 effectively tying up the show’s main storyline. But due to the show’s increasing ratings, it was renewed by The CW for a sixth season without Kripke as the showrunner. As of April 2013, the show is airing its eighth season with a ninth season in pre-production.[1]
Reception
Though with its following from fans, Supernatural received overall fair reviews from critics. As of April 2013, the series has an 8.6/10 score on IMDb[2], and a score of 56/100 on Metacritic.[3] While the first season averaged 4.52 million viewers, the eighth season has averaged 2.1 million viewers.[4] In 2009 and 2012, Supernatural won the People’s Choice Award for Favorite Sci-Fi/Fantasy Show, also taking home Favorite Network TV Drama in 2012.[8]
Online Presence
In 2008, the official Facebook[5] fan page for the show created, which has accumulated more than 11 million likes as of April 2013. Two years later, in April 2010, he show also launched the official @CW_Supernatural[6] Twitter account, gaining more than 250,000 followers in three years. They also maintain an official Tumblr[20] account.
Fandom
Due to its immense cult-like fan following, the show is very self aware of itself, known for adding slight nods to the fandom throughout the series, including a 2009 episode where the Winchesters attend a supernatural convention.[9] Fans of the show began convening on LiveJournal as early as November 2005 to share fan works about the show. The oldest known community, Supernatural Fanfiction[10], has since accumulated more than 19,000 posts and 7,700 comments and is still actively posting as of April 2013. In February 2006, the Supernatural Newsletter[11] (shown below) launched, posting daily roundups of news about the show and its actors as well as information on new communities, trending fan works, and fan fiction challenges. At least three separate directories on LiveJournal[12], the Supernatural Wiki[13] and Delicious[14] have been assembled to chronicle as many Supernatural-related LiveJournal communities as possible. The Supernatural Wiki has also chronicled the fandom’s history on LiveJournal from 2005-2009.[19]
On August 17th, 2008, the /r/Supernatural[7] subreddit was created, gaining more than 15,900 subscribers as of April 2013. In 2011, following a DDoS attack across LiveJournal[15], many fan fiction writers began migrating their work to other sites. This mass exodus resulted in the number of Supernatural related works on Archive of Our Own[16] to go from 2,000 in May 2010 to more than 10,000 by August 2011. As of April 2013, the site hosts more than 38,000 stories in the Supernatural tag. Fanfiction.net[18] hosts an additional 59,000 stories and nearly 6,000 crossover stories featuring Supernatural characters outside of their universe. On deviantART,[25] over 183,000 fan creations has since been submitted within the site, as of April 2013.
Supernatural fans also began congregating on Tumblr,[26] and one of the the first fandom blogs, Superfreakingnatural[21], launched in July 2010. The Supernatural Wiki maintains a list[22] of Tumblr blogs related to the series. In July 2011, Supernatural-Fandom.com[18] launched, creating a hub site for fans to interact outside of the blogosphere. In February 2012, the fandom was the subject of an article on entertainment blog Affairs[23], who interviewed a handful of fans about their experiences.
Related Memes
Mishapocalypse
Mishapocalypse refers to a flashmob event that took place on Tumblr on April 1st, 2013, which involved dozens of Tumblr users changing their profile pictures to a photo of actor Misha Collins, who plays the character Castiel on the show. The trend quickly evolved into users photoshopping Misha’s head into a variety of unlikely situations.
Misha Crying
Misha Crying is a series of animated reaction gifs taken from a scene from the season 6 episode The French Mistake, during which Misha Collins’ character Castiel is sobbing after being held at knife-point by hitman Virgil. These reaction gifs are often used to show fondness of a certain object or group and are often accompanied with additional text.
Destiel
Destiel is a portmanteau referring to the slash shipping relationship between the characters Dean Winchester and Castiel. The term was used as early as February 2008, when the first LiveJournal community[24] dedicated to the pairing was created. Actor Misha Collins has commented on the pairing on several occasions, mentioning it at two separate conventions in 2009.
2014 Crotoan Outbreak
On January 1st, 2014, fans of the show on Tumblr[27] began joking about an impending arrival of a zombie apocalypse in reference to “The End” (Season 5, Episode 4)[28], originally aired in October 2009, in which Dean wakes up five years into the future in an alternate universe and finds out that the world has been overrun after Lucifer released a zombie virus called Croatoan. In the episode, Dean’s future self learns that Sam has been possessed by Lucifer while fighting alongside a small band of fellow survivors. Upon confronting him, Lucifer explains, “Whatever choices you make, whatever details you alter, we will always end up here.”
