Jeff The Killer

About

“Jeff The Killer” is a popular creepypasta character depicted as a nose-less, grinning, white skinned man with no eyelids and a black ring around his eyes. The character is frequently used as a popular Internet Screamer along with becoming a largely popular creepypasta story. The character is also frequently associated with the phrase “go to sleep”.

Origin

The first known use of the image originates from a post on the Newgrounds forums by the user killerjeff on August 14th, 2008.^[1] In the post, killerjeff claimed that the image was in fact, a picture of himself. The image is commonly believed to be a photoshopped image of Katy Robinson, a girl who was bullied to suicide by 4chan users for her weight in Fall of 2008.^[5]

Spread

Later, on October 3rd, 2008, YouTube user Sesseur uploaded a video presentation of a creepypasta based around the character. The video has since gained over 700,000 views in under 8 years and is the first known use of the creepypasta based on the character.

The creepypasta later spawned a number of derivatives, with over 200 results on Creepypasta Wiki^[7] and over 3,700 on Creepypasta.com.^[8] YouTube user MrCreepyPasta later uploaded a video in which he read the creepypasta (shown below, left). The video has since gained over 4 million views in 4 years. A video of a rap battle between Jeff The Killer and Slender Man was uploaded by YouTube user Keyblade on November 1st, 2014 (shown below, right). The video has since gained over 50 million views.

A popular screamer site known as “anne.jpg” featuring Jeff The Killer accompanied by a gunshot sound was created on September 9th, 2008.^[9] Over the next 8 years, the site was visited over 23 million times. An Urban Dictionary definition for the screamer was later created on July 30th, 2013.^[10]