Background

The Pea Guacamole Recipe Controversy, also known as #Guacgate or Peacamole, refers to the online reaction to a Tweet made by the New York Times in reference to a recipe for guacamole that contained mashed peas in addition to the traditional avocado, which was perceived as strange or absurd. On July 1st, 2015, the New York Times published a Tweet to their main account advertising an archival recipe titled “Green Pea Guacamole,” originally published July 2nd, 2013, by food writer Melissa Clark.^[1][2]

As of July 6th, 2015, the tweet had received 764 retweets and over 1,266 favorites.

Notable Developments

Response to the tweet was initially mostly negative, and many of the negative tweets were widely retweeted. Internet publication Buzzfeed tweeted “don’t do this.” and was retweeted over 100 times and favorited over 500 times by July 6th. Many users tweeted variations on Nope as an indication of their disgust.

On July 1st, user @JGreenDC asked President Obama, via Twitter, what he thought of the recipe. His reply received 16,097 and 21,147 favorites as of July 6th, 2015. ^[3]

Other politicians, including Jeb Bush and the Republican Party of Texas, agreed with the President in a rare example of American bipartisanship.^[7] Musicians Paul and Storm created a short song, which received over 7,000 views in 5 days.

In response to the negative reaction, which even included tweets from other departments of the newspaper like NYT Sports, the New York Times cooking section prepared a more comprehensive list of recipes featuring peas from their archive, including more traditional uses of the vegetable.^[4] In an interview with the BBC, New York Times Social Media Editor Michael Gold claimed that he was was not trying to troll Twitter when he posted the inflammatory tweet, but rather that he thought the recipe looked interesting.^[5]

The negative response inspired the hashtag #Guacgate, which as of July 6th, 2015, had over 500 uses on Twitter.^[6] Along with several local news stations, the Atlantic and The Indianapolis Star made the recipe, with mixed reactions.

Search Interest

External References

Work in Progress

About

Klinik Tong Fang refers to a series of image macros which aims to mock the controversial commercial for Klinik Tong Fang, a traditional Chinese medicinal clinic which has been accused for breaking ethical laws in Indonesian Television broadcasting by airing alleged patient testimonies in their commercial.

Origin

Klinik Tong Fang began operating in the Indonesian capital city of Jakarta around 2010. Between 2011 to 2012, the clinic began promoting their services via commercial on a number of television stations.

The commercial has been heavily criticized for its use of allege patient testimonies which has been considered deceptive and breaking ethical laws in Indonesian Television broadcasting.

Spread

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References

About

Fluffle Puff is the name given to an OC pony made by DeviantART user Mixermike622 on January 3, 2012 depicting what a fluffy pony would look like.

Origin

The pony was first created on January 3rd, 2012^[1] by Mixermike622 as a representation of himself although he is sometimes negative about the outcome of what he had created.

Spread

Ever since the original image was uploaded, Fluffle Puff has accumulated a large amount of fan art dedicated to the pony. With the artist having approved of the spread of the character, he gave it numerous appearances in his Tumblr blog Dan Vs. Friendship is Magic (shown below, left)^[2] along with the Tumblr Ask BlogAsk Fluffle Puff (shown below, right)^[3]. On February 29, 2012, a flash game for the character was made.^[4]

As of July, 2015, there are 3,893 user-submitted fan-art of the character on DeviantArt^[5] and 2,030 results on Derpibooru.^[6]

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References

About

Justin Bieber’s Butt Photo refers to a photograph of pop star Justin Bieber in which he is shown standing in front of the ocean while completely nude. After being shared on Instagram in July 2015, photoshopped variations of the image were widely circulated across the web.

Origin

On July 6th, 2015, Bieber uploaded a photograph of himself standing nude on a boat while vacationing in Bora Bora, in which his buttocks are prominently exposed in the frame (shown below). In the first 14 hours, the post gained over 1.6 million likes and 486,000 comments on Instagram.^[1]

Spread

That day, the @turnaroundjustin^[2] Instagram feed was launched, which highlights photoshopped variations of the Bieber photo. Also on July 6th, pop star Miley Cyrus posted a cropped close-up image of Bieber’s butt on her Instagram feed,^[5] where it received upwards of 299,000 likes and 16,000 comments in 12 hours (shown below).

On July 7th, the @BiebsNetwork^[3] Twitter account posted a photoshopped version of the photo in which Bieber’s buttocks are enlarged to resemble Kim Kardashian’s Paper Magazine cover (shown below). Within eight hours, the tweet garnered more than 630 retweets and 85 favorites. The same day, Redditor raginpsycho submitted the original photo to the /r/gayporn^[4] subreddit. In the coming days, several news site published articles about the photoshop meme, including The Daily What,^[6] The Daily Mail,^[7]MTV,^[8] NY Mag,^[9] Billboard^[10] and Noisey.^[11]

Various Examples

Search Interest

Not available

External References

About

Don’t Judge Challenge (#DontJudgeChallenge) is a selfie video fad in which the participant records oneself at a close-up angle while wearing heavy facial makeup to appear as unattractive as possible, before transitioning into another self-portrait in which the subject is shown in their most photogenic form.

Origin

The challenge reportedly began as a hashtag campaign to combat the widespread phenomenon of body shaming on the Internet, with some of its earliest instances submitted to Instagram sometime between late June and early July 2015.

The identity of the hashtag creator or the location of the original instance remains unclear; however, Chicago Tribune has cited British beauty blogger Em Ford’s makeup tutorial video titled “YOULOOKDISGUSTING” as a potential source of trigger that may have given rise to the hashtag.

Precursor

Prior to the emergence of #DontJudgeChallenge on Instagram, there have been numerous selfie trends centered around the theme of intentionally making oneself look unattractive, such as the Sellotape Selfie Challenge and Kylie Jenner Challenge, not to mention the Pretty Girls, Ugly Faces photo fad that juxtaposes one’s least attractive-looking self-portrait with his or her most photogentic counterpart.

Spread

During the first weekend of July 2015, #DontJudgeChallenge quickly snowballed into a full-fledged multi-platform video fad, generating nearly 170,000 user-submitted videos on Instagram, more than 1.7 million mentions on Twitter, according to Topsy Analytics, and over 11,600 clip submissions on Vine within the first week of its takeoff. Meanwhile, as the hashtag continued to take stronghold on other major media-sharing platforms, many observers and social media commentators began expressing skepticism in regard to the effectiveness of the campaign’s mission, particularly from those affiliated with the social justice blogosphere blogging."

Examples

Search Interest

External References

work in progress, feel free to request editorship!

Overview

The Jared Fogle Child Porn Investigation was a 2015 investigation by federal authorities into the existence of child pornography at the residence of Jared Fogle, a spokesman for the Subway sandwich chain who is better known as “Subway Jared” or Jared from Subway.

Background

In 2000, Jared Fogle rose to fame after losing 200 pounds by exercising and habitually eating at a Bloomington, Indiana Subway franchise. The company used an ad campaign featuring Jared holding up a pair of pants that he had used before he began losing weight as a method of demonstrating the health of their sandwiches compared to other fast foods. Subway continued the campaign through 2013, filming at least 300 commercials. Jared also had a lucrative career in motivational speaking connected to his weight loss. ^[1]

In 2004, Fogle established the Jared Foundation, dedicated to fighting obesity in American children.^[2] In 2009, Russell Taylor was appointed the executive director of the foundation. Seven years later, on April 29th, 2015, Taylor was arrested on charges of possession of child pornography, child exploitation, and voyeurism, and was found to have over 400 different graphic of child pornography in his possession at the time, all recorded by him at his residence between the years of 2012 and 2015.^[3] Taylor later attempted suicide while in prison.^[4]

Notable Developments

On July 7th, 2015, at 6:30 am, federal and state agents, acting on a federal warrant, entered Fogle’s home in Zionsville, Indiana, and removed several electronic devices, analyzing them in a van parked in the driveway. Fogle was seen exiting his home and entering the van, but by noon he had left with his lawyer and was not under arrest. It was unclear as to whether Fogle himself was under investigation or if the seizings were related to the investigation into Taylor.^[5]

Subway released the following statement:

“We are shocked about the news and believe it is related to a prior investigation of a former Jared Foundation employee. We are very concerned and will be monitoring the situation closely. We don’t have any more details at this point.”

By 2 pm EST on July 7th, Subway had removed all mention of Jared from their web site, including a section called "Jared’s Journey":www.subway.com/subwayroot/freshbuzz/Jared/, which began redirecting to their home page instead.

Online Reaction

Most of the online reaction happened on Twitter, where users tweeted the phrase “Subway Jared” more than 40,000 times in less than 12 hours.^[6] Many of the jokes parodied other Subway marketing tag lines, including the marketing campaign “$5 Footlong”, their slogan “Eat Fresh,” and the use of Jared’s large pre-weight loss pants in their marketing. Users also incorporated images of Chris Hansen from the child pornography vigilante television show To Catch a Predator and his slogan, “Why don’t you take a seat.”

Search Interest

External Sources

About

Dragon Ball AF (also known as Dragon Ball Hoshi) refers to the name of a purported new series in the Dragon Ball franchise. The name has been used by numerous people, typically on YouTube, to try and gain viewers through deceiving said viewers into believing they are watching clips from a new Dragon Ball series, when in fact they are viewing clips from lesser known Dragon Ball properties. These usually come in the form of Dragon Ball games released in Japan. Both Dragon Ball AF and Dragon Ball Hoshi have been written off as hoaxes by the majority of the Dragon Ball fanbase.

History

The exact origin of AF is unknown, but, according to The Dao of Dragon Ball: ^[1]

Dragon Ball AF was originally the creation of an unknown fan that evidently had a strong desire for a fourth Dragon Ball anime series.

Is believed that this same fan also created an image which showcases series protagonist Son Goku in a white haired hypothetical “Super Saiyan 5” form which began circulating the web around the same time. (shown below).

With the release of Dragon Ball Super, the first official Dragon Ball series since the end of Dragon Ball GT, both Dragon Ball AF and Dragon Ball Hoshi will most likely no longer be able to hold any sense of validity within the Dragon Ball community.

Online Relevance

On YouTube there are around 74,300 results for Dragon Ball AF, and around 20,100 results for Dragon Ball Hoshi. ^[2][3] Various YouTubers use clips from other Dragon Ball properties in order to trick others into viewing their video(s). The earliest known video to use this technique on YouTube was a video entitled “Dragon Ball AF Opening” uploaded by YouTuber superkakarotto on August 23, 2006 (shown below, left). Since then various other YouTubers have done the same, with the most viewed video having over 17 million views (shown below, right).

On Tumblr there are various results for Dragon Ball AF and Dragon Ball Hoshi under various tags. ^{[4][5][6][7][8]} There are also various fan blogs which use the series’ names as their own, such as Dragon Ball AF Webcomic ^[9] and Offical DBAF. ^[10]

Fan Animations

There are various content creators whom have taken the name Dragon Ball AF as a name for their fan-made videos. The two most viewed of these both have over 9 million views as of July 2015. The earlier of these two was uploaded on June 24, 2010 by YouTuber SuperDBAF and mixes clips from other Dragon Ball series and the uploaders own original work (shown below, left). The latter was uploaded on May 11, 2011 by YouTuber Canal de pameliitahv which is composed entirely of original art (shown below, right).

On November 30, 2012 YouTuber Mellavelli uploaded the first episode in his fan series Dragon Ball Absalon which takes many of the concepts and characters from other Dragon Ball AF series (shown below)

Fanart

On DeviantArt there are over 5,500 results for Dragon Ball AF, and around 100 images on the Japanese art site Pixv. ^[11][12]

Related Memes

Super Saiyan 5

Super Saiyan 5 (often abbreviated as SSJ5) is a fanmade transformation that was created in the first Dragon Ball AF image. Since then many official and original characters have been made using the transformation. Super Saiyan 5 has also inspired a slew of other numbered Saiyan transformations.

Xicor

Xicor (also known as Zaiko) is a fanmade character whom appears in many of the various fan interpretations of Dragon Ball AF. Throughout most of his interpretations Xicor is the child of Goku and the Western Supreme Kai and was conceived during his time off-world in between the Namek and Android sagas.

Search Interest

External References

While first used as an ironic way to say “help me” or “send help,” this phrase has now turned into a phrase used to spam sites. It has also become the source of pranks when someone takes another persons phone and changes the autocorrect options so basic phrases such as “yes” or “no” change to “SOS” automatically. Over time it has orally transformed from an exclamation into a verb.

Ex. I was SOSing hardcore during that test today.

About

Ellen K. Pao is a corporate lawyer and the interim CEO of Reddit. She is known for her controversial decisions as CEO and for a sexual harassment lawsuit she was engaged in with her former employer, venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers.

History

Pao is from Maplewood, New Jersey, and attended Princeton and Harvard. She worked as a corporate attorney at several web firms in Silicon Valley before joining Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers in 2005, where she served as the technical chief of staff for senior partner John Doerr and then was given the position of junior partner under senior partner Ted Schlein in 2007. In 2008 she married hedge fund manager Buddy Fletcher.^[1][2]

On May 10, 2012, she filed a sexual discrimination lawsuit against Kleiner Perkins alleging that she had been passed over for a senior partner position based on alleged retaliation against her for an affair she carried out with another employee. On October 31st, she was terminated from her position at Kleiner Perkins. In 2013, Pao was hired at Reddit, and in November 2014, after the resignation of then CEO Yishan Wong, she became the CEO.

Controversies

Ellen Pao’s Gender Discrimination Case

Ellen Pao’s Gender Discrimination Case (Ellen Pao v. Kleiner Perkins) was a lawsuit filed by American corporate attorney and executive Ellen Pao against her former employer and venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers in May 2012. Upon the beginning of the trial in February 2015, the case drew much online attention due to her current position as the interim chief executive officer of Reddit and sparked debates on the issue of gender discrimination in the technology industry.

After the verdict in the case went in Kleiner Perkins’ favor, a group of women created t-shirts and took out an advertisement in the Palo Alto Daily Post that read simply, “Thanks, Ellen,” in support of her raising awareness of gender issues in Silicon Valley.^[6]

Reddit Harassment Policies

In a reversal of policy under the former CEO, Yishan Wong, Reddit instituted an anti-harassment policy on May 14th, 2015.^[3]

TL;DR: We are unhappy with harassing behavior on reddit; we have survey data that show our users are, too. So we’ve improved our practices to better curb harassment of individuals on reddit.

This resulted in the ban of five subreddits on June 10th, 2015: /r/fatpeoplehate, /r/hamplanethatred, /r/transfags, /r/neofags, /r/shitniggersay. Many users blamed Pao for the crackdown on hate-speech subreddits, claiming that this censorship mirrored a pattern of social justice warrior behavior that was also seen in her previous sexual discrimination lawsuit.^[4] As a result, users created the subreddit /r/ellenpaohate, which has 3,149 readers as of July 7th, 2015, and /r/paomustresign, which at the time of this writing was set to private.

AMAGeddon, a.k.a. the Reddit Blackout

Late in the day on July 2nd, 2015, it became known to the Reddit community that Victoria Taylor (aka /u/chooter), the talent coordinator for r/iama, had been fired for unknown reasons. Speculation claimed that she was in disagreement with the management in regards to commercial decisions Reddit was attempting to make, including the creation of a video AMA format. After learning of the firing, the moderators of /r/iama changed the settings for the subreddit to private because it was impossible for the subreddit to operate without Victoria. /u/karmanaut explained that “Tl;dr: for /r/IAMA to work the way it currently does, we need Victoria. Without her, we need to figure out a different way for it to work”. This, effectively blacked out one of the most popular subreddits on the site.

Soon after r/iama went private, the mods of other popular subreddits began privatizing their sections of the site as well. At the height of the blackout, more than 300 different subreddits with more than 5,000 readers were either privatized or locked. Nearly all rage toward these events was directed Pao, who initially commented that “the vast majority of Reddit users are uninterested in what unfolded over the past 48 hours," but later apologized extensively and claimed that the company was going to be making changes in its management policy.^[5]

Online Presence

Pao maintains an active presence on Reddit, where she has 4,600 link karma and 33,469 comment karma as of July 7th, 2015. She also tweets as @ekp, where she has over 10,600 followers. Her Facebook profile is private.

Reputation

Since succeeding Yishan Wong as the interim CEO of Reddit in November 2014, Pao has drawn intense scrutiny within the reddit community and strong opposition from the critics of social justice and feminist activism, especially after the trial of her workplace gender discrimination lawsuit began in February 2015. Pao’s executive decisions surrounding reddit, which are often criticized by the site’s community, has gained her the derogatory nickname Chairman Pao, based on her name rhyming with the communist leader Chairman Mao and her Chinese heritage. Users also refer often to her firing from Kleiner Perkins in misogynistic terminology.

Outside of reddit, reactions to Pao’s management of Reddit has been mixed. The Washington Post’s Digital Culture Critic Caitlin Dewey called the turmoil within Reddit is “indicative of the state of free speech today.”^[4]

Search Interest

External References

Protein is among the greatest among all Muscle Building products. King Size Male Enhancement You will find different substitutes to whey like eggs and soy protein. You can also try these choices too. Let these choices are discussed by us first before convincing ourselves why protein is the alternative that is greatest.
http://testosteronebuyonline.com/king-size-male-enhancement/

[WORK IN PROGRESS]

Overview

The “Shoplifting” fandom, also known as the “Lifting” fandom or “Liftplayers”, are a group of individuals who advertise their shoplifting lifestyle on their tumblr blogs, often reblogging and posting posts about how to shoplift, where the most vulnerable places are, and their shoplifting haul. Some of these blogs have claimed to have stolen thousands of dollars worth of goods.

Background

The shoplifting fandom, despite being reported on by online journalist websites in the past, have never been reprimanded for their actions, and outside of individuals being caught on their own accord, have never faced criminal charges for their excessive thievery.

In July 2015, tumblr user tenaflyviper compiled a list of notable users in the fandom, which caused a reaction from the shoplifting fandom on tumblr. In addition, tenaflyviper exposed posts that exposed shoplifters, such as “reblog if you’re a lifter”.

Initially, tumblr staff did not react to this fandom, despite most tumblr users being outraged. The shoplifting fandom initially claimed that their shoplifting blogs were simply role play blogs, but because they had repeatedly posted images of stolen merchandise, most tumblr users did not believe them. Later, they tried to defend their actions by claiming they suffer from kleptomania, claiming that the marijauna culture on tumblr is not prosecuted, accusing Tenaflyviper of doxxing the shoplifters, claiming that the FBI has no interest in identifying shoplifters and that they were shoplifting to be able to survive. Due to a variety of factors, all of these attempts to divert the situation failed, as more and more shoplifting blogs began to be reported.

Notable Developments

On July 5th, Tenaflyviper posted her master list of shoplifters she discovered, initially triggering the event.

On July 7th, according to Tenaflyviper, Tumblr staff is now investigating the blogs in question for illegal activity.

Search Interest

[I don’t know how to do this, can someone please fill this in for me? thanks]

External References

[will annotate the article later]

http://www.dailydot.com/lifestyle/tumblr-shoplifting-subculture/
http://tenaflyviper.tumblr.com/post/123414494855/master-list-of-entitled-children-celebrating-being
http://tenaflyviper.tumblr.com/post/123477631810/does-it-make-you-feel-big-and-important-to-notify
http://tenaflyviper.tumblr.com/post/123484621645/my-advice
http://tenaflyviper.tumblr.com/post/123423385230/reblog-if-you-are-a-lifter
http://tenaflyviper.tumblr.com/post/123491418410/i-do-wish-their-response-wasnt-so-generic-but-at

Heavy WIP

About

Dragon Age is a high-fantasy action role-playing video game series developed by Bioware and published by EA Games. The series has garnered a devoted following and a strong online presence.

Premise

The world of Dragon Age is known as Thedas. In the three main games, the player controls the Grey Warden, Hawke, and the Inquisitor respectively. Each character’s background as well as their names are chosen by the player. Each of these characters face their own unique political problem that they must solve with peculiar individuals who become party members along the way.

History

Reception

The trilogy is praised highly. Dragon Age Origins received a metascore of 91/100 from Metacritic^[8] and a 9.5/10 from gamespot^[9]. Dragon Age II received a score of 8/10 from gamespot,^[10] an 8.5/10 from IGN^[11] and a metascore of 82/100 from Metacritic^[12]. Dragon Age Inquisition received a metascore of 85/100 from Metacritic^[13] and a 9/10 from gamespot^[14]. The series is mostly praised for having intricately-woven lore and endearing characters.

Impact

Online Relevance

There are multiple official sites for the games such as Dragon Age Keep^[16], Dragon Age Inquisition^[17], Dragon Age Origins^[18] Dragon Age Journeys^[19], and a Twitter account with roughly 225,000 followers.^[15]

Fandom

The devoted following of Dragon Age are well represented throughout the internet. The Dragon Age Wiki currently has a staggering number of 11,525 pages.^[1] A sub-reddit dedicated to the series has 52,366 subscribers.^[2] Dragon Age holds the sixth place of Fanfiction.net’s Video Game category with approximately 17,000 fanfictions.^[3] Fans of the series on tumblr are also well-represented^[4] with multiple blogs dedicated to the games such as confession blogs^[5] and news blogs.^[6] DeviantArt’s search bar yields a large 202,009 results for ‘dragon age’.^[7]

Various Fan-Art

Cosplays

Related Memes

X Approves

X Approves is a remark often stated by the game after the player has made a decision in several of the choices presented in the game. It shows if the party members are approving or disapproving of the player’s actions, which can make or break their relationship with them.

Swooping is Bad

Search Interest

External References

About

Here in My Garage is an online video ad by American entrepreneur Tai Lopez that shows him standing in his garage in front of a Lamborghini sports car and urging viewers to visit his self improvement website. Throughout the first half of 2015, it was frequently featured as a pre-roll ad on YouTube, leading many users on the site to create remixes and parodies of the video.

Origin

In February 2015, YouTube began displaying a pre-roll ad featuring Tai Lopez showing off his Lamborghini and bookshelf while promoting his self improvement video program “67 Steps to Wealth, Health, Love, and Happiness” (shown below).

Spread

On February 6th, 2015, the Blogspot blog Some Final Words^[3] published an article about Lopez’ career, which accused him of running a “fraudulent internet business.” On February 8th, Redditor go_sens submitted a post titled “Who is this guy that just bought a new Lamborghini that’s fun to drive up in the Hollywood Hills and brags about it on YouTube ads?” to the /r/OutOfTheLoop^[1] subreddit. On February 23rd, YouTuber OneLineDerek uploaded a parody of the ad in which he mocks Lopez’ speech (shown below, left). On April 21st, YouTuber Craig has Dysentery uploaded a YouTube Poop of the Lopez ad titled “HereInMyGarage.mwv” (shown below, right). In the first three months, the video gained over 500,000 views and 350 comments.

On June 7th, Redditor andybiotic submitted a post titled “Here in my garage, just bought this new Pegassi here…”, featuring a screen captured image of the character Michael De Santa from the game Grand Theft Auto V standing in front of a sports car (shown below). In the first month, the post gathered upwards of 4,400 votes (90% upvoted) and 1,400 comments on the /r/gaming^[4] subreddit.

On June 9th, YouTuber Vehicle Virgins uploaded a parody of the ad, in which he confesses that he can no longer afford to own a garage after purchasing a Lamborghini (shown below, left). On June 29th, Funny Or Die launched the site TaiLopez.website,^[2] featuring parodies of various Tai Lopez promotional videos (shown below, right).

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References

About

Zoobe is a voice messaging app for iPhone and Android which allows its users to send and receive audio recorded messages that are dictated by personified animal characters, whose lips move in sync with the voice recording, through short 3D animated video clips. In 2015, Zoobe became a popular tool for creating video messages on the social media site Tumblr, where users would tell absurdly personal or humorous stories through the animated character videos.

History

Zoobe was released in Berlin in 2013 by animator Lenard F. Krawinkel. As of June 2015, more than 160 million messages have been recorded and sent and the app has been downloaded 4 million times.^[1] Techcrunch called the Zoobe characters anthropomorphic nature of the messenger characters featured in the app, Techcrunch has said it “embraced a cartoonish uncanny valley.”^[2]

Features

• The app offers more than 80 unique characters, including 15 world-famous faces and other pop culture icons, including Paddington Bear, Om Nom from Cut the Rope, Ryu from Street Fighter®, Maya the Bee™, Vic the Viking™, Angela Merkel, the cute Bunny and other famous avatars including Aunjai, the official mascot of AIS (Thailand’s biggest telecom company).

• The app allows users to customize their video message with an animated background or personal photograph.

• The characters can react accordingly to the user’s mood by analyzing the voice recording.

• Each video message can be sent to another user through private transmission or publicly shared via social media accounts.

Highlights

Usage in Eastern Europe

Zoobe messages have been posted on YouTube since before the app was launched and presumably was still in development, especially from Eastern European countries.^[3] The highest-viewed Zoobe video on YouTube is a Russian one – the title translates as “Zoobe Bunny Wants to go to Dubai” – which was uploaded on October 14th, 2014, and has recieved over 1,17 million views as of July 8th, 2015.

Usage on Tumblr

In late June, 2015, Zoobe videos began appearing on Tumblr more frequently, with the characters saying ironic, absurd or humorous speeches. One of the earliest examples was posted on June 27th by japanese-bird-dad, entitled “DON’T TRY TO CHANGEWHO I AM”.^[4] The post received 601 notes as of July 8th. The single topic blog ZoobeDiaries was created on July 2nd, and since then has reposted 57 individual Zoobe videos as of July 8th.^[5] On July 3rd, popular fan art blogger Kylie Henke created her first Zoobe video, which received 567 notes as of July 8th;^[6] she created several more (compilation below), including one on July 6th entitled “these are basically turning into my video diaries” which received over 171,000 notes in two days.^[7]

On July 8th, Tumblr user Handsomehugs created a series of art of the Zoobe rabbit inspired by videos of Kylie Henke^[7][12] and Kurikurimix.^[13] In less than 24 hours, the post managed to gather over 21,000 notes (shown below). Various other artists on Tumblr also created fanart of Henke’s Zoobe videos

As of July 8th, Zoobe is a trending search on Tumblr.^[8] There are over 108,00 results when the term is searched on YouTube, and the word has been tweeted and hashtagged on Instagram over 2,000 times each in the past month.^[9][10][11]

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References

About

Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is a United States-based nonprofit organization that works to preserve civil liberties for individuals around the world to access computers, communications networks and create and publish digital media.

History

In April 1990, American poet and political activist John Perry Barlow was investigated by the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) for distributing source code for Macintosh computers. After expressing his frustration with the agency’s visit on the online community The Well, Barlow was contacted by Lotus Development Corporation founder Mitch Kapor to create an organization for the protection of Internet civil liberties from various law enforcement agencies. On July 10th, the EFF^[1] was formally founded by Barlow, Kapor and activist John Gilmore (shown below), with initial funding provided by Kapor, Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak and an anonymous benefactor.

The EFF’s first high-profile case involved the search and seizure of Steve Jackson Games, Inc. by the U.S. Secret Service. When the case went to trial in 1993, Steve Jackson Games was awarded $50,000 in damages and $250,000 in attorney fees. Additionally, the Secret Service were reprimanded for improper warrant preparation and ignorance of relevant statutes. In 1995, the EFF hired lawyer Cindy Cohn to represent cryptologist Daniel J. Bernstein in suing the U.S. government for permission to publish his encryption software Snuffle.

EFF Pioneer Awards

The EFF has awarded an annual prize to individuals who made an impact in digital rights and Internet civil liberties. The first Pioneer Awards were given to artist Tom Jennings, computing educator Jim Warren and engineers Douglas Engelbart, Andrew Smereczynski and Robert Kahn in 1992. In 2013, the award was given posthumously to activist Aaron Swartz.

Highlights

The Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement

The Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) is a proposed trade agreement that aims to establish international conventions on enforcing intellectual property rights. It would establish an international legal framework for national governments to join voluntarily and create a governing body outside existing decision-making bodies such as World Trade Organization (WTO), the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) or the United Nations. In 2010, the EFF publicly came out against the treaty, calling for more public scrutiny of the proposal.

Protect IP Act / Stop Online Piracy Act

The Protect IP Act (PIPA) is a U.S. Senate bill introduced by Senator Patrick Leahy in May 2011. Along with its House counterpart Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), the bills were designed to provide the government and copyright holders with powers to block access to “rogue websites dedicated to infringing or counterfeit goods,” especially those registered outside the United States. The bills were met with heavy opposition by the EFF and many other organizations.

Internet Defense League

The Internet Defense League is an Internet watchdog organization and a website launched in March 2012 with the mission to educate the public and organize online protests against upcoming anti-piracy legislation. The league includes several high-profile companies and organizations, including the EFF.

Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protect Act

The Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protect Act (CISPA) is a U.S. Senate bill introduced in 2012, designed to allow more sharing of “cyber threat intelligence” between the U.S. government and private sectors. On April 3rd that year, EFF staff member Trevor Timm appeared in an interview with RT, raising several concerns about the act.

World Conference on International Communications

World Conference on International Communications (WCIT) is a treaty-level conference regarding international rules and regulations for telecommunications, facilitated by the United Nations agency International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and hosted in Dubai in December 2012. In May 2012, the EFF, along with 30 organizations, drafted a letter denouncing the WCIT’s secretive planning process.

2013 NSA Surveillance Scandal

NSA Surveillance Scandal is an ongoing controversy surrounding the U.S. National Security Agency’s data-mining operation of millions of customers from major telecommunications providers in the United States, as well as its clandestine electronic surveillance program known as PRISM. In July 2013, the EFF published a blog post awarding various companies who supported online privacy protections in wake of the NSA scandal. In January 2014, the EFF joined online protest against the surveillance program titled “The Day We Fight Back” In February 2015, the EFF launched the website Fight215.org, urging viewers to contact their representatives to allow Section 215 of the United States Patriot Act to expire, which allowed the NSA to collect phone records of United States citizens who were not suspected of criminal activity.

Internet Slowdown Day

Internet Slowdown Day was an online protest in support of net neutrality held on September 10th, 2014. In a press release for the event, the EFF was listed as one of the early activist groups supporting the protest.

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About

#SunburnArt is a social media hashtag for photographs of sunburned skin with areas that have been purposely covered up with sunblock, stickers or clothing to create various designs and shapes.

Origin

The earliest known use of the #SunburnArt hashtag was in a tweet posted by @MeowSyz^[1] on January 27th, 2014, which featured a photograph of a woman’s back with a floral sunburn design (shown below).

Spread

On April 9th, 2014, Twitter user @MauraGrierson^[2] posted a photograph of a woman with several purposely designed tan lines with the hashtag #SunBurnArt (shown below, left). On May 29th, Instagram^[4] user bbear420 uploaded a photo of a back sunburn created with a marker illustration (shown below, right).

On July 1st, 2015, The Daily Mail^[6] published an article about the trend, noting that dermatologists warn the practice could cause skin cancer. On the following day, The Independent^[5] published an article accusing online news sites of perpetuating the sunburn art trend. Also on July 2nd, the Skin Cancer Foundation’s senior vice president Deborah Sarnoff released a statement urging people to avoid sunburns at all costs in response to the sunburn art photos.^[7] On July 3rd, YouTuber FunnyMeNow uploaded a video in which he gets the poop emoji sunburned on to his butt (shown below). On July 6th, BuzzFeed^[3] published a compilation of Instagram photos with the hashtag #sunburntattoo.

Various Examples

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About

“Hoodini” is an onomatopoeic pun used as a punchline to a joke about the name of a magic owl which became popular among the fans of Grand Theft Auto V_ after it was featured in a Machinima stand-up skit by YouTuber VanossGaming. On YouTube, the word “hoodini” is often uttered in comments as an irrelevant stock response to a variety of questions and jokes, in a similar vein to the use of “Darude-Sandstorm”":http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/darude-sandstorm.

Origin

On June 22nd, 2015, VanossGaming uploaded a video titled “GTA 5 Online Funny Moments,” in which a Grand Theft Auto V character performing stand-up comedy while wearing an owl mask delivers a joke about a magic owl named"Hoodini" (shown below). Within three weeks, the video gained over 6.8 million views and 9,000 comments.

“What do you call a magic owl? Hoodini!”

Spread

On June 27th, YouTuber Ichiban Animations uploaded an animated version of the original VanossGaming video (shown below, left). The same day, Redditor VALERock submitted a post titled “Why is the word ‘hoodini’ appearing everywhere on YouTube comments now?” to the /r/OutOfTheLoop^[1] subreddit. On June 28th, YouTuber VanossAndFriends uploaded a compilation of “Hoodini” parody videos (shown below, right).

Also on June 28th, an owl-themed Minecraft skin titled “Hoodini,” was submitted to the MinecraftSkins^[3] database. On July 6th, Urban Dictionary^[2] user Viktor OP submitted an entry for “Hoo-dini,” defining it as “a magic owl.” The same day, VanossGaming placed a Hoodini owl T-shirt for sale on his online store.^[4]

Search Interest

Not available.

External References

Work in progress. “Feel” free to request editorship

About

Wojak, also known as Feels Guy, is the name given to a MS Paint drawing of a bald man with a sad expression on his face. The image has been often used as the manifestation of feels and overal sad or depressive emotions on the Internet, becoming an exploitable and inspiring a series of related fads.

Origin

According to an AMA thread on reddit by Wojak, the user who popularised the drawing on the German board Krautchan, the original image comes from the Polish imageboard Vichan, named “twarz.jpg” (“warm face”).^[2] Wojak posted the bald man image in several other threads on Krautchan’s /int/ (international) board mourning his lack of a girlfriend. Soon after, the picture became known as “Wojak’s face” and “ciepła twarz” (“warm face”). The image spread to other international image boards, including the Italian Pastachan^[3] and the Russian Dobrochan.

Spread

Various Examples

I Know That Feel Bro

“I Know That Feel Bro” (also known as “to uczucie” or “to uczócie”) is an Internet slang expression used to convey empathy towards or agree with someone else’s feeling or opinion. The expression, which roughly means “I feel you, bro,” is typically accompanied by a image of two Wojak embracing each other expressionlessly.

I Wish I Was At Home

I Wish I Was At Home (Playing Videogames) is an exploitable comic series featuring Wojak in which the subject is depicted as anxious and uncomfortable at parties and other social situations.

Country Feels

Country Feels is a series of customized illustrations featuring Wojak sitting at a computer desk surrounded by various stereotypes associated with a particular country or region. Many of the images bear similarities to the “How People View Me” two-pane cartoons.

Pretty Princess Points

Pretty Princess Points is a series of Wojak imageslikely stemming from 4chan’s /r9k/ board and depicting attractive but mentally handicapped and NEET-ish gender-flipped versions of Wojak.

Relation with Pepe the frog

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About

Bartkira is a fan art project featuring crossover recreations of the Akira manga and anime film with characters from The Simpsons.

Origin

On April 1st, 2013, the Bartkira Tumblr^[2] blog was launched by artists Ryan Humphrey and James Harvey, highlighting illustrations of comic panels from the Akira manga redrawn with characters from The Simpsons (shown below).

Spread

On April 5th, 2013, the website Bartkira.com^[4] was launched, which features completed Simpsons-Akira crossover artwork. Within two years, the project accumulated three volumes of Bartkira manga comics. In May 2014, Bartkira was featured in an art show at Floating World Comics in Portland, Oregon.^[6] On January 11th, 2015, Redditor JustAsLost submitted the Bartkira website to the /r/movies^[5] subreddit.

Animated Film Project

On November 19th, 2014, animator Kaitlin Sullivan launched the Tumblr^[3] blog Bartkira Road Show to promote the Bartikira group animation project. On July 4th, 2015, Sullivan uploaded a trailer for an upcoming Bartkira animated film to Vimeo (shown below). The following day, the Bartkira Roadshow YouTube^[1] channel reuploaded the video. In the coming days, the trailer was reblogged by several news sites, including The Daily Dot,^[7] The Verge,^[8] AV Club,^[9] Anime News Network^[10] and UpRoxx.^[11]

Various Examples

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External References

Use the main My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic entry for image or video uploads

About

Princess Celestia is one of the supporting characters of the Hasbro animated television series My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. She is depicted as a pale white alicorn with a sun cutie mark and a motherly personality.

Origin and Character

Celestia was introduced in the first episode of MLP, premiering October 2010, as the ruler of Equestria, the primary setting of the show. She becomes co-ruler in the second episode when her sister, Princess Luna, returns. Initially depicted as Twilight Sparkle’s official teacher, Celestia remains her mentor after Twilight becomes a princess in the season three finale.^[1]

She is voiced by Nicole Oliver.^[7]

Spread

Many videos of scenes featuring Celestia from MLP have been uploaded to Youtube, a few of which (examples below) have garnered several million views.

Princess Celestia’s page on the MLP wiki was created on December 26th, 2010.^[2] As of July 2015, her wiki page has been edited over 2000 times; searching for “Celestia” on DeviantArt returns over 140,000 results,^[3] while Derpibooru hosts over 40,000 images relating to her.^[4]

Related Memes

Molestia

Molestia is the most popular fandom-driven alternate version of Celestia, depicting her as depraved and sexually aggressive towards other characters from the show. The concept has been supported by several fan projects, the most prolific of which was the “Ask Princess Molestia”^[6] Tumblr blog.

Swanlestia

Swanlestia is the fandom-given name of a pony re-imagining of Princess Celestia, which parodies her resemblance to a white swan, often by depicting her without legs.^[5]

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