About

“Whoosh” is an onomatopoeia for the sound of a fast moving object flying over someone’s head. In online discussions, the word is often used to poke fun at someone’s inability to appreciate or understand a joke, especially one that is sarcastic or ironic in nature; such sentiment can be also conveyed in the form of reaction GIFs that are known by various names, including “you missed the joke,” “you and the joke,” and “that’s the joke”.

Origin

The origin of the onomatopoeic expression is unknown. The earliest Urban Dictionary^[1] entry for “whoosh” was submitted by userCougarSW2 on November 14th, 2004, defining it as an indication “that the joke just told was too sophisticated for the listener and has gone ‘way over their head’.”

Spread

On May 6th, 2005, Straight Dope Forums^[6] member Jim B. submitted a thread titled “What does ‘Whoosh’ mean?”, to which user Governor Quinn replied that it served the purpose of “alerting a poster that they have misunderstood something in a previous post.” On February 11th, 2008, a question asking about the usage of “whoosh” on web discussion forums was submitted to Yahoo! Answers.^[7] On October 29th, 2010, an image macro featuring a parrot with the word “whoosh!” written over it’s head was submitted to a thread on the Piston Heads Forums^[8] (shown below).

On November 11th, 2012, a Star Trek: The Next Generation animated GIF showing an alien woman failing to catch a ball with the word “joke” written on it was submitted to /r/AdviceAnimals,^[3] where it garnered upwards of 900 votes (97% upvoted) before it was archived (shown below, left). On June 14th, 2013, Imgur user Rainman18 uploaded an animated GIF titled “Whoosh,” which depicted the trajectory of a joke graphed over an illustration of a person’s head (shown below, middle). On June 23rd, an animated GIF of a joke flying through space past a person depicted as the entire Earth’s orbit was uploaded to the /r/gifs^[2] subreddit, where it received more than 1,500 votes (86% upvoted) prior to being archived (shown below, right).

On the following day, Redditor shindyy submitted a post titled “What does whoosh mean?” to the /r/OutOfTheLoop^[5] subreddit, to which Redditor _Robbstark submitted the top comment noting “it is used as an onomatopoeia for a joke going over someone’s head.”

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References

Background

Purmerend’s Roundabout Cam is a livestreaming webcam aimed at a rotary in the town of Purmerend in The Netherlands by the software company Archie. After an initial cancelled flashmob on the roundabout, the webcam gained new fame when American Reddit users discovered the webcam. Following this, Dutch users subsequently started writing troll phrases and memes on the road.

History

The webcam aimed at the roundabout is stationed on the roof of the building located in Purmerend by the software company Archie, who initially placed the webcam there to test if their systems worked properly (shown below).^[1] On May 28th, 2015, Dutch entertainment website GeenStijl wrote an article after their discovery of the webcam,^[2] in which they promoted people to start a flashmob on the roundabout in the style of the Project X events.

Notable Developments

Following the spread of GeenStijl’s article, the roundabout gained notable attention throughout the country. The video reached over 50,000 views by June 1st, and had surpassed 250,000 views by June 4th. GeenStijl was also rewarded with champagne by Archie after the video surpasses 50,000 views during their shooting of a video on the roundabout (shown below). Various Dutch news outlets reported the sudden increase in views on the roundabout, including the NOS^[7] and Nieuws.nl.^[8]

Flashmob

A Facebook page titled “Flashmop de rotonde Purmerend”^[3] (Flashmop the roundabout Purmerend) was launched which tried to organise a flashmob event by having participants do a polonaise around the roundabout. After around 150 people signed up for the event, Purmerend’s city council decided to cancel the event due to traffic safety^[9] (shown below) and Archie would shut down the webcam.^[10] The flashmob and the reaction was covered by various Dutch news outlets, such as Algemeen Dagblad^[4] and RTVNH.^[5][6] The Facebook page of the event was deleted shortly after and the webcam later went back online.

Reddit Rediscovery

On July 14th, 2015, a post on the r/videos sub-Reddit^[11] notified the site’s community about the roundabout’s lifestream. Following the post, a Purmerend citizen who goes by the Reddit handle SomeoneOutThere_ replied to the post^[12] and was subsequently challenged to appear on the webcam (shown below). Within a day, the video of the SomeoneOutThere_’s appearance on the webcam managed to gather over 45,000 views and his reply became the top voted reply with over 14,000 points.

Following SomeoneOutThere_’s appearance on the webcam, that same day various other Redditors used the opportunity to also appear on the webcam. In the following 24 hours, various messages were written on the roundabout, including “OP = Faggot” and “Reddit = 4 Fags”.^[13] Redditor Damindenie also made a reply to the post with hyperlinks to pictures of various events that took place on the roundabout throughout the day.^[14] Another Redditor, who goes by the Youtube handle Slechte TV,^[15][16] also drew an image of Dick Butt on the roundabout alongside Ellen Pao’s name and a website URL. Redditor Johan-Senpai also appeared dressed in a witch outfit (shown below, left), and other Redditors later appeared to clean off the website url after Redditors complained about the website presumably hijacking the roundabout (shown below, right). Eventually that night police started to patrol around the roundabout, after which activity died down. Archie respectively took down the webcam, although it was already back up again the next day.

At its peaks, the livestream counted over 4,000 viewers during the events. A sub-Reddit dedicated to the roundabout, r/otonde,^[17] was also launched on July 14th, which managed to gather over 60 subscribers within 24 hours. Dutch news outlets also covered the events that took place on the roundabout, including Algemeen Dagblad,^[18] The Telegraaf,^[19] Metro^[20] and PowNed.^[21]

Search Interest

External References

About

Vote Brigading is the practice of mobilizing a campaign within an online community to promote or undermine a targeted page, user or belief en masse through the user-voting system. On Reddit, brigading is often employed as a silencing tactic by those who wish to undermine the presence of competing political agendas or opinions.

Origin

According to the Online Etymology Dictionary,^[1] the word “brigade” was originally a French word for “body of soldiers.” According to Wiktionary,^[3] the English variation of the word refers to “a group of people organized for a common purpose.” Following the rise in popularity of Reddit, various factions on the website began encouraging each other to vote on content as a group. According to Reddit’s “Rules of Reddit” page,^[5] practices that can be considered a type of “vote manipulation” are prohibited on the site, including “sharing links with your friends or coworkers and asking them to vote” (shown below).

The earliest known use of the term “brigade” in the context of website voting was in a post by blogger Konstantine Thoukydides about the Toy Town Germany web forum, which referred to a massively downvoted thread as the result of a “downvote brigade.”^[8]

Spread

On November 11th, 2011, The Daily Dot^[7] published an article about controversies on Reddit regarding the /r/ShitRedditSays community, which began with the question “Is Reddit being gamed by a 4,500-strong downvote brigade?” On February 7th, 2014, Redditor WingedPastry submitted a post about vote brigading to the /r/TheoryOfReddit^[4] subreddit, arguing in favor of the practice and claiming it should not constitute “vote manipulation.” On April 30th, Redditor Wimali_Stebox submitted a post asking what vote brigading was and why it was not allowed on Reddit to the /r/OutOfTheLoop^[2] subreddit. In the post, Redditor drafterman cited the /r/SubredditDrama and /r/ShitRedditSays subreddits as groups that are often accused of vote brigading. On April 20th, 2015, YouTuber Richard Lewis uploaded a video in which he discusses a vote brigading controversy (shown below). On June 13th, Urban Dictionary^[6] user nullive submitted an entry for “brigading,” defining it as “a concentrated effort by one online group to manipulate another.”

Search Interest

External References

Overview

Jade Helm 15 is the codename of the United States military training exercise taking place across several southwestern states from July 15th to September 15th, 2015. Online, the announcement of a new, large-scale domestic special operations exercise quickly became a popular subject of conspiracy theories, especially in the right-wing, conservative blogosphere and social media.

Background

On March 24th, 2015, the United States Army’s Special Operations Command (USASOC) announced the upcoming launch of Jade Helm 15, a new, large-scale domestic military training exercise to be held between July 15th and September 15th in seven states (Texas, Arizona, New Mexico, Utah, Colorado, California and Nevada) in conjunction with other U.S Armed Forces. In the following months, other vague details of the operation emerged through the news media, including reports that at least 1,200 troops would be participating, including Army Green Berets, a small group of Navy SEALS and Air Force special operations troops, as well as conventional Army infantry units.

Notable Developments

Online Reactions

While multi-state military training exercises are not uncommon, the news of Jade Helm 15 was met with varying reactions in the social media, ranging from curiosity and concerns to outright opposition and paranoia, especially in Texas, following the viral circulation of a map released by the USASOC (shown below), classifying the region into four colors: two hostile states (Texas and Utah), three permissive states (California Colorado and Nevada) and two conflicted states (New Mexico and Arizona).

Throughout March, a wide range of speculations about the nature of the military exercise in Texas ran wild through Twitter, local blogs including Freedom Outpost and All News Pipeline (the latter of which center-aligns all of its articles), as well as the local conservative radio talk show circuit.

Conspiracy Theories

On March 31st, The Washington Post ran an article titled “Why Operation Jade Helm 15 is freaking out the Internet -- and why it shouldn’t be,” detailing some examples of the misinformed fears, such as rumored imposition of martial laws in the participating states.

On April 8th, 2015, YouTuber ANONYMOUS 47258 uploaded a 13-minute video presentation of multiple conspiracy theories, edited in the style of an Anonymous video communique (shown below). Within three months, the video has garnered more than 528,000 views.

On May 17th, Hartford Courant published an article titled “Thank You Texas and Good Luck with the Invasion,” highlighting some of the most far-fetched conspiracy theories and hoaxes surrounding the operation.

• A cover-up for a “psychological operation aimed at getting people used to seeing military forces on the streets” in preparing for an impending invasion on the homeland by Chinese military, due to jade being traditionally associated with China.

• A military plan to “round up political dissidents” and “remove key political figures” who may be against the imposition of martial law.

• A secret international operation devised to impose martial law, confiscate firearms and invade Texas; Alex Jones has said that “helm” in the operation codename is an is an acronym for “Homeland Eradication of Local Militants”.

• An emergency preparation for an approaching impact event on Earth believed by some conspiracy theorists to occur sometime in September 2015; ending date of Jade Helm 15 is September 15th, 2015.

Search Interest

External References

About

The Planned Parenthood Sells Parts controversy refers to a viral video and campaign by a pro-life organization called the Center for Medical Progress wherein actors, pretending to be medical professionals, secretly filmed a discussion with a Planned Parenthood employee where the employee appears to be suggesting that Planned Parenthood sells fetal body parts it extracts in partial-birth abortions. The video caused outrage in the pro-life community, but was debunked as portraying a false situation by Planned Parenthood.

Origin

On July 14th, 2015, a pro-life organization called Center for Medical Progress posted two videos on YouTube, along with a lengthy exegesis on their web site,^[1] detailing a meeting they paid two actors to have with Planned Parenthood doctor Deborah Nucatola. In video, the actors are pretending that they are approaching Planned Parenthood as medical professionals interested in beginning a transaction where they purchase body parts from partial birth abortions. Nucatola appears to nonchalantly explain a process by which this would be possible, while eating salad and having wine. The edited version also features news clips from older news stories about Planned Parenthood (below left). In two days, this video received almost 2 million views. The group also posted what they claim is an unedited version of the conversation (below right), which received 92,000 views in the same period.

The video had been filmed July 25th, 2014, and the Center for Medical Progress claimed that its release was the first in a series and the result of a three year investigation.

Precursor

The act of sending paid right-wing undercover operatives to create videos against progressive targets was pioneered in 2009, after actor pretending to be a prostitute and pimp asked for tax advice from the federally-funded community group ACORN (below left). While ACORN claimed that the tapes were heavily edited in order to slander the organization, the tape elicited outrage from the right wing media like Fox News, and federal funding for ACORN was eventually cut.^[2]

A similar campaign was conducted in 2011 against Planned Parenthood by the anti-abortion group Live Action, which sent actors pretending to be a pimp and a prostitute into a clinic to obtain an abortion for the pregnant woman (above right).^[3]

Spread

The videos were distributed widely throughout the right wing media on the day of their release, including many anti-abortion outlets like LifeNews.com and Fox News.^[4][5] It was also written about on mainstream media outlets like the Washington Post and Gawker.com.^[6][7] Planned Parenthood soon addressed the video, accusing the Center for Medical Progress of trying to mount a misleading “sting” campaign against the medical provider. They also explained the conversation that was held from their point of view:

“At several of our health centers, we help patients who want to donate tissue for scientific research, and we do this just like every other high-quality health-care provider does -- with full, appropriate consent from patients and under the highest ethical and legal standards,” spokesman Eric Ferrero said. “In some instances, actual costs, such as the cost to transport tissue to leading research centers, are reimbursed, which is standard across the medical field.”

Nonetheless, the hashtag #PlannedParenthood was trending nationally on July 14th and 15th, with almost 200,000 tweets.^[8]

Search Interest

External References

About

We Get It, You Smoke Weed is an expression used to mock those who outwardly identify themselves as stoners by sporting cannabis-patterned clothes and accessories. On Tumblr and Twitter, the phrase is usually prefaced by the remark “I hate people who dress like this…” and accompanied by various images of people or fictional characters dressed in green for ironic humor.

Origin

On June 7th, 2015, Twitter user @neptunecutie^[1] tweeted a photograph of Queen Elizabeth wearing a light green outfit with the caption “I hate people who dress like this… we get it, you smoke weed” (shown below). Within two months, the tweet gained over 21,400 favorites and 13,900 retweets.

Spread

On June 11th, Tumblr user communistbakery^[4] highlighted a picture of the Super Mario character Luigi with the caption “I hate people who dress like this… we get it you smoke weed” (shown below, left). In the next month, the post garnered upwards of 5,300 notes. The following day, Tumblr user trapjryt^[5] posted an image of the Sesame Street character Oscar the Grouch with the same caption (shown below, right).

On June 16th, the Meme Documentation^[2] blog published an explanation of the meme’s recent popularity on Tumblr and Twitter. On June 20th, Twitter user @tbhjustlol^[6] tweeted a photograph of First Lady of the United States Michelle Obama with the caption “Like we get it, you smoke weed!” (shown below). On June 30th, 2015, BuzzFeed published a listicle titled “19 People Who Obviously Smoke Weed” with the description “OK, we get it…”, highlighting photographs of various people wearing green clothing. According to the Twitter analytics site Topsy,^[3] the keywords “we get it you smoke weed” were tweeted over 10,200 times throughout June and July of 2015.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References

About

Iridocyclitis is a type of eye inflammation a Vine video remix series featuring a clip of Mississippi-based teenager Dev Jaiswal saying the word “iridocyclitis” during the Scripps Spelling Bee competition in May 2015.

Origin

On May 28th, 2015, the 88th Scripps National Spelling Bee was held at the Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center in National Harbor, Maryland. During the competition, Louisville, Mississippi teenager Dev Jaiswall placed 5th after incorrectly spelling the word “iridocyclitis.” The following day, Viner Fails of Vine uploaded a short clip of Jaiswal repeating the word “iridocyclitis” (shown below).

Spread

On June 1st, 2015, YouTuber Conor Crowley reuploaded the Vine. On July 2nd, the Iridocyclitis Vine channel uploaded a warped version of the clip with slowed down audio (shown below). In the next two weeks, the Vine accumulated upwards of 48,000 loops, 1,000 likes and 600 revines.

On July 14th, the ObeseFailTV YouTube channel uploaded a compilation of iridocyclitis Vine videos (shown below). The same day, another compilation was uploaded by the World’s Best Videos YouTube channel (shown below, right).

Various Examples

As of mid July 2015, there are over 500 results for the tag “#iridocyclitis” on Vine.^[1]

Search Interest

External References

About

This Is Just to Say is the title of a poem by the early 20th Century American poet William Carlos Williams. Due to the poem’s original fame, rhythmic timbre, short length, and relatively common subject matter, it is frequently parodied online, where users substitute their own subjects into the poem’s text, often retaining the verse structure and the significant line breaks.

Origin

This Is Just To Say was first published by William Carlos Williams in 1934. It is considered a canonical work of Imagist poetry.^[1] The original text is as follows:

I have eaten
the plums
that were in
the icebox

and which
you were probably
saving
for breakfast

Forgive me
they were delicious
so sweet
and so cold

According to New York Magazine,^[2] parodies of the poem date back to at least the 1960s, with Kenneth Koch’s “Variations on a Theme by William Carlos Williams.”^[9] Koch would go on to advocate using “This is Just to Say” as a teaching tool in his 1970 book Wishes, Lies, and Dreams: Teaching Children to Write Poetry^[10] where he offered the poem as a model that young poets could riff off of to improve their skills.

The first early evidence of parody being written online is an allusion to a thread that existed on the “Straight Dope” message board, but was deleted in 2002. ^[2][3]

Spread

The easily parodic nature of the poem has been noted frequently in popular culture. In 2008, the radio show This American Life included an explanation of the spoofable qualities of the poem (and several spoofs of their own) in the second act of an episode entitled “Mistakes Were Made”:

Spoofs of the poem have been featured on web sites such as The Millions, Jezebel, and Metacritic.^[4][5][6] Creating spoofs of the poem continues to be popular on Twitter, where the bot @JustToSayBot tweets a new version of the poem every hour.^[7] Many tweeted parodies of the poem have gone viral. Posting spoofs or parodies of the poem is also popular on Tumblr.^[8]

Notable Examples

Search Interest

Note: this refers to the poem as a whole, not just parodies of it.

External References

Work in progress. Feel free to request editorship

About

[PROTOTYPE] is a video game series created by Radical Entertainment and published by Activision. The series follows Alex Mercer, a powerful amnesic shapeshifter who tries to recover his memories while fighting against an infection spreading through Manhattan.

Premise

Gameplay

History

Reception

Online Relevance

inFamous vs Prototype

Protocreed

Search Interest

External References

About

Jelly Bean Challenge (also known as either “BeanBoozled”, or “Harry Potter Jelly Beans”) is a viral dare game, where a person eats one or more jelly beans from either “Bertie Bott’s Every Flavor Beans” or “BeanBoozled”, both of which are produced by Jelly Belly, and uploading the results onto YouTube.

Origin

In 2005, as marketing for the new Harry Potter film Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, jelly bean company Jelly Belly released a new line of jelly beans called “Bertie Bott’s Every Flavor Beans” which contained both “good” and “gross” beans, many of which looked the same. Several years later in 2008 Jelly Belly released a similar line of jelly beans, called “BeanBoozled”. Around the release of both lines of jelly beans, candy reviewing site, Candy Addict, released reviews for both lines.^[1][2]

The earliest known instance on YouTube of someone uploading their reaction to eating the beans was on January 5th, 2012, by YouTuber i cannot wait for summer (shown below). As of July 2015, the video has gained only around 700 views.

Spread

On August 6th, 2012, YouTube channel Smosh, uploaded a video of opening fan-mail in which they find and eat the Beanboozled beans (shown below). As of July 2015, the video has nearly 4 million views.

AS of July 2015 there are nearly 100,000 search results for “Jelly bean challenge” and around 265,000 results for “Bean boozled”.^[3][4] The two most viewed videos have over 11.8 million and and 11.4 million views respectively (both shown below).

On December 4, 2014, Creatures member, ImmortalHD, uploaded a video of himself doing the challenge as a part of his Counter Strikecase unboxing (shown below, left). He later did this again on March 8, 2015 (shown below, right). As of July 2015, the two videos have 950,000 and 260,000 views respectively.

On March 8th, 2015, YouTuber Pewdiewpie uploaded his own take on the challenge, which has gained over 7.7 million views as of July 2015 (shown below).

Board Game

Jelly Belly has also taken the “Beanboozled” product and created a board game around the concept. ^[5] The company has also created an online version of the game, in which a user can click on a virtual roulette wheel and, presuming the user owns the beans, eat the bean that the spinner lands on. Also, depending on which bean the spinner lands on, a clip from a random challenge video will play in an embed player to the right of the wheel. ^[6]

Search Interest

External Links

About

Starcade is a miniseries by ^[1] YouTuber Jontron where he reviews games about the hit movie ^[2]Star wars. The miniseries spans three episodes so far. The miniseries has spammed many websites with gifs and reaction images

Origin

On April 30th 2015 Jontron uploaded a video to channel called Jontron Whereabouts! In the video he tells the viewers that the reason for his absence was because he was working on a secret project. This was the first clue to Starcade and his first upload in two months

On May 4th 2015 Jontron uploaded a video called JonTron’s StarCade – Official Trailer announcing the miniseries Starcade. the video showed clips from filmed Starcade episodes and some game footage from Star Wars games. It has also been pointed out by fans that the video was uploaded on National Star Wars day (May 4th). On May 9th the first episode of Starcade was uploaded to YouTube showing of Star wars Atari 2600 games. The plot is that JonTron finds himself on the Millennium Falcon forced to play Star Wars Games for Darth Vader.

Spread

The miniseries announcement first spread on Reddit on May 4th when Reddit user ^[3]coreygrandy uploaded the JonTron’s StarCade – Official Trailer to a Subreddit dedicated to JonTron called /r/Jontron. As of July 2015 the post has gotten over 1,000 points and more than 300 comments.
On May 9th 2015 Reddit user ^[4]BlJohnFreeman posted The first episode of Starcade was uploaded to Reddit the video has gotten more points and comments than the first uploaded trailer at more than 1,700 points and 400 comments

Search interest

External References

^[1]Know your meme – Jontron

^[2]Know your meme – Star wars

^[3]Reddit – Coreygrady

^[4]Reddit – BlJohnFreeman

About

Lewis’ Law is an internet axiom asserting that any comment section of an article dealing with the Feminism movement will always contain derogatory comments justifying the need for feminism in our societies. In a way similar to Godwin’s Law and The Greater Internet Dickwad Theory, it serves as a reminder that the longer an online discussion lasts, the more likely it will eventually contain ad hominem attacks and shitposting.

Origin

The phrase was coined by English journalist Helen Lewis on her twitter account^[1] on August 9th 2012 (shown below). As of July 2015, the tweet has gained around 800 retweets and 700 favorites.

Its definite usage as a law reads as follows:

“The comments on any article about feminism justify feminism.”

Spread

The tweet itself remained rather unknown for several months before it was brought to light in a Wired article reporting on the Donglegate incident and discussing the online rise of MRA as well as sexism in the tech industry, published March 23th 2013. On April 2th, 2013, Lewis, acknowledging the Wired article, commented on the newborn fame of her eponymous law on her tumblr^[3]. On April 3th, the law was picked by the “Feminist Philosopher” blog^[4] and began to be embraced by feminists online, as shown by opinion pieces and articles written on The King’s Tribune^[5] in September 2014, on Pipe Dream^[6] in October 2014 or Belle Brita^[7] in June 2015.

Following its popularity online, the law was added to Urban Dictionary in September 2013^[8], to the Geek Feminism Wiki in April 2013^[9] and to the Rational Wiki in May 2013^[10].

External References

About

Tap Twice Games, also known as Vine Games or Double-Tap Games are short video loops posted to the social media applications Vine and Instagram and subtitled with an invitation to the user to tap twice on the loop to play the game. The tapping both pauses and un-pauses the video, causing a game-like action to happen, and also gains the video a like, thereby increasing its viral appeal.

Origin

The original user of this technique is unknown; it’s possible that this manually edited version of Texas Hold’em, seen below left, was the first, as it dates back to September 11th, 2013.^[1] However, video loops in this style began growing in popularity on Vine in the middle of 2014, after an update to the application’s video tools allowed users to upload videos made with external cameras. Since users could import any video from their phone’s memory, it became simple to create loops in animation programs and upload them to Vine. The first instance to receive attention outside of Vine, a game using an image of Drake (below right), was posted by the popular user @DonJulio^[3] on December 27th, 2014, and received over 15 million loops in the first six months since its posting.

Spread

Since the entire purpose of the looping game is to facilitate more likes and loops for the video, many of these types of games have millions of loops and likes. Business Insider, when talking about the phenomenon, described Tap Twice Games as “addictive,” since users may try repeatedly to freeze the loop in the correct spot, causing, on Vine, many more loops per viewer than may have otherwise had^[4] Many accounts devoted to spreading viral videos, like WorldStar Funny (not related to WorldStar HipHop) and Amazing Vines post these types of videos frequently.^[5][6]

Notable Examples

Search Interest

not available at this time

External References

About

Sweet Jesus, Pooh! is an exploitable comic featuring the character Tigger from Winnie the Pooh panicking over Pooh’s ingestion of his father’s cremated ashes. The comic is usually edited to feature different ingested substances as well as different remarks made by Pooh.

Origin

The original comic was published by the webcomic Safely Endangered under the title “Oh Bother” on July 5, 2013.^[1]

Spread

An edit featuring The Illuminati and Jet Fuel Can’t Melt Steel Beams was posted to the subreddit /r/conspiracy on February 2, 2015, where it gained over 100 upvotes.^[2] Compilations of comic edits were uploaded to FunnyJunk and Imgur in May 2015.^[3][4] An edit of the comic about harsh noise music was reposted to the Tumblr blog Power and Violence On July 9, where it gained over 12,000 notes.^[5]

A series of edits based on an edited version of the comic which replaces the ashes with a brown substance became popular on the Russian Internet; information on this variant is currently being researched.

Example Images

Search Interest

Safely Endangered received a large spike in popularity around the time the original comic was released.

External References

work in progress

About

Rainbow Dash Always Dresses in Style is a catchphrase associated with the Generation 3.5 version of the character of Rainbow Dash from the My Little Pony franchise. It is frequently used to troll bronies^[1] on MLP-related imageboards in a similar fashion to Twilight Sparkle’s Chocolate Milk.

Origin

The phrase is taken from the introduction song of the G3.5 series of My Little Pony, the version that came before the current incarnation, Friendship is Magic. In a similar manner to the FiM intro, it briefly describes each of the main characters of the show, including the line “Rainbow Dash always dresses in style”.

Due to the fact that the G4 variant of Rainbow Dash is depicted as tomboyish and wholly disinterested in fashion, a still frame of the opening animation captioned with the lyrics is frequently used to troll G4 fans.

Spread

Derivatives of the meme often feature fan-made images and videos of G4 Rainbow Dash reacting to her G3.5 counterpart, along with remixes and tributes. Examples include videos uploaded by YouTubers such as mike wazowski on April 23rd, 2011, titled “rainbow dash always dresses in style”;^[2] and SupaSpeedStrut on August 31st, titled “Rainbow Dash Always Glitches In Style”^[3] (shown below).

Notable Examples

Search Interest

External References

^[1]Gyropedia – Rainbow Dash Always Dresses In Style

^[2]Youtube – rainbow dash always dresses in style

^[3]Youtube – Rainbow Dash Always Glitches In Style

About

Kassem G. (real name Kassem Gharaibeh) is a popular YouTube user who does various interviews and comedy sketches.^[1]

Origin

He was born in Jordan and lived in Saudi Arabia for a short time before moving to Florida when he was four years old. Before his YouTube career, Gharaibeh worked at a Best Buy and did stand-up comedy on weekends, usually performing in small venues like restaurants. Kassem G created his YouTube channel on Oct 24, 2006 and uploaded his first video on Jan 16, 2008. The short video was of a guy trying to jump a sign but falling over with the sign as Kassem laughs in the background (shown below). In 2009 he co-founded Maker Studios along with Shay Butler and Lisa Donovan.

Online Presence

KassemG’s official Facebook account is updated regularly and has been liked over 316k times.^[6] He has stated in his personal interests that “I’m interested in becoming so rich that I can hire a white housekeeper for my Mexican housekeeper” and his short description is “I’m very cute and popular.” His Twitter account kassemg has over 356k followers and has produced more than 9k tweets.^[7]

Kassem’s main YouTube channel is KassemG. The majority of the channel’s content consists of celebrity interviews and discussions with other YouTubers. The channel has nearly 2.7 million subscribers and nearly 470 million views as of July 2015.^[2] The most viewed video on his channel, entitled “ASAAKIRAGOESDEEP”, has gained over 13.3 million views as of July 2015 (shown below, left). Kassem’s second channel, KassemGtwo, consists of videos answering comments and vlogs. The channel has over 500k subscribers and over 36 million views as of July 2015.^[3] As of July 2015, the most viewed video on the channel has over 1.1 million views (shown below, right).

Guest Appearances

Kassem G has also made appearances in the series Epic Rap Battles of History, rapping in the episode “The Final Battle. Nice Peter vs EpicLLOYD” (shown below, left). The other videos he has made cameos in are “Cleopatra VS Marilyn Monroe”,^[8] as well as “Hitler vs Vader 3”,^[9] Kassem also hosted an episode Ray William Johnson’s show popular show Equals Three on June 13, 2011 (shown below, right). He has also hosted three episodes since then on June 16, 2011,^[10] and on January 13, 2012.^[11]

On December 1, 2013, Kassem G did an interview with fellow YouTuber Doug Benson on his show Getting Doug with High (shown below). In the video Kassem gets high off of marijuana. The episode has gained nearly 650,000 views as of July 2015.^[5]

Fandom

On Tumblr there are several fan-made blogs for Kassem, such as Uncle Kassem,^[12] We Love Kassem G,^[13] and Going Deep With Kassem G.^[14] On DeviantArt there are only around 83 results for “KassemG”.^[15]

Search Interest

External References

About

Moff’s Law is an internet axiom asserting that, at some point during a discussion about a work of pop culture, there will always be a commenter asking a variation of the question “Why can’t you just enjoy it for what it is?” in order to dismiss criticism of it. In similar vein as Godwin’s Law, Lewis’ Law and the like, Moff’s Law demonstrates predictable human behavior and reactions, especially silencing methods, in online interactions.

Origin

On December 18th 2009, ie9 writer Annalee Newitz issued a lengthy article about racial issues and white privilege surrounding blockbuster hit Avatar^[1]. As discussion grew in the comment section of the article, user Moff (a.k.a Josh Wimmer) made a reply that would be deleted later on. It read as follows:

Of all the varieties of irritating comment out there, the absolute most annoying has to be “Why can’t you just watch the movie for what it is? Why can’t you just enjoy it? Why do you have to analyze it?”
If you have posted such a comment, or if you are about to post such a comment, here or anywhere else, let me just advise you: Shut up. Shut the fuck up. Shut your goddamn fucking mouth. SHUT. UP.

On December 21st, Racialicious writer Latoya Peterson quoted Moff’s rant in its entirety, dubbing it “Moff’s Law”^[2] as a counterpoint defending the very nature of media critique.

Spread

In the comment section of Peterson’s article, shortly after its release, Racialicious user karinova suggested a set of rules regarding the law, stated as follows:

Moff’s Law:
1) As a discussion of a creative work grows longer, the probability of some ass whining about “overanalyzing” approaches 1.
2) In any discussion of creative work, anyone who says “OMG, why can’t you just enjoooy it??” automatically loses. Hard.

This version was then posted to Urban Dictionary in January 2010^[4].

The law was also submitted to The Geek Feminism Wiki on December 30th^[3] which describes its relation to Feminism in how it condemns silencing tactics. It was again rephrased in a way similar to Godwin’s, which reads as follows:

As comments continue in a feminist [social justice] discussion of pop culture, the probability of someone saying “why do you have to analyze it? it’s just a movie/cartoon/book!” approaches 1.

It then found its way to Rational Wiki’s list of Feminist Internet Laws in 2013^[5] and TVTropes in 2014^[6]

Since its inception as an internet axiom, several articles and blog posts has been made praising the craving need for such a law, especially concerning critical analysis of pop culture and forging one’s own opinion on a piece of media. This is exceedingly apparent on opinion pieces such as a 2010 Floccinaucical’s blog post^[7], a Tumblr post on Fuck Yeah Character Development^[8] and a 2015 Pop Primer article by Amy Leigh Strickland^[9]

External References

About

Nick Young is an NBA player, who currently plays shooting guard for the Los Angeles Lakers. He has gained traction for his style of shooting over passing as well as a reaction image of him which has spread across Twitter as well as other social media.

History

Nick Young was drafted 16th overall by the Washington Wizards in 2007. He gained the nickname “Swaggy P” after his twitter handle, @nickswagypyoung.

Online History

Young didn’t gain a lot of traction on the internet until the 2013 season in which he signed with the Los Angeles Lakers. Fans often made jokes about his inability to pass, as well as his perceived ego.

Confused Nick Brown

Confused Nick Brown is a reaction image of Nick Brown confused as he looks at the camera with question marks surrounding his face. The image originally comes from the YouTube series Thru The Lens^[1] in which shows a day in the life of Nick Young.

The image is often used in situations of confusion as well as annoyance in others.

Search Interest

External Reference

About

WOW! HOT a What Baabhabhiat is an exploitable comic series using a page from a pornographic Indian webcomic, which is known for its Engrish dialogue.

Origin

The comic page originates from the Savita Bhabhi series of pornographic comics,^[10] originally hosted on the Indian pornographic website savitabhabhi.com.^[1] The comic was subsequently moved to the subscription-based site kirtu.com.^[2]. According to notes on Kirtu, the comic was last updated on March 29th, 2008. The exploitable itself originates from the first page of the first comic in the series, titled “Savita Bhabhi – Episode 1: Bra Salesman,” in which a door-to-door bra salesman meets lead character Savita after ringing the door at a house (shown below).

The version hosted by Kirtu (shown above, left) contains different speech bubble text than the version which circulated online (shown above, right). It is unknown if Kirtu fixed errors present in the original version, or if the texts were falsely edited by a reader afterwards.

Spread

Edited variations of the comic did not appear until May 2011, when several recreations appeared on Tumblr by users Screenburned,^[3] Grapeyguts^[4] and Thewickermanstarringnicolascage^[5] (shown below, from left to right).

Since then, the comic has been recreated with characters from a variety of series. Additionally, the phrase “HOT a What Baabhabhiat” gained usage as an description of attractive characters and people. On October 4th, 2012, YouTuber sadshawty^[7] uploaded the original comic with spoken text (shown below, left), which managed to gather over 19,000 views in the following three years. On May 9th, 2015, Tumblr user WilliamDewey^[6] uploaded a version featuring the characters Pearl and Mayor Dewey from the animated children’s show Steven Universe (shown below, right), which gained upwards of 8,000 notes in the following two months. Additional versions can be found on Tumblr through related tags.^[8][9]

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References

About

Joan Cornellà Vázquez, better known as Joan Cornellà, is a Spanish cartoonist and illustrator known for the surreal and dark humor of his web comics.

Online History

On January 17th, 2011, Cornellà created a blog on Blogspot,^[5] accompanied by an introduction post where he linked to an interview with the publication Tebeosfera.^[9] On February 14th, 2013, Cornellà created a Facebook account, which has received over 2 million likes over the following two years.^[2] Approximately one month later, on March 19th, 2013, Cornellà created a Twitter account, which has over 194,000 followers as of July 20th, 2015.^[1] On May 20th, 2013, Cornellà created a Tumblr account,^[6] accompanied by a post featuring one of his comics, which has accumulated over 340 notes during the following two years.^[10] On October 20th, 2013, a dedicated subreddit was created, receiving over 300 subscribers in less than two years.^[3] On July 19th, 2014, one of his comics was posted on /r/Unexpected, where it gained 2,981 votes (91% upvoted) in a year.^[8] Cornellà’s work can also be found widely on communities like Tumblr,^[7] where some of the comics posted on his account have obtained thousands of notes (shown below).

Related Memes

Joan Cornellà Face

Joan Cornellà is also known for recurrently drawing an almost vacant smiling expression on his characters, in contrast with the overall violent and dark atmosphere of the comics. This expression has been often used in exploitables.

Personal Life

Joan Cornellà was born on Barcelona, Spain on January 11th, 1981. Graduated in fine arts, he has created work for numerous Spaniard publications, such as the magazines La cultura del Duodeno and El Jueves or the newspapers El Periódico and Ara, and has illustrated for The New York Times.^[4] As of 2015, he has released four compilations of his illustration work; for the first compilation, Abulio, he won the Joseph Coll Prize in 2009.

Search Interest

External References