About

Ladybeard is the stage name of Australian professional actor, heavy metal singer, wrestler and martial artist Richard Magarey, whose peculiar stage persona as a five-year-old girl often crossplaying in little girl costumes made him an internet sensation in Asia circa 2011. In mid-2015, he joined Japanese Pop-Metal band LadyBaby and his online popularity soared worldwide when the clip of their debut song Nippon Manju was released to Youtube.

Personal Life

Richard Magarey was born in 1983 in Adelaide, Australia. He graduated from the Flinders University of South Australia Drama Centre in 2004 with a Bachelor of Creative Arts. Since 2011, he lives in Tokyo, Japan.

Career

Acting

In 2006, he moved to Hong-Kong and travelled around Asia starring in a number of flicks and commercials (shown below), both as an actor and stuntman.

Wrestling

Around the same time he arrived in Hong-Kong, Magarey started performing with the Hong Kong Wrestling Federation in which he created his Ladybeard character, also known as WuSoLui, mixing his muscular bear-like stature with the persona of a pop singer little girl usually wearing dresses and pigtails (example shown below).

Music

More than his stage name, Ladybear was also the name of a metal band in which he performed as the vocalist^[1].
His popularity among Southern Asian people was so impressive that he conducted several interviews, including one for Hong-Kong TVB J2 in the summer 2011 (shown below).

Modeling

In Japan, Magarey began pursuing a career in modeling using his persona. On August 11th 2014, Japanese news site Girls Walker interviewed him about the release of his first pin-up dvd^[2]. The story was picked by videogame and Japanese culture site Kotaku on August 14th^[3], noting that some photographs take place in a well-known Japanese location (shown below).

Internet Presence

Ladybeard has his own official website^[4] as well as an official Facebook page with over 57 000 likes^[5] and a Twitter account with over 83 000 subscribers^[6]. During the course of 2014, he collaborated with Hideaki Kobayashi, also known as the “Sailor Suit Old Man” and another Japanese internet sensation, in various photographs^[7] (shown below).

LadyBaby’s Debut

On July 4th, 2015, Japanese Pop-Metal band LadyBaby released their debut song Nippon Manju, featuring vocalist Ladybeard (shown below). The Youtube clip accumulated over 6 700 000 views in the next two months.

Soon after, news websites such as Forbes^[8], Mashable^[9] and The Daily Mail^[10] issued pieces about the phenomenon, highlighting this weird combination of a western hairy muscular man with pigtails and a wide range of costumes performing among Japanese young girls.

Search Interest

External References

Editor’s note: Extremely work in progress.

About

Inklingification is the process of creating crossover art involving characters, real and fictional, reimagined as Inklings from the third-person shooting video game Splatoon.

Origin

Splatoon was released in various parts of the world between May 28 and 30 of 2015. Prior to the release of the game, several pieces of artwork were released featuring a crossover between the game and the manga series Shinryaku! Ika Musume, which may have sparked some inspiration for later fanmade crossovers.^[1]

Precursor: Ponify

Ponification is the trend in which various characters are reimagined as ponies from the My Little Pony series. The trend caught on in late 2010 when the cartoon My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic became popular.

Spread

wip

Various Examples

Search Interest

Not available.

External References

work in progress

About

2NE1 is an all-female musical group from South Korea, consisting of CL, Minzy, Dara (Sandara Park), and Park Bom. The group is known for its popular music, which is K-pop with a hip hop influence, and their edgy, bright appearance.

Online History

Debut and Early Career

2NE1 were officially formed in 2009 by the South Korean company YG Entertainment, and their first single was a collaboration with another group on the YG label, Big Bang, for a song called “Lollipop,” which was created as a commercial for a new LG mobile phone. Between its upload date of May 15th, 2009 and August 2015, the song has received over 56 million views on YouTube. It also sold over 3.3 million digital copies and topped the Gaon musical chart in April 2009.^[1]

Their first single by the group, released in May 2009 and titled “Fire,” incorporated many hip hop elements into a K-pop song written by producer Teddy Park. The group released two videos for the single, a “Space” version and a “Street” version. The “Space” version is more popular, with over 39 million views, while the “Street” version has over 12 million views. The single topped all of the Korean charts.^[4]

Japanese Debut and Later Albums

The group planned to debut in Japan in 2011, but after the 2011 Japanese Earthquake and Tsunami the group released their record 2NE1 with no promotion or fanfare. Despite this, the record still reached number 36 on the Japanese charts, and the group performed for relief fundraisers with many other Korean stars.^[1]

2NE1 produced the group’s most popular single, “I Am the Best (내가 제일 잘 나가)”, which was first uploaded to YouTube on June 27th, 2011 and between then and August 2015 has received more than 130 million views and the single topped the world digital sales charts in 2014 after it was used in advertisement for the Microsoft Surface 3 tablet.^[23][24]

World Tour and Drug Scandal

In 2014, 2NE1 released a full length record entitled Crush and embarked on the “All: Or Nothing” world tour, which gained them more international notoriety; in addition, they released “I am the Best” in America, where it became popular.^[24]

During the tour, news broke that Park Bom had attempted to smuggle 82 pills of medical narcotic amphetamines into South Korea in October of 2010. Prescribed the amphetamines by a doctor in the United States, where they are legal, Bom nonetheless attempted to use international mail to illegally transport the pills to South Korea. Although the incident was only discovered four years later, Bom withdrew her participation from all awards ceremonies in 2014, and only re-emerged to the public in 2015 after a long reclusive period.^[17][18]

Solo Careers

Three members of 2NE1 are currently pursuing solo careers in addition to their work through the group. Park Bom has released two singles independently of 2NE1 that have reached number one on the Gaon Singles Chart, titled “You and I” and “Don’t Cry”. “You and I” is the most downloaded single by a solo female artist in the history of YG Entertainment. Dara works frequently as an actress and model, having appeared frequently on Korean television in a variety of cameo and speaking roles.^[20][25]

CL began releasing solo music in 2013, scoring an international hit with “나쁜 기집애 (The Baddest Female).” As of August 2015 CL is managed by Scooter Braun, who also manages American pop stars like Justin Bieber, and has announced that her debut American album, where she raps and sings in English, will be released in fall of 2015, following the debut of her initial single “Doctor Pepper” on August 14th, 2015.^[19]

Online Presence

2NE1 maintains profiles on all Western social media sites, including Facebook, where they have over 9 million likes, and Instagram where they have barely posted but still have over 375,000 followers.^[5][8] Their fans are called Blackjacks, as an allusion to the number 21 in the name of the group, and club maintains official fan club web sites in English and Japanese as well as an official Twitter and a subreddit.^[6][7][11] There are also localized profiles in other regions, including Japan and China, where they have an official Weibo with over 800,000 followers.^[10]

In addition, each member has their own official western profiles on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.^{[12][13][14][15][16]} The official 2NE1 YouTube account has 312 videos and almost 2.9 million subscribed as of August 2015; 90 of those videos have over 1 million views. ^[4]

“Bad Blood” Controversy

In July of 2015, several media outlets, most vocally Jezebel, began discussing the visual similarities between Taylor Swift’s“Bad Blood” music video, which had been nominated for several MTV Video Music Awards, and the video for 2NE1’s “Come Back Home.” “Bad Blood” was directed by a Korean-American filmmaker named Joseph Kahn, and some writers assumed that this fact and the visual similarities, which occurred in several different scenes could make a valid case for plagiarism.^[22]

Joseph Kahn responded to the allegations made by Jezebel by saying that the allegation was slanderous:

“The implication your writer is making is explicit: I am a foreigner born overseas and I am trying to reconnect with my birth country and have obvious motive to copy it.

I do not listen to Kpop. I am American. And this is an unethical, slandering article."

Search Interest

External References

About

“Today You, Tomorrow Me” is a memorable quote from a heartwarming anecdote told by Redditor Jason Horner about a Mexican immigrant who refused to take $20 in exchange for giving him roadside assistance.

Origin

On December 13th, 2010, Redditor MD786 submitted a post titled “Have you ever picked up a hitch-hiker?” to the /r/AskReddit^[1] subreddit, which subsequently reached the front page with over 2,500 votes (97% upvoted) prior to being archived. In the comments section, Redditor Jason Horner (a.k.a. rhoner) posted a story about a Mexican immigrant couple who selflessly helped him on the side of the road with a blown out tire. When Horner insisted on giving the couple $20 for their aid, the man refused and said “Today you, tomorrow me.”

Spread

On December 22nd, 2010, Urban Dictionary^[3] user Rahxephon000 submitted an entry for “Today you, tomorrow me,” defining it as an expression “used to ‘justify’ acts of kindness toward strangers.” On March 4th, 2011, The New York Times Magazine^[4] published a version of the story rewritten by Horner titled “The Tire Iron and the Tamale.” That day, the story was submitted to the /r/reddit.com^[5] subredit, where Horner replied with an explanation of how the story was chosen for publication. On June 24th, 2012, Vimeo user Ravi Shankar uploaded a short film based on Horner’s story (shown below).

On September 28th, 2014, Redditor WebClinger66 submitted a rage comic titled “Today you, tomorrow me,” in which a spider snipes a burglar after being rescued by the homeowner (shown below). Prior to being archived, the post received upwards of 1,800 votes (72% upvoted) on the /r/funny^[2] subreddit.

On February 13th, 2015, Quora^[6] user Rubail Birwadker cited “today you, tomorrow me” as “one of the most popular and often referenced” stories on Reddit. In March 2015, filmmaker Edan Cohen launched a Kickstarter^[7] campaign for a series of short films titled “Today You Tomorrow Me.” On March 29th, the project did not meet it’s funding goal of $12,000.

Search Interest

External References

About

Megyn Kelly is a news pundit and television host on the Fox News channel. Online, Kelly has gained notoriety for various gaffes uttered over the years as well as a public feud with entrepreneur and Presidential candidate Donald Trump during the 2016 Republican presidential primary.

History

Television Career

In 2003, Kelly was hired at the ABC affiliate news station WJLA-TV in Washington, DC as an assignment reporter, covering national and local events. In 2004, Kelly contributed to various legal segments on the Fox New channel. In February 2010, Kelly was selected as the host of the Fox New show America Live. On October 7th, 2013, Kelly began hosting the Fox News program The Kelly File.

Santa Claus is White

On December 10th, 2013, Slate^[1] published a column by writer Aisha Harris titled “Santa Claus Should Not Be a White Man Anymore,” which argued that Santa Claus should be depicted as a penguin rather than the traditional image of an “old white male.” On the following day, Kelly discussed the article on her The Kelly File, during which she argued vehemently against against the idea of an image makeover for the mythical figure and claimed that both Santa Claus and Jesus were White (shown below). Kelly’s remark was subsequently met with punchlines from the late-night pundit circles and criticisms of race-baiting.

2015 Republican Presidential Debate

On August 6th, 2015, the first debate for the 2016 Republican presidential primary was hosted by Fox News at the Quicken Loans Arena in Cleveland, Ohio. The main debate was moderated by Kelly, Bret Baier and Chris Wallace, with candidates Donald Trump, Jeb Bush, Scott Walker, Mike Huckabee, Ben Carson, Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, Rand Paul, Chris Christie and John Kasich. During the debate, Kelly questioned Trump regarding various insults he has directed at women, to which Trump responded that he didn’t appreciate the way Kelly had treated him in the past (shown below).

On August 24th, Trump posted several tweets disparaging tweets toward Kelly about an interview segment on The Kelly File, referring to her as “the bimbo” and professing a preference for her temporary replacement while she was on vacation (shown below).^[3][4][5][6] On August 25th, Fox News executive Roger Ailes released a statement describing Trump’s attack on Kelly as “unacceptable” and “disturbing.”^[7]

Social Media Presence

As of August 2015, Kelly has over 1.1 million Twitter^[2] followers and 800,000 Facebook^[1] likes.

Related Memes

Megyn Kelly Essentially

Megyn Kelly Essentially, also known as “Euphemism Megyn Kelly”, is an advice animal image macro series featuring a photo of Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly captioned with dismissive statements trivializing acts of violent crime and human rights violations.

Personal Life

Megyn Kelly was born on November 18th, 1970 in Syracuse, New York. She received her undergraduate degree in political science at Syracuse University before earning a J.D. from Albany Law School in 1995.

Search Interest

External References

Overview

BigCatDerek is the screen name of Derek Krahn, the operations director of the Center for Animal Research and Eductation (CARE) located in Bridgeport, Texas. He has become famous on various websites such as Youtube and Vine for posting videos of the various big cats in the center’s compound.

Origin

Derek Krahn, originally from Wisconsin, moved to Texas in 2006 to be a weekend volunteer at CARE. He would eventually become part of the board of directors a year later, and would also go on to marry Heidi: the executive director and founder of the
center.^[1]

About

In December of 2013, Derek would start posting videos of the big cats at the center, the earliest one featuring one of the cougars named Cassie.

Walk Around the Compound

Walk Around the Compound is a series that Derek started on his Youtube account, with the first episode posed on July 24, 2014. The series basically features Derek filming Derek walking around CARE’s facility and talking about various topics while interacting with the various big cats.

The series helped popularize Derek’s reputation further, and the series would go on to make over 100 episodes. Derek also would add captions to videos to explain various things as well be humorous, by using the persona “Editor Derek”. Several catch-phrases and words also helped with the popularity, such as “peets”, “crazypants” and “KillPlayKillPlayKillPlay”.

The Cats

Aside from Derek himself, the big cats that have been featured in his videos have gained popularity. Some of the most notable cats include:

Spread

Derek has now become well known for his work, earning over 35,000 subscribers on Youtube^[8] and over 1 million followers on Vine^[9], he has since given the name to his followers “The Pride”. According to the 119th episode of Walk Around the Compound, Derek has enjoyed how his content has been featured on various sites such as iFunny and Imgur^[10]. He has also started two other series on his Youtube account: Compound Karaoke, where he sings songs in front of other cats, and The Conservation Equations, where he talks with experts about conserving exotic animals.

Search Interest

Other Videos and Vines

External Links

• CARE’s official website

• BigCatDerek – Youtube

• BigCatDerek – Vine

• Derek Krahn – Instagram

Sources

^[1]CARE– Derek Krahn

^[2]CARE– Cassie

^[3]CARE– Solano

^[4]CARE– Mwali

^[5]CARE– Ace

^[6]CARE– Jelani

^[7]CARE– Araali and Zuberi

^[8]Youtube – BigCatDerek – About

^[9]Vine – BigCatDerek

^[10]Youtube – WATC Ep. 119

About

Politwoops is a web application and a network of connected websites devoted to archiving the deleted tweets of government officials. The tool operated between June 2012 and August 2015, and was widely cited by political journalists.

History

Politwoops was launched on May 30th, 2012 by the Sunlight Foundation, a non-profit devoted to transparent government practices. Using Twitter’s developer API, the site tracked the Twitter accounts of all the members of Congress in the United States, as well as President Barack Obama, and the accounts of candidates running for president in 2012]

According to Sunlight Foundation employee Nicko Margolies, the site would track when the politician deleted the tweet, how much time elapsed between when it was posted and when it was deleted, and include screenshots of any links to external sites. Upon its launch it already had an archive of over 3,000 tweets; by the end of the site, three years later, it had archived over 15,500.^[1]

Cessation of Service

On June 3th, 2015, Twitter contacted the Sunlight Foundation and informed them that the exception being made to the Twitter Terms of Service that allowed Politwoops to collect and archive the tweets of politicians would no longer be honored. Twitter claimed in a statement to Gawker that “Honoring the expectation of user privacy for all accounts is a priority for us, whether the user is anonymous or a member of Congress.”^[4] However, this is in direct opposition to the law, which says that what American elected officials say publicly (Twitter is considered a public forum) is a matter of public record. ^[3]

The Sunlight Foundation claimed to have not received any warning of the decision. In fact, according to the Christopher Gates, the president of the foundation, Twitter had actually cut the feed to their application three weeks before any communication had occurred between the two. Gates stated, “. . .We were told that their decision was not something that we could appeal, and, most surprisingly, they were not interested in reviewing any of the email conversation from 2012. Clearly, something changed -- and we’re not likely to ever know what it was.”

The cessation of Politwoops – first in America, and then with the 30 worldwide affiliates that used the same software – was covered in most major news publications, including the Guardian , the Washington Post, and the New York Daily News.^[5][6][7] In addition, many Twitter users involved in the political sphere on both the conservative and progressive sides of government publicly stated their support for the tool using Twitter, resulting in over 5,000 tweets using their name.^[8]

Highlights

Jeff Miller’s Birther Tweet

Upon its launch in on May 30th, 2012, one of the tweets recorded by Politwoops came from Florida Congressman Jeff Miller, who asked “Was Obama Born in the United States?” and linked to a Facebook poll asking the same question, indicating that the representative was supportive of the Birther Movement. Miller’s staff, when asked about the deleted tweet by Slate reporter Jeremy Stahl, said that the Congressman did not support the movement and that the tweet had been sent by mistake. Miller deleted his Twitter account that day.^[9]

Bowe Bergdahl Release Tweets

After the release of prisoner of war Bowe Bergdahl from the Taliban, many politicians tweeted to express happiness that Bergdahl had been returned to his home country. However, when Republicans began to criticize the Obama administration for exchanging five high-level Taliban prisoners for Bergdahl, who many believed defected from his base, members of the GOP began deleting their congratulatory tweets. The members of the goverment who deleted tweets collected by Politwoops included Rep. Stephen F. Lynch (D-MA), Rep. Lee Terry (R-NE), Rep. Mark Amodei (R-NV), and Joni Ernst, GOP Senate candidate in Iowa.^[10]

Search Interest

External References

About

“MOMHOLYFUCK” is a quote from a fan made Phineas and Ferb comic which poked fun at parts of the series, with the characters acting over the top compared to their canon counterparts. One of the panels, featuring the character Candace kicking a door open and yelling “MOMHOLYFUCK”, has been parodied with other characters, as well as the quote being used frequently out of context of this scene.

Origin

On June 21st 2013, Tumblr user Juniorbizarre uploaded part of a parody Phineas and Ferb comic from its sketchbook. In the series, the older sister of the main characters, Cadance, tries to tell their mother of her brother’s exploits, while in the fan comic many of the common features of episodes in the series are parodies or overblown. This posted gained over 275,000 notes in two years ^[1]

On June 28th of the same year Juniorbizzare later posted the full comic,^[2] and said “this was just a silly thing i did quite a while ago to make myself laugh :D i’m so glad other people think it’s funny too omg”. The artist also refers to the comic as the “crumpets comic”, due to one of the odd quotes that the character Ferb says in the comic.

Spread

On November 20th, 2014 Tumblr user Muuuuuuuuuuuuuuurdock uploaded a version they had made from an anonymous request about the the then upcoming Marvel movieAvengers: Age of Ultron.^[3] Later that same day, the actor for the Avengers’ Tony Stark, Robert Downey Jr. posted this image, with the caption “The most accurate portrayal of Tony in Age of Ultron I’ve seen.” and linked back the orginal tumblr blog. This Facebook post gained over 178,000 likes in less than a year.^[4] On April 30th, 2015, artist and voice actor Kylee Henke uploaded to his personal Tumblr blog a dramatic reading of the catchphrase, getting over 51,000 notes during the following four months.^[5]

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References

About

Airport Snape, also known as Air Snape, is an advice animal image macro series featuring a photograph of an airline ticket agent resembling the character Severus Snape as portrayed by actor Alan Rickman in the Harry Potter film series. The captions typically feature flight-related jokes containing various references to the fantasy franchise.

Origin

On November 27th, 2012, Redditor mygoodness82 submitted a photograph of a American Airlines employee David Dolci standing at a ticketing counter at the New York La Guardia Airport to the /r/pics^[6] subreddit (shown below).

Spread

On December 13th, Redditor Candlegary submitted a Harry Potter-themed captioned version of the image titled “Flying with Air Snape” to the /r/AdviceAnimals^[11] subreddit, where it gained over 2,700 votes (96% upvoted) and 290 comments prior to being archived (shown below, left). On the following day, Redditor Corysherpard117 posted another captioned version to /r/AdviceAnimals,^[12] referencing Snape’s relationship with Harry Potter’s father (shown below, right).

That month, the original photograph was reposted on Tumblr,^[3] where it garnered more than 146,000 notes over the next three years. On April 23rd, 2013, Redditor XxDailyDreamxX reposted the original photo to /r/funny,^[7] where it gathered upwards of 1,600 votes (78% upvoted) and 190 comments prior to being archived. In June 2015, American Airlines posted a photograph to Facebook^[9] of Dolci pointing a wand at a young woman wearing a Harry Potter costume (shown below). In the coming days, the news sites People^[1] and Metro^[10] published articles about the airline ticketing agent.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References

Warning: This entry contains video footage portraying graphic violence.

Overview

2015 WDBJ-TV On-Air Shooting refers to the shootings of news reporter Alison Parker, camera operator Adam Ward and Chamber of Commerce spokeswoman Vicki Gardner during a live interview broadcast on the Virginia CBS affiliate news station WEBJ in late August 2015. Following the attack, Parker and Ward died from gunshot wounds.

Background

On August 26th, 2015, news reporter Alison Parker and camera operator Adam Ward were interviewing Moneta Chamber of Commerce employee Vicki Gardner during a live broadcast on the CBS affiliate WDBJ near the Smith Mountain Lake in Moneta, Virginia. During the interview, former WDBJ reporter Vester Lee Flanagan II walked up to the group and began firing upon them, killing Parker and Ward while severely injuring Gardner.

Notable Developments

Perpetrator’s Identity

While being pursued by police down a Virginia highway, Flanagan, who also went by the name Bryce Williams, posted tweets^[4] claiming Parker had made racist comments and questioned why she had been hired by the station (shown below).

Additionally, Flanagan posted a video recording of the shooting taken from his perspective.^[5] Two hours after the incident, a letter from Flanagan was received by ABC News, in which he confessed to the murders claiming he had been discriminated against for being a homosexual black man while citing the 2015 Charleston church and 2007 Virginia Tech shootings as inspirations.

“What sent me over the top was the church shooting. And my hollow point bullets have the victims’ initials on them. Also, I was influenced by Seung–Hui Cho. That’s my boy right there. He got NEARLY double the amount that Eric Harris and Dylann Klebold got…just sayin. As for Dylann Roof? You want a race war? BRING IT THEN”

Hours after the pursuit started, Flanagan drove off the road where he was discovered with a self-inflicted gunshot wound, later dying at a local hospital. According to The Daily Mail,^[3]WDBJ general manager Jeffrey Marks claimed Flanagan was “always looking out for people to say things he could take offense to” and had to be escorted by police out of the station after his employment was terminated in 2013.

Online Reaction

That day, YouTuber Vegetto991 uploaded a clip of the shooting (shown below). Shortly after, Redditor MBMinor1 submitted the footage to the /r/videos^[1] subreddit, where it reached the front page with more than 8,000 votes (96% upvoted) and 10,400 comments in less than seven hours.

Meanwhile, Redditor ComedianMikeB posted a photograph of Parker and Ward to the /r/pics^[2] subreddit, discouraging viewers from listening to reports about the gunman (shown below). Within six hours, the post gathered upwards of 6,200 votes (90% upvoted) and 6,000 comments.

Boyfriend’s Reaction

That day, WDBJ reporter Chris Hurst posted a Facebook status update revealing that he and Parker were in love and had planned on getting married, along with several photographs of the two of them (shown below).

Search Interest

Not available.

External References

About

Flakka and Gravel are slang terms for α-Pyrrolidinopentiophenone^[1] (a-PVP), a synthetic stimulant used recreationally which is often compared to the designer drug bath salts. The substance has been widely covered by news media online and has spawned a number of image macros and viral videos.

Origin

The earliest known online mention of the drug was posted on the drug treatment blog Soberooms,^[6] where it was listed as a “new designer drug of abuse” and described as “the latest street version of bath salts.”

Spread

On December 2nd, 2014, YouTuber Landeater Entertainment posted a video titled “Flocka is Destroying USA,” featuring footage of a woman dancing by herself in the rain (shown below). Over the next year, the video received more than 840,000 views.

In January 2014, the United States Department of Justice listed alpha-PVP as a Schedule 1 narcotic with a temporary ban.^[2] On April 16th, 2015, Gawker^[3] published an article about Flakka, comparing news media coverage of the substance to that of “bath salts,” jenkem and “meow meow.” On April 15th, 2015, Redditor frugalrhombus submitted a news story about a naked man on flakka having sexual intercourse with a tree to the /r/FloridaMan^[4] subreddit. On April 19th, 2015, the drug chemist blog The Dose Makes The Poison^[5] published a compilation of flakka image macros (shown below).

On May 3rd, YouTuber Jenica Gregory uploaded a video titled “High on Flakka,” featuring a man crab walking on the sidewalking while repeatedly making strange noises (shown below, left). On July 21st, the wdmv362radio.com YouTube channel uploaded a video of a woman laying in a parking lot while cursing at the cameraman (shown below). Within one month, the video received over 1.1 million views and 200 comments.

Search Interest

External References

About

But That’s Wrong You Fucking Retard is an exploitable meme and reaction image series typically featuring a close-up of a character with a patronizing expression on their face, captioned with either the phrase “But that’s wrong, you fucking retard” or a variation thereof.

Origin

The image most likely originated on 4chan; on September 20th, 2009, the Tumblr“epic4chan”, a blog dedicated to posting images from 4chan, uploaded the first known instance of the meme in a post titled “But that’s wrong you fucking retard (Bill Nye the Science Guy)”.^[1] The image features a picture of prominent science popularizer Bill Nye looking at the viewer.

Spread

The phrase on its own is frequently used in titles and descriptions. Examples include Facebook pages,^[2] Youtube videos,^[3] and viral images.^[4] A notable variation of the meme uses the image of Bill Nye as an exploitable, referencing the Warhammer 40,000 franchise and its iconic invocation of the term “heresy”.

Another popular example (shown below) featuring the character of Apple Bloom from “My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic”: was submitted to quickmeme^[5] under the title “Apple Bloom Doesnt Take Your Shit”. It has been shared close to 900 times as of September 2015.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References

About

E-mail Storm (Reply Allpocalypse) refers to a spontaneous chain reaction of many-to-many messages in a group discussion that is usually triggered by an individual unintentionally sending one’s response to all users on the e-mail distribution list, instead of the original sender alone. Once initiated, other users often tend to prolong the discussion by replying to all users on the list with requests to be removed from the list or asking everyone to stop replying to all.

Origin

The earliest notable instance of an e-mail storm on a massive scale dates back to October 14th, 1997, when a Microsoft employee erroneously used the “reply all” option to unsubscribe himself from an obscure company e-mail distribution list labeled Bedlam DL3, which contained more than 13,000 e-mail addresses (approximately a quarter of the company’s employees). Soon, other employees who received the e-mail response began replying all in the thread with similar requests to be removed from the list, and some pleading others to stop responding to the thread. As a result, an estimated 15 million messages were sent by Microsoft employees, using roughly 195 GB of traffic in the process.

Spread

[researching]

On October 3rd, 2007, an unnamed subscriber to the United States Department of Homeland Security’s Open Source Intelligence Report, a daily e-mail newsletter sent to hundreds to thousands of recipients, unknowingly replied to all subscribers on the list with a request for a change. Within the next hour, several dozens of other subscribers joined in on the discussion with a wide range of responses, including pleas to cease replying all, spams of job offers and political advertisements and humorous messages with status updates on local weather, which amounted to more than 2.2 million messages by the end of the day; according to the Department of Homeland Security and Defense officials, the thread unintentionally triggered a minor scale DDoS event and exposed the names of hundreds of security professionals and government contractors,.

In January 2009, yet another e-mail storm nearly knocked out one of the U.S. State Department’s main servers after several American diplomats began replying all to a blank e-mail that was accidentally sent to thousands of subscribers on a global email list. Soon, a similar chain reaction unfolded, generating an extensive volume of e-mail communications which ultimately prompted the officials to issue a cable warning disciplinary actions for using the “reply to all” function.

“Department staff hitting ‘reply to all’ on an e-mail with a large distribution list is causing an e-mail storm on the department’s OpenNet e-mail system. Anyone who disregards these instructions will be subject to disciplinary actions.”

In November 2012, New York University Bursar’s Office sent a school-wide e-mail asking students to opt for paperless forms. Upon receiving the message, NYU sophomore student Max Wiseltier accidentally replied all to an outmoded Listserve system while trying to forward the e-mail to his mother for advice, which resulted in all 39,979 undergraduate students receiving his message.

Search Interest

External References

About

Flash is one of DC comics most iconic superheroes who has the main power of super speed, and is a member of The Justice League. The name belongs to characters within DC. The Flash has also appeared in media outside comic books such as television and animation.

History

The name of the fictional character Flash refers to multiple characters, the first to appear was Jay Garrick, who was featured in “The Flash Comics” in 1940. He later appeared in “All Star Comics” along with the original Green Lantern, Hawkman and other characters to form the Justice Society of America. Afterwards he got one more last solo series before becoming nearly unused ever since, only guest starring in later Flash comics and Justice Society comics.

Barry Allen is the second Flash, and is the most iconic and well known. Barry Allen first appeared in _"Showcase #4" in 1956 and after a few issues of the series later took over the main Flash series at issue #105. Barry had a long run that lasted up until the characters death in the DC comics even “Crisis on Infinite Earths” in 1985. Barry Allen remained dead until his revival in the event “Final Crisis” (2008) where he returned as the main Flash again and took back the Flash series, and then became the Flash that carried into the company wide reboot New 52 and still remains the Flash. Barry Allen tends to appear as the Flash in the most media outside the comic books.

Wally West was the first Kid Flash and later the 3rd Flash becoming the sidekick to Barry (who is Wally’s uncle) in issue #110 of The Flash. He was also a member of the Teen Titans until the last issue of Crisis on Infinite Earths where he took over the mantle of the Flash. Wally remained as the Flash right until Final Crisis and the return of Barry Allen. Wally is usually considered the second most popular Flash and had a noticeable appearance as one of the main characters in the cartoon Justice League.

About

Trick Shot Videos are a popular genre of viral videos in which the participant successfully performs a highly improbable or challenging task that requires a great deal of athletic finesse or luck. Trick shots are practiced in a wide range of conventional sports, including pool, frisbee and basketball, as well as lesser-known games based on physical activities.

Origin

Trick shots predate the Internet by several decades; some of the earliest known practices of trick shots are attributed to artistic pool,^[1] a type of Billiards competition in which pool players perform trick shots to be judged both on creativity and skill, and the Harlem Globetrotters, a non-competitive basketball team known for its creative trick shots and entertaining play-throughs.^[2] Online, the earliest known viral trick shot video was an artistic pool video uploaded on October 20th, 2006 by YouTuber WHOOMP.TV, which received over 11 million views as of August 2015. ^[3]

Spread

There are over 530,000 results for trick shot videos on YouTube, which continues to be the largest accumulation.^[4] However, trick shots are growing in popularity on Vine, where there are more than 35,000 results,^[5][6] and many of the top videos have millions of loops. In addition, there are more than 98,000 videos and photos on Instagram tagged with the hashtag “trickshots.”^[7]

Several YouTube and Vine accounts are known for their elaborate trick shots. The most popular YouTube trick shot account is called “Dude Perfect,” which was created on March 16th 2009 and has more than 6.5 million subscribers as of August 2015.^[8] The account has posted 149 videos in five years, more than two thirds of which have more than 1 million views.

On Vine, one of the most prominent trick shot video accounts belongs to a Frisbee trick shot creator named Brodie Smith. Smith has over 1.7 million followers and over 469 million loops from his videos.^[9]

Notable Examples

Search Interest

External References

About

OC Super Saiyan Levels refers to the theoretical fan renditions of Super Saiyan levels featured in the Dragon Ball franchise beyond the final Super Saiyan 4 (eg. Super Saiyan 5, Super Saiyan 6, etc).

Origin

The first known example of an fan-made saiyan level beyond Super Saiyan 4, was the Super Saiyan 5 created by Daniel Montiel Franco for his fan-made sequel to Dragon Ball GT titled Dragon Ball AF. Franco also created an image featuring an original character named Tablos as a Super Saiyan 5 (shown below).

Spread

On August 26th, 2009, YouTuber Brazixxx uploaded a video titled “Goku Super Saiyan 1-6” (shown below, left)^[1] claiming that Super Saiyan 5 and Super Saiyan 6 were official Super Saiyan levels, and that the footage had come from Dragon Ball AF, which the uploader claimed was a legitimate series. Several years later on January 3rd, 2011, YouTuber Sledgehammer Gray uploaded a video titled “DragonBall Z – Goku Super Saiyan 1-20” (shown below, right).^[2] As of August 2015 the video has over 15.7 million views.

On June 30th, 2014, YouTuber GamersBlogX uploaded a clip from a stream by Joel from Vinesauce, in which he gives his thoughts on OC Super Saiyans (shown below).^[3]

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References

About

Mic Drop and Drop the Mic are expressions referring to the practice of intentionally letting a microphone fall to the ground as a display of bold confidence following a successful performance. Colloquially, the expressions have also been used to celebrate the delivery of an impressive argument or insult.

Origin

According to an article on Slate^[2] titled “The History of the Mic Drop,” the practice of letting a microphone drop on stage was popularized by rappers and comedians in the 1980s. The earliest known example occurred during comedian Eddie Murphy’s 1983 stand-up special Delirious, in which he drops the microphone on stage after a fan yells “Shut up bitch!” at a heckler (shown below, left). The earliest known reference to the practice in hip hop is contained within the 1987 track “I Ain’t No Joke” by Eric B. & Rakim, in which Rakim raps “I used to let the mic smoke, now I slam it when I;m done and make sure it’s broke” (shown below, right).

Spread

During a scene in the 1988 comedy film Comedy to America, the lead singer of the fictional R&B band Sexual Chocolate finishes a song and yells “Sexual Chocolate!” while dropping the microphone (shown below, left). In the 2000s, comedian Chris Rock employed the mic drop at the end of his stand-up sets (shown below, right). On September 5th, 2006, a theater house manager published a post on his personal blog,^[3] which urged performers to stop damaging microphones by dropping them on stage.

On March 19th, 2007, the channelzerotv YouTube channel uploaded footage of rapper Big Daddy Kane dropping the mic on stage at a concert in Chicago, Illinois (shown below, left). In 2008, Saturday Night Live introduced the character Obnoxious Microphone Guy (played by Bobby Moynihan), who would steal microphones from public speakers, yell “what” and then drop it to the ground (shown below, right).

On October 4th, 2011, Urban Dictionary^[1] user Nicki Menagerie submitted an entry for “mic drop,” defining it as “when a performer or speaker intentionally drops/throws the microphone to the floor after an awesome performance.” On February 7th, 2012, the Comedy Central YouTube channel uploaded a skit from the show Key & Peele, in which United States President Barack Obama approaches a street rapper, takes his microphone and says “I’m the leader of the free world” before letting the mic fall to the ground (shown below, left). Within three years, the clip gained over 4.5 million views and 1,800 comments. On April 24th, Obama appeared on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, where he sings a “slow jam” with the show’s host before dropping the microphone on stage (shown below, right).

On July 4th, 2013, a page for “Mic Drop” was created on TV Tropes.^[4] On July 11th, 2015, actor Bryan Cranston dropped the microphone after delivering a “your mother” joke to an audience member during a panel Q&A session at the Nerd HQ convention (shown below, left). On July 27th, the JackInTheBox YouTube channel released a commercial in which the fast food company’s mascot drops a microphone after introducing a new sandwich (shown below, right). On August 27th, the OxfordDictionaries.com^[5] added “mic drop” to its online dictionary.

Search Interest

External References

About

NISLT is a YouTube channel featuring edited gameplay footage from the first-person shooter game Team Fortress 2 (TF2). The videos typically contain impressive kills, humorous failures or strange glitches.

Online History

Early Videos

On November 15th, 2009, the NISLT YouTube^[1] channel was launched by a user with the online handle “siN.” The first video was uploaded on December 16th, 2009, featuring footage from a “Soldier vs. Demoman” TF2 server (shown below, left). On April 21st, 2010, NISLT uploaded a video titled “Total Frag Movie: No Name,” containing a montage of TF2 kill clips (shown below, right).

Episodes

On June 17th, 2012, NISLT uploaded a video titled: “TF2: how to reflect a single rocket,” in which two Pyro players use air blasts to reflect a single rocket back and forth several times (shown below, left). NISLT subsequently uploaded many additional “How To” videos with interesting or impressive TF2 moments. On December 24th, 2013, NISLT uploaded a compilation of videos from the “How To” series, which gained over 2.7 million views and 3,900 comments in the next two years (shown below, right).

On August 30th, 2012, NISLT launched the “Frag Clip of the Day” series, highlighting notable TF2 kill clips (shown below, left). On September 4th, 2013, NISLT introduced the new “Pub Hero” series, featuring TF2 highlight clips recorded on public servers (shown below, right).

Reception

On September 14th, 2014, the /r/NISLT^[3] subreddit was launched for discussions about the YouTube channel. On March 1st, 2015, a page for NISLT was created on the YouTube Wiki.^[2] As of August 2015, the NISLT channel has gained over 400,000 subscribers and has become widely known among the Team Fortress 2 community.

Search Interest

External References

About

Brojob is a slang term for acts of oral sex between two ostensibly heterosexual male friends. Online, the practice is often joked about as a closeted homosexual act and is associated with the expression “no homo”.

Origin

On December 9th, 2005, Urban Dictionary^[2] user Freddie Cougar submitted an entry for “bro job,” defining it as “oral sex between two allegedly heterosexual male friends.”

Spread

On August 8th, 2006, Anandtech Forums^[3] member pclstyle submitted a thread titled “Ever heard of a brojob?”, which included an anecdote about a man explaining the oral sex practice to a group of friends. On August 27th, 2013, an anonymous 4chan user submitted a green text story about a man giving his friend oral sex while saying “Brojob brojob! Choo Choo!” (shown below).

On May 12th, 2014, Redditor BitterPeter submitted a post titled “What does ‘Brojob Brojob Choo Choo’ Mean?” to the /r/OutOfTheLoop^[4] subreddit, where Redditor whitesock replied with a link to the 4chan green text story. On June 1st, Body Building Forums^[5] member koloxid submitted a thread titled “is it gay to give ur friend a brojob?” On July 30th, 2015, The Huffington Post^[1] published an article titled “Dear Straight Men, Come Out Already,” which referenced the bro-job as a closeted homosexual act. On August 9th, YouTuber SupDaily06 uploaded a video titled “Giving a Brojob” (shown below). The following day, the news site Alternet^[6] published an article about brojobs and homosexual identity.

Search Interest

External References

About

Sam and Nia (last name: Rader) are a Christian family of YouTube vloggers, who have become popular for sharing videos of their lives and the lives of their children, Symphony and Abram. Their became well-known outside of the Christian vlogging community after a series of videos they created, announcing a Nia’s pregnancy followed closely by her miscarriage, were accused of being fabricated.

Online History

Sam Rader created his YouTube account, samuel8955, on March 8th, 2007,^[1] and started posting videos regularly in March of 2014. after their video “Good Looking Parents Sing Disney’s Frozen (Love Is an Open Door)” went viral shortly after its posting, inspiring articles on publications as varied as Babble, Gizmodo, and Perez Hilton.^[2][3][4] The video was featured on television show Kathie Lee and Hoda, and eventually garnered more than 21 million views.^[5]

Soon, the family began posting videos more than once per day, releasing more than 500 videos between March 2014 and August 2015, many of which received more than 100,000 views. The videos often showed their intimate family moments and exhibited their Christian-American values. Their account eventually acquired over 363,000 subscribers.

Pregnancy Announcement, Miscarriage Video, and Backlash

On August 5th, 2015, Sam and Nia uploaded a video titled HUSBANDSHOCKSWIFEWITHPREGNANCYANNOUNCEMENT!, in which Sam, upon hearing that Nia’s period is late, dips a pregnancy test in a toilet bowl filled with his wife’s urine and then surprises her with the positive result. This video gained more than 1 million views in 24 hours, and was posted many entertainment blogs, including the Huffington Post, E! News, and The Daily Mail.^[6][7][8] As of August 28th, 2015, the video has more than 14 million views.

Three days later, on August 8th, 2015, after not posting to their account for 24 hours, Sam and Nia uploaded the video “Our Baby Had a Heartbeat,” which detailed how Nia had miscarried the previously announced pregnancy. This video received over 4 million views as of August 28th, 2015.

Many commenters and others online voiced their skepticism at the authenticity of Sam and Nia’s pregnancy; many said that it was possible to get a false positive from the testing method used by Sam, and also that it was too early in the pregnancy to have known the gender of the child, which Sam and Nia refer to in their miscarriage video as female. In addition, according to Sam Rader, the viral success of the pregnancy videos had provided the family with enough income for him to quit his job as an ER nurse and live off of vlogging alone, and many suspected that this income was the impetus for the announcement, as pregnancy announcement videos are generally very popular in the Christian vlogging community, often going viral.^[9] On August 14th, Sam and Nia uploaded a video titled “RESPONDING TO HATECOMMENTS!”, in which Sam discusses the criticisms and states that the backlash they were receiving was religious persecution, since the pregnancy and miscarriage was the fate chosen by God.

Ashley Madison Controversy

On August 21st, 2015, the Daily Mail published an exclusive analysis of the Ashley Madison data breach, which showed that Sam Rader, or someone using his name, address, and credit cards, had created an Ashley Madison account in September 2013 and made two $189 payments to keep it open, purportedly to find a partner with which to cheat on his marriage during his four year wedding anniversary to Nia and the birth of their second child.^[10] After the disclosure, which was republished widely, Sam and Nia published both a video and written confession where they claim that Sam never met up with another woman using the site and that Nia had forgiven him.

Over 2 years ago I did create the Ashely Madison account. To be clear this was only an account I used to navigate the site in my sinful curiosity and any messages or data pulled from that account would be evidence of that. I absolutely did not meet up or see another woman from the site. It was clearly a bad moment in my life and I acted on a sinful desire to be with another woman but never came close to going through with it. ^[11]

This video received more than 1.1 million views, becoming their fifth most popular, but three days later, after being kicked out of the Seattle Vloggers Conference for getting in a verbal confrontation with another family vlogger, Sam and Nia announced that they were taking a short hiatus from vlogging.^[12]

Online Presence

Sam and Nia have a Facebook page with over 73,000 likes, an Instagram with 18,300 followers, and a Twitter account with 14,600 followers. ^[13][14][15]

Search Interest

External References