About

Desus (better known by his Twitter handle @DesusNice) is the professional pseudonym of Daniel Baker, an American comedian most well-known for his humorous commentaries on Twitter, as well as co-hosting the weekly podcast series Desus vs. Mero and starring in numerous TV shows along with fellow entertainer The Kid Mero.

History

Desus created his Twitter account in April 2008^[1] while working as a columnist for a business news magazine geared towards black readers. According to an interview with Rolling Stone^[6], Desus garnered his early fame on the microblogging platform by sharing his personal grievances about day-to-day struggles at work, and later on, commentaries on hot-button issues and current events in popular culture, sports and hip hop music, which proved to be relatable and comical to many of his readers.

Media Coverage

As early as in 2012, Desus’ tweets started getting mentioned in listicles and round-up articles that highlight the best examples of social media reactions to various happenings in the news media, including Newser’s article about American news anchor Ann Curry’s awkward on-air farewell in June and The Urban Daily’s round-up of “7 Best Tweets About Joe Budden’s Oakland Struggle Show” in November that same year. In 2013, Desus continued to draw mass exposure on Twitter and elsewhere in the blogosphere by regularly chiming in on trending hashtags that cover a wide range of current events and pop culture gossips, from the trial of George Zimmerman and Paula Deen‘s racism scandal to album releases by hip hop artists like Kanye West and Kendric Lamar, among others. By December 2013, Desus had accrued more than 13,000 followers on Twitter and become known as an influential early adopter of Black Twitter, as mentioned in Complex’s “Black Twitter’s 2013 All-Stars” article. By November 2014, Desus’ audience on Twitter had nearly quadrupled to more than 50,000 followers.^[7]

Desus vs. Mero

During this time, Desus also began crafting his signature brand of comedy after re-connecting and collaborating with fellow Bronx native The Kid Mero, whom he had first met during his childhood at a summer camp, via Twitter.^[2] On December 18th, 2013, the duo debuted their first episode of Desus vs. Mero on Complex Magazine.^[3] The pair received critical acclaim for the podcast, which released a new episode every week for 46 weeks until December 30th, 2014.

Joking Off

Following the successful run of Desus vs. Mero, Desus and The Kid Mero continued to make regular TV appearances as cast members on a number of MTV shows, including Guy Code, Joking Off and Uncommon Sense.

DesusGate

On April 2nd, 2014, The Kid Mero tweeted a photograph of himself with a white man, who he identified as being Desus.^[8] Many of the fans of the podcast felt betrayed, as they had believed that Desus was black. However, the next day Complex debuted episode 21 of Desus vs. Mero, which was the first episode to be filmed as well as recorded as an audio podcast; fans realized that The Kid Mero’s tweet had been a prank, and that Desus was, as they had originally assumed, a black man.^[9]

Bodega Boys

On September 11th, 2015, The Kid Mero and Desus launched a new podcast entitled “Bodega Boys”, and recorded at New York City’s Red Bull Studios. The first episode received over 109,000 plays via Soundcloud; as of February 23rd, 2016 there have been 15 episodes of the podcast.^[10]

Online Presence

With over 115,000 followers on Twitter^[1] (as of February 2016), Desus has often been cited as an influential social media commentator and Internet comedian, particularly within the rapidly emerging world of Black Twitter. In addition to his well-known presence on Twitter, Desus also runs a Tumblr^[4] blog and an Instagram account, where he has over 15,000 followers (as of February 2016).^[11]

Highlights

As of February 23rd, Desus’s most popular tweet references a Kidz Bop-style cover of Fetty Wap’s hit song Trap Queen.

Personal Life

Born on May 18th, 1983, Daniel Baker was raised by Jamaican immigrant parents and spent his childhood and early adulthood in Bronx, New York City. Baker has a degree in literature at the College of Mount St. Vincent, which is located in the Bronx.

Search Interest

Note: Desus is a word or acronym in several languages other than English.

External References

About

Keit-ai is a copypasta of an original story made in the Anime & Manga section of 4chan. The premise goes like:

A boy falls in love with a girl.
Unable to confess, he is gifted with by a deus ex machina with the girl’s phone number. Never minding the strange area code, he immediately calls her, and is overjoyed to find out that she has a crush on him as well.
But, the next day, when he recounts the previous day’s confessions to the girl, she only looks at him with a perplexed expression. After some investigation, he finds out that the girl he called is not the same girl he fell in love with. In fact, she doesn’t exist in this universe at all. She is the girl’s alternate universe counterpart, who has fallen in love with the MC’s own AU self, who too is blissfully unaware of her crush.
Hijinks ensue as the two strike up a deal to give each other their darkest, most private secrets in order to equip the other with the weapons they need to conquer the heart of their other selves. While the two chase their respective loved ones, DRAMA ensues as they begin to fall in love with each other instead and question the NATURE of LOVE.

Origin

Keit-ai was posted at around 2012 when “ITT: Write Your Own Anime Plot” thread starts becoming popular.

One of the most well received story was the copypasta above due to its elaborate premise as well as its open-ended idea.

Spread

Keit-ai starts spreading when it was posted at almost every, some with different version from its original copypasta.

With its notorious reposting, as well as its unique premise, users starts posting and editing different image macros and memes whenever the copypasta pops up again.

<img src=“http://i3.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/001/084/069/927.jpg” width ="200">

<img src=“http://i2.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/001/084/071/737.jpg” width ="200">

Soon, a writer by the name of Abdiel1, with the blessing of Hataki, the anon who claimed to write the original copypasta, starts actually writing the details of the story at July 7, 2014, having currently 12 Chapters since June 21, 2015
https://www.fictionpress.com/s/3206139/1/

Confirmed Chinese Cartoon

References

http://4chandata.org/a/A-boy-falls-in-love-with-a-girl-Unable-to-confess-he-is-gifted-with-by-a-deus-ex-machina-with-the-girl-s-phone-number-Never-mindin-a15382

About

Napping Kanye is a photoshop meme based on an Instagram photograph of the American hip hop artist Kanye West and his daughter North West napping on display furniture while shopping at a Los Angeles nursery store in February 2016.

Origin

On February 21st, 2016, Kim Kardashian posted an Instagram of her husband Kanye West and their two-year-old daughter North napping in the middle of a Bel Bambini boutique nursery store while out on a day of shopping with fellow celebrity couple John Legend and Chrissy Teigen in Los Angeles, California (shown below). Within the first 72 hours of the post, Kardashian’s Instagram photo garnered over 1.4 million likes and 23,400 comments.

Spread

The next day, Redditor Joeval83 submmitted the Instagram image to /r/PhtoshopBattles in a post titled “Kanye West caught snoozing at the baby store,” which quickly garnered several dozens of photoshopped parodies in the comments section, including a couple of notable mashup instances featuring the subject behind the Sleeping on the First Day of Internship meme that had taken off on the previous week (shown below).

As the /r/PhotoshopBattles thread continued to gain momentum on the frontpage of Reddit, many celebrity gossip blogs^[6][8][9] and entertainment news sites^[3][4][5][7] began reporting on the latest photoshop parody meme centered around Kanye West, who had recently returned to his home in Los Angeles after going on a highly publicized media blitz in New York to promote the release of his latest album The Life Of Pablo.

Examples

Search Interest

[not yet available]

External References

About

“Garlic Bread” is a series of in-jokes referencing bread that has been topped with garlic and butter, which inspired dedicated circlejerk-style communities on both Facebook and Reddit.

Origin

The exact origin of the meme is unknown. Some have credited a video clip of English comedian Elaine Williams performing a cringeworthy stand-up comedy routine during an episode of the British reality television show Britain’s Got Talent with popularizing garlic bread jokes online. In the clip, Williams awkwardly repeats the punchline “garlic bread” after the audience fails to react to her initial delivery (shown below). On April 23rd, 2011, YouTuber mitchlastone uploaded a clip of the footage.

Others have credited a screenshot of a Facebook post in which an elderly woman scolds her granddaughter for posting a photo and accidentally replies with the words “garlic bread” (shown below). On October 26th, 2013, image was submitted to the /r/facepalm^[4] subreddit, where it received upwards of 2,500 votes (94% upvoted) prior to being archived.

Spread

On October 27th, 2013, Redditor Dyxus submitted a post titled “What is the deal with ‘garlic bread’?” to the /r/OutOfTheLoop^[9] subreddit, which received replies citing the Britain’s Got Talent audition, the Facebook screenshot and a routine by British comedian Peter Kay. On September 19th, 2014, a clip of Elaine Williams’ stand-up routine titled “Comedian fails at jokes, then shares bizarre punchline about garlic bread” was submitted to the /r/cringe^[1] subreddit. On April 15th, 2015, Redditor arribalosrudos submitted a photoshopped tweet of the phrase “Yeah sex is cool but have you ever had garlic bread” attributed to rapper DMX to /r/BlackPeopleTwitter^[7] (shown below). Prior to being archived, the post garnered over 8,000 votes (97% upvoted) and 220 comments.

On May 10th, the Garlic Bread Memes Facebook^[2] page was launched, gathering upwards of 131,000 likes in the following two years. On October 20th, the /r/garlicbreadmemes^[3] subreddit was launched, accumulating more than 8,000 subscribers in the next four months. On November 5th, the MTV^[5] entertainment news site published an article about the Garlic Bread Memes Facebook page. On January 22nd, Redditor TommieTheTurd submitted a photoshopped picture of a skeleton holding garlic bread to the /r/dankmemes^[6] subreddit (shown below).

On January 25th, the news site The Odyssey^[6] published an article about the rapid subscriber growth of the Garlic Bread Memes Facebook page. On February 23rd, 2016, Redditor Aleesus submitted a post titled “What is this garlic bread meme?” to the /r/OutOfTheLoop^[8] subreddit.

Various Examples

Search Interest

Google search queries for the keywords “garlic bread meme” saw a large spike in October 2013, the same month the Facebook screenshot was submitted to Reddit.

External References

Overview

The F.B.I. vs. Apple is an ongoing dispute between Apple, Inc, and the United States Department of Justice in which the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is asking for Apple to create a method by which security features tied to version 8 of the iOS operating system could be bypassed by investigators attempting to gather data for law enforcement activities. Apple has opposed the official order, saying that creating the bypass (often referred to as a “backdoor”) would negate the safety of the iPhone and set a dangerous anti-privacy precedent.

Background

On February 16th, 2016, a U.S. District Court judge presiding over the case ordered Apple to provide “reasonable technical assistance” to the federal investigators in unlocking the data stored on an iPhone that had been owned by Syed Farook, one of the two killers in the 2015 San Bernardino Shooting. According to the court ruling, Apple was ordered to help the FBI with clearing at least two technical obstacles hindering their investigation: disabling the phone’s auto-erase function, which activates after 10 consecutive failed attempts at entering the password, and installing a custom-coded version of the iPhone operating system that would allow investigators to bypass the phone’s security features electronically.^[2]

The next morning, Apple CEO Tim Cook released an open letter titled “A Message to Our Customers,” revealing that the U.S. government demanded the company unlock an iPhone that had been recovered during the San Bernardino shooting investigation. The company also announced its intention to challenge the court ruling, asserting that its compliance would require creating a “backdoor” to circumvent its own security measures, an action that could set a dangerous precedent in cooperation between the government and the information technology sector.^[1]

“The government is asking Apple to hack our own users and undermine decades of security advancements that protect our customers -- including tens of millions of American citizens -- from sophisticated hackers and cybercriminals. The same engineers who built strong encryption into the iPhone to protect our users would, ironically, be ordered to weaken those protections and make our users less safe.

We can find no precedent for an American company being forced to expose its customers to a greater risk of attack. For years, cryptologists and national security experts have been warning against weakening encryption. Doing so would hurt only the well-meaning and law-abiding citizens who rely on companies like Apple to protect their data. Criminals and bad actors will still encrypt, using tools that are readily available to them.^[3]

Notable Developments

Department of Justice Motion & Response

On February 19th, The US Department of Justice filed a motion in the United States District Court for Central California to compel Apple to obey the original court order. The court order accused Apple of using the FBI’s request as a “marketing ploy”, and claimed that the company forced the government to pursue further legal action. From the order:^[4]

“Apple left the government with no option other than to apply to this Court for the Order issued on February 16, 2016. The Order requires Apple to assist the FBI with respect to this single iPhone used by Farook by providing the FBI with the opportunity to determine the passcode. The Order does not, as Apple’s public statement alleges, require Apple to create or provide a ‘back door’ to every iPhone; it does not provide ‘hackers and criminals’ access to iPhones; it does not require Apple to ‘hack [its] own users’ or to ‘decrypt’ its own phones; it does not give the government ‘the power to reach into anyone’s device’ without a warrant or court authorization; and it does not compromise the security of personal information.”

iCloud Password Change

In response to the further court order, Apple revealed that the FBI had actually prevented it from being able to retrieve the data on the phone by prematurely changing Farook’s iCloud pasword, which would have allowed the phone to connect to Apple’s servers and the data to potentially be retrieved without bypassing the password of the individual phone. Initially, the San Bernardino Sheriff’s Department was blamed for the change, but the Department of Justice later disclosed that the phone was, in fact, in the possession of the FBI at the time of the change.^[12]

Other iPhone Data Requested by FBI

ON February 23rd, a New York District Court filing by Mark Zwilliger, one of Apple’s lawyers, was unsealed; the filing detailed 12 other cases in which the United States Government had asked Apple to retrieve data from fifteen other iOS devices since October 2015. This contested with the FBI’s message on the San Bernardino unlocking case, in which they claimed that the software bypass they were seeking from Apple was a special case that would not be duplicated. The filing detailed that the government had asked to access data on 11 devices that had not been operating iOS 8, and therefore were able to have their data retrieved, but in four of the pending cases the device was running iOS 8. In all of the cases, the write said that Apple objected to the government’s request.^[8]

Public Response

On February 17th, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump urged Apple to unlock the phone (shown below).

On February 18th, Business Insider^[6] published an article by John McAfee, who offered to decrypt the iPhone free of charge in three weeks to prevent Apple from compromising iPhone devices. Many other technology leaders agreed with Apple. Mark Zuckerberg, the owner of Facebook, said that he sided with Apple in the dispute,^[11] but on February 23rd, Bill Gates told the Financial Times that he disagreed with Apple’s stance, saying that the company should comply with the government.^[7]

“This is a specific case where the government is asking for access to information. They are not asking for some general thing, they are asking for a particular case. It is no different than [the question of] should anybody ever have been able to tell the phone company to get information, should anybody be able to get at bank records. Let’s say the bank had tied a ribbon round the disk drive and said, ‘Don’t make me cut this ribbon because you’ll make me cut it many times’.”

On February 22nd, the Pew Research Center released a poll that stated that 51% of Americans sided with the FBI in the unlocking dispute, and that 38% of people sided with Apple. However, the level of support was very different depending on what age group the respondents were in. From the study:^[10]

Across age groups, adults ages 18-29 are divided over what Apple should do: 47% say the company should unlock the iPhone, while about as many (43%) say it should not unlock the phone to ensure the privacy of its other users. Among adults age 30 and older, somewhat more say Apple should unlock rather than not unlock the San Bernardino suspect’s iPhone. By a 54%-27% margin, those 65 and older think Apple should unlock the phone; 18% do not offer a view.

Some privacy advocates, like Edward Snowden, said they believed in Apple’s right to encrypt the devices but not the fact that they were having to defend themselves from the government. In a tweet that was retweeted more than 18,000 times, Snowden stated that “The @FBI is creating a world where citizens rely on #Apple to defend their rights, rather than the other way around.”^[13] An organization called Don’t Break Our Phones^[14] held rallies nationwide calling for the FBI to stop asking Apple to unlock the phones; reports said that the protests were ill-attended.^[15]

Search Interest

External References

About

DURRPLANT is a meme unintentionally made by YouTube user I Hate Everything to mock and compare the equivalent of the Damn Daniel vine meme and has later been edited and remixed in other media platforms.

Origin

On February 23th 2016, I Hate Everything posted a video talking about the trending meme Damn Daniel and why he disapproves of it, including a part in the 2:45 mark of the video where he explains the meme has no much of a difference as recording a clip of someone pointing their hand at a plant saying in a dopey accent, “Durr Plant!!!” as shown here.

Spread

(WIP)

Many countless videos have been uploaded spreading across the internet using DURRPLANT clip.

A video was posted a few hours after IHE’s video by chookax at February 24th 2016, reusing IHE’s audio in 4 second video.

The clip has later been converted into a Vine by Yoshi The Lion the same day and has currently has over 1,200 loops.

Later, a video was posted by YeloPartyHat the same day editing the The Duck Song with the meme.

Notable Examples

About

Legbeard is a pejorative term referring to unattractive, overweight and socially inept women who do not shave their legs. As the female counterpart to the neckbeard stereotype, legbeards are often associated with social justice warriors and misandrists who frequent the website Tumblr.

Origin

The term “legbeard” references the feminist movement urging women to abstain from shaving their legs to protest socially imposed standards of beauty. On October 7th, 2009, the earliest known instance of the term was posted on the /a/ (anime and manga) board on 4chan (shown below).^[7]

Spread

On February 19th, 2010, Urban Dictionary^[3] user Marcel Laverdongle created an entry for “legbeard,” defining it as “the female equivalent of neckbeard.”

Over the next two years, the term remained relatively dormant until it was used in reference to unattractive women in a post on 4chan’s /r9k/ (Robot9001) board on June 10th, 2012.^[8] On April 21st, 2014, the /r/JustLegbeardThings^[11] subreddit was created, for posts mocking examples of the legbeard stereotype found online. Within two years, the subreddit garnered upwards of 8,200 subscribers. On January 16th, 2015, the Social Justice Legbeard Tumblr^[13] blog was created. On February 14th, Redditor SyncNexus posted a “I Wish I Was at Home” comic titled “Legbeard at a Party” to the /r/justlegbeardthings subreddit (shown below).

On May 28th, Redditor N0Treal submitted an “I Made This” comic in which a /r/TrollXChromosomes Redditor reclaims the word “legbeard” (shown below). Prior to being archived, the post gathered upwards of 1,800 votes (98% upvoted) and 270 comments.

Search Interest

External References

About

Vic Berger is a video editor, satirist, and musician most well-known for his humorous Vine edits during 2016 Republican Presidential Primary and for trollingJeb Bush during his 2016 presidential campaign.

Online History

Berger has maintained a YouTube account since August 2006, although there are no videos uploaded to the account before 2012.^[1] He joined Vine in June 2013 and began uploading edited videos to the social network when that functionality became available in 2014.^[2]

On April 28th, 2014, Berger created a video on YouTube called “E-ZPass has the worst on-hold music I’ve ever heard.” The video, which featured a recording of the strange sounds callers heard when trying to speak with an operator for the automatic toll pass company E-ZPass, received over 187,000 views as of February 2016. In addition, it was posted to the subreddit /r/politicalvideos, where it received 2,371 points (94% upvoted),^[3] and was spotlighted by New York City news anchor Pat Kiernan on Twitter.^[4]

On Vine, Berger began gaining attention to his videos with a series in early 2015 on Chubby Checker, the original singer of “The Twist,” who still makes many television appearances. The videos of Checker were often humorous out-of-context snippets.

Berger produced videos consistently on both his Vine and YouTube channels, often targeting Guy Fieri, Jimmy Fallon, televangelist Jim Bakker, and Chubby Checker, among other celebrities. In the summer of 2015, when candidates began announcing their presidential candidacies, Berger created a series of videos in which the candidate’s announcement speeches were edited humorously; several of these videos became popular.

Throughout the presidential campaign, Berger has created popular videos on both his YouTube and Vine accounts and also for the online content portal SuperDeluxe^[5] about the 2016 Presidential Campaign. These videos have been described as “surreal” and “absurdist.” The writer Dan O’Sullivan has praised Berger’s satirical videos, saying “Vic Berger IV might be this election’s Ralph Steadman, but with Vine footage instead of dripping pens.”^[6]

#Jeb4Prez Tattoo

On July 16th, 2015, Berger created the Vine “Jeb Bush loves technology. #JebBush,” in which Jeb names several Apple products, including an Apple Watch. The video has gained more than 7.9 million loops as of February 2016.

On July 25th, Berger tweeted that if the video received 1 million views by the end of the following weekend, he would get a #Jeb4Prez neck tattoo. The tweet was retweeted over 1,077 times and favorited 826 times.^[8] On July 26th, Jeb Bush tweeted about the video, saying “I’d like to make Vic get a #Jeb4Prez tattoo. He’s halfway to 1mil, give this Vine a few views…”^[9] According to the Daily Dot,^[10] Berger was contacted by the communications director for Bush’s campaign, who encouraged him to get the tattoo; following the meeting Berger changed the rules to the contest, saying that he would receive the tattoo whenever the video hit 1 million views.

On August 11th, Berger tweeted several photos indicating that he got the tattoo, and was immediately contacted by several news outlets, who published stories about his support for Bush. However, in a later story with CNN, he explained that the tattoo was a hoax.^[11]

Personal Life

Berger lives in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania with his family. He is a longtime collaborator of Tim Heidecker and Eric Wareheim of Tim & Eric, with whom he works as a video editor; he also works freelance in this capacity.

Search Interest

External References

About

Better Names For Things is an image macro series in which various photographs of subjects and objects, such as animals, food and instruments, are intentionally captioned with made-up, troll-scientific names for comedic effect, in a similar vein to the proper anatomical charts of animals.

Origin

On January 11th, 2011, pop culture blog The Tangential ran an article titled “Better Names for Infomercial Products,” which suggested alternative labels for an array of novelty products that are advertised through TV infomercials. However, the earliest known blogger to propose alternative names for everyday things that are humorously oversimplified can be attributed to Jeff Wysaski of PleatedJeans, who wrote and published the article “Better Names for Things (10 Pics)” on his comedy blog on December 6th (shown below).

Spread

Throughout the first half of 2012, Wysaki’s original post on Pleated Jeans was picked up by many Internet humor blogs and communities, including CollegeHumor, SMOSH, AcidCow and BuzzFeed, among others. On March 14th, by popular demand, Wysaki ran a second article with a new batch of “Better Names For Things” (shown below).

On June 28th, SMOSH ran an original article titled “20 Original Names for Famous Snacks & Foods” (shown below), which was subsequently picked up by Pleated Jeans on July 1st (shown below).

On August 29th, 2012, Wysaki published the first video edition of his “Better Names for Things” series, in which he takes a trip to a local Target superstore and slaps on stickers featuring better names for things over a variety of products on display. (shown below, left) The immense viral success of the video quickly provided further boost to his “Better Names” series, as well as his blog Pleated Jeans. On May 8th, 2013, Wysaki released the second installment of the video series, this time, documenting a similar prank he staged during a visit to a Lowe’s hardware store (shown below, right).

Jenna Marbles’ Video Series

Meanwhile, taking after the viral success of Pleated Jeans’ “Better Names for Things” series, YouTube personality Jenna Marbles posted a video titled “Better Names For Animals” based on a similar premise on February 14th, 2013 (shown below). Over the next three years, the video gained more than 4.2 million views on YouTube.

Between 2013 and 2014, Marbles released two additional episodes titled “Better Names For Foods” and “Better Names For Body Parts,” which garnered 3.4 million and 4 million views, respectively, over the next three years (shown below).

Imgur Derivatives

In 2015, after “Better Names for Things” became adopted as a popular trope in image macro comedy, many Redditors and Imgur users began sharing their own contributions to the ever-growing collection of humorous misnomers for ordinary things under the alternative title “Imgur names for things.”

Search Interest

External References

WiP, feel free to help out

About

Merlin Network,^[1] also known as various derivatives such as [Merlin] CDLTD and [Merlin] Phonofile, refers to a, reportedly fake, online network that claims to be a digital rights agency. Although the group first appeared online in 2007, it did not reach prominence until several years when it began to issue copyright claims against Montage Parodies and Let’s Plays and montage parodies and later in 2016 when it issued claims against higher profile channels such as NFKRZ and I Hate Everything.

Origin

According to the Merlin website, the group was formed back in 2007 to help protect clients’ digital rights against piracy.^[2]

Spread

On November 13th, 2013 YouTuber mp4podcastDOTcom uploaded a video talking about both [Merlin] Phonofile, and another company, named IDOL, and how the claims they have made on his videos are false, and that they do not own the rights to the videos they claimed (shown below).

Later in 2015 [Merlin] CDLTD began claiming various videos, typically let’s plays. Several threads on Reddit began springing up about the company questioning whether or not it was a legitimate company or not.^[3][4][5] On February 24th, 2016, YouTube critic and comedian, I Hate Everything, uploaded a video detailing how [Merlin] CDLTD had filed a false claim against his Damn Daniel video (shown below, left). The following day, montage parody creator NFKRZ also uploaded a video explaining that [Merlin] CDLTD had filed a false claim against his Damn Daniel video (shown below, right).

Search Interest

not currently available

External References

About

Iceberg Tiers Parodies are usually images of an iceberg, captioned humorously so as to convey that the tip of the iceberg is the summation of the knowledge of most people, while the much larger submerged part of the iceberg is the sum of all knowledge of a particular topic. These parodies are often used in the context of imageboards like 4chan to ridicule outsiders, but they have also spread to fandoms.

Origin

It is unknown where the iceberg metaphor originates from in general usage. Sigmund Freud used an iceberg metaphor to describe the relationship between the conscious and unconscious mind,^[1] and another academic named Edward T. Hall created the “Cultural Iceberg Model” as a way to discuss cultural differences.^[2] The earliest known example of the iceberg metaphor being used as a parody image was uploaded to Imgur on May 31st, 2011, although it probably dates from sometime earlier than that. In the visible part of the iceberg are the logos for many popular web sites which are easily accessible via Google or URL, while below the waterline were different types of web sites that were only accessible by those who can access the deep web. The image has received over 150,000 views on Imgur,^[3] and an associated reddit post in the subreddit /r/askreddit received 161 points (74% upvoted).^[4]

Spread

On June 12th, 2012, the user enfdude submitted the image to the subreddit /r/4chan, inquiring as to what the deep web was; the post received 252 points (79% upvoted) and 128 comments.^[5] In early 2015, more parody images began to appear on 4chan, which were collected in a blog post on the blog Morbo’s World on May 15th, 2015.^[6] As recently as December 2015, new parodies are being collected and created on /mu/ and /v/]

Notable Examples

Search Interest

not yet available

External References

About

No Sense Posts, also known as No Sense Made, This Makes No Sense and No Sense Account, are Twitter feeds that tweet random stock photographs paired with unrelated and nonsensical captions.

Origin

On February 8th, 2016, several Twitter feeds with variations of the names “no sense posts,” “no sense made” and “no sense account” were created on Twitter, which began posting various stock photographs taken from the website Feelgrafix^[1] juxtaposed with unrelated reaction image captions (shown below).^{[4][5][6][7][8][9]}

Spread

On February 11th, Twitter user @PicPedant^[3] tweeted several examples of No Sense Posts Twitter feeds with the caption “Nonsensical image-caption juxtapositions are the new hot meme amongst original thinkers on Twitter dot com” (shown below).

On February 25th, The Washington Post^[2] published an article by staff writer Caitlin Dewey titled “The Twitter meme so stupid that we literally can’t make sense of it,” speculating that the accounts were created by promotion network that encompass the Twitter feeds @SweetSabrinabae,^[10] @LiftMotivate^[11] and @FltConfessions.^[12]

Search Interest

Not available.

External References

About

“If Young Metro Don’t Trust You” is one of the DJ tag of producer, Metro Boomin’. The phrase has become popular on Twitter, tweeted along with images that detail the consequences of not being approved by Metro Boomin’. The tag became popular on twitter jokes following it’s use in the songs Jumpman by Drake and Future, and Father Stretch My Hands Pt. 1 by Kanye West from The Life of Pablo.

Origin

The origin of the tag, was it’s use in the song in the song “Jumpman,” by rapper Future in a collaboration with Drake. The first lyric of “Jumpman” by Future and Drake is “If Young Metro don’t trust you I’m gon’ shoot you;” the song was released on September 26th, 2015, and became an instant hit; it has over 81 million listens on YouTube.^[1] The phrase is a shout-out to Future’s producer Metro Boomin’, who Future indicates must approve of all associates, or else violence will ensue.

The lyric was reprised by Future on Kanye West’s “Father Stretch My Hands Part 1” and released as part of The Life of Pablo in early February; the album has several samples of “Jumpman” throughout.^[2]

Spread

The first instances of the phrase being tweeted slightly precede the initial release of “Jumpman,” most likely due to song previews. The first tweet paired with an image for humorous effect was created on September 20th, six days before the official release of “Jumpman;” by Twitter user @RichFlair_; it received two favorites.^[3]

After being tweeted consistently, the phrase began to be paired with images frequently after the initial stream of “Father Stretch My Hands Part 1,” at which point the pairings began to be very popular. On February 11th, 2016, after the initial preview of The Life of Pablo, Twitter user wherebaeat tweeted the lyric combined with two photographs: one of Kim Kardashian holding a rifle, and another of Kris Jenner holding a handgun. The tweet received 35 retweets and 27 favorites.^[4]

On February 14th, user meechonmars tweeted “what you do if you about to get married and metro boomin tell you he dont trust her”, which received 200 retweets and 327 likes.^[5] On February 26th, Drake tweeted “And on the off chance that Metro Boomin doesn’t trust you…well…,” which received 62,577 retweets and 63,405 likes.^[6]

Selections from Twitter in regards to the meme were collected by several mainstream publications, including Bossip^[7] and Complex^[8]. In addition, several examples of the meme were submitted to the /r/blackpeoplesubreddit, where they received hundreds of points.^[9] In addition, the meme spread to Vine, where there are currently 165 results for the phrase.^[10]

Notable Examples

Search Interest

not yet available

External References

About

#OnVautMieuxQueÇa (French for We Are Better Than This) is a hashtag campaign aimed at opposing a new draft bill meant to reform the French Labor Code. Online, A petition was launched, followed by the Twitter hashtag which has gained massive traction due to several Youtube celebrities showing their support for the movement.

Context

Through the end of 2015, a commission was hired by the French government to evaluate the current Labor Code and find points that could be changed, improved or removed. They issued their reports in late January 2016, leading to the official announcement of a major Labor Code reform under the name Loi du Travail (“Work Law”) and Loi El Khomri (“El Khomri Law”), coming from France current Work Minister Myriam El Khomri.
In early February 2016, the bill was leaked to the internet and the mainstream media which published several articles about the upcoming law set to be voted on March 9th^[1].

On February 19th, 2016, Feminist activist Caroline DE HAAS launched a petition on Change.org, directed at the Ministry of Work, in which she listed what she perceived as several flaws in the law that would result in workplace conditions, firing and wage abuse by employers^[2], calling for protests and opposition against it.
In a little more than a week, the petition gained more than 600 000 signatures.

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The petition page also links to a single-serving site presenting potential abuses that would be made legal by the law^[3].
On Twitter, the reform was heavily criticized under the hashtag #loitravail^[4] which was reported on by various new outlets.

[WIP]

#OnVautMieuxQueÇa

On February 24th, several French Youtubers united to make a video titled “On vaut mieux que ça”, French for We are better than this (shown below). In it, they exposed their viewpoints on the current situation and they ask for people to oppose the law. The video has gained over 100 000 views in the first two days of its release.

The hashtag #OnVautMieuxQueÇa^[5] began trending on Twitter, including people sharing their actual experience with workplace injustice and abuse. Again, this movement was reported on by numerous new outlets.

[WIP]

Response from the government

[WIP]

External References

WIP; feel free to request editorship.

About

“I Am a Simple Man” is a memorable quote uttered by the character Ron Swanson in an episode of American TV sitcom Parks and Recreation.

Origin

[researching]

Spread

[researching]

Search Interest

External References

About

#Trapcovers are covers of pop songs performed in a trap music style. The covers, and their related hashtag, became popular after members of the Black Twitter became angered by white women performing pop-style covers of hip hop songs, which often included “translating” the song from patois or Black American English^[1] into Standard American English.

Origin

On February 18th, 2016, a singer named Samantha Harvey posted a video to Facebook and YouTube in which she covered Rihanna’s “Work,” a song that is mostly sung in a Caribbean patois. In a now-deleted comment, Harvey wrote that she had to “translate” the lyrics before she could sing them, indicating that they were not in a proper English.^[2] Many white people commented that the cover was great because they could now understand the words to “Work.” The controversy was reported in several major outlets, including Paper Magazine.^[3]

On February 25th, Twitter user moisturizeds created a series of tweets where she spotlit white people singing "Work as well as Beyonce’s single “Formation”, in which the word “negro” is used; the tweets all received several thousand favorites and retweets each, and were collected in an article on web site Foxy. Later that day, the user NathanZed created a video of himself singing The Beatles’ “Hey Jude” in the style of trap music. In a subsequent tweet he explained that the video and the hashtag was a rebuttal for “white covers turnin’ party songs into elevator music.” The tweet received just under 11,000 retweets and 18,000 favorites in less than 24 hours. NathanZed also gave credit for the hashtag to another user, IllCapitano94, who also released a trap cover of Vanessa Carlton’s “A Thousand Miles” shortly after.

Spread

The hashtag #trapcover spread quickly after the two initial videos were made, as followers of NathanZed (he has over 150,000) quickly took to the format. User Yo_Its_Tree posted the first response, using the lyrics of Coldplay’s “Yellow”; the tweet received 1,400 retweets and over 2,000 likes. After more covers were posted, including ones of popular songs like Taylor Swift’s “Shake It Off” and “The Star Spangled Banner”, NathanZed reported that the hashtag was trending with more than 38,000 tweets. The hashtag was covered in mainstream publications like Jezebel and New York Magazine’s Vulture.

Notable Examples

Search Interest

Not Yet Available

External References

About

“The Sand Guardian” refers to a Vine of a man covered in sand claiming he is the sand guardian that was uploaded in September 2013. The Vine is frequently parodied in animations and comics.

Origin

On September 21st, 2013 Vine user Katiestrophic uploaded a video of a man buried in sand claiming he is the sand guardian, with another man shouting “Poseidon quivers before him!” As of February 27th 2016 the Vine has gained over 47 million loops, 280 thousand likes, 129 thousand revines, and 10 thousand comments.

Man 1: I am the sand guardian, guardian of the sand.
Man 2: Poseidon quivers before him!
Man 1: Fuck off!

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On December 11th, 2015 a dub over of the anime Hetalia was uploaded to Vine, where it gained over 40 thousand loops and 2 thousand likes.

On November 20th, 2014 a video of Groudon from Pokemon was uploaded, where Groudon acted as the sand guardian. The video has gained over 500 thousand views as of February 27th, 2016.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References

Work in progress.

About

The Iron Fist Casting Controversy refers to the uproar based on the race of the actor that has been cast for the Marvel superhero, and it spawned a hashtag #AAIronFist in favour of changing the casting.

Background

The Marvel superhero Iron Fist was created in 1974, who’s is a man who finds the ancient mystical city of K’un-L’un where he learned Kung Fu and how to produce supernatural energy from his fists. Marvel announced that there would be a series of some lesser known characters, including Iron Fist and on the 26th of February they cast the actor Finn Jones of Game of Thrones fame.

Notable Developements

[WIP]

External References

About

Too much ass is a catchphrase on 4chan that is associated with the country Ireland, where Irishmen are stereotyped as disliking big asses on women. It originated from 4chan’s /sp/ board.

Background

Flags were first added on /sp/ on July 2nd, 2012 for the 2012 Olympics.^[2] At that time, the impact of having flags was not fully felt yet, and stereotypes based on country had yet to be formed.

Origin

On July 6th, 2012, four days after flags were added, in a gymnastics thread made in preparation for the 2012 Summer Olympics in London, an image of the gymnast Bridgette Glass was posted.^[1] The first reply to the image had an Ireland flag, saying “too much ass, but that is hot as fuck”. The reply in turn generated over 30 replies, most of which greentexted “too much ass” with a > prefix.

Click to enlarge

Spread

During the following days, the phrase “too much ass” spread to other boards such as /v/ and /tv/.^[3] On boards with flags, every poster from Ireland was mocked with the reply “>too much ass”, and on boards without, any post with even a hint of disliking women’s asses that were “too big” would be seen as being posted by someone from Ireland.

Despite a number of Irish posters claiming that they did like women with big asses, the stereotype would stick.

Search Interest

External References

About

“Am I Out Of Touch” refers to a two pane image of Principle Skinner from The Simpsons. The comic is frequently used in edits and as a reaction image.

Origin

The two pane image originates from a scene in Season 5 The Simpsons episode “The Boy Who Knew Too Much”.^[1] In the scene, Principle Skinner is trying to catch Bart skipping school. When he does not find Bart at the places he used to visit, he questions if he is out of touch, resolving that “It’s the children who are wrong.”

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The two pane image was submitted to the /r/TheSimpsons subreddit^[2] on April 7th, 2014, where it gained over 662 points (93% upvoted) as of February 2nd, 2016.

A tumblr post with the image replying to a post about not connecting to the youth was posted on January 26th, 2015 where it has gained over 200 thousand notes as of February 27th, 2016.^[3]

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References

^[3]tumblr- gets zero notes on a post