American comedy website, founded 1999
Something Awful
(
SA
) is an American comedy website hosting content including
blog
entries,
forums
, feature articles, digitally edited pictures, and humorous media reviews. It was created by
Richard "Lowtax" Kyanka
in 1999 as a largely personal website, but as it grew, so did its contributors and content. The website has helped to perpetuate various
Internet phenomena
,
[1]
[2]
[3]
and it has been cited as an influence on
Internet culture
.
[4]
In 2018,
Gizmodo
placed it as 89th on their list of "100 Websites That Shaped the Internet as We Know It".
[5]
The website has been involved in a number of events. These include a conflict with the
Spam Prevention Early Warning System
, a
Hurricane Katrina
relief fund being caught in
PayPal
's
red tape
,
[6]
an exhibition boxing match between Kyanka and movie director
Uwe Boll
, and the creation of the
Slender Man
.
History
[
edit
]
Something Awful
was created by Richard "Lowtax" Kyanka.
[7]
Kyanka started
Something Awful
several months before leaving his previous job, after using his "Cranky Steve" persona to write a comedic website update deriding the attitude and work performance of a fellow
Planet Quake
administrator. He moved the "Cranky Steve" personality he had created to the
Something Awful
site in 1999.
[8]
In the years immediately following
Something Awful
's
launch, several sponsors, including
GameFan
and
eFront
, failed to compensate Kyanka as promised for advertising on the site.
[9]
[10]
In 2001, the site began charging an activation fee (currently
US$
10.00) for forum access.
[11]
Only members can post messages or threads; to encourage new registrations, the forums are only intermittently viewable by unregistered users. The site and forums draw continuous income from fees for new accounts, forum upgrades such as custom avatars and access to the forum archives and search features, and merchandise sales.
[11]
On October 9, 2020, following a backlash from the community in response to allegations that Kyanka was a domestic abuser,
[12]
Kyanka sold
Something Awful
to a fifteen-year member and moderator known under the
pseudonym
of Jeffrey of YOSPOS.
[12]
Following its sale, Kyanka was banned from
Something Awful
on March 23, 2021.
[13]
[
non-primary source needed
]
On November 9, 2021, Kyanka died by suicide.
[14]
Spam Prevention Early Warning System
[
edit
]
On July 20, 2003, the spam filtering organization
Spam Prevention Early Warning System
(SPEWS) added an entire class-B subnet with the
Cogent
ISP to their spammer list, since Cogent was hosting a known spammer that SPEWS found difficult to block.
[
citation needed
]
Something Awful
was added to the list in the process, disrupting its ability to communicate with its customers who were using SPEWS. Upon appeal, SPEWS initially refused to delist SA. The
Something Awful
administrators responded by telling their users to post their support in the
Usenet
newsgroup
news.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting
. However, that group and
news.admin.net-abuse.email
were flooded with off-topic posts and trolls from
Something Awful
users, incensing SPEWS advocates. The SA administrators claimed that SPEWS was attempting to hack the Something Awful server. Forum users responded by threatening to perform a
distributed denial of service
attack on SPEWS, although this type of behavior was strongly discouraged by Kyanka and assistant editor Zack Parsons.
[15]
GreenMeat Body Armor charity drive
[
edit
]
Something Awful forum user GreenMeat deployed to Iraq in 2004, despite his unit not having hard body armor. SA forum users, along with help from
Fark
users, raised over $20,000 to buy body armor, plate carriers, and assorted care packages for a group of 31 soldiers.
[16]
Hurricane Katrina charity
[
edit
]
As
Something Awful
's
servers
were located in
New Orleans
, the site temporarily went offline in August 2005 during the
flooding from Hurricane Katrina
. After the site was brought to a semi-functional state, Kyanka set up a link to a
PayPal
account where people could donate money to the survivors of the hurricane via the
Red Cross
. Kyanka put in $3,000 of his own money,
[17]
and promised to give some free merchandise to anyone who donated more than $10.
[
citation needed
]
PayPal froze the donation account, then stated that they would unfreeze the account once it was provided with proof of shipping from aggrieved buyers. Due to the nature of the collection, there were no actual "buyers", and it was impossible to provide proof of shipping for donation.
[18]
Eventually, Kyanka contacted a customer service representative over the phone, and asked to have PayPal donate all of the money to the
American Red Cross
. However, he was told that PayPal would only give the money to
United Way of America
due to their business affiliation; Kyanka initially agreed, but after receiving several emails from readers detailing alleged corruption and inefficiency within United Way, he changed his mind and told PayPal to refund all of the money to the individual donors. PayPal refunded the money, but did not refund exchange and handling fees for international donors.
[17]
Shooting deaths
[
edit
]
In 2005, William Freund sought advice in the
Something Awful
gun subforum about purchasing Hevi-Shot brand
ammunition
[19]
several days before embarking on a "shooting rampage", during which he killed two people before taking his own life. Freund had stated in the thread, which was closed before the killing spree, along with his ability to post comments being revoked, that he intended to use the ammunition to defend his Halloween pumpkins from vandals.
[20]
Uwe Boll fight
[
edit
]
In June 2006, Kyanka accepted an open challenge from German movie director
Uwe Boll
, who had offered to fight critics of his movies in a series of ten-round boxing matches.
Something Awful
had posted a humorous review that was critical of one of his films.
[21]
[22]
The event took place in
Vancouver
, Canada, on September 23, 2006; after being knocked down several times and eventually forfeiting the fight in the first round, Kyanka claimed that he had been told by Boll, a trained amateur boxer, that the fight would be just for show. To that effect, Kyanka purportedly acted like a
silent film
comedy
character during the fight rather than seriously attempting to fight Uwe Boll.
[23]
Death of Sean Smith
[
edit
]
Sean Smith
, a US Foreign Service Information Management Officer, as well as a Something Awful forum moderator and leading member of the
Goonswarm Federation
alliance (which originated in part from the Something Awful forums) in the video game
Eve Online
, was killed in the
2012 Benghazi Attack
on September 11, 2012.
Eve Online
players paid respect to Smith by renaming in-game space stations after him.
[24]
Site content
[
edit
]
The frontpage article series
Golan the Insatiable
is the basis of an animated series of the same name that premiered on
Animation Domination
on
Fox
on July 27, 2013.
[25]
In 2014, the
American Folklife Center
announced that
Something Awful
was one of the sites it would be archiving as part of its efforts to compile a history of digital culture.
[26]
Forums
[
edit
]
The site is home to a collection of
Internet forums
running a highly customized version of
vBulletin
, charging a one-time registration fee of US$9.95 for posting privileges and full access to the forums, with additional user account and forum features available for purchase at prices ranging from US$4.95 to US$29.95.
[27]
The forums have spread several
Internet memes
, such as "
all your base are belong to us
".
[2]
The forum's users refer to themselves as "Goons". A weekly activity is "Photoshop Phriday", where users will modify existing images to create parodies through the use of image-editing software such as
Adobe Photoshop
.
[28]
The website also highlights some of what its administrators believe to be exceptional forum threads in the Comedy Goldmine feature.
[29]
A forum member,
moot
, also launched
4chan
after
hentai
was banned,
[30]
[31]
and the
Let's Play
phenomenon originated in posts on the
Something Awful
forums.
Many originators of "
Weird Twitter
", including
dril
, originally posted in
Something Awful
's
Fuck You and Die forum.
[32]
The
Slender Man
urban legend
was created in a 2009 thread in the
Something Awful
forum.
[33]
The 2015 video game
Dropsy
originated as a 2008
CYOA
thread on the
Something Awful
forums.
[34]
See also
[
edit
]
References
[
edit
]
- ^
"Tourist of Death"
. Archived from
the original
on December 22, 2010
. Retrieved
November 24,
2006
.
[
unreliable source?
]
- ^
a
b
Johnston, Rich (February 28, 2001).
"All your base..."
Guardian Unlimited
. London
. Retrieved
November 24,
2006
.
- ^
"All Your Base Are Belong To Frogstar"
. Archived from
the original
on October 20, 2006
. Retrieved
November 24,
2006
.
- ^
David Thorpe,
Kevin Pereira
(July 5, 2005).
Somethingawful.com, Pink Five, Chris Gore
(television). G4 television.
- ^
"100 Websites That Shaped the Internet as We Know It"
.
Gizmodo
. October 19, 2018
. Retrieved
May 3,
2021
.
- ^
Mook, Nate (September 9, 2005).
"PayPal Blocks Hurricane Relief Funds"
.
BetaNews
.
Archived
from the original on April 10, 2021
. Retrieved
December 12,
2021
.
- ^
Lynch, Steven G.
"Rich "Lowtax" Kyanka"
. Retrieved
May 10,
2007
.
- ^
Kyanka, Richard (May 10, 2005).
"Here's Mud In Your Eye, Batman"
. Retrieved
May 10,
2007
.
- ^
Dan Knight (October 11, 2000).
"Something Awful & Express.com"
.
Low End Mac
.
- ^
Tim Johnson (March 13, 2001).
"eFront: What Went Wrong?"
.
The Duke of URL
. Archived from
the original
on February 2, 2002.
- ^
a
b
Jeremy Turnage (January 23, 2006).
"Something awfully funny"
. Archived from
the original
on February 25, 2007
. Retrieved
February 13,
2007
.
[
unreliable source?
]
- ^
a
b
Something Awful, a Cornerstone of Internet Culture, Is Under New Ownership
, by Matthew Gault; at
Vice
; published October 13, 2020; retrieved October 15, 2020
- ^
The Button
,
archived
from the original on December 12, 2021
, retrieved
March 24,
2021
- ^
Gault, Matthew (November 11, 2021).
"Richard 'Lowtax' Kyanka, Founder of Something Awful, Is Dead at 45"
.
Vice
. Retrieved
November 11,
2021
.
- ^
John Leyden (August 8, 2003).
"Something Awful going on with SPEWS"
.
The Register
. Situation Publishing Ltd.
- ^
https://www.somethingawful.com/news/update-from-frontlines/
- ^
a
b
Farivar, Cyrus (September 8, 2005).
"PayPal Freezes Out Katrina Aid"
.
Wired
. Retrieved
May 27,
2018
.
- ^
Demerjian, Charlie (September 4, 2005).
"All your donations are belong us"
. Archived from the original on December 13, 2009
. Retrieved
May 27,
2018
.
{{
cite news
}}
: CS1 maint: unfit URL (
link
)
- ^
"Something Awful forum post"
.
(subscription required)
- ^
Kimi Yoshino (November 6, 2005).
"The Cyber World Shut Out O.C. Loner Too"
.
LA Times
.
- ^
Kietzmann, Ludwig (September 25, 2006).
"Uwe Boll does something awful to another critic"
. joystiq
. Retrieved
March 12,
2007
.
- ^
Chris Baker (December 1, 2006).
"Raging Boll"
.
Wired
. Retrieved
March 12,
2007
.
- ^
Tillson, Tamsen (September 24, 2006).
"Boll K.O.'s crix in the ring"
.
Variety
. Archived from
the original
on June 9, 2007
. Retrieved
May 10,
2007
.
- ^
Beckhusen, Robert (September 12, 2012).
"Diplomat Killed In Libya Told Fellow Gamers: Hope I 'Don't Die Tonight'
"
.
Wired
. Retrieved
March 28,
2018
.
- ^
Byrne, Craig (February 28, 2013).
"FOX Announces Season Finale Dates & Summer Premieres"
.
FOX
. KSiteTV
. Retrieved
March 1,
2013
.
- ^
Getting serious about collecting and preserving digital culture
, by Nicole Saylor, at
Folklife Today
(at the
Library of Congress
); published June 5, 2014; retrieved December 15, 2014
- ^
"Something Awful Secure Purchase System"
. Retrieved
April 18,
2009
.
- ^
"Photoshop Phriday"
. Something Awful
. Retrieved
February 2,
2008
.
- ^
"Comedy Goldmine"
. Something Awful
. Retrieved
February 2,
2008
.
- ^
Jerry Langton (September 22, 2007).
"Funny how 'stupid' site is addictive"
.
The Toronto Star
. Retrieved
July 16,
2008
.
- ^
Rich Stanton (November 11, 2021).
"Richard 'Lowtax' Kyanka, founder of Something Awful and onetime king of the internet goons, dead at 45"
.
PCGamer
.
- ^
Weird Twitter: The Oral History
- ^
Blistein, Jon (February 19, 2015).
"Images From Slender Man Stabbing Suspect's Notebook Surface"
.
Rolling Stone
. Retrieved
March 8,
2015
.
- ^
Gera, Emily (July 17, 2013).
"Dropsy: The surreal adventure game the Internet made"
.
Polygon
.
Vox Media
. Retrieved
July 4,
2015
.
External links
[
edit
]