When it comes to writing our little lives, the Trickster God is a lazy, cliche-dependent novelist. The douchecanoe responsible for sluicing “The Fappening” upon our attention turns out to be just what anybody would have predicted — an unemployable oddball who is severely butthurt that (even) the Washington Post successfully tracked him down. Is there no privacy in this cold new world?!?…
And, of course, now comes another “reveal”, per Jessica Roy at NYMag:
Official internet garbage heap and misogynist watering hole Reddit made enough money off of those stolen nude celebrity photos to keep their expensive server racks running for almost a month, reports Wired.
The moderator of r/thefappening, the subreddit that published the photos until administrators banned it over the weekend, broke down just how much revenue his evil empire generated for Reddit. Thirty-three-year-old John Menese said users of r/thefappening bought enough $3.99 Reddit Gold subscriptions (like a premium account) to fund server costs for at least 27 days…
Roy was also responsible for the earlier “Should We Ban That Subreddit? A Flowchart Look Inside the Mind of Reddit Admins“, so… not a fan, I’m thinking. She linked there to Reddit administrator Yishan Wong’s extremely libertechnerd defense, “Every Man Is Responsible for His Own Soul“:
… [W]e are unlikely to make changes to our existing site content policies in response to this specific event.
The reason is because we consider ourselves not just a company running a website where one can post links and discuss them, but the government of a new type of community. The role and responsibility of a government differs from that of a private corporation, in that it exercises restraint in the usage of its powers…
Uh, no. Reddit is no kind of government, and it’s not a community so much as a whole bunch of communities using the same private corporation’s servers for their own ends, while being used by said private corporation as advertising clickfodder. Much like very large swathes of the internet, only with even less adult supervision!
I prefer the analogy that “the Internet” is a very large, mostly dysfunctional clan — brother against brother, brothers against cousins, cousins against the outside world. And Reddit is the snot-nosed, sticky-fingered, hyperactive Little Brother who gets access to more mature goodies than it can safely handle, because the older kids don’t want it ratting them out. (It also gets kicked around on the regular, sometimes just because those kids need an outlet, not that it doesn’t work at earning those beatdowns… )
lamh36
Just came across my twitter TL…
So basically, some low-level exec is gonna take the charge saying they “intercepted” the video before it got to Goodell and top NFL brass
ranchandsyrup
Gonna blogwhooore here too. My wife muses about Facebook
Mike in NC
Read today that Facebook is one of the richest companies in the world. Worth many billions. Bigger than Disney and several others.
Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)
Damn, AL, your whole thing seemed damned Irish, can you please translate it into WASP for the Hibernian impaired? That sarcasm aside, the Reddit folks don’t really understand what a government does. they may have established a “community;” we have one here. We don’t have a government. There is a difference – libertarians tend to discount both, so the fuck-up isn’t surprising.
piratedan
I’m sure that we can trust Mara, after all, he was the guy who came up with the collusion strategy a couple of years back to bring the NFLPA back into the fold and then found a way to make it legal for them to flout both the labor laws and penalize the owners that chose to challenge them. Totally stand up dude.
lamh36
Mike in dc
@lamh36: Predictable. Have a lower level guy fall on his sword to save Goodell. Presumably he is getting a nice golden parachute on the flip side.
srv
You people just don’t get Social Networks & Media.
Freddie de Bore tried to help bridge the gap between the youts and the olds here, but he was run off the lawn.
I haz a sad though, this was a perfect opportunity for you to drag the Snowman back onto the front page and you punted.
What happened to the days when John demanded one of you to “WIN THE MORNING!” I can only hope Obama’s War leads to a new era, perhaps one where Angry Sober John takes on his own dudebros like GG.
We need a war that gives our little lives meaning.
Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)
@piratedan: Mara’s niece is lovely though.
Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)
@srv:
Enlighten us. Please.
MattR
@Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name): I prefer Rooney’s ;)
(EDIT: errr, hmmm. Seems like Kate Mara may be a cousin of Art Rooney’s, not a niece. I blame Wikipedia and Obama)
srv
Shot across the bow! Who will fight the dudebro navy?
srv
Assault from rear! Oh, the humanity!
lamh36
Ok, now for a bit of the superficial. Let’s see how many people even know what I am talking about…lol.
So, have any of ya’ll heard of this new show on LOGO TV called “Secret Guide to Fabulous”. Essentially it’s Queer Eye for the 2010s I guess.
Meh…I just can’t get behind the show though. I mean aside from the Sean T dude from that “Hip Hop Abs” DVD, all it’s done was just make me miss the guys from Queer Eye For The Straight Guy!
srv
@Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name): You must embrace freedom first. Freedom is messy.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
Kissinger is on Colbert tonight. Now.
:-/
Cheers,
Scott.
max
@Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name): Damn, AL, your whole thing seemed damned Irish, can you please translate it into WASP for the Hibernian impaired?
Reddit dude started a forum called TheFappening and posted all the nude celebrity pics. Gloated over it, apparently. The WaPo wrote a profile of the um, anonymouse that indicated he posted to asexuality and Aspergers boards and that also he posted a lot in the Reddit cocaine forum. Turns out he’s 33 and kinda broke, presumably because he has a coke habit. AL is disgusted by the spreading of the nudies and loathes this jet-engined young fellow.
Then she goes on to bash Reddit for being a bunch of clueless assholes that call themselves a government.
I feel like I’m doing sign language translation, sorry that’s not what you were after.
Full disclosure: I might be an oddball, but I don’t do coke, read or post to Reddit, and have easily avoided seeing the celeb nudies. So I can say personally the guy doesn’t sound like an oddball or an eccentric to me, but an assholey dweeb, kinda like the PUA shooter in California.
max
[‘Your mileage may vary.’]
Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)
@srv: @srv: Please do try to work commenters in to a froth. Your trolling is well done, but it is still trolling. Have you considered fishing? It requires both mental and physical subtlety.
Starfish
@max: Wow. Thanks for explaining that. I didn’t understand what she was saying at all. It sounded like “I am old, and I am condescending about subcultures that I do not participate in.”
Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)
@max: I was just commenting on the clan on clan , brother on brother, element in her post. Nothing else.
scav
@lamh36: ooooooOoooo, a variant of blaming the social media intern. Obvious, as the larger game strategy is lookie me! I’m not guilty I’m incompetent! The buddies as indepenent investigators just makes me want to dig up John Finnemore on News of The World. It’s always reruns this time of year. . .
srv
@Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name): I can do physical, and I can do mental, but I can’t do them together.
Look, there’s a war on. You’re either with us or against us. Are you just going to join the masses of Obama haters and leave your President hanging?
Serious trolling is serious. Obama needs your support. Is BJ just going to roll over? It is time to dispatch the BJ Troll Force to the intertubes and fight the great fight.
Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)
@srv: Honestly, I feel bad that I ever took you seriously as a commenter. My bad.
lamh36
I’m watching episodes of the Golden Girls on Hallmark Channel. God I love this show now and I loved it then.
Watching the episode where Dorothy and Sophia were dressed like Sonny & Cher.
It’s funny how many social issues this show showcased with both heart and laughter. Man…love it.
RIP Rue, Bea and Estelle, and much love to the ageless Betty White!
srv
@Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name): So you’ve joined the milquetoast Obamabandoniers.
It’s up to the PUMAs and Newt to save this Presidency.
srv
You people know what’s really frightening?
When a Yahoo News comment section sounds like a bastion of pacifists and McCain bashers.
Obama and the Very Serious People are way out on a limb here.
KG
@lamh36: I really hope that they can’t find someone to fall on their sword and everyone of them says “we tried to give it to Goddell and he refused to watch it”
Southern Goth
@max:
I only read reddit for the programming subreddits/articles.
lamh36
And on this note I’m going to fuckin’ bed.
Sad to say, but from the video, at least one of these guys appears to be white? Which means maybe people will believe them?
Damnit.
New Michael Brown shooting witnesses describe scene
hilts
Stephen A. Smith has gone off his meds again:
“I’m sorry, I think this woman is off her rocker,” Smith said, referring to NOW President Terry O’Neill. “I think she’s lost her mind. That’s right, I said it.” “This is the most ridiculous nonsense I’ve ever heard in my life,” Smith said. “Roger Goodell deserves to lose his job? Why are you acting like he’s Ray Rice? Roger Goodell didn’t hit Janay Palmer Rice. He hasn’t hit any women. And by the way, the last time I checked, Skip, why are we talking about the NFL as if it’s some cesspool for domestic violence? There’s a few cases. It’s being dealt with…What the hell is this? That’s crazy!”
h/t http://www.mediaite.com/tv/espns-stephen-a-smith-loses-it-over-nows-call-for-goodell-resignation
srv
pandera
great post. you can write the the hell out of a thing when you feel like it. :-)
srv
kos speaketh:
Who will bear the white man’s burden? Onward, Christian Soldiers!
Cerulean Spork
if reddit is a government then most of its subreddits wld fall into the vicinity of The Shades . . . .
trollhattan
R.I.P Jaws.
Anne Laurie
@Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name):
Actually, I’ve been seeing variations on that line used all over discussions of the ongoing Middle East fustercluck!
cckids
This would fit better in the thread below, but it seems to be dead. Just in case the Faux News viewers aren’t freaked out enough by ISIS/IL, O’KEEFE RETURNS!!!
What do you suppose “fake Ebola” looks like??
Such a tool.
A Humble Lurker
@srv:
Yes, let’s listen to the cauldron stirrer.
Chris T.
I asked this in another thread (courtesy of google suggesting “take a messiah” => “take two and call me in the morning”) but now I’m curious enough to try it here: what is the proper plural form of “messiah”, given that the word comes in via Hebrew?
steve from Antioch
Reddit has something like 100 million unique monthly visitors so any claims about what it “is” are probably a bit of an overgeneralization.
Indeed, I saw scores – maybe hundreds – of posts on Reddit raising the same “if we don’t like NSA invasions of privacy, why is this any better” argument made in the linked “article.”
mclaren
“The fappening”? “Nude celebrity pix”?
Must be cloistered, ’cause I’ve never heard of any of this.
Oh, well, back to reading Joris-Karl Huysmans’ The Damned…
Yatsuno
@A Humble Lurker: Copulators of rodentia gotta copulate.
Major Major Major Major
The Internet is supposed to be a crazy libertarian wild-west paradise where nobody makes any rules and everybody agrees to voluntary standards to make sure that stuff actually works.
In reality, it’s a bunch of telco’s telling you to go pound sand.
Bob In Portland
Hmmm. Russia wants a more thorough investigation.
srv
bjacques
Ooohhh…a “government of a new type of community?”
That sounds like an open invitation to hack that “community” along the lines of “The Man That Corrupted Hadleyburg” or “The Monsters Are Due On Maple Street.” Reduce the “community” to a permanent jihad of all against all (like the last days of F*ckedCompany)), ending with the CEO setting himself on fire (or redditors burning him in a Wicker Man–I’m not choosy). A serious memetic attack.
Kennedy is still alive?
Cain
man, I am so totally drunk, it is nuts. I’m going to have to spend quite some time getting sober!
A Humble Lurker
@Bob In Portland:
Well now imagine that.
Mike J
@Southern Goth:
I read the minecraft forums. All in a tizzy over the rumored purchase of Mojang by Microsoft for $2,000,000,000. I can’t say I’d blame notch for taking the money, but it’s a pity what they’ll do to the game.
Elias
Regarding IS, everyone says we should drop Chuck Todd on ’em.
If we sent Chris Christie up to the Space Station he’d never refuse. The first governor in space. Give him a push out the door over the Iraq/Syria border. The explosion would rival Tunguska. IS would be done, courtesy of the ISS.
Cain
@srv:
Sounds kinda fucked up. They are all about The Hate. Of course, the fuck would be boo’ed off stage.
Cain
@max:
I like reddit, and I find things like /r/pollitics to be very liberal. It is great that there are so many people who agree with my point of view.
srv
@Cain: You’re welcome, it took years of trolling Truthers to make it slightly less inane.
You’d think the Anne Laurie’s of the Left would want to build bridges to all those aimless, unemployed and impressionable youts being tugged by the dark side of Civil Glibertarianism. It’s a veritable trove of De-Chomskyfied ISIS haters of late, ready to March with Obama and find a common cause to Courtesy Droning…
Villago Delenda Est
@srv: OK, it’s dangerous to channel Sarah Palin’s word salad generator. Could lead to drain bamage.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
ROFL Ye gods, talk about living down to expectations.
BruceFromOhio
At least, that how it sounded when I read it out loud.
Schlemazel [was Schlemizel till NotMax taught me proper yiddish!]
I drop by Reddit once in a while if I want to waste some time though I do know there are useful subreditts I don’t generally care. What I have seen is about what you would expect from an online place with millions of visitors. To try to classify it as any one thing would be useless. Generally speaking the community is liberal but there is a wicked subculture of Paultard glibetarians, they work like the flying monkeys, I once pointed out little Ayn’s issues & about 2 dozen descended on the thread to call me a doodie-head.
FWIW, and in no way a defense of /r/thefappening/ the people in charge did realize it was a mistake & attempted to give the money raised to some cancer research or (I was not paying attention so I don’t know which one) and they refused it. There are a lot of ‘man-children’ there
Aimai
@Starfish: if you werent paying attention to a hugely important story in the ongoing war between the mra/reddit/misogynists and all women everywhere i suppose you could think the post was obscure. I doubt if the rest of us found it confusing.
Alex S.
8/31/14 never forget…
Aimai
@Schlemazel [was Schlemizel till NotMax taught me proper yiddish!]: they did not “realize it was a mistake and try to give the money to cancer research” they tried to use a small gift to Prostate Cancer research–a cancer that effects only men–as a different form of fuck you to the women whose pictures had been stolen and publicly masturbated over in a distributed form of mass sexual assault.
Schlemazel [was Schlemizel till NotMax taught me proper yiddish!]
@Aimai: Ah, I see. As I said I was not really paying attention as I don’t really care about reditt. Thats different
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@Bob In Portland: I guess they can’t read either.
Hint: It was a Preliminary Report. The final report will take around a year. The investigation isn’t done yet.
(sigh)
Cheers,
Scott.
Lee
Reddit is exactly what you make it (just like the internet in general) which is why its tag line is ‘The front page of the internet’.
Apparently Anne’s tastes run toward the snot nosed hyper-actve little kid. Personally I tend more toward /askhistorians, /askscience,/asksocialscience,/economics, /aww & /nononoyes.
But everyone has different tastes.
Matt
Make no mistake – Reddit isn’t a techno-libertarian dream that’s devolved into warlordism. Warlordism IS the dream…
Billy K.
So much ignorance about Reddit. Honestly, Anne Laurie, you should read up a bit before posting something like this. I’ve come to expect better from you.
BTW, Reddit is owned by Conde-Nast, so if anyone feels the need to spew some uninformed techno-bile, that would be the general direction.
WaterGirl
Love the name – Reddit and Weep