The anonymous forum thrived when edgelord content wasn’t acceptable on more mainstream social media. Today, it can be found most anywhere.
I never used 4chan myself but I was in high school in the late 2000's and knew folks in my computer science classes who used to spend much time there. The late 2000's was before "mainstream social media" right? Only facebook.com was there and you could post whatever you wanted including "edgelord" stuff on facebook of the late 2000's as that version of facebook wasn't really moderated...
And then you had reddit also which at that time had many subreddits where you could post anything including 4chan stuff. I remember people on reddit back then complaining that reddit was for people too scared to go to 4chan. And I would laugh at the comments because they basically described me back then haha.
Mainstream social media stuff that this article talks about...that happened later in the 2010's....
Also it is still so surreal to me to see prestigious publications like the New Yorker talking about 4chan. Back in the 2000's and early 2010's 4chan was one of those super nerdy silly kinda dumb underground things that you didn't really talk about in public because it would be cringe worthy. I remember in 2016 when somebody shouted "PEPE!" at some Hillary Clinton rally and looking at the video of that and feeling cringe. The thought that history students in the future would have to study memes and the thought that people in the "real world" like CNN would be writing about some dumb silly nerd meme website was so bizzare. Even now in 2025 the fact that The New Yorker has this giant article about 4chan is so weird to me.
4chan...those "edgelord memes"....crazy reddit subreddits....Pepe the frog....
All these things were not supposed to change the "real world." Like I said earlier, I never used 4chan myself, but I really don't think anyone actually using 4chan or any of us using reddit back in the late 2000's or early 2010's ever imagined that anything posted on those sites would ever have any impact on the real world. The internet was just this place where nerdy people could go to post silly shit. What the hell happnened?
xg15•9mo ago
> What the hell happnened?
The people who did post on 4chan became adults. I say "became adults", not "grew up".
neom•9mo ago
Technically I think we were first with deviantART, 2000. Myspace was after us, only thing I know around the same was was Habbo Hotel, but it didn't come out of beta till 2001 iirc. Either way, I was dealing with edgelordies uploading crazy shit to dA long before 4chan. The things I've seen...
pixelpoet•9mo ago
The way deviantArt snatched defeat from the jaws of victory by repeatedly messing up everything regarding the large and numerous communities they had, leading to their eventual exodus (such as the fractal art community) is pretty legendary. They literally could just have done nothing (i.e. no harm, for example breaking dAmn) and just ride off into the sunset.
We're you responsible for that, as the Communities director? Because that was basically dA's self-inflicted and unprompted Brexit moment.
Nope, on the other side, I was throw out with Scott and Eric. They fired 6 of us "hippies". I've written about it a few times, I'm still pissed about... That group was all the kind hearted folks. Hi lyc!! I have 4 accounts since 1999.
pixelpoet•9mo ago
Ah, apologies for my somewhat combative question, and I'm relieved to hear you were on Team Sanity / just because money was spent doesn't make the new system better! So many updates that literally forced several communities centred around dAmn to move... now we have the current diaspora / balkanisation situation, and TBH I think many of us would have preferred to stay on old-dA.
I would love to read what you've written about that; as with Matt Pharr writing about Intel's internal compiler team politics, it's a fascinating insight into how some orgs are run.
Just ridiculously stupid, juvenile stuff. Being "edgy" on 4chan was often just copy-pasting the n-word or "JEWS" a thousand times. That feels really so tame to what goes on there now. Looking through this archive, it all feels so... disconnected from reality. It was all so fake and stupid.
These elite "hackers" were often just pwning people who reused passwords, and then posting gay porn on their MySpace. When Fox News did a report saying that "4chan are hackers on steroids. They can turn your computer into a bomb!", they all laughed because they knew they're not capable of that. And then Anonymous? I mean the V for Vendetta masks? So stupid lol.
It all changed as time went on. I remember seeing a tweet around 2015 that said something like "it's crazy how I can type something in this box that would destroy my life", except it wasn't a joke.
ViktorRay•9mo ago
Reading through the links you posted from the 2000's it's interesting how...innocent some of those users seem.
The word "innocent" may seem absurd to describe 4chan users...but those comments really do come off as being posted by kids in suburban middle class families who seem gleeful they can anonymously say things on a computer that they cannot say in real life at school or at home because their teachers or their parents would put them into time out or something...
I don't think anyone would ever use the word "innocent" to describe 4chan of the 2010's or nowadays though
HaZeust•9mo ago
There are high-stakes now, there are more volumes of people on these digital public squares, that are letting the jokes and the absurdism they encounter seep through their individual reality as beliefs and behaviors. At scale, this makes online trends and mannerism seep into our collective reality.
If only those who otherwise fell trap into these absurdist talking points had some perspective, something to lose, some dream to be held hostage - you could actually prevent this.
I wish there was a refund on wasted time on propaganda.
neom•9mo ago
I never got into 4chan because I used irc, looking at those threads, reads like irc logs.
soulofmischief•9mo ago
What exactly is stupid about Anonymous?
numpad0•9mo ago
yeah, anons and most user groups of toxic anonymous BBS are only stupid as in tasteless; not stupid as in having low INT and/or education. Too many people conflate those two.
4chan is composed of different boards. There's/b/ which used to be fun/funny to go to, back in the 00s up until probably 2012ish. There's /pol/ which has always been a shitshow and has become synonymous with "4chan" when people think of it these days. And a bunch of others. Think of it like maybe you go to /r/showerthoughts or /r/cats but you'd never step foot in /r/the_donald (when it existed) or /r/feet (not shaming, just using for range). The same goes for 4chan. Personally, I'd go to /b/ (random) or /m/ (mecha).
It was never cringe to talk about 4chan openly back then because most people didn't even know about it, and for those who did it was like a secret badge/nod to those who knew.
Before 2012 it was also a hub for Anonymous, lulzsec, and others, and was a force behind Occupy Wallstreet, protesting the church of scientology and spreading word about Lisa McPherson, taking down gov sites in protest, Stratfor leaks, and far more focused on taking action on issues related to civil liberties.
Then in 2012 it really went down hill after Jeremy Hammond got arrested, after Sabu snitched on him. Yes, moot owned the site, but I'm of the opinion that due to the arrest/snitching, moot had to go against the "anonymous" ethos of 4chan and give access to everything to the fbi for "national security" reasons because they got spooked after the whole Occupy movement and the activity of activists on the site. The whole site turned into total garbage in a really short period of time following, and became flooded with a completely different crowd, a ton of brainrot (more so than before), way more right leaning posts/posters, and wayyy more porn than usual filled boards like /b/. Then when moot started another business (or he got a higher position at one of the big tech companies... I forget) and sold off 4chan, it became an absolute cesspool for the things listed earlier.
Tldr - it used be good... stupid but good. Now it's garbage, full of maga bs, and brainrot.
Igrom•9mo ago
Moot first got engaged in growing Canvas Networks, then got a job at Google.
This post seems so weird to me. Coming from a generation on the internet in the late 90's.
> Back in the 2000's and early 2010's 4chan was one of those super nerdy silly kinda dumb underground things that you didn't really talk about in public because it would be cringe worthy.
> And then you had reddit also which at that time had many subreddits where you could post anything including 4chan stuff. I remember people on reddit back then complaining that reddit was for people too scared to go to 4chan.
> All these things were not supposed to change the "real world."
> The internet was just this place where nerdy people could go to post silly shit. What the hell happnened?
Social media was IRC and Hotline(Mac) and Usenet. The 4chan was Usenets' Alt. hierarchy. Not anything you used a web browser for.
Browsers were for surfing the World Wide Web, for finding personal and small business "homepage"'s and sharing information. Hotline and alt.binaries.* for "filez" or other "-z"'s. Public IRC for chats, but also whatever the reddit comment section is. Newsgroup readers for forum like things; except the newsgroup Alt hierarchy (other than .binaries), that was for things 4chan took over;one of those super nerdy silly kinda dumb underground things that you didn't really talk about in public because it would be cringe worthy. It was never suppose to make it on to the "real" internet, or change the "real world". (easy accessible things like 4chan)
The internet was for nerdy people to have their own corner of this newly connected world, where businesses could put their information for easier access than the yellow pages. A place to share your nerdy eclectic area of knowledge for others like you to find. What the hell happened?
Cpoll•9mo ago
> Also it is still so surreal to me to see prestigious publications like the New Yorker talking about 4chan.
It's happened now and again. And lesser publications love to talk about "hacker group Anonymous."
matrix87•9mo ago
> Also it is still so surreal to me to see prestigious publications like the New Yorker talking about 4chan
They have to acknowledge the internet, even if it's more plebian in nature, because that's where shit happens now. They aren't on the cutting edge of cultural commentary anymore. It's just yesterday's medium fighting to stay with the times
tiahura•9mo ago
Where else am I going to find coupons for a free X-Box?
y-curious•9mo ago
Or learn how to charge your phone via microwave
user9999999999•9mo ago
they just moved to x
Discordian93•9mo ago
I remember all type on /vp/ for HGSS, board was basically created to contain it because it was taking over other video game boards. Fun times, sad to see the fate of the site.
amadeuspagel•9mo ago
4chan isn't about edgelord content. It's about anonymity and a bump mechanism that rewards trolling.
ViktorRay•9mo ago
The anonymous forum thrived when edgelord content wasn’t acceptable on more mainstream social media. Today, it can be found most anywhere.
I never used 4chan myself but I was in high school in the late 2000's and knew folks in my computer science classes who used to spend much time there. The late 2000's was before "mainstream social media" right? Only facebook.com was there and you could post whatever you wanted including "edgelord" stuff on facebook of the late 2000's as that version of facebook wasn't really moderated...
And then you had reddit also which at that time had many subreddits where you could post anything including 4chan stuff. I remember people on reddit back then complaining that reddit was for people too scared to go to 4chan. And I would laugh at the comments because they basically described me back then haha.
Mainstream social media stuff that this article talks about...that happened later in the 2010's....
Also it is still so surreal to me to see prestigious publications like the New Yorker talking about 4chan. Back in the 2000's and early 2010's 4chan was one of those super nerdy silly kinda dumb underground things that you didn't really talk about in public because it would be cringe worthy. I remember in 2016 when somebody shouted "PEPE!" at some Hillary Clinton rally and looking at the video of that and feeling cringe. The thought that history students in the future would have to study memes and the thought that people in the "real world" like CNN would be writing about some dumb silly nerd meme website was so bizzare. Even now in 2025 the fact that The New Yorker has this giant article about 4chan is so weird to me.
4chan...those "edgelord memes"....crazy reddit subreddits....Pepe the frog....
All these things were not supposed to change the "real world." Like I said earlier, I never used 4chan myself, but I really don't think anyone actually using 4chan or any of us using reddit back in the late 2000's or early 2010's ever imagined that anything posted on those sites would ever have any impact on the real world. The internet was just this place where nerdy people could go to post silly shit. What the hell happnened?
xg15•9mo ago
The people who did post on 4chan became adults. I say "became adults", not "grew up".
neom•9mo ago
pixelpoet•9mo ago
We're you responsible for that, as the Communities director? Because that was basically dA's self-inflicted and unprompted Brexit moment.
Just noticed that my dA account is old enough to drink (in the US)! https://lyc.deviantart.com/
neom•9mo ago
pixelpoet•9mo ago
I would love to read what you've written about that; as with Matt Pharr writing about Intel's internal compiler team politics, it's a fascinating insight into how some orgs are run.
neom•9mo ago
qtoMPkuZe46ny•9mo ago
Right. The whole internet and the culture around it changed.
Early 4chan really was just stupid silly garbage. Did you know there's an archive of old 4chan posts from around 2006-2008?
https://old.sage.moe/b/thread/85525276 (sarah palin email "hack")
https://old.sage.moe/b/thread/9691632/ (just a random thread.)
https://old.sage.moe/_/articles/glossary/
Just ridiculously stupid, juvenile stuff. Being "edgy" on 4chan was often just copy-pasting the n-word or "JEWS" a thousand times. That feels really so tame to what goes on there now. Looking through this archive, it all feels so... disconnected from reality. It was all so fake and stupid.
These elite "hackers" were often just pwning people who reused passwords, and then posting gay porn on their MySpace. When Fox News did a report saying that "4chan are hackers on steroids. They can turn your computer into a bomb!", they all laughed because they knew they're not capable of that. And then Anonymous? I mean the V for Vendetta masks? So stupid lol.
It all changed as time went on. I remember seeing a tweet around 2015 that said something like "it's crazy how I can type something in this box that would destroy my life", except it wasn't a joke.
ViktorRay•9mo ago
The word "innocent" may seem absurd to describe 4chan users...but those comments really do come off as being posted by kids in suburban middle class families who seem gleeful they can anonymously say things on a computer that they cannot say in real life at school or at home because their teachers or their parents would put them into time out or something...
I don't think anyone would ever use the word "innocent" to describe 4chan of the 2010's or nowadays though
HaZeust•9mo ago
If only those who otherwise fell trap into these absurdist talking points had some perspective, something to lose, some dream to be held hostage - you could actually prevent this.
I wish there was a refund on wasted time on propaganda.
neom•9mo ago
soulofmischief•9mo ago
numpad0•9mo ago
thenthenthen•9mo ago
Lammy•9mo ago
Needs moar yellow van: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=128IR21ZQa0 (2007)
throwaway743•9mo ago
It was never cringe to talk about 4chan openly back then because most people didn't even know about it, and for those who did it was like a secret badge/nod to those who knew.
Before 2012 it was also a hub for Anonymous, lulzsec, and others, and was a force behind Occupy Wallstreet, protesting the church of scientology and spreading word about Lisa McPherson, taking down gov sites in protest, Stratfor leaks, and far more focused on taking action on issues related to civil liberties.
Then in 2012 it really went down hill after Jeremy Hammond got arrested, after Sabu snitched on him. Yes, moot owned the site, but I'm of the opinion that due to the arrest/snitching, moot had to go against the "anonymous" ethos of 4chan and give access to everything to the fbi for "national security" reasons because they got spooked after the whole Occupy movement and the activity of activists on the site. The whole site turned into total garbage in a really short period of time following, and became flooded with a completely different crowd, a ton of brainrot (more so than before), way more right leaning posts/posters, and wayyy more porn than usual filled boards like /b/. Then when moot started another business (or he got a higher position at one of the big tech companies... I forget) and sold off 4chan, it became an absolute cesspool for the things listed earlier.
Tldr - it used be good... stupid but good. Now it's garbage, full of maga bs, and brainrot.
Igrom•9mo ago
See: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19119576
1659447091•9mo ago
> Back in the 2000's and early 2010's 4chan was one of those super nerdy silly kinda dumb underground things that you didn't really talk about in public because it would be cringe worthy.
> And then you had reddit also which at that time had many subreddits where you could post anything including 4chan stuff. I remember people on reddit back then complaining that reddit was for people too scared to go to 4chan.
> All these things were not supposed to change the "real world."
> The internet was just this place where nerdy people could go to post silly shit. What the hell happnened?
Social media was IRC and Hotline(Mac) and Usenet. The 4chan was Usenets' Alt. hierarchy. Not anything you used a web browser for.
Browsers were for surfing the World Wide Web, for finding personal and small business "homepage"'s and sharing information. Hotline and alt.binaries.* for "filez" or other "-z"'s. Public IRC for chats, but also whatever the reddit comment section is. Newsgroup readers for forum like things; except the newsgroup Alt hierarchy (other than .binaries), that was for things 4chan took over;one of those super nerdy silly kinda dumb underground things that you didn't really talk about in public because it would be cringe worthy. It was never suppose to make it on to the "real" internet, or change the "real world". (easy accessible things like 4chan)
The internet was for nerdy people to have their own corner of this newly connected world, where businesses could put their information for easier access than the yellow pages. A place to share your nerdy eclectic area of knowledge for others like you to find. What the hell happened?
Cpoll•9mo ago
It's happened now and again. And lesser publications love to talk about "hacker group Anonymous."
matrix87•9mo ago
They have to acknowledge the internet, even if it's more plebian in nature, because that's where shit happens now. They aren't on the cutting edge of cultural commentary anymore. It's just yesterday's medium fighting to stay with the times