Les Horrible Cernettes

July 10, 2012 4:31 PM

The First Photo on the Web: A story of crossdressing, particle physics, humorous science-based novelty songs, and terrible photoshop.
posted by The Whelk (14 comments total)

This photo is almost a prophesy of what the web would come to be.
posted by justsomebodythatyouusedtoknow at 5:03 PM on July 10, 2012 [2 favorites]

The first photographic image ever uploaded to the Web was a Photoshop disaster.

It could be worse -- at least Silvano de Gennaro didn't use Comic Sans for the text.
posted by Chinese Jet Pilot at 5:07 PM on July 10, 2012

So I come home and my girlfriend tells me that her entertainment at work today was seeing a friend facebook-link to a VICE article on The First Picture On the Internet and then watching it pop up on her news reader in intervals as Fox, HuffPo, etc. picked it up and reposted.

When she gets back from her run I will tell her that I have seen it in my own corner of the internet too, and that the circle is now complete.

Of all the other "first picture"s out there, this one probably best fits its context.
posted by postcommunism at 5:13 PM on July 10, 2012

Also, when she said that "the guy who did it" was into cross dressing, I had no idea she was talking about Tim Berners-Lee.
posted by postcommunism at 5:18 PM on July 10, 2012

So, believe it or not, the picture isn't image isn't actually showing up when I try to load the page.

And I keep trying to desperately try to reload it so I can see it.

Which, oddly reminds me of much of my earliest 'pictures over the web' memories as well.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 5:20 PM on July 10, 2012 [3 favorites]

It could be worse -- at least Silvano de Gennaro didn't use Comic Sans for the text.

Thankfully, Comic Sans hadn't even been invented yet when that image was created.
posted by zsazsa at 5:32 PM on July 10, 2012

Collider really is a charming song.
posted by sawdustbear at 5:34 PM on July 10, 2012

Yeah, the Cernettes are absolutely slaying over in my house tonight. "Collider" is hilarious. (It also has lots of shots of Crays just kind of strewn around like furniture.) It's one of the nerdiest things I have ever seen.
posted by Scientist at 6:58 PM on July 10, 2012

"cross-dressing"? Sigh, the inability of the rest of the world to understand pantomime once again causes huge confusion and misunderstanding. Let us hope that at least this time we avoid a repeat of the Widow Twankey incident which laid waste to so much of Trieste in the 1890's.
posted by fallingbadgers at 8:00 PM on July 10, 2012 [4 favorites]

Hey! I went to college with the author of that article. Go Abe!
posted by ocherdraco at 10:06 PM on July 10, 2012 [1 favorite]

Unfortunately the gals are calling it quits.
This Aug. 9th is their last performance.
posted by quazichimp at 12:19 AM on July 11, 2012

Sigh, the inability of the rest of the world to understand pantomime once again causes huge confusion and misunderstanding.

Or in other words, TBL is into cross-dressing to the same extent as Terry Jones of Monty Python: i.e. for comedy performance purposes only.
posted by rory at 1:04 AM on July 11, 2012 [2 favorites]

Also, that isn't terrible Photoshop for 1992. That's pretty good for 1992. It would even have been par for the course in 1999.
posted by rory at 1:10 AM on July 11, 2012 [1 favorite]

rory: Also, that isn't terrible Photoshop for 1992. That's pretty good for 1992. It would even have been par for the course in 1999.

Even as we speak, Iranian agents are putting out resume inquiries to the artist.
posted by IAmBroom at 1:24 PM on July 11, 2012