Crowdsourcing the Uncanny
January 6, 2014 8:33 PM Subscribe
"With a flood of dark memes and viral horror stories, the internet is mapping the contours of modern fear" - How creepypasta is reinventing folklore, via io9.
Core Theory is nerdy garbage that tries to take something the entire point of which is to be ultimately vague and ineffable and systematize and categorize it. It's like making D&D stats for Existential Dread.
Some good modern web horror/creepypastas:
I found a video tape on the beach a few weeks ago.
The Rake, the only monster that's really taken off other than Slendy. It appears in EveryManHybrid.
White with Red Eyes
posted by Pope Guilty at 8:56 PM on January 6, 2014 [5 favorites]
Some good modern web horror/creepypastas:
I found a video tape on the beach a few weeks ago.
The Rake, the only monster that's really taken off other than Slendy. It appears in EveryManHybrid.
White with Red Eyes
posted by Pope Guilty at 8:56 PM on January 6, 2014 [5 favorites]
See ya! I'll be reading with the covers pulled up over my head alllllll night.
posted by Elsa at 9:10 PM on January 6, 2014 [1 favorite]
posted by Elsa at 9:10 PM on January 6, 2014 [1 favorite]
I'm not sure what I was thinking when I clicked on some of these links right before bed.
But I'm sure whatever it was, I'll have plenty of time to think it when I'm still wide awake at 4am, listening to every crackle, thud and bump in the heating system and wondering which of them aren't just metal expanding.
posted by jacquilynne at 9:18 PM on January 6, 2014 [3 favorites]
But I'm sure whatever it was, I'll have plenty of time to think it when I'm still wide awake at 4am, listening to every crackle, thud and bump in the heating system and wondering which of them aren't just metal expanding.
posted by jacquilynne at 9:18 PM on January 6, 2014 [3 favorites]
God, I love this stuff. There's only one rule to remember. Always, always check the file extension, and never, never click on .gif.
posted by Ghidorah at 9:18 PM on January 6, 2014 [12 favorites]
posted by Ghidorah at 9:18 PM on January 6, 2014 [12 favorites]
It's morally wrong to post this sort of thing after sunset.
I'll retaliate with a relatively benign example from the internet's leading containment facility for creepypasta, the SCP Foundation: SCP-1981
posted by justsomebodythatyouusedtoknow at 9:19 PM on January 6, 2014 [13 favorites]
I'll retaliate with a relatively benign example from the internet's leading containment facility for creepypasta, the SCP Foundation: SCP-1981
posted by justsomebodythatyouusedtoknow at 9:19 PM on January 6, 2014 [13 favorites]
jacquilynne, shhhh, come hide under here with me. We're safe as long as we keep the blankets on.
posted by Elsa at 9:21 PM on January 6, 2014 [1 favorite]
posted by Elsa at 9:21 PM on January 6, 2014 [1 favorite]
The thing is, as much as I love this stuff, I can't play any kind of scary/horror video game. Anything FPS with monsters that jump out, anything freaky.
It all goes back to Stephen King, and It, which gave me my biggest irrational fear. I'm terrified that the horrible monster on screen will stop doing whatever it's doing, and look directly at the camera. Except it's not looking at the camera, it's looking directly at me, and will then jump up and force it's way through the TV and, well, I doubt it would be asking me if I'd like to have some tea.
posted by Ghidorah at 9:22 PM on January 6, 2014 [6 favorites]
It all goes back to Stephen King, and It, which gave me my biggest irrational fear. I'm terrified that the horrible monster on screen will stop doing whatever it's doing, and look directly at the camera. Except it's not looking at the camera, it's looking directly at me, and will then jump up and force it's way through the TV and, well, I doubt it would be asking me if I'd like to have some tea.
posted by Ghidorah at 9:22 PM on January 6, 2014 [6 favorites]
I was halfway through the article when my cat jumped on the bed, resulting in infarctions all around.
posted by Lemmy Caution at 9:23 PM on January 6, 2014 [9 favorites]
posted by Lemmy Caution at 9:23 PM on January 6, 2014 [9 favorites]
as jacquilynne walks towards the bedroom, a hand snakes out of the linen closet and pulls her inside. Elsa puts a finger over her lips and says "I know, I heard the voice too"
posted by Ghidorah at 9:24 PM on January 6, 2014 [19 favorites]
posted by Ghidorah at 9:24 PM on January 6, 2014 [19 favorites]
The thing is, as much as I love this stuff, I can't play any kind of scary/horror video game.
I downloaded the Slenderman game well over a year ago. I have never played for more than a scant few minutes because I can't stand all that running around in the dark, wondering what might come looming out of it. I mean, I haven't even played it long enough for anything to happen. Just seeing the darkness spread out beyond the tiny beam of flashlight gets to me.
posted by Elsa at 9:28 PM on January 6, 2014 [3 favorites]
I downloaded the Slenderman game well over a year ago. I have never played for more than a scant few minutes because I can't stand all that running around in the dark, wondering what might come looming out of it. I mean, I haven't even played it long enough for anything to happen. Just seeing the darkness spread out beyond the tiny beam of flashlight gets to me.
posted by Elsa at 9:28 PM on January 6, 2014 [3 favorites]
My eldest son is a total scaredycat and he's just at the age where he is discovering stuff like this. I probably should not let him know about creepypasta...
posted by KokuRyu at 9:31 PM on January 6, 2014 [2 favorites]
posted by KokuRyu at 9:31 PM on January 6, 2014 [2 favorites]
I'm terrified that the horrible monster on screen will stop doing whatever it's doing, and look directly at the camera. Except it's not looking at the camera, it's looking directly at me, and will then jump up and force it's way through the TV and, well
Never ever read Arthur Porges' 'The Mirror', Ghidorah.
posted by jamjam at 9:33 PM on January 6, 2014 [4 favorites]
Never ever read Arthur Porges' 'The Mirror', Ghidorah.
posted by jamjam at 9:33 PM on January 6, 2014 [4 favorites]
I found a camera in the woods... (There's a 2004 MeFi thread about this, but it looks like all the links are now dead.)
posted by Guy Smiley at 9:33 PM on January 6, 2014 [3 favorites]
posted by Guy Smiley at 9:33 PM on January 6, 2014 [3 favorites]
God, I love this stuff. There's only one rule to remember. Always, always check the file extension, and never, never click on .gif.
Never trust an imgur link if you're going by this rule, because you can throw any old extension you want on those and they'll still work.
posted by jason_steakums at 9:34 PM on January 6, 2014 [2 favorites]
Never trust an imgur link if you're going by this rule, because you can throw any old extension you want on those and they'll still work.
posted by jason_steakums at 9:34 PM on January 6, 2014 [2 favorites]
The thing is, as much as I love this stuff, I can't play any kind of scary/horror video game. Anything FPS with monsters that jump out, anything freaky.
I was doing pretty well in Amnesia til I came to the bit where you're in a slightly flooded basement. You can see the footsteps of something invisible walking in the water, but if you're not in the water it can't get you. Fair enough, so let's just pick our way from pile of rubble to pile of rubble to pile of rubble to... oh. Oh dear, I'm going to have to run across open water to get to that, aren't I?
Oh well, I didn't need to see the rest of this game. Or still have Amnesia installed.
posted by Pope Guilty at 9:38 PM on January 6, 2014 [10 favorites]
I was doing pretty well in Amnesia til I came to the bit where you're in a slightly flooded basement. You can see the footsteps of something invisible walking in the water, but if you're not in the water it can't get you. Fair enough, so let's just pick our way from pile of rubble to pile of rubble to pile of rubble to... oh. Oh dear, I'm going to have to run across open water to get to that, aren't I?
Oh well, I didn't need to see the rest of this game. Or still have Amnesia installed.
posted by Pope Guilty at 9:38 PM on January 6, 2014 [10 favorites]
I was just remembering the first time I watched The Ring.* I was home, alone, and it was about one am. I'd already turned down the lights, popped in the DVD to let it go through the annoying Coming Soon stuff, and walked over to the stove to make some jiffy-pop. Most DVD menus show bits of the movie, have a little theme music playing. The Ring menu? It plays bits of the tape from the movie, complete with horrifically jarring sounds and noises. I wasn't, in anyway prepared for it, and it freaked me right the fuck out.
* The American version is... well, it's just better. The Japanese one is badly dated, and the 'special effects' (ooh, lets turn the film negative!) are painfully bad. Juon, on the other hand, is better than The Grudge, though there, the American version isn't bad at all.
posted by Ghidorah at 9:50 PM on January 6, 2014 [3 favorites]
* The American version is... well, it's just better. The Japanese one is badly dated, and the 'special effects' (ooh, lets turn the film negative!) are painfully bad. Juon, on the other hand, is better than The Grudge, though there, the American version isn't bad at all.
posted by Ghidorah at 9:50 PM on January 6, 2014 [3 favorites]
* The American version is... well, it's just better.
Jesus, no.
posted by Artw at 9:56 PM on January 6, 2014 [12 favorites]
Jesus, no.
posted by Artw at 9:56 PM on January 6, 2014 [12 favorites]
I don't know if Ted's caving page is strictly creepypasta, but it is on the creepypasta wiki, and it is certainly creepy.
posted by zeptoweasel at 9:57 PM on January 6, 2014 [20 favorites]
posted by zeptoweasel at 9:57 PM on January 6, 2014 [20 favorites]
Ted the caver is absolutely early web horror, and there's a reason it's endured.
posted by Pope Guilty at 10:00 PM on January 6, 2014 [5 favorites]
posted by Pope Guilty at 10:00 PM on January 6, 2014 [5 favorites]
I wonder if the "haunted eBay painting" (AKA The Hands Resist Him) is the first example of this. It's certainly the first one I remember being all over the place online.
posted by Rangeboy at 10:03 PM on January 6, 2014 [3 favorites]
posted by Rangeboy at 10:03 PM on January 6, 2014 [3 favorites]
Ted's Caving Page is so good. Not exactly creepypasta but exactly in the spirit of it. When I'm feeling stressed or anxious about life I read creepypasta and it has a strange normalising effect on me.
posted by dobie at 10:04 PM on January 6, 2014 [1 favorite]
posted by dobie at 10:04 PM on January 6, 2014 [1 favorite]
I was really into Morrowind for a while, so I thought this Morrowind creepypasta was really well done.
It's about a mod and its origins in the dark corners of the internet is plausible, then you get the story of the guy who can crack the code to the mod, and then...
It builds slowly and if you've played Morrowind you just get gradually more terrified. Great stuff.
posted by mcmile at 10:06 PM on January 6, 2014 [3 favorites]
It's about a mod and its origins in the dark corners of the internet is plausible, then you get the story of the guy who can crack the code to the mod, and then...
It builds slowly and if you've played Morrowind you just get gradually more terrified. Great stuff.
posted by mcmile at 10:06 PM on January 6, 2014 [3 favorites]
Candle Cove is still my favorite creepypasta. This is my favorite expansion of it, about a journalist who starts looking into this mysterious Candle Cove show.
posted by yasaman at 10:09 PM on January 6, 2014 [6 favorites]
posted by yasaman at 10:09 PM on January 6, 2014 [6 favorites]
It's interesting to me how much of this is in the Frankenstein vein of science overreach turning to Gothic menace, though rarely with the dedicated technophobia of Shelley. Is it because we just don't understand so much of the tech around us that we start to fear it?
In any event, the ones that I really like are the ones based on madness instead of the supernatural. While I tend to think of folklore as fun and cool to explore, it just doesn't spook me the same way that derangement does. (And not even violent, honestly. Though usually the best end in suicide.)
posted by klangklangston at 10:13 PM on January 6, 2014
In any event, the ones that I really like are the ones based on madness instead of the supernatural. While I tend to think of folklore as fun and cool to explore, it just doesn't spook me the same way that derangement does. (And not even violent, honestly. Though usually the best end in suicide.)
posted by klangklangston at 10:13 PM on January 6, 2014
Ahh creepypasta, where Borges meets 4chan. Or more specifically, where "The world will be Tlön. I pay no attention to all this and go on revising, in the still days at the Adrogue hotel, an uncertain Quevedian translation (which I do not intend to publish) of Browne's Urn Burial" meets "THEN WHO WAS PHONE?"
posted by infinitewindow at 10:26 PM on January 6, 2014 [24 favorites]
posted by infinitewindow at 10:26 PM on January 6, 2014 [24 favorites]
Polybius. Was it Toasty Frog that had the Polybius article with the screamer on it? That article got me twice.
Haunted Majora's Mask is definitely the best of the whole glitchy, haunted video game cartridge genre. Sort of related: If you want to play a video game that revolves around you playing a cursed 8-bit RPG (something along those lines), you can check out Nameless Game for the DS.
posted by Redfield at 10:29 PM on January 6, 2014 [1 favorite]
Haunted Majora's Mask is definitely the best of the whole glitchy, haunted video game cartridge genre. Sort of related: If you want to play a video game that revolves around you playing a cursed 8-bit RPG (something along those lines), you can check out Nameless Game for the DS.
posted by Redfield at 10:29 PM on January 6, 2014 [1 favorite]
One day one of these things is gonna turn real and start murdering and committing unspeakable obscenities on people IRL, you mark my words.
posted by save alive nothing that breatheth at 11:17 PM on January 6, 2014 [5 favorites]
posted by save alive nothing that breatheth at 11:17 PM on January 6, 2014 [5 favorites]
This shit weirds me out. Especially knowing it's all under an umbrella and I can go looking for it too easily.
Here are some good ideas I'd like to develop into nightmare fuel, or just exorcise:
One time there was a series of Dell Computers (GX150) that we had in small minority (10 machines out of 200) or so. Over time we discovered that these computers would spontaneously reboot when certain images were brought on-screen. Usually a flurry of specific activity would trigger it, and typically if you were connected to a machine with VNC (a remote accessmsupport / administration tool) there was a chance the machine would reboot when you disconnected and the user's wallpaper was restored (which otherwise slowed down the remote access).
This was a hard reboot, as in the power supply would audibly click. Eventually the person who experienced the problem most (1-2 times a month) found a JPG file that would reproduce the problem every time. And you could open the JPG in different viewers, convert it to different formats, take a screen shot of it, etc.
So I realized the actual act of displaying the image in video RAM was triggering the issue at any color depth, resolution setting, etc. It happened in Linux and Windows. I sent the file to the other GX150 users and 8 out of 10 had the problem. These machines were out of warranty but the problem was weird enough (I could find nothing about it online) that I reported it to Dell on a lark.
I reported the problem to Dell and was pretty good at using their email form at the time to get a tech out without any back-and-forth. Sure as shit they said they'd be out the next day to replace the motherboards free of charge despite being a year out of warranty.
The tech was incredulous being a random outsourced guy but had worked with this model and never seen it before. I reproduced the problem for him and a new motherboard with the same revision number resolved the issue. He was unable to "tattoo" the new motherboards with service tags from the previous motherboard, a typical practice to ensure your computer "knew" its service tag within any operating system. It just wouldn't take.
So far this is all true except for the reason he didn't tattoo them (I don't know, probably laziness)...but while he was working on the replacements I had one machine up and tried downsizing the image down to ridiculous levels until it was nothing but a single pixel of RGB(78,83,65). This would still create the issue. I created a fresh new image by hand with the same single pixel RGB and couldn't reproduce the issue, and instead got a giant blue STOP error, except it said
STOP.
With no error codes
posted by lordaych at 11:22 PM on January 6, 2014 [34 favorites]
Here are some good ideas I'd like to develop into nightmare fuel, or just exorcise:
One time there was a series of Dell Computers (GX150) that we had in small minority (10 machines out of 200) or so. Over time we discovered that these computers would spontaneously reboot when certain images were brought on-screen. Usually a flurry of specific activity would trigger it, and typically if you were connected to a machine with VNC (a remote accessmsupport / administration tool) there was a chance the machine would reboot when you disconnected and the user's wallpaper was restored (which otherwise slowed down the remote access).
This was a hard reboot, as in the power supply would audibly click. Eventually the person who experienced the problem most (1-2 times a month) found a JPG file that would reproduce the problem every time. And you could open the JPG in different viewers, convert it to different formats, take a screen shot of it, etc.
So I realized the actual act of displaying the image in video RAM was triggering the issue at any color depth, resolution setting, etc. It happened in Linux and Windows. I sent the file to the other GX150 users and 8 out of 10 had the problem. These machines were out of warranty but the problem was weird enough (I could find nothing about it online) that I reported it to Dell on a lark.
I reported the problem to Dell and was pretty good at using their email form at the time to get a tech out without any back-and-forth. Sure as shit they said they'd be out the next day to replace the motherboards free of charge despite being a year out of warranty.
The tech was incredulous being a random outsourced guy but had worked with this model and never seen it before. I reproduced the problem for him and a new motherboard with the same revision number resolved the issue. He was unable to "tattoo" the new motherboards with service tags from the previous motherboard, a typical practice to ensure your computer "knew" its service tag within any operating system. It just wouldn't take.
So far this is all true except for the reason he didn't tattoo them (I don't know, probably laziness)...but while he was working on the replacements I had one machine up and tried downsizing the image down to ridiculous levels until it was nothing but a single pixel of RGB(78,83,65). This would still create the issue. I created a fresh new image by hand with the same single pixel RGB and couldn't reproduce the issue, and instead got a giant blue STOP error, except it said
STOP.
With no error codes
posted by lordaych at 11:22 PM on January 6, 2014 [34 favorites]
That's 90% real stuff but I have another fucking one, where I wrote an old school text file describing a weird one-off utility I built. The text file has been identified as malware from day one -- I didn't use antivirus in 1993 or whatever, but some of my friends freaked out when it was identified as a virus and told me about it. I fired up F-PROT and sure enough, it was quarantined. The actual executable wasn't flagged at all, and what it did was modify a single line of "Quake C" that was visible as plain text inside some of the original Quake demo data files. This demo had no monsters but there was plenty of code and textures for them all including the shambler. I just had to figure out what their names were and could summon a single instance of them accordingly.
I could never figure out what part of that text file was causing the issue. It was a program called LHQHACK.TXT so I figured the "HACK" in the file name might be it, but that had nothing to do with it, renaming the file still triggered detection and still does to this day, but I could never remember the name of the virus until I tried to open it now. I never really understood why the "shambler" was so creepy.
VMLFMRRO'F REK;WK;EK;WL
posted by lordaych at 11:27 PM on January 6, 2014 [1 favorite]
I could never figure out what part of that text file was causing the issue. It was a program called LHQHACK.TXT so I figured the "HACK" in the file name might be it, but that had nothing to do with it, renaming the file still triggered detection and still does to this day, but I could never remember the name of the virus until I tried to open it now. I never really understood why the "shambler" was so creepy.
VMLFMRRO'F REK;WK;EK;WL
posted by lordaych at 11:27 PM on January 6, 2014 [1 favorite]
It barely even exists to this day, in name only in a single place
posted by lordaych at 11:30 PM on January 6, 2014 [1 favorite]
posted by lordaych at 11:30 PM on January 6, 2014 [1 favorite]
Kris Straub’s ‘Candle Cove’, a ‘lost TV show’ story and certainly among the best creepypasta out there
This is the one story I found and read and... meh. Either I'm too jaded, or the fun is in what these stories start (as I see upthread there are variations etc.) but this wasn't particularly scary or believable as forum posts to me. Surely creative but seems like it could've been written in about 20 minutes.
posted by cell divide at 11:38 PM on January 6, 2014
This is the one story I found and read and... meh. Either I'm too jaded, or the fun is in what these stories start (as I see upthread there are variations etc.) but this wasn't particularly scary or believable as forum posts to me. Surely creative but seems like it could've been written in about 20 minutes.
posted by cell divide at 11:38 PM on January 6, 2014
"For sale: baby scalp, never worn."
posted by rifflesby at 12:09 AM on January 7, 2014 [17 favorites]
posted by rifflesby at 12:09 AM on January 7, 2014 [17 favorites]
Noseybonk is fake, right? Please reassure me that Noseybonk is well-done creepypasta and was not an actual character in a television show intended for children....or anyone, actually.
posted by Uniformitarianism Now! at 12:11 AM on January 7, 2014 [1 favorite]
I kind of love creepypasta like Candle Cove, Dead Bart, and Suicide Mouse, because it captures the real feeling of having seen something weird and scary on TV when you were a kid, swearing that it was a dream, and suddenly finding a few people that can confirm that they saw the same thing.
It's usually something that happened long enough ago that the technology didn't exist to record it, or it's short enough that nobody thought to do so.
And it's a real enough phenomenon: Check out this entry on the Lost Media Wiki about Cracks (1975) a rarely aired Sesame Street short that frightened not a few children back in the day.
Maybe I just enjoy it because, as messed up as the stories sometimes are, I have been rewired to think there is MEDIA TREASURE somewhere in there, and even if it's a load of horseshit, it still hits my "OOOH DISCOVERY TIEM" buttons.
posted by louche mustachio at 12:25 AM on January 7, 2014 [12 favorites]
It's usually something that happened long enough ago that the technology didn't exist to record it, or it's short enough that nobody thought to do so.
And it's a real enough phenomenon: Check out this entry on the Lost Media Wiki about Cracks (1975) a rarely aired Sesame Street short that frightened not a few children back in the day.
Maybe I just enjoy it because, as messed up as the stories sometimes are, I have been rewired to think there is MEDIA TREASURE somewhere in there, and even if it's a load of horseshit, it still hits my "OOOH DISCOVERY TIEM" buttons.
posted by louche mustachio at 12:25 AM on January 7, 2014 [12 favorites]
Noseybonk is real! Noseybonk is an actual character from a show called Jigsaw... maybe we'll just quit while we aren't too far behind.
posted by louche mustachio at 12:30 AM on January 7, 2014 [2 favorites]
posted by louche mustachio at 12:30 AM on January 7, 2014 [2 favorites]
God, I love this stuff. There's only one rule to remember. Always, always check the file extension, and never, never click on .gif.
You need to check the Content-Type header. It's the only way to be sure. (Unless you use Internet Explorer. But don't do that.)
posted by Pruitt-Igoe at 12:39 AM on January 7, 2014
You need to check the Content-Type header. It's the only way to be sure. (Unless you use Internet Explorer. But don't do that.)
posted by Pruitt-Igoe at 12:39 AM on January 7, 2014
OK. This isn't the original Noseybonk. I believe a fellow who rejoices in the name of ashens did this.
There is also some processed footage.
But look! Here is the real Noseybonk, from the lovely programme for little children ages 4 to 6!
posted by louche mustachio at 12:40 AM on January 7, 2014 [2 favorites]
There is also some processed footage.
But look! Here is the real Noseybonk, from the lovely programme for little children ages 4 to 6!
posted by louche mustachio at 12:40 AM on January 7, 2014 [2 favorites]
louche mustachio, you might be interested in the story of Cry Baby Lane, a Nickelodeon horror movie that was shown once and never again. There was something of an urban legend around it, and in a thread about it, a Redditor piped up saying he had a copy, which was ultimately converted and uploaded. The interest prompted Nickelodeon to show it again, promoting it as the movie so scary it was banned from tv!
posted by Pope Guilty at 12:54 AM on January 7, 2014 [3 favorites]
posted by Pope Guilty at 12:54 AM on January 7, 2014 [3 favorites]
Guy Smiley: I found a camera in the woods... (There's a 2004 MeFi thread about this, but it looks like all the links are now dead.)
YES!! I was going to post here asking about this exact thing because I haven't been able to find it since then! This was probably the first form of creepypasta I ever found and boy, did I scare the shit out of all my friends on myspace when I showed it to them. I posted it everywhere I could with the whole idea of it being that I actually did find that camera in the woods. It's brilliant, I love it.
House of Leaves is one of my favorite books and works so well as a creepypasta archetype. It's too bad that it'd be almost impossible to film, unless you strictly did the entire Navidson camera recordings.
Are there examples of creepypasta from Usenet or anything similar? I figure there must be some examples.
posted by gucci mane at 1:04 AM on January 7, 2014
YES!! I was going to post here asking about this exact thing because I haven't been able to find it since then! This was probably the first form of creepypasta I ever found and boy, did I scare the shit out of all my friends on myspace when I showed it to them. I posted it everywhere I could with the whole idea of it being that I actually did find that camera in the woods. It's brilliant, I love it.
House of Leaves is one of my favorite books and works so well as a creepypasta archetype. It's too bad that it'd be almost impossible to film, unless you strictly did the entire Navidson camera recordings.
Are there examples of creepypasta from Usenet or anything similar? I figure there must be some examples.
posted by gucci mane at 1:04 AM on January 7, 2014
Yes. I am very interested in this thing. I will watch it when I pry myself out of The Lost Media Wiki, which I forgot is a deep cave full of wonderment, sadness, and powerful longing.
posted by louche mustachio at 1:05 AM on January 7, 2014
posted by louche mustachio at 1:05 AM on January 7, 2014
Noseybonk, previously.
Two sentence horror, previously. Lots of Metafilter user material in that thread.
posted by JHarris at 4:03 AM on January 7, 2014 [1 favorite]
Two sentence horror, previously. Lots of Metafilter user material in that thread.
posted by JHarris at 4:03 AM on January 7, 2014 [1 favorite]
Also be sure to check out MeFi's own Faint of Butt's MicroHorror website!
posted by Sticherbeast at 5:17 AM on January 7, 2014 [3 favorites]
posted by Sticherbeast at 5:17 AM on January 7, 2014 [3 favorites]
One day one of these things is gonna turn real and start murdering and committing unspeakable obscenities on people IRL, you mark my words.
posted by Rock Steady at 5:35 AM on January 7, 2014
posted by Rock Steady at 5:35 AM on January 7, 2014
I love this genre of Modern Horror. I'm totally convinced that the Something Awful forums have slowly turned into the 21st century version of Weird Tales, SCP and Night Vale have connections to them.
posted by The Whelk at 5:59 AM on January 7, 2014 [3 favorites]
posted by The Whelk at 5:59 AM on January 7, 2014 [3 favorites]
That's weird. This thread is showing up in my Recent Activity, but I haven't commented in it, as far as I can tell. Can a mod look into that for me?
posted by Rock Steady at 6:06 AM on January 7, 2014 [3 favorites]
posted by Rock Steady at 6:06 AM on January 7, 2014 [3 favorites]
Haha, Popeguilty, that part of Amnesia is responsible for how my buddy was found in his room with all the lights turned on, the screen brightness turned all the way up and 'Girls Just Wanna Have Fun' blaring out of the speakers at 4am. Apparently it was the only way he could get through it.
posted by Ned G at 6:08 AM on January 7, 2014 [7 favorites]
posted by Ned G at 6:08 AM on January 7, 2014 [7 favorites]
(erm Rock Steady, you commented half an hour ago, UNLESS THAT WAS THE CREATURE)
posted by Ned G at 6:10 AM on January 7, 2014
posted by Ned G at 6:10 AM on January 7, 2014
I have a soft spot for the Parrot. The idea of seeing a disturbing image which buries a landmine in your brain expresses a particular type of internet experience, especially as regards shock sites and niche messageboards. (iirc, the parrot was well before smiledog.jpg, and definitely before the red-grin photoshop followup to smiledog, but I'm not sure.)
posted by postcommunism at 6:12 AM on January 7, 2014 [1 favorite]
posted by postcommunism at 6:12 AM on January 7, 2014 [1 favorite]
One day all of these things are gonna turn real and start murdering and committing unspeakable obscenities on people IRL, you mark my words.
posted by Rock Steady at 6:14 AM on January 7, 2014 [2 favorites]
posted by Rock Steady at 6:14 AM on January 7, 2014 [2 favorites]
Has anyone seen Rock Steady around the site recently? Seemed like he dropped off all of a sudden.
posted by middleclasstool at 6:18 AM on January 7, 2014 [1 favorite]
posted by middleclasstool at 6:18 AM on January 7, 2014 [1 favorite]
One day all of these things are gonna turn real and start murdering and committing unspeakable obscenities on people IRL, you mark my words.
posted by The Whelk at 6:20 AM on January 7, 2014
posted by The Whelk at 6:20 AM on January 7, 2014
i like the SCP archives, but how does anyone take anything called "creepypasta" seriously
posted by Quart at 6:26 AM on January 7, 2014
posted by Quart at 6:26 AM on January 7, 2014
Yes it's very important that our horror narratives be serious. This is serious business. Not some ....fun thing. Lives are at stake.
posted by The Whelk at 6:30 AM on January 7, 2014 [9 favorites]
posted by The Whelk at 6:30 AM on January 7, 2014 [9 favorites]
And it's a real enough phenomenon: Check out this entry on the Lost Media Wiki about Cracks (1975) a rarely aired Sesame Street short that frightened not a few children back in the day.
Alright this was a bizarre experience. I had no recollection of this short while reading about it but as soon as it started playing it was "blam" and I was taken back to me as a kid. Holy crap I remember this... I stopped it and thought okay there's going to be a monkey and they go into the wall and then there is this monster. I re-felt what it was like when I saw this. Not creeped out but utterly fascinated by it's weirdness.
Amazing that something only played 11 times over three years made enough of an impression to bring back such a 'feeling' recognition. I can see why it would be frightening to kids.
Cool beans. Thanks for the link
posted by Jalliah at 6:30 AM on January 7, 2014 [1 favorite]
Alright this was a bizarre experience. I had no recollection of this short while reading about it but as soon as it started playing it was "blam" and I was taken back to me as a kid. Holy crap I remember this... I stopped it and thought okay there's going to be a monkey and they go into the wall and then there is this monster. I re-felt what it was like when I saw this. Not creeped out but utterly fascinated by it's weirdness.
Amazing that something only played 11 times over three years made enough of an impression to bring back such a 'feeling' recognition. I can see why it would be frightening to kids.
Cool beans. Thanks for the link
posted by Jalliah at 6:30 AM on January 7, 2014 [1 favorite]
There's a comment on the Morrowind story about a modder who accidentally created creepypasta. It's pretty great and shows how seeds develop that turn into these stories:
So I made this morrowind mod. I didnt want anyone cheating to get past my puzzles. I worked hard on them! So I had an idea. Void Monsters. Basically, I inserted invisible monsters (not normal invisible, like the spell, but ones that didnt have graphics that were displayed.) into the spots outside of the normal game boundaries. They could only ever interact with the player if you turned off clipping. Now when I made this, I only considered the possibility that You'd be attacked if you went out of the cell. I neglected the fact taht turning off collision would give them time to get into the cell. Yes, in what was clearly a mistake, I didnt alter their pathing behavior. So they'd move around.
So after not very long at all, there would be dozens, hundreds in the game world. Just about anywhere. Cause they'd respawn instantly if they were no longer where I put them. Again, seemed like a good idea at the time. Well all of this is not really that big a deal... except for a problem.
I also fixed with this mod numerous in-game scripting issues. Like one that makes your game crash if you tried to use this pendant that's supposed to teleport you back to Tel Fyr. It was just a comma where a period should've been, real simple stuff. But apparently some people took parts of my mod, simply removed the additional dungeons I'd made, and used mine as a basis for other bug fix mods. I guess with all the normal bugs in the game, no one was surprised to randomly die.
So yeah. A very large number of mods out there have been, for lack of a better term, infected by my void monsters. And I have no way of finding out which they are.
posted by tofu_crouton at 6:33 AM on January 7, 2014 [15 favorites]
So I made this morrowind mod. I didnt want anyone cheating to get past my puzzles. I worked hard on them! So I had an idea. Void Monsters. Basically, I inserted invisible monsters (not normal invisible, like the spell, but ones that didnt have graphics that were displayed.) into the spots outside of the normal game boundaries. They could only ever interact with the player if you turned off clipping. Now when I made this, I only considered the possibility that You'd be attacked if you went out of the cell. I neglected the fact taht turning off collision would give them time to get into the cell. Yes, in what was clearly a mistake, I didnt alter their pathing behavior. So they'd move around.
So after not very long at all, there would be dozens, hundreds in the game world. Just about anywhere. Cause they'd respawn instantly if they were no longer where I put them. Again, seemed like a good idea at the time. Well all of this is not really that big a deal... except for a problem.
I also fixed with this mod numerous in-game scripting issues. Like one that makes your game crash if you tried to use this pendant that's supposed to teleport you back to Tel Fyr. It was just a comma where a period should've been, real simple stuff. But apparently some people took parts of my mod, simply removed the additional dungeons I'd made, and used mine as a basis for other bug fix mods. I guess with all the normal bugs in the game, no one was surprised to randomly die.
So yeah. A very large number of mods out there have been, for lack of a better term, infected by my void monsters. And I have no way of finding out which they are.
posted by tofu_crouton at 6:33 AM on January 7, 2014 [15 favorites]
Just checked out the r/nosleep's Scariest Stories of the Year thread. This is, no doubt, the winner. Please call the number at the end. Please call it.
posted by Potomac Avenue at 6:39 AM on January 7, 2014 [7 favorites]
posted by Potomac Avenue at 6:39 AM on January 7, 2014 [7 favorites]
I called. Ahhhhhh.
posted by dobie at 6:54 AM on January 7, 2014 [1 favorite]
posted by dobie at 6:54 AM on January 7, 2014 [1 favorite]
The article mentions the shorter creepypasta that are structured like jokes, and I really love those. The one they use is good, and I also like:
A young girl is playing in her bedroom when she hears her mother call to her from the kitchen, so she runs downstairs to meet her mother.
As she’s running through the hallway, the door to the cupboard under the stairs opens, and a hand reaches out and pulls her in. It’s her mother. She whispers to her child, “Don’t go into the kitchen. I heard it too.”
Some of longer ones are also good, but to do it well in three or four sentences is something I love.
posted by Bulgaroktonos at 6:56 AM on January 7, 2014 [9 favorites]
A young girl is playing in her bedroom when she hears her mother call to her from the kitchen, so she runs downstairs to meet her mother.
As she’s running through the hallway, the door to the cupboard under the stairs opens, and a hand reaches out and pulls her in. It’s her mother. She whispers to her child, “Don’t go into the kitchen. I heard it too.”
Some of longer ones are also good, but to do it well in three or four sentences is something I love.
posted by Bulgaroktonos at 6:56 AM on January 7, 2014 [9 favorites]
This is a very good rundown of the genre. I'd probably have included a bit about SCP, especially since SCP articles have begun circulating as creepypasta (often without attribution).
I can't stress how much the "ritual" creepypasta sucks, though. I think the article author isn't hard enough on it, because it's basically all incredibly unimaginative, and also makes it entirely obvious that the author is a 14-year-old wannabe goth. Seriously, it's incredible how many rituals depend on clove cigarettes, specifically.
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 7:00 AM on January 7, 2014 [2 favorites]
I can't stress how much the "ritual" creepypasta sucks, though. I think the article author isn't hard enough on it, because it's basically all incredibly unimaginative, and also makes it entirely obvious that the author is a 14-year-old wannabe goth. Seriously, it's incredible how many rituals depend on clove cigarettes, specifically.
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 7:00 AM on January 7, 2014 [2 favorites]
> I don't know if Ted's caving page is strictly creepypasta, but it is on the creepypasta wiki, and it is certainly creepy.
I don't think you can call Ted the Caver creepypasta because there's no pasta involved, but it's a classic. It was my first or nearly first experience with online horror. I think it had different final pages at different points in time: in one of them, you'd see Ted's final message, click forward, and get this picture. The other ended in 404, which I think is scarier.
I got the 404 ending when I first read it. Story was in my head for months.
posted by postcommunism at 7:02 AM on January 7, 2014 [2 favorites]
I don't think you can call Ted the Caver creepypasta because there's no pasta involved, but it's a classic. It was my first or nearly first experience with online horror. I think it had different final pages at different points in time: in one of them, you'd see Ted's final message, click forward, and get this picture. The other ended in 404, which I think is scarier.
I got the 404 ending when I first read it. Story was in my head for months.
posted by postcommunism at 7:02 AM on January 7, 2014 [2 favorites]
What's the one with the murderous house that appears in different towns?
posted by Chrysostom at 7:08 AM on January 7, 2014
posted by Chrysostom at 7:08 AM on January 7, 2014
Chrysostom: "What's the one with the murderous house that appears in different towns"
Dionaea House.
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 7:13 AM on January 7, 2014 [2 favorites]
Dionaea House.
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 7:13 AM on January 7, 2014 [2 favorites]
Another one in the vein of Ted the Caver is The Dibbuk Box, which was the basis for the movie The Possession (which I haven't seen, but is supposed to be so-so).
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 7:15 AM on January 7, 2014
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 7:15 AM on January 7, 2014
By MeFi's own WPW. Aeon keeps turning out great stuff.
posted by Mister_A at 7:27 AM on January 7, 2014
posted by Mister_A at 7:27 AM on January 7, 2014
I'd have been all over this if it had been around when I was a kid... we just has second hand horror novels and annoying our English teacher by turning every writing assignment into a gorefest (although it was probably really only the 'what would you do in a nuclear war?' that I went full trenchcoat)
Oh and I totally thought I was going to have heart attack during the end of Ringu... and I had a full on night terror nightmare afterwards. If any piece of narrative fiction is possessed by evil it's that.
And I'm not lying but something really weird happened with my computer as I was typing this in and I had to start again... it's probably nothing mind... probably...
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 7:30 AM on January 7, 2014
Oh and I totally thought I was going to have heart attack during the end of Ringu... and I had a full on night terror nightmare afterwards. If any piece of narrative fiction is possessed by evil it's that.
And I'm not lying but something really weird happened with my computer as I was typing this in and I had to start again... it's probably nothing mind... probably...
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 7:30 AM on January 7, 2014
One day all of these things are gonna turn fearfulsymmetry and start fearfulsymmetry and committing unspeakable fearfulsymmetry on people IRL, you mark my fearfulsymmetry.
posted by Rock Steady at 7:33 AM on January 7, 2014 [2 favorites]
posted by Rock Steady at 7:33 AM on January 7, 2014 [2 favorites]
...yrtemmyslufraef...yrtemmyslufraef...yrtemmyslufraef...yrtemmyslufraef...yrtemmyslufraef...yrtemmyslufraef...yrtemmyslufraef...yrtemmyslufraef...yrtemmyslufraef...yrtemmyslufraef...yrtemmyslufraef...yrtemmyslufraef...yrtemmyslufraef...yrtemmyslufraef...yrtemmyslufraef...yrtemmyslufraef...yrtemmyslufraef...yrtemmyslufraef...yrtemmyslufraef...yrtemmyslufraef...yrtemmyslufraef...yrtemmyslufraef...yrtemmyslufraef...yrtemmyslufraef...yrtemmyslufraef...yrtemmyslufraef
posted by Mister_A at 7:43 AM on January 7, 2014
posted by Mister_A at 7:43 AM on January 7, 2014
BTW if I was cortex I'd be fucking with people in this post so bad.
posted by Mister_A at 7:44 AM on January 7, 2014 [4 favorites]
posted by Mister_A at 7:44 AM on January 7, 2014 [4 favorites]
YOu know I really love these stories. They make me smile. I just finished brushing my teeth because I keep smiling. I feel like they make my smile more sharp. Big rows of bright white teeth. Never had a cavity. Keep them nice and sharp. Nice sharp smile.
posted by dobie at 7:45 AM on January 7, 2014 [10 favorites]
posted by dobie at 7:45 AM on January 7, 2014 [10 favorites]
Glad that I got beaten to the mention of SCP. One of my favorite time-killers.
posted by mrbill at 7:48 AM on January 7, 2014
posted by mrbill at 7:48 AM on January 7, 2014
Big rows of bright white teeth. Never had a cavity. Keep them nice and sharp. Nice sharp smile.
Teeth.
posted by The Whelk at 7:50 AM on January 7, 2014 [1 favorite]
Teeth.
posted by The Whelk at 7:50 AM on January 7, 2014 [1 favorite]
White with Red Eyes
Wait, is that the whole thing, or a synopsis?
posted by kenko at 8:11 AM on January 7, 2014
Wait, is that the whole thing, or a synopsis?
posted by kenko at 8:11 AM on January 7, 2014
It's a summary of a Henry James novella.
posted by Iridic at 8:15 AM on January 7, 2014 [1 favorite]
posted by Iridic at 8:15 AM on January 7, 2014 [1 favorite]
Is there a summary of all the things people noticed in the "I found a camera in the woods..." pictures so I don't have to stare at them?
posted by Theta States at 8:50 AM on January 7, 2014 [1 favorite]
posted by Theta States at 8:50 AM on January 7, 2014 [1 favorite]
I kind of love creepypasta like Candle Cove, Dead Bart, and Suicide Mouse, because it captures the real feeling of having seen something weird and scary on TV when you were a kid, swearing that it was a dream, and suddenly finding a few people that can confirm that they saw the same thing.
Yes! I have some bizarre memories from early childhood that I still can't place. Maybe they were dreams, maybe they were cartoons. Not too long ago I found this Sesame Street segment that had been in the back of my memory for years, and I was relieved to find out that it was real and just as unsettling as I remembered.
I also love creepypasta involving electronics or broadcast media. Ghostly figures and voices in caves don't usually resonate with me, but stories with haunted video games or incomprehensible TV broadcasts often do. They're close enough to real things, like numbers stations or the Pokemon MissingNo. glitch, that they hit fairly close to home. (When I was a kid I had a malfunctioning record player, and I was sure it was haunted.)
posted by Metroid Baby at 9:18 AM on January 7, 2014 [4 favorites]
Yes! I have some bizarre memories from early childhood that I still can't place. Maybe they were dreams, maybe they were cartoons. Not too long ago I found this Sesame Street segment that had been in the back of my memory for years, and I was relieved to find out that it was real and just as unsettling as I remembered.
I also love creepypasta involving electronics or broadcast media. Ghostly figures and voices in caves don't usually resonate with me, but stories with haunted video games or incomprehensible TV broadcasts often do. They're close enough to real things, like numbers stations or the Pokemon MissingNo. glitch, that they hit fairly close to home. (When I was a kid I had a malfunctioning record player, and I was sure it was haunted.)
posted by Metroid Baby at 9:18 AM on January 7, 2014 [4 favorites]
"I found a camera in the woods..." is really good... subtle. Shitbrix indeed
(Of course it's great that my local woods, bar the concrete building, are exactly like this... there's even a spotting tower... but I'm sure I'll have totally forgotten the next time I visit. Totally. And that time I saw something... something unnatural, near there.)
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 9:35 AM on January 7, 2014
(Of course it's great that my local woods, bar the concrete building, are exactly like this... there's even a spotting tower... but I'm sure I'll have totally forgotten the next time I visit. Totally. And that time I saw something... something unnatural, near there.)
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 9:35 AM on January 7, 2014
And that time I saw something... something unnatural, near there
I'm totally not joking btw... no one ever believes me but I definitely saw one of these.
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 9:39 AM on January 7, 2014
I'm totally not joking btw... no one ever believes me but I definitely saw one of these.
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 9:39 AM on January 7, 2014
Is there a summary of all the things people noticed in the "I found a camera in the woods..."
Yeah all I saw was the silhouette of a person in one of them, the rest I can't see anything other than creepy foggy woods
posted by Hoopo at 9:56 AM on January 7, 2014
Yeah all I saw was the silhouette of a person in one of them, the rest I can't see anything other than creepy foggy woods
posted by Hoopo at 9:56 AM on January 7, 2014
My favorite geeky parts are when the creepypasta seep fanfic-style into other stories I know: like A Study in [DATA EXPUNGED], with SCP as a dark Sherlock romance*, or Come, scientist, destroy, in which Hannibal Lecter is an SCP employee and there is BAD WRONGNESS.
Mostly I love how creepy pasta will change how horror lit is written and consumed, as our brains are all infected by creepypasta and we write to infect each other in turn. To start with, I'm crossing my fingers for a third John Dies at the End book that involves Slendy developing a taste for John's spinal fluid or something. After reality-warping sentient meth and soul-eating brain spiders, evil glitchy videogames can't be far behind...
* (everything is a potential Sherlock romance lying in wait. EVERYTHING)
posted by nicebookrack at 10:03 AM on January 7, 2014 [1 favorite]
Mostly I love how creepy pasta will change how horror lit is written and consumed, as our brains are all infected by creepypasta and we write to infect each other in turn. To start with, I'm crossing my fingers for a third John Dies at the End book that involves Slendy developing a taste for John's spinal fluid or something. After reality-warping sentient meth and soul-eating brain spiders, evil glitchy videogames can't be far behind...
* (everything is a potential Sherlock romance lying in wait. EVERYTHING)
posted by nicebookrack at 10:03 AM on January 7, 2014 [1 favorite]
There's a silhouette in one, some creepy eyes in 19 and then a reflected figure in 25. The bigger thing, though, I think, is the narrative, where the guy is exploring this stuff, followed by the silhouettes and eyes, gets to the top of the tower (where the reflected figure is) then starts to run. The last picture is the camera lying on the ground. I don't think its a "spot the creepy thing in each picture" exercise.
posted by Bulgaroktonos at 10:04 AM on January 7, 2014
posted by Bulgaroktonos at 10:04 AM on January 7, 2014
After sleeping for the longest I've slept in months (7 hours) and waking up with some gnarly back pain some extra details have emerged from my Dell story, which happened about 7-8 years ago.
The outsourced service company was called "DecisionOne." Dell works with other companies too, but we always got the "DecisionOne" tech UNTIL this event. We always got the same guy -- a soft spoken Eastern European who spoke a Slavic language on the phone but I wasn't about to ask him what his nationality was, mainly out of respect. Never say "Are you Russian?" to someone who might be Ukrainian, Czech, Lithuanian, etc. And don't say "Ahh you have such a lovely accent, where are you from?" Just let them tell you if you deserve to know, if you know them well enough. First generation Slavic immigrants from former Eastern Bloc countries are inherently "nothing special," they aren't magical spies with neck-snapping Dolph Lundgren powers, but a certain seemingly larger than usual proportion of them will never fail to blow your mind with stories that they've come to accept as mundane aspects of Eastern Bloc life. Their history of repression and fear is far more recent than we can really understand. So many of them actually are pretty damned special.
This guy was super soft-spoken and friendly. The few words we've exchanged over several visits amounted to:
Him: "Why call me for help when you know how to replace motherboards and such? You are IT guy, no?"
Me: "As long as my manager keeps approving full on-site coverage, I'm going to let you do the work. I know you get paid to do it, and I know that I have plenty of other things to do, in the software world, and quite honestly I hate replacing motherboards."
Him: "Thank you for that."
Next conversation:
Me: "So, how competitive is it driving around for Dell?" (Particularly disgruntled, 25 years old,fantasizing about driving around stoned in a van replacing motherboards for just enough money to get by and not be "stressin'")
Him: "Very competitive. It's not fair at all. They don't pay us enough. We have to keep certain parts out of our own pockets to be competitive. Sometimes Dell calls two companies and whoever gets there first wins. There are disputes. It is barely worth the trouble. I am only doing it temporarily until I find something better."
Anyway, this is the guy who took the 8 motherboards. He'd been out at least 4 times previously and this was the last time I ever saw him. No big deal, but then some other details emerged, some from previous memories that suddenly seemed relevant back then, and others that seem relevant right now:
1. I took a camera shot of the "STOP." error from my phone. It was totally bewildering, just a normal "text mode" screen like you see in a typical blue screen of death, with "STOP." in the extreme upper left corner. The period creeped me out more than any absence of error codes. The photo looked fine when I previewed it immediately after the pic but the next day it was completely washed out. There are some mundane explanations for that so I just sort of kicked myself.
2. The person who experienced the rebooting problem the most was also one of the few people in the company who liked using speakers. Most people stuck with headphones. But she was constantly buying new speakers. After awhile, any pair of speakers she bought would start picking up tons of static that would increasingly dominate anything you were listening to. It would get to a point where it almost sounded like humans talking, like they were picking up actual radio signals, which made sense, but it was like they were slowly tuning in to a cacophony of crap.
We chalked it up to Lookout Mountain, a nearby feature with shit-tons of radio antenna activity including the HDTV signal for most Denver channels. But why did the speakers work for awhile? It was like they were being broken in. An every time she picked up new ones, she was surprised that they worked, as if this hadn't been a repeating problem for months. She could not stop it with the speakers, and always had them cranked up so when she logged in you heard that stupid ass Windows XP sound from across the office and she had no desire to change any of that.
3. I never did much with this story until now. Now I think this was nascent "air gap bridging" technology and the computers were rebooting inappropriately instead of doing something else.
The images triggering the reboot were to be "tagged" somehow in a way that would identify any terminal accessing them by generating a flurry of activity using all communication methods available -- the internet, eventually BlueTooth, and even a hodge-podge combination of crude but highly boosted radio signals emerging from the computer's internals.
Somehow we managed to stumble on a "hot image" spontaneously. It was a scanned license record for medical professional with a state license on it, and nothing more. But I realized the computers weren't supposed to be rebooting, they were supposed to generate a powerful carrier signal that could be picked up by someone who was looking for troublemakers. The idea was that if you intercepted some intelligence and viewed its contents, your computer would make sure somebody knew using a variety of methods. I research the medical professional who was a partner and all we know about them is that they have a PO BOX. We don't know where they live, they don't attend Christmas Parties, and they don't talk to anyone unless you've worked at the company for 2 years. Every week they receive huge shipments of wine cases sent by "happy patients." Nobody dares open them.
posted by lordaych at 10:11 AM on January 7, 2014 [4 favorites]
The outsourced service company was called "DecisionOne." Dell works with other companies too, but we always got the "DecisionOne" tech UNTIL this event. We always got the same guy -- a soft spoken Eastern European who spoke a Slavic language on the phone but I wasn't about to ask him what his nationality was, mainly out of respect. Never say "Are you Russian?" to someone who might be Ukrainian, Czech, Lithuanian, etc. And don't say "Ahh you have such a lovely accent, where are you from?" Just let them tell you if you deserve to know, if you know them well enough. First generation Slavic immigrants from former Eastern Bloc countries are inherently "nothing special," they aren't magical spies with neck-snapping Dolph Lundgren powers, but a certain seemingly larger than usual proportion of them will never fail to blow your mind with stories that they've come to accept as mundane aspects of Eastern Bloc life. Their history of repression and fear is far more recent than we can really understand. So many of them actually are pretty damned special.
This guy was super soft-spoken and friendly. The few words we've exchanged over several visits amounted to:
Him: "Why call me for help when you know how to replace motherboards and such? You are IT guy, no?"
Me: "As long as my manager keeps approving full on-site coverage, I'm going to let you do the work. I know you get paid to do it, and I know that I have plenty of other things to do, in the software world, and quite honestly I hate replacing motherboards."
Him: "Thank you for that."
Next conversation:
Me: "So, how competitive is it driving around for Dell?" (Particularly disgruntled, 25 years old,fantasizing about driving around stoned in a van replacing motherboards for just enough money to get by and not be "stressin'")
Him: "Very competitive. It's not fair at all. They don't pay us enough. We have to keep certain parts out of our own pockets to be competitive. Sometimes Dell calls two companies and whoever gets there first wins. There are disputes. It is barely worth the trouble. I am only doing it temporarily until I find something better."
Anyway, this is the guy who took the 8 motherboards. He'd been out at least 4 times previously and this was the last time I ever saw him. No big deal, but then some other details emerged, some from previous memories that suddenly seemed relevant back then, and others that seem relevant right now:
1. I took a camera shot of the "STOP." error from my phone. It was totally bewildering, just a normal "text mode" screen like you see in a typical blue screen of death, with "STOP." in the extreme upper left corner. The period creeped me out more than any absence of error codes. The photo looked fine when I previewed it immediately after the pic but the next day it was completely washed out. There are some mundane explanations for that so I just sort of kicked myself.
2. The person who experienced the rebooting problem the most was also one of the few people in the company who liked using speakers. Most people stuck with headphones. But she was constantly buying new speakers. After awhile, any pair of speakers she bought would start picking up tons of static that would increasingly dominate anything you were listening to. It would get to a point where it almost sounded like humans talking, like they were picking up actual radio signals, which made sense, but it was like they were slowly tuning in to a cacophony of crap.
We chalked it up to Lookout Mountain, a nearby feature with shit-tons of radio antenna activity including the HDTV signal for most Denver channels. But why did the speakers work for awhile? It was like they were being broken in. An every time she picked up new ones, she was surprised that they worked, as if this hadn't been a repeating problem for months. She could not stop it with the speakers, and always had them cranked up so when she logged in you heard that stupid ass Windows XP sound from across the office and she had no desire to change any of that.
3. I never did much with this story until now. Now I think this was nascent "air gap bridging" technology and the computers were rebooting inappropriately instead of doing something else.
The images triggering the reboot were to be "tagged" somehow in a way that would identify any terminal accessing them by generating a flurry of activity using all communication methods available -- the internet, eventually BlueTooth, and even a hodge-podge combination of crude but highly boosted radio signals emerging from the computer's internals.
Somehow we managed to stumble on a "hot image" spontaneously. It was a scanned license record for medical professional with a state license on it, and nothing more. But I realized the computers weren't supposed to be rebooting, they were supposed to generate a powerful carrier signal that could be picked up by someone who was looking for troublemakers. The idea was that if you intercepted some intelligence and viewed its contents, your computer would make sure somebody knew using a variety of methods. I research the medical professional who was a partner and all we know about them is that they have a PO BOX. We don't know where they live, they don't attend Christmas Parties, and they don't talk to anyone unless you've worked at the company for 2 years. Every week they receive huge shipments of wine cases sent by "happy patients." Nobody dares open them.
posted by lordaych at 10:11 AM on January 7, 2014 [4 favorites]
95% real shit stirred and pulled into Taffy for you reading pleasure, and I'm shivering, LOL.
posted by lordaych at 10:14 AM on January 7, 2014
posted by lordaych at 10:14 AM on January 7, 2014
Ooh, a tasty morsel from this year's Yuletide.
Ninety Five (1227 words) by Wayfarers
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Windows 95 Tips
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Author Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Characters: Windows 95
Additional Tags: Horror, Creepypasta
Summary: A collection of helpful tips to improve your Windows 95 experience.
posted by nicebookrack at 10:15 AM on January 7, 2014 [3 favorites]
Ninety Five (1227 words) by Wayfarers
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Windows 95 Tips
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Author Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Characters: Windows 95
Additional Tags: Horror, Creepypasta
Summary: A collection of helpful tips to improve your Windows 95 experience.
posted by nicebookrack at 10:15 AM on January 7, 2014 [3 favorites]
lardyach, it sounds like someone set the Evil Bit on that image file. We all know about the Evil Bit in IPv4, but somehow you stumbled across it in the JPEG header.
Did the image come to you over Internet Protocol? Maybe the evil bit in the header infected the payload?
posted by benito.strauss at 10:31 AM on January 7, 2014 [1 favorite]
Did the image come to you over Internet Protocol? Maybe the evil bit in the header infected the payload?
posted by benito.strauss at 10:31 AM on January 7, 2014 [1 favorite]
It's funny, -all this internet stuff. Is it real, is it fake? It's good to know where the limits are, really. It's all meant for fun, though, right?
You get a good jolt, and you come back for more, each time feeling more comfortable with the knowledge that something is going to happen to you.
Believe me, I get it. I do.
Because the truth is we all need it. That moment of purity that elevates us out of the daily grind. I like walking through my house late at night, just to listen to it creak as it tries to settle into a firmer foundation.
Like when you move into a new home, and you're marveling at it's shining simplicity and welcome. But over time, things wear down, a shade flips up suddenly in another room, or the doors don't quite shut square anymore.
And in the morning, over coffee, it's just your place, you know? You still recognize it, make your payments, go off to work and so on.
But all those creaks and dents and ticking, clicking sounds do tend to wear on you after while. You don't know what they mean, so you start making up stories about them, and then start staying up with them. Night after night. Until you can speak whatever language it is they do. Such long conversations.
My family says that we shouldn't have bought this house. They never liked it, appreciated it enough. What I called homey charm, (or really, come on now, it's my home, right?), they found horrible and claustrophobic. My wife left, and my daughter stayed, for a few weeks more anyway.
"Dadda, are you going to sleep ever?" She'd say to me, eyes wide and so curious!
But then, like now, I told her to keep quiet and still, so quiet. Because an adult is talking. And there's still so much more I have to tell them.
posted by Lipstick Thespian at 10:32 AM on January 7, 2014 [6 favorites]
You get a good jolt, and you come back for more, each time feeling more comfortable with the knowledge that something is going to happen to you.
Believe me, I get it. I do.
Because the truth is we all need it. That moment of purity that elevates us out of the daily grind. I like walking through my house late at night, just to listen to it creak as it tries to settle into a firmer foundation.
Like when you move into a new home, and you're marveling at it's shining simplicity and welcome. But over time, things wear down, a shade flips up suddenly in another room, or the doors don't quite shut square anymore.
And in the morning, over coffee, it's just your place, you know? You still recognize it, make your payments, go off to work and so on.
But all those creaks and dents and ticking, clicking sounds do tend to wear on you after while. You don't know what they mean, so you start making up stories about them, and then start staying up with them. Night after night. Until you can speak whatever language it is they do. Such long conversations.
My family says that we shouldn't have bought this house. They never liked it, appreciated it enough. What I called homey charm, (or really, come on now, it's my home, right?), they found horrible and claustrophobic. My wife left, and my daughter stayed, for a few weeks more anyway.
"Dadda, are you going to sleep ever?" She'd say to me, eyes wide and so curious!
But then, like now, I told her to keep quiet and still, so quiet. Because an adult is talking. And there's still so much more I have to tell them.
posted by Lipstick Thespian at 10:32 AM on January 7, 2014 [6 favorites]
More extra weird bits from today:
I woke up at 10:17AM with no wife and kids in the house. They're on Christmas Break one more day and without fail are always home. I haven't texted my wife yet, just went to work.
My computer at work was "on" but frozen. I had to hold the power button down. When I turned it back on, my monitor went through all sorts of "power saving / no signal" gyrations, over and over again and finally came up. Weird.
The guy in my office said he's been having "internet problems" that nobody else is having. By "in my office" I mean "in my 2 person office" in a larger office of 150+ people.
My Android phone has started acting like a Windows XP machine with malware, literally giving me popups like "You have malware" and "A program is trying to do something unauthorized to your phone." I installed some AV and naturally it's found nothing. OK, that actually started about a week ago after a minor JellyBean update from AT&T.
At Starbucks some guy two people ahead of me was going on and on about some stupid arcane gift card coupon shit that he was entitled to. I couldn't really understand what he was on about, it just seemed like he wanted to tie up the cashier for a few minutes.
Everyone in line was like "?" and cashier just gave him whatever he asked for "this one time" to shut him up.
He had a trenchcoat (so what, right) and eventually left after chatting up the barista who had just been acting as his cashier and getting a bunch of apologies for something nobody else understood. I got my plain coffee and went to add creamer and had to ask some burly 40 year old lookin' Dolph Lundgren dude who also had a trenchcoat and a Home-Alone-Harry skull cap "excuse me" because he was standing there in front of the creamer, hovering around with a mixture of "just standing in the way by accident" and "standing there thinking about something intently." He had black skeleton gloves, LOL. I used up the last bit of creamer and then had it replaced. He waited for me and added some to his fru-fru drink.
I'm feeling a little weird...haven't finished the coffee yet but I'm the kind of guy who will, because it'd be crazy to think otherwise.
posted by lordaych at 11:15 AM on January 7, 2014 [1 favorite]
I woke up at 10:17AM with no wife and kids in the house. They're on Christmas Break one more day and without fail are always home. I haven't texted my wife yet, just went to work.
My computer at work was "on" but frozen. I had to hold the power button down. When I turned it back on, my monitor went through all sorts of "power saving / no signal" gyrations, over and over again and finally came up. Weird.
The guy in my office said he's been having "internet problems" that nobody else is having. By "in my office" I mean "in my 2 person office" in a larger office of 150+ people.
My Android phone has started acting like a Windows XP machine with malware, literally giving me popups like "You have malware" and "A program is trying to do something unauthorized to your phone." I installed some AV and naturally it's found nothing. OK, that actually started about a week ago after a minor JellyBean update from AT&T.
At Starbucks some guy two people ahead of me was going on and on about some stupid arcane gift card coupon shit that he was entitled to. I couldn't really understand what he was on about, it just seemed like he wanted to tie up the cashier for a few minutes.
Everyone in line was like "?" and cashier just gave him whatever he asked for "this one time" to shut him up.
He had a trenchcoat (so what, right) and eventually left after chatting up the barista who had just been acting as his cashier and getting a bunch of apologies for something nobody else understood. I got my plain coffee and went to add creamer and had to ask some burly 40 year old lookin' Dolph Lundgren dude who also had a trenchcoat and a Home-Alone-Harry skull cap "excuse me" because he was standing there in front of the creamer, hovering around with a mixture of "just standing in the way by accident" and "standing there thinking about something intently." He had black skeleton gloves, LOL. I used up the last bit of creamer and then had it replaced. He waited for me and added some to his fru-fru drink.
I'm feeling a little weird...haven't finished the coffee yet but I'm the kind of guy who will, because it'd be crazy to think otherwise.
posted by lordaych at 11:15 AM on January 7, 2014 [1 favorite]
Aaand I just set my laptop down on top of a speaker lead that I leave unplugged for laptop and phone tunes, and it started blasting out a morse code sequence from my speakers. NOPE NOPE NOPE
posted by lordaych at 11:17 AM on January 7, 2014
posted by lordaych at 11:17 AM on January 7, 2014
lordaych, what city are you in? And where is your office? Where is your house located? The exact address. W I was just wondering.
posted by Potomac Avenue at 11:18 AM on January 7, 2014 [3 favorites]
posted by Potomac Avenue at 11:18 AM on January 7, 2014 [3 favorites]
Come, scientist, destroy, in which Hannibal Lecter is an SCP employee and there is BAD WRONGNESS.
I wish you coud see the face I'm making right now cause it is really something.
posted by The Whelk at 11:20 AM on January 7, 2014 [4 favorites]
I wish you coud see the face I'm making right now cause it is really something.
posted by The Whelk at 11:20 AM on January 7, 2014 [4 favorites]
But I'm sure whatever it was, I'll have plenty of time to think it when I'm still wide awake at 4am, listening to every crackle, thud and bump in the heating system and wondering which of them aren't just metal expanding.
That's been dominating me for a week but kicked into high gear last night, I tell you what. Then it culminated in my son being awake at 1:30AM for no reason. I asked him if he wanted me to lay in bed with him and he said "no." I asked him why he was awake and he said "I want you to lay next to me." OK...I put my computer away and he was asleep in a minute when I came back, but I certainly did sleep there with him.
I stay up late quite a bit and usually think nothing of that creaky house stuff, then I push myself too hard and things get weirder and weirder and if I go too far I'll start hearing my name, meaning "You are now experiencing a form of acute psychosis, go sleep now."
My new house has plenty of features that make it easy for me to "see" moving figures coming up the stairs, etc. Somehow I understand how this works with the way the human brain assembles perception like the "dog behind the fence" experiment but it's hard to explain.
posted by lordaych at 11:25 AM on January 7, 2014
That's been dominating me for a week but kicked into high gear last night, I tell you what. Then it culminated in my son being awake at 1:30AM for no reason. I asked him if he wanted me to lay in bed with him and he said "no." I asked him why he was awake and he said "I want you to lay next to me." OK...I put my computer away and he was asleep in a minute when I came back, but I certainly did sleep there with him.
I stay up late quite a bit and usually think nothing of that creaky house stuff, then I push myself too hard and things get weirder and weirder and if I go too far I'll start hearing my name, meaning "You are now experiencing a form of acute psychosis, go sleep now."
My new house has plenty of features that make it easy for me to "see" moving figures coming up the stairs, etc. Somehow I understand how this works with the way the human brain assembles perception like the "dog behind the fence" experiment but it's hard to explain.
posted by lordaych at 11:25 AM on January 7, 2014
Also, I meant to link to this when I mentioned the Shambler, I'll just leave the link text here unclickable. Nothing to see, it's not bad or good, it doesn't even exist.
http://file-intelligence.comodo.com/windows-process-virus-malware/xml/Crypt%20Shambler(1)
The LHQHACK file name simply means "Lord H [lordaych] Quake Hack." But in reality, the entire Universe as we know it is a "demo" with very limited parameters available at your disposal, until you find a way to peek inside and find the simplest thing you can change to unleash its wonders.
Unfortunately there's never an easy way to put things back :|
posted by lordaych at 11:39 AM on January 7, 2014
http://file-intelligence.comodo.com/windows-process-virus-malware/xml/Crypt%20Shambler(1)
The LHQHACK file name simply means "Lord H [lordaych] Quake Hack." But in reality, the entire Universe as we know it is a "demo" with very limited parameters available at your disposal, until you find a way to peek inside and find the simplest thing you can change to unleash its wonders.
Unfortunately there's never an easy way to put things back :|
posted by lordaych at 11:39 AM on January 7, 2014
Also, it's weird that I called the LHQHACK.TXT a "program" earlier in the thread because I know what a fucking program is, I wrote a program called LHQHACK.EXE, and the text file simply described now simply, nifty, and cool it was, just changing some text in a binary file that was easily human readable.
But in the Universe, data and executable code are one in the same. The computer world has caught up to that reality very quickly. OK no more thread sitting :W
posted by lordaych at 11:42 AM on January 7, 2014
But in the Universe, data and executable code are one in the same. The computer world has caught up to that reality very quickly. OK no more thread sitting :W
posted by lordaych at 11:42 AM on January 7, 2014
Oh my goodness, the "Cracks" segment from Sesame Street. What were people thinking? I'd ride home from school with my mother, standing on the bench seat next to her while she drove and smoked and we sang songs together. Then she'd give me a Coke and a Slim Jim and I'd watch sesame street and Electric Company for a billion hours. "Camel thank you for the ride, the rain has stopped outside"? You're lucky to be alive, girl. Don't do that again.
posted by staggering termagant at 11:53 AM on January 7, 2014 [2 favorites]
posted by staggering termagant at 11:53 AM on January 7, 2014 [2 favorites]
Those purported Dead Bart videos are just the worst. Obvious clips from early-style animation interspersed with much later animation styles. Really sloppy. And the "twist" ending with all the tombstones is really lame.
posted by Kitty Stardust at 12:47 PM on January 7, 2014
posted by Kitty Stardust at 12:47 PM on January 7, 2014
I think my favorite has always been Humper-Monkey's enormous magnum opus of strange goings-on on a military base.
posted by telophase at 1:23 PM on January 7, 2014 [2 favorites]
posted by telophase at 1:23 PM on January 7, 2014 [2 favorites]
Kitty Stardust, most of the art for these doesn't hold up that well. It can get dated pretty quickly. The images in your mind though, those are the ones that work best.
We'll be over shortly for image retrieval.
posted by Ghidorah at 2:13 PM on January 7, 2014 [3 favorites]
We'll be over shortly for image retrieval.
posted by Ghidorah at 2:13 PM on January 7, 2014 [3 favorites]
My roommate's gone for a few days, so it's kind of nice being alone, right up until I took a shower and forgot my towel in my room. I was blind and naked and warm and wet and groping for the towel to clear my eyes, when I realized that I'd neglected to bring the towel with me.
It was okay, though.
Somebody handed it to me.
posted by Pope Guilty at 2:40 PM on January 7, 2014 [2 favorites]
It was okay, though.
Somebody handed it to me.
posted by Pope Guilty at 2:40 PM on January 7, 2014 [2 favorites]
Reader, I marred him
posted by lordaych at 2:46 PM on January 7, 2014 [5 favorites]
posted by lordaych at 2:46 PM on January 7, 2014 [5 favorites]
As long as everyone's mentioning the SCP Foundation, I thought I'd bring up one of my favorites, which still creeps me right the hell out: SCP-087.
(Be sure to read the linked documents at the bottom.)
posted by Mr. Bad Example at 2:47 PM on January 7, 2014 [1 favorite]
(Be sure to read the linked documents at the bottom.)
posted by Mr. Bad Example at 2:47 PM on January 7, 2014 [1 favorite]
Yep, Endless Stair is the best.
posted by Chrysostom at 3:07 PM on January 7, 2014
posted by Chrysostom at 3:07 PM on January 7, 2014
My favorite, because there is nothing really supernatural, just slightly off is the piece of creepy pasta I found first: Killswitch.
I want this game to exist.
posted by Hactar at 3:29 PM on January 7, 2014 [2 favorites]
I want this game to exist.
posted by Hactar at 3:29 PM on January 7, 2014 [2 favorites]
After reality-warping sentient meth and soul-eating brain spiders, evil glitchy videogames can't be far behind...
Oh! There was a freebie game like this I played last year. I'm pretty sure it was linked from RockPaperShotgun though I can't find it immediately, but it was an 8-bit platformer homage that was a dude running across the screen, and it was just non-stop super-creepy intentional glitches. Crazy and creepy sound effects and music. A lot of backtracking, or you exit one level and enter it again...though it's slightly different. Dammit, I wish I remembered what it was, I'm posting in case somebody else does. It was pretty cool.
posted by turbid dahlia at 4:30 PM on January 7, 2014
Oh! There was a freebie game like this I played last year. I'm pretty sure it was linked from RockPaperShotgun though I can't find it immediately, but it was an 8-bit platformer homage that was a dude running across the screen, and it was just non-stop super-creepy intentional glitches. Crazy and creepy sound effects and music. A lot of backtracking, or you exit one level and enter it again...though it's slightly different. Dammit, I wish I remembered what it was, I'm posting in case somebody else does. It was pretty cool.
posted by turbid dahlia at 4:30 PM on January 7, 2014
Vermicelli is the creepiest of all pastas.
posted by humanfont at 4:41 PM on January 7, 2014 [1 favorite]
posted by humanfont at 4:41 PM on January 7, 2014 [1 favorite]
Gonna try a simpler one:
Working late, parking lot empty. I work in a "safe" area but my neck is tingling and I have my keys ready to unlock my car quickly. It's freakin' cold so I hustle as quickly as I can, hop into the car, and start it up. I tell myself out loud "it's fucking cold!" as I rub my hands together and then realize the car itself is warmed up, somehow. A voice from behind says "not where you're going..."
posted by lordaych at 4:43 PM on January 7, 2014
Working late, parking lot empty. I work in a "safe" area but my neck is tingling and I have my keys ready to unlock my car quickly. It's freakin' cold so I hustle as quickly as I can, hop into the car, and start it up. I tell myself out loud "it's fucking cold!" as I rub my hands together and then realize the car itself is warmed up, somehow. A voice from behind says "not where you're going..."
posted by lordaych at 4:43 PM on January 7, 2014
I realized I didn't say it out loud, and the car is empty. Did I make it all up? Ever think something aloud and wonder if you said it? A voice says "minime" and I try to Google the meaning from my phone, but I can't unlock it. Reader, I entered hell
posted by lordaych at 5:06 PM on January 7, 2014 [2 favorites]
posted by lordaych at 5:06 PM on January 7, 2014 [2 favorites]
Oh! There was a freebie game like this I played last year. I'm pretty sure it was linked from RockPaperShotgun though I can't find it immediately, but it was an 8-bit platformer homage that was a dude running across the screen, and it was just non-stop super-creepy intentional glitches. Crazy and creepy sound effects and music. A lot of backtracking, or you exit one level and enter it again...though it's slightly different. Dammit, I wish I remembered what it was, I'm posting in case somebody else does. It was pretty cool.
I believe that you are thinking of Eversion.
posted by Pope Guilty at 6:10 PM on January 7, 2014
I believe that you are thinking of Eversion.
posted by Pope Guilty at 6:10 PM on January 7, 2014
Afraid not, Pope Guilty, but thanks for the suggestion. It wasn't anywhere near as "clean" as Eversion (which sounds kinda fun), it was gritty and grainy, like an old cartridge game that still ran but was full of dust and cat wee. It was dead basic and your jumping guy (it was a human) couldn't do anything special except move left and right and, yeah, jump, and it was quite short, and I believe ran in your browser (though I may be mistaken).
posted by turbid dahlia at 6:41 PM on January 7, 2014
posted by turbid dahlia at 6:41 PM on January 7, 2014
Man, I love the idea of these things, and I love reading them sometimes, but damn if I'm not way to susceptible to them to actually do it more then once or twice.
posted by Canageek at 12:05 AM on January 8, 2014
posted by Canageek at 12:05 AM on January 8, 2014
My personal favorite SCP (as a former theater geek) is The Hanged King's Tragedy. Be sure to read the very creepy supplemental materials.
posted by Rock Steady at 7:55 AM on January 8, 2014 [1 favorite]
posted by Rock Steady at 7:55 AM on January 8, 2014 [1 favorite]
As another (current) theater geek, I keep wanting to do an SCP based on Thomas Nashe and Ben Jonson's play The Isle of Dogs--it was performed in 1597 and immediately suppressed, but there's no record detailing exactly why. (It was reported as seditious and slanderous, but there are no actual examples of any such material from the play.) I just need to figure out the real reason...
posted by Mr. Bad Example at 8:42 AM on January 8, 2014 [3 favorites]
posted by Mr. Bad Example at 8:42 AM on January 8, 2014 [3 favorites]
The entry for The Hanged King's Tragedy notes that it sometimes appears under different titles. Perhaps there is a whole class of memetic viruses that are transmitted through theatrical performance.
posted by Rock Steady at 9:07 AM on January 8, 2014
posted by Rock Steady at 9:07 AM on January 8, 2014
The spirit of Robert W. Chambers hangs over this stuff almost as heavily as that of HPL.
posted by Artw at 9:30 AM on January 8, 2014 [3 favorites]
posted by Artw at 9:30 AM on January 8, 2014 [3 favorites]
humanfont: "Vermicelli is the creepiest of all pastas."
What about strozzapreti?
posted by Chrysostom at 9:56 AM on January 8, 2014
What about strozzapreti?
posted by Chrysostom at 9:56 AM on January 8, 2014
I saw the link to the director of Room 237 did an AMA on reddit, and has a new doc about sleep paralysis coming out.
Some of the examples in the thread are total creepypasta / sheer horror.
I have something similar every night, it's a man made out of twigs and roots who slowly makes his way into my room. He won't move when my eyes are open but moves every time I blink until he's sitting on my chest.
And someone linked to this as an example of their sleep paralysis experience and yeah... don't click that. I couldn't get very far in it. No idea how long it goes for.
(Someone please give me the synopsis, k?)
posted by Theta States at 10:52 AM on January 9, 2014 [1 favorite]
Some of the examples in the thread are total creepypasta / sheer horror.
I have something similar every night, it's a man made out of twigs and roots who slowly makes his way into my room. He won't move when my eyes are open but moves every time I blink until he's sitting on my chest.
And someone linked to this as an example of their sleep paralysis experience and yeah... don't click that. I couldn't get very far in it. No idea how long it goes for.
(Someone please give me the synopsis, k?)
posted by Theta States at 10:52 AM on January 9, 2014 [1 favorite]
I saw the link to the director of Room 237 did an AMA on reddit, and has a new doc about sleep paralysis coming out.
That is going to be the creepiest thing ever.
posted by Artw at 11:09 AM on January 9, 2014 [1 favorite]
That is going to be the creepiest thing ever.
posted by Artw at 11:09 AM on January 9, 2014 [1 favorite]
I saw the link to the director of Room 237 did an AMA on reddit, and has a new doc about sleep paralysis coming out.
oh jeepers this guy is obviously filming from directly inside my brain
posted by Elsa at 2:51 PM on January 9, 2014
oh jeepers this guy is obviously filming from directly inside my brain
posted by Elsa at 2:51 PM on January 9, 2014
And someone linked to this as an example of their sleep paralysis experience
I clicked it and then closed it after the first blink. I don't know what I was thinking; I rarely suffer (and "suffer" is the word for it, all right) from sleep paralysis these days, but one of the few reliable triggers for me is reading about sleep paralysis. (No, I don't have a clue why, and I don't think that thinking carefully about sleep paralysis is a great idea for me, either.) I can't even imagine what watching a simulation might do to me.
posted by Elsa at 2:54 PM on January 9, 2014 [1 favorite]
I clicked it and then closed it after the first blink. I don't know what I was thinking; I rarely suffer (and "suffer" is the word for it, all right) from sleep paralysis these days, but one of the few reliable triggers for me is reading about sleep paralysis. (No, I don't have a clue why, and I don't think that thinking carefully about sleep paralysis is a great idea for me, either.) I can't even imagine what watching a simulation might do to me.
posted by Elsa at 2:54 PM on January 9, 2014 [1 favorite]
I never experienced sleep paralysis until I tried to dream lucidly.
See, the way that you apparently get to have lucid dreams is by realizing during the dream that you're dreaming. This is accomplished by what's called "reality checking"- you establish a habit of occasionally checking to see if you're dreaming, and eventually you start to do it in your dreams. Once you successfully reality check in your dream and realize you're dreaming, bam, you're lucid.
Or so the theory goes.
I got into the habit of reality checking and after a week or so finally had it happen during a dream. "Wait!" I said. "I'm dreaming! This is a dream!" But instead of the lucid freedom that lucid dreamers promise, instead the world drained away and I fell into a dark place. I became intensely aware of my body but could not move- could not open my eyes or breathe or act. As I slowly began to suffocate in the darkness my mind raced and I struggled for breath, and after several seconds bolted awake, flailing my limbs and taking huge, gulping breaths.
I stopped reality checking immediately, but it happened three more times within a week before it finally ended. I never attempted to dream lucidly again. It's one of the most traumatic things I've ever been through.
posted by Pope Guilty at 3:55 PM on January 9, 2014
See, the way that you apparently get to have lucid dreams is by realizing during the dream that you're dreaming. This is accomplished by what's called "reality checking"- you establish a habit of occasionally checking to see if you're dreaming, and eventually you start to do it in your dreams. Once you successfully reality check in your dream and realize you're dreaming, bam, you're lucid.
Or so the theory goes.
I got into the habit of reality checking and after a week or so finally had it happen during a dream. "Wait!" I said. "I'm dreaming! This is a dream!" But instead of the lucid freedom that lucid dreamers promise, instead the world drained away and I fell into a dark place. I became intensely aware of my body but could not move- could not open my eyes or breathe or act. As I slowly began to suffocate in the darkness my mind raced and I struggled for breath, and after several seconds bolted awake, flailing my limbs and taking huge, gulping breaths.
I stopped reality checking immediately, but it happened three more times within a week before it finally ended. I never attempted to dream lucidly again. It's one of the most traumatic things I've ever been through.
posted by Pope Guilty at 3:55 PM on January 9, 2014
My brother told me he had been getting these weird video chat messages on his computer just before he was brutally murdered. He called me the night he vanished and said he'd traced the source of the chats. His last words to me were that the chats were coming from 127.0.0.1, then our Skype disconnected.
posted by humanfont at 7:03 PM on January 9, 2014 [3 favorites]
posted by humanfont at 7:03 PM on January 9, 2014 [3 favorites]
I never experienced sleep paralysis until I tried to dream lucidly...
[FORM OF A CREEPYPASTA]
[NOT A CREEPYPASTA]
posted by save alive nothing that breatheth at 9:36 PM on January 9, 2014
[FORM OF A CREEPYPASTA]
[NOT A CREEPYPASTA]
posted by save alive nothing that breatheth at 9:36 PM on January 9, 2014
I clicked it and then closed it after the first blink. I don't know what I was thinking;
So did ANYONE watch that animated gif?
No way. nope nope nope nope.
posted by Theta States at 10:16 PM on January 9, 2014
So did ANYONE watch that animated gif?
No way. nope nope nope nope.
posted by Theta States at 10:16 PM on January 9, 2014
Yeah, not creepypasta. Just a memory of helpless suffocating in the dark.
posted by Pope Guilty at 12:22 AM on January 10, 2014
posted by Pope Guilty at 12:22 AM on January 10, 2014
So did ANYONE watch that animated gif?
No way. nope nope nope nope.
I did, mostly because I very occasionally suffer from sleep paralysis. The eyes keep opening and closing, while a creature moves slowly into the room, disappears, and then reappears on your chest. It's a pretty accurate to my experience.
posted by Bulgaroktonos at 6:26 AM on January 10, 2014
No way. nope nope nope nope.
I did, mostly because I very occasionally suffer from sleep paralysis. The eyes keep opening and closing, while a creature moves slowly into the room, disappears, and then reappears on your chest. It's a pretty accurate to my experience.
posted by Bulgaroktonos at 6:26 AM on January 10, 2014
I did, mostly because I very occasionally suffer from sleep paralysis. The eyes keep opening and closing, while a creature moves slowly into the room, disappears, and then reappears on your chest. It's a pretty accurate to my experience.
Then my utmost condolences to you and everyone else who experiences anything like this.
There is no way I can watch his new doc, The Nightmare.
posted by Theta States at 9:59 AM on January 10, 2014
Then my utmost condolences to you and everyone else who experiences anything like this.
There is no way I can watch his new doc, The Nightmare.
posted by Theta States at 9:59 AM on January 10, 2014
My favorite SCP has to be SCP-093 (you MUST read the "Test" documents and "Recovered Materials"), although I got sucked into the site by SCP-294.
I still don't "get" SCP-173 after many years. At all.
posted by mrbill at 3:55 PM on January 10, 2014
I still don't "get" SCP-173 after many years. At all.
posted by mrbill at 3:55 PM on January 10, 2014
173 was the first SCP, so it's not nearly as sophisticated as the later entries.
posted by Rock Steady at 4:27 PM on January 10, 2014
posted by Rock Steady at 4:27 PM on January 10, 2014
Although, reading it again now.. Weeping angel variant?
posted by mrbill at 5:34 PM on January 10, 2014
posted by mrbill at 5:34 PM on January 10, 2014
The Hole in the Wall: A Childhood Reminiscense
posted by the man of twists and turns at 10:04 PM on January 10, 2014 [2 favorites]
posted by the man of twists and turns at 10:04 PM on January 10, 2014 [2 favorites]
Ironically, the chainsaw suit guy also does Broodhollow which is a charming and sometimes creepy horror serial.
posted by postcommunism at 12:00 PM on January 17, 2014
posted by postcommunism at 12:00 PM on January 17, 2014
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posted by Ghostride The Whip at 8:54 PM on January 6, 2014 [1 favorite]