Hey, there, Lonelygirl15.

June 16, 2016 6:38 AM

Lonelygirl15: how one mysterious vlogger changed the internet. The Guardian interviews the creators and actors involved in one of YouTube's greatest virals. Mefi originally discussed the mystery at the end of August 2006. Within a week the truth was revealed.
posted by feelinglistless (26 comments total)

These MetaFilter retrospectives are always interesting for me, because those old threads are full of comments that absolutely would not fly today. I find myself wondering when exactly the turning point was.
posted by Parasite Unseen at 7:13 AM on June 16, 2016 [8 favorites]

I was late to the Lonelygirl15 thing (only started watching after the series was finished), and still found it really compelling, as well as interesting from a dramatic standpoint in a lot of ways. Though, maybe it's just me, I feel like most subsequent dramatic series/Internet performance art/whatever you want to call it took the wrong thing away from the series? The naturalistic form and the possibilities it allows for interest me far more than the "is this real or not???" that phenomena like the Slender series or that irritating PronunciationGuide thing leant on so heavily.

In retrospect, it's really funny that there was any doubt as to whether or not this was staged. The medium is so well-known by now that the ways in which this was a studio production stand out like a sore thumb. Man, growing up with the infancy of an art form is so cool.
posted by rorgy at 7:15 AM on June 16, 2016 [5 favorites]

Parasite Unseen: " I find myself wondering when exactly the turning point was."

I don't have an actual link,, but I'm guessing it was a smackdown by jessamyn. Or 2 or 3 of them.
posted by signal at 7:16 AM on June 16, 2016 [1 favorite]

Wowwwww, that old thread. A lot of people I now think of as pretty vocal about Hey Assholes Cut It Out saying some pretty gross stuff. History! What a terrible thing.
posted by rorgy at 7:18 AM on June 16, 2016 [3 favorites]

I find myself wondering when exactly the turning point was.

I find myself wondering the same thing and also at what point did ten years ago become something that feels like 'just the other day.'
posted by MCMikeNamara at 7:19 AM on June 16, 2016 [6 favorites]

Parasite Unseen: " I find myself wondering when exactly the turning point was."

I don't have an actual link,, but I'm guessing it was a smackdown by jessamyn. Or 2 or 3 of them.

jessamyn did most of the proverbial heavy lifting, but there have been a lot of inflection points along the way rather than a single turning point.
posted by Etrigan at 7:29 AM on June 16, 2016 [3 favorites]

From the article: "They were largely ignored by the mainstream media, who at the time dismissed YouTube as just a repository for cat videos." (Emphasis mine.)

?!?!? This is like saying a church is "just a house of God."
posted by slkinsey at 7:34 AM on June 16, 2016 [28 favorites]

There has definitely been a big reduction in brofilter over time. Metafilter has always been pretty much on the left but yeah there wasn't really a big understanding of intersectionality and male privilege back in the day.

I'm glad that many of the people saying gross stuff 10 years ago have matured and up'ed their game and gotten educated on how not to be creepy or gross. Strong evidence that places like metafilter can really improve the quality of discourse over time. And people who used to be the students can now be the teachers.
posted by vuron at 8:03 AM on June 16, 2016 [14 favorites]

These MetaFilter retrospectives are always interesting for me, because those old threads are full of comments that absolutely would not fly today.

One from me that I would blast off the earth if I could, but it's useful to remember that there was a time when I thought ironic sexism was fine, and that I changed.
posted by maxsparber at 9:00 AM on June 16, 2016 [11 favorites]

I really enjoyed the linked article and then reading the two old threads. I was very impressed with the competence of Beckett & Flinders (and associates). They thought carefully about what they wanted to do, they researched, they prepared -- and not just about, say, what other vlogs were like, but also what it takes to get subscribers and to get featured. I sort of feel badly for the producers and actors in that they were YT superstars in the era before that would have meant quite a lot of money. While I strongly support true amateurs making it big and making money from YT or Twitch or whatever, I like the idea of some people in the business -- not a corporate thing, just some folk trying to do something new -- having a good idea like this and executing it well and being rewarded for it.

I enjoyed reading those old threads because it's super-interesting how many people were sure that it was fiction, but that being fictional, it necessarily must be some kind of viral marketing. Only a few people were willing to strongly assert that just doing it for its own sake was obviously reason enough.
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich at 9:01 AM on June 16, 2016

I've never really regarded myself as bro-ey particularly but I absolutely credit Metafilter and the community here as a big contributing factor in how I approach discussion with others, both online and in meatspace. I have learnt so much here and continue to do so.

I am eternally grateful to all of you.
posted by vbfg at 9:05 AM on June 16, 2016 [6 favorites]

So many now-disabled accounts in those threads!
posted by goatdog at 9:38 AM on June 16, 2016

Oh. And his account's not disabled, but he's gone nonetheless: hey there, comments from Brian Clark.

.
posted by rewil at 9:48 AM on June 16, 2016

I wish I had noticed the people leaving earlier and why. On that Mefi culture shift I would point to the "boyzone" discussions like this one or this religious one or the fat shaming discussions from the that same 2007 period as the start of a culture of decency. But we were still in the weeds. Remember all the fights and call outs? Until fall 2012. First it was the "Girlzone" and decent, interesting, good people where leaving (mansplain thread), and I noticed (suicide thread). And it mattered and I stopped being a shit ally. To women. To everyone who isn't some white guy like me. It's a work in progress.

And it's not that I was some raging asshole, mostly just a lurker, and a pretty liberal one at that. But I didn't fully perceive the scope of the issues around toxic masculinity and privilege. And entitlement. So that's why it really gets me, tears at work gets me, when I get back to the emotional labour thread - and that final request to "Please. Help us build this world." And it's seems insufficient to just say thanks to all the folks who wanted and fought and dragged this place into being a better community. Here's a . for all the folks who put in that labor here and and had to stop.
posted by zenon at 9:54 AM on June 16, 2016 [9 favorites]

Now I'm beanplating if using a . is the right message - they're not dead. And they've likely moved on with their life. And now see how that makes me sound like I'm talking about an x or something? It's beans all the way down.

This is why I mostly lurk.
posted by zenon at 10:00 AM on June 16, 2016

jessamyn did most of the proverbial heavy lifting, but there have been a lot of inflection points along the way rather than a single turning point.

No, it was a number of important and very difficult conversations undertaken by women and allies on Metafilter over years. zenon has linked above some of the threads; I would also point to the Hey Whatcha Reading thread and subsequent Meta from 2009. I'm a bit dismayed to find that people have so quickly forgotten those threads and the site-wide self-examination they inspired.
posted by jokeefe at 10:47 AM on June 16, 2016 [8 favorites]

jessamyn did most of the proverbial heavy lifting, but there have been a lot of inflection points along the way rather than a single turning point.

No, it was a number of important and very difficult conversations undertaken by women and allies on Metafilter over years.

I meant to indicate that jessamyn was the single most visible and active person, and a significant mover on the administrative side, saying "This post/comment is Not Cool and has been deleted" where it previously would have stood. My reference to inflection points was to make the same point about that number of conversations to which you refer, not to say that jessamyn was solely responsible for them.

I apologize for the confusion.
posted by Etrigan at 10:58 AM on June 16, 2016 [1 favorite]

No problem, Etrigan. And thanks.
posted by jokeefe at 11:07 AM on June 16, 2016 [1 favorite]

zenon: see how that makes me sound like I'm talking about an x or something?

An x? Sorry, wat do you mean?
posted by Too-Ticky at 11:41 AM on June 16, 2016

Given the context, as seen by the comment zenon linked, my perspective on this is biased but I think that those threads at the end of 2007 were extremely important, a real turning point, because while prior to it there had periodically been individual women complaining about the boyzone stuff and jessamyn had acted against some of it, in those threads for the first time there were literally dozens of women -- like fifty or more -- speaking up about how unfriendly the site felt to them and there was this groundswell of support for change. Of course, that resulted in a big backlash, which for me at the time was very upsetting, but in the end, and after I was gone, the sexism flag was added, the approach to moderation became more active, and slowly the whole community changed how it behaved. But it was first and foremost all those women speaking up and working together that made it happen at that particular time.

And that change, reducing the sexism on the site, itself acted as a catalyst for MeFi becoming more inclusive in other respects, as well as just generally causing people to behave better. It wouldn't have happened without jessamyn -- for reasons that are well-known and some not as well-known -- but it definitely required all of those people, mostly women, making that difficult effort in the face of some vicious opposition. And that's still true today, even still about sexism here, but also about some other things we've been grappling with lately. It's the people for whom the environment is the most hostile and who are risking the most in speaking up who end up doing the hardest work to effect change, and they pay a big price for it. I really feel like we should always keep that in mind.
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich at 11:47 AM on June 16, 2016 [12 favorites]

Too-Ticky x = ex boy/girl/friend or partner.

And I didn't want to undermine or downplay jessamyn's role. It would have been hard being the face, a female face, of the active moderation of sexism on the site. Not to discount the work of the other mods on the issue - but she certainly saw some ugly ugly stuff.
posted by zenon at 2:23 PM on June 16, 2016 [1 favorite]

Wasn't there some sort of construct of a teenage girl that popped up on 4Chan and promptly drove that already roiling cesspool of misogyny and testosterone into volcanic overflow? I remember hearing about it back in the day but I'll be damned if I'm going to type the words "teenage girl 4chan" into search.
posted by Ber at 6:16 PM on June 16, 2016

So many now-disabled accounts in those threads.

*sigh* I miss iconomy. She was the greatest.
posted by y2karl at 8:50 PM on June 16, 2016 [2 favorites]

Ber: You're thinking of Boxxy! And you're mistaken. 4chan didn't hate her, she was their ruler.
posted by rorgy at 3:39 AM on June 17, 2016

Please add the lonelygirl15 tag to this post! Meeeeeemooooorrrriiiiiiiieeeeeeees!
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 5:27 AM on June 17, 2016

Well, well, well... she's back.
posted by cendawanita at 10:14 AM on June 18, 2016