I have suspected this for a while because I see a whole bunch of references in their articles that seemed to have originated here but I was never sure because maybe it is just some kind of convergence. In case you aren’t family with Cracked.com, it is an extremely popular fact/humor website that specializes in daily articles often in a list format written in a provocative style.
“I’m talking about when you suddenly realize, out of the blue, that some completely benign topic, or very mild joke, is the subject of someone else’s bitter, ongoing conflict. We covered a whole bunch of these before – for instance, you can’t show up in a public forum asking about tipping at restaurants, declawing cats, or circumcision without finding that you have accidentally taken one side in a long-running war where passions run high and both sides have long since abandoned rational discussion.”
Sounds pretty familiar but maybe it is a coincidence.
However, then it gives an example of people arguing passionately about font choices of all things. The very first example is this thread from here.
Seriously? I’m pretty sure that Cracked used “every general message interest board in the history of the world dating back the Usenet” as their reference but that’s just me.
To my recollection, the stupidest example of this was when a Doper was at a big rock concert and one of the musicians said hello to his friend who happened to be named Opal. They were sure that it was a call out to the message board. :rolleyes:
They seem to have regular contributors (today’s articles were written by David Wong, Soren Bowie, Kristi Harrison, and Chris Bucholz; all of whom I’ve seen featured many times for many different articles by each); but Cracked does solicit items from anybody at large as well. As I understand things, you have to pitch Cracked on your item, and while their editors will consider it, it is quite possible that they will reject it, so having your item published by Cracked is not as easy as it seems.
There are other ways to get involved however–Cracked’s Photoplastys and Image Macro contests seem to attract a number of readers who can put together a one-shot image of something funny or interesting. I’m one of these; I’ve been a runner-up in a few of them, though I’ve never won one. Still, they’re a lot of fun, and it’s always nice to see my item posted as a runner-up.
The Straight Dope column does get referenced across the Internet, and I have seen some mention of the SDMB somewhat independently on other sites (io9, for example*), but otherwise we’re nothing particularly unique.
*I don’t know if Charlie Jane Anders is an active member or just a lurker.
I am pretty sure I have seen direct references to The Straight Dope (Cecil’s column), and I think also to the message board, on Cracked. Sorry, but I don’t remember enough to be able to find the articles again.
Google clearly ranks the SDMB pretty high, and spiders it often. Unusual topics discussed here often turn up at or near the top of Google searches within minutes of the thread being started.
