It is a cool club for smart people. Just one nobody knows about.
I once saw the evolution of a phrase on a messageboard that became an acronym and catchphrase, and then much later saw it used on a completely unrelated place, and I got really excited. The phrase was PPOR, or Post Proof Or Retract, meaning something very much like “cite!” does here. I saw all this on the Star Wars messageboard at “TheForce.net”.
Except then I discovered it’s a much older phrase that pre-dates the web. I believe it actually originated on Usenet, or even earlier still.
no. It’s not easy to make something less cool than the letterman top ten list, but repeating an ancient catchphrase that was never funny to begin with would probably get the job done.
I’ve always thought the best thing about this message board is that nobody else I know ever reads it. In fact, the more obscure it is the better, as far as I’m concerned.
Wait…I knew about asshat…I’m not surprised by ‘bacon’…are people really taking pie references as some sort of SDMB innovation? WE got it from Weebl and Bob!
If you’re keening for the possibility that D-list famous people might see what you’re saying, go to Fark. This board is TINY. TI! NY! If I were to become famous I wouldn’t reveal my true identity on here - I’d be afraid ever thread I posted to would be mobbed with people trying to feel famous/important by association.
Rebecca Watson on The Skeptic’s Guide to the Universe podcast* a few weeks ago referenced “the invisible pink unicorn” in a discussion about religious fanatics and God. I thought: “ooh! an SDMB reference! I gotta tell the gang. But wait – I’ll get laughed out of town when everyone says how common that is.”
Then, two weeks later the same panelist was talking about PETA’s new wacky publicity stunt. She listed off a bunch of jokes about it and then said: “Those are all from the Straight Dope Message Board.”
So: not EVERY instance is imagined.
*Listenership 40,000. Your definition of “popular” may vary.
Yes, that’s why I didn’t say anything after the first podcast. But then in the next one she said the phrase “Straight Dope Message Board.” This phrase has only been around since 1999, which, perhaps by coincidence, is the same year that the SDMB was founded!
Did you even read the Wiki quote? The phrase “Invisible Pink Unicorn” was first used on Usenet in 1990. She may have read it here, but whoever used it here pulled it from the greater ether.
And something tells me we didn’t originate “penis ensues” either.
You might want to try re-reading his post a third time, for comprehension. She didn’t reference IPU and SDMB in the same show. She listed off a bunch of jokes about the most recent (at the time) PETA publicity stunt, and said she had read all the jokes on the SDMB. IOW, sometimes things mentioned on the board DO get noticed.
I thought this thread was about false impressions of references to the SDMB in the wider world, and hey look, here’s an actual verifiable reference to the SDMB, and…what’s your point again?
No it isn’t, it really isn’t. I like the SDMB, but there’s nothing remotely cool about it. And the people here range in intelligence, just like everywhere else. There might be a slightly higher average intelligence here compared to the rest of the internet, but that is not saying much. The smartest people I know wouldn’t spend 5 minutes yakking about all the crap we talk about around here, especially not on an internet message board.
In “All Tomorrow’s Parties” by William Gibson, the main character says something like “I remember reading somewhere that glass is a liquid and in a million years would end up as a puddle on the floor.”
WE got it from Weebl and Bob!