Category Archives: Digital

The Secret Cow Level in Diablo

Nationality: South Korean
Age: 22
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles, CA
Performance Date: April 2nd, 2018
Primary Language: English
Language: Korean, Mandarin

Story

 

“There was a rumor where if in Diablo, if you clicked on a certain cow in Tristram a specific amount of times, you can go to a secret cow level that was just full of cows.”

 

Context

 

I collected this from my older brother, who has been an avid gamer with me since as long as I can remember. When we went abroad to Vancouver, Canada, to study English, we started playing on Diablo on the desktop computer at the house of his homestay. This was in 2006, when Diablo II was already out. By the time we played the game, the game developers have already debunked the rumors and created a secret cow level in Diablo II as a tribute to this rumor. However, despite knowing that the rumor was not true, we would consistently try to click on the lone cow of Tristram different amount of times, hoping that the rumors were actually true and we could witness that awesome moment.

Blizzard Games, the company that created Diablo, continues to create more Cow Levels in new games in the franchise.

 

 

Analysis

 

This collected data emphasizes the propagative nature of folklore. Some rumor that was traveled by word of mouth grew to become a tradition to keep up for the franchise. The rumor on its own is a gaming legend and the ritual to the cow level happens in a very real place within the game.

 

The Crypto Term “Hodl”

Nationality: American
Age: 23
Occupation: Masters-level engineering student
Residence: Los Angeles, CA
Performance Date: April 7, 2018
Primary Language: English

Daniel Shapiro is currently pursuing his masters degree in Mechanical Engineering at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles, CA.  He dedicates much of his free time to researching and investing in cryptocurrency and blockchain technology (or ‘decentralized ledger technology’).  As a result of recent profit yields, the market for these technologies has grown exponentially and begun to attract investors from around the world.  Online forums and communities are emerging in tandem with the technologies themselves.  Reddit, an online social news aggregation, is one of the most popular websites among crypto enthusiasts.  There, they exchange information about blockchain technology and offer advice to other investors.  Daniel frequents these websites and has adopted the “language” of crypto.  In the excerpt below, he describes the origins of one specific term, “hodl,” and then explains how it is used across various forums.

 

Daniel: “So, on the Reddit crypto forums, there’s a notorious post where someone was telling everyone to ‘hold,’ as in ‘don’t sell your bit-coins, or your alt-coins’ but he misspelled ‘hold’ as ‘h-o-d-l,’ or ‘hodl.’  So now, in all crypto forums and twitter and in any crypto blogs, space, whatever — people say ‘hodl’ instead of ‘hold.’  And it’s a term to say, when the price is going bad, ‘hodl’ and don’t sell, because if you’re selling away at a low price when you SHOULD be holding and selling at a high price.”

Isabella: “And what is cryptocurrency?”

Daniel: “Crypto is a buzzword name given to decentralized ledger technologies… which are, effectively, networks of computers which operate as a single server, so you don’t need a third-party server to host different networks, which are centralized and controlled by a single party, and require advertising to pay for their servers.”

Isabella: “And why do crypto forums exist?”

Daniel: “Well, these forums exist to… spread news about many of the different cryptocurrencies… such as, when they [the creators and proprietors of blockchain technologies and cryptocurrencies] release specific products or make specific partnerships.  They’re mainly for distributing information… also to have discussions about the coin.  But realistically, probably about half of these pages are just ‘meme’ pages.”

The original author of the term ‘hodl’ was ridiculed on account of his spelling error. As such, ‘hodl’ has satirical undertones and is often used in a joking manner. But as Daniel notes in the transcription above, ‘hodl’ is also used during actual trading deliberations, wherein the goal is to dissuade someone from selling their shares at a low price. ‘Hodl’ serves as an example of folk speech because it is unique to the crypto community and serves a specific purpose amongst its members — one’s knowledge and use of the term can corroborate their belonging to the community.

Daddy Nikias

Nationality: American
Age: 20
Residence: Los Angeles, California
Performance Date: April 26, 2018
Primary Language: English

This USC-specific internet meme was described by a friend after class. It refers to USC President C.L. Max Nikias.

“So, uh, there is this whole thing at USC, that like, uh, Nikias is kind of like the father figure, but also in kind of a kinky way? Uh, so people like to say he is, uh, ‘Daddy Nikias,’ um, which is of course a play on a very sexual way of uh, of uh, talking to someone. Um, you know? So, yeah, of course people are going to take this sort of older authoritarian figure and sort of bring him down to our level as college students and say, ‘Yes, let’s make him very kinky.’ So that’s ‘Daddy Nikias.’”

I thought his observation that the students were attempting to “bring him down to our level” was astute, as jokes like this can help to poke fun at authority figures. This joke originated, as far as either of us know, on the Facebook page “USC Memes for Spoiled Pre-Teens.”

Marshall Snakes

Nationality: American
Age: 19
Residence: Los Angeles, California
Performance Date: April 26, 2018
Primary Language: English

This USC-specific internet meme was described by a classmate after class had ended. It refers to students in the Marshall School of Business.

“Um, Marshall students are, like, known for being, like, snakes. And, I guess the snakes are supposed to be like, that they’re sneaky and like mean and bad, and like, um, cross you over. And so they get a lot of shit on the page for being, like, assholes really. And so like, there’s all these memes about, like, snakes, and how Marshall students are like snakes, and how it’s funny, and how everyone should hate them.”

This meme originated on the Facebook page, “USC Memes for Spoiled Pre-Teens.” She described this page to me as well:

“All of this information is…information can be found, basically like on this USC memes page, um, that a lot of USC students are on, um, or have gotten invited to, and add little posts to, and um, things that are basically just funny to the entire student generation. Or, yeah, student…not generation, I don’t even know what we’re called. Um, body, yeah that’s it.”

Creepypastas

Nationality: American
Age: 20
Occupation: USC Student - Interactive Media
Residence: Los Angeles, California
Performance Date: 4/25/18
Primary Language: English

Transcription:

Interviewer: “What do you know about Creepypastas?”

Informant: “Uh…I know they are uh…well generally speaking it’s kind of an umbrella term for like…short horror stories written on the internet. Typically, they somehow involve like…technology like I know there’s a lot about like creepy video games like ‘Oh I bought this video game and it was fucked up. Sonic came into my house and killed me’ or something. And like other ones that involve the internet in general or like…technology but they don’t necessarily have to. And uh…sorry I got distracted by the cute dog video. But uh… I think they originated on a site called Creepypasta hence the name but I think now it just sort of refers to any story of that…uh likeness.”

Interviewer: “Are you familiar with Sonix.exe?”

Informant: “Yes. The…I don’t remember it precisely but I know the gist of it. It’s like uh…from my recollection somebody like…somebody buys like a sketchy Sonic like used Sonic game. And then, there’s a bunch of creepy shit, hyper realistic blood, and other Creepypasta tropes. And then they die? I don’t remember the end of the story.”

Interviewer: “I noticed you said hyper realistic blood.”

Informant: “Yeah it’s kind of a Creepypasta staple.”

Interviewer: “Is that a term that’s used a lot?”

Informant: “I feel like it is. Like I haven’t read that many but I feel like whenever people joke about Creepypastas, they’re like ‘yeah the hyper realistic blood in this otherwise innocent video game’.”

Summary:

The informant talks about creepypastas, a type of story that is circulated around the internet. They are known to be about technology and video games. It’s possible they first originated from a site of the same name but now they can be found anywhere. I asked about one of the more popular creepypastas Sonic.exe. Despite never having read the story herself, the informant was able to remember the general gist of the story. It stood out to me that she mentioned hyper realistic blood so I asked about that as. She says it’s a line that’s said often in creepypastas. I found it interesting that despite not having read many creepypastas, she is still very aware of the tropes and jokes regarding them, showing how widespread they are, at least in the gaming community.

The title screen for the sonic.exe creepypasta game

The title screen for the sonic.exe creepypasta game