Category Archives: Digital

Herobrine

Nationality: American
Age: 20
Occupation: Student at the University of Southern California, majoring in Game Design
Residence: Las Vegas, NV
Performance Date: April 3, 2018
Primary Language: English

Collected in a college apartment while the informant was preparing to cook lunch.

The informant played Minecraft in middle school, and, being a game designer, is well-versed in gamer culture. She, unlike many others, first heard about Herobrine from a friend rather than from the Internet.
Informant: “To my understanding – Sorry, I’m going to be a little noisy. [informant rustles plastic wrapping, preparing to cook] Okay. Herobrine, from my understanding, is, yeah, it’s like the Minecraft uhh… the Minecraft ghost? He’s got, like, white eyes and people claim that… I don’t know, that he behaves kind of similarly to Slenderman? Like he’ll just kinda show up. Um, I don’t remember if he does anything bad to you? I don’t think he does? But, there’s just like screenshots that are, like, very obviously edited [laughs]. Um, but those got a lot of traction, and then mods came out that had an actual Herobrine, but I’m pretty sure that it was just, like, another mod skinned to be looking like Herobrine… But I remember being kinda freaked out about it, like every time I’d play at night I’d be like, ‘Oh my god, what if I wake up in the middle of the night [in Minecraft] and instead of, like, a zombie… being over my bed in Minecraft it’s Herobrine’ and I’d be like, ‘OH SHIT, IT LOOKS JUST LIKE ME! [laughs] Except it has white eyes!’ And that was about the extent of, like, how deep the lore was for me [laughs]. And I kinda loved it, I don’t know.”

Interviewer: “When do you remember hearing about Herobrine, and through what?”

Informant: “Oh god, [chuckles] that was, like, middle school? One of my friends was like, ‘… [In a mocking, purposefully deep voice] Have you heard of Herobrine?’ And I was like, ‘ [In a mocking, purposefully high, airy voice] NO?! What’s Herobrine?!’ And he was telling me all about it, but it was like total fucking bullshit, like he told me the same thing three times, except each time was a little bit different about, like, the first time he’d seen it. So I was like, ‘Ian, you’re a jackass [laughs] .’ But… yeah then I, then I started digging into it on my own… because it was way more fun than listening to fucking [in a mocking voice] Ian talk about it. And then I told my other friends… and they all looked into it, except I was a much better storyteller than Ian was [laughs]. Do you have any other Herobrine questions?”

Interviewer: “Do you know what he does? So he appears in the game, right?”

Informant: “Theoretically.”

Interviewer: “Do you know what he does?”

Informant: “I don’t remember off the top of my head, no. Does he steal your shit? What does he do?”

Interviewer: “I don’t know, that’s for you to tell me.”

Informant: “[Laughs] I’m pretty – From my memory, he just was, like, jumpscare-man. Like he would just pop up, like all of the screenshots he wasn’t doing anything; He literally was just there. Uhh… like when people turn around they were like, ‘[In a mocking voice] And then Herobrine was right there!’ Or they’d be in, like, the desert, where you have a lot of visibility, and they’d see in the distance, like, the shape of, of Minecraft, you know, the Minecraft avatar, um, except they would have, like, glowing white eyes and they’d be, like, ‘[In a mocking voice] That’s not me.’ Uhh [laughs] yes. And that is my understanding of what Herobrine does.”

Interviewer: “Do you know Herobrine’s origin?”

Informant: “Umm, I’m pretty sure someone just, like… I feel like I, I saw, like, a 4chan screenshot? There was, it was literally just, like, the, the, the base avatar from Minecraft except with, like, Photoshopped white eyes. Umm, and then someone was telling this story about, like, their creepy interaction with Herobrine and how, like, Herobrine watched them. That’s, like, my most distinctive, and it feels like the most original [laughs].”

Herobrine
The informant is clearly amused by the notion of Herobrine, and by what, to her, is the sheer silliness of the character and her memories from middle school. She does not believe in Herobrine. Interestingly, while most others associate Herobrine with the statement, “Removed Herobrine” in every patch note, the informant had not heard of this ever being done.

Pokemon Truck

Nationality: African American
Age: 19
Occupation: Student at the University of Southern California, majoring in Game Design
Residence: Smyrna, GA
Performance Date: April 26, 2018
Primary Language: English
Language: Spanish

Collected in my empty apartment. I began by simply asking, “What do you know about the truck from Pokemon?”

The informant is a big fan of the Pokemon franchise, and is very immersed in gaming culture. He has played many Pokemon games of different varieties, and loves the first generation of Pokemon (which includes the game he is referencing), though it’s not his favorite.
Informant: “There is a truck in Pokemon Red, I believe, either Red or – well, the first generation of games. So Red, Blue, Green, Yellow, all that good stuff. Umm, and apparently if you go to that truck and look under it, you can get Mew.

Interviewer: “What do you mean ‘Look under it?’”

Informant: “Like, y- you, if you, I guess if you just interact with the truck, you can battle and catch Mew.”

Interviewer: “Do you know what city it’s in?”

Informant: “It’s, ooh, I wanna say it’s one of the port cities so…. [inhales] I wanna say it’s one of the cities where you board the S.S. Anne, making it either… the city with Lieutenant Serge, which I cannot remember for the life of me.

Interviewer: “Vermillion?”

Informant: “Ver… million… Possibly, that’s probably it.”

Interviewer: “Um, where did you hear about this, and when?”

Informant: “Oh I have no idea when I heard this. I guess it was just, like, when I was still playing Pokemon Red, it was just a rumor that always went around.”

Interviewer: “Through word of mouth?”

Informant: “Mm, yeah, well or on the Internet.

Interviewer: “So you saw it on the Internet?”

Informant: “Yeah.”

Interviewer: “How old were you?”

Informant: “I don’t know. Probably a kid.”

Interviewer: “Is it real?”

Informant: “No… Well, no. First off, you can’t access the truck in the game by yourself. You have to, like, glitch over to it. Which is probably how… it kept people thinking it was real, cause they couldn’t test it out themselves. Um, yeah, but no, even if you glitch over to it and press A, it doesn’t do anything. However, uh, you can glitch the game and get Mew, just not through the truck.”

Interviewer: “For real? You can get Mew?”

Informant: “M-hm. I did it. I was 100 percenting all the games and I got all 151 Pokemon in the first game.”

Interviewer: “How?”

Informant: “Um, that is a question… I do not know the answer to. Uhh, it’s really complicated, so I forgot it, but I know it involves entering and exiting buildings and flying… to certain places. Yeah.”

Interviewer: “But it has nothing to do with the truck?”

Informant: “No. [Sudden realization] OHH!! I do remember! Okay so… above Cerulean City, there was, like, this path on the way to Bill’s house, and there was a bunch of trainers. And when you get to one of the trainers, it’ll, like, you know, exclamation point above their head when they see you. When you do that, you press Start, and then fly somewhere else. And then a bunch of other stuff. And that’s how you unlock Mew.”
This version of the truck myth has to do with finding Mew. The informant does not believe the truck has any real significance, though he is aware of the rumors. He does, however, know a real way to get Mew, proving that it is possible to get Mew in the game, even if it’s not through the truck. Like other versions, the truck is in Pokemon Red.

Pokemon Truck

Nationality: Peruvian Jewish
Age: 20
Occupation: Student at the University of Southern California, majoring in Narrative Studies
Residence: Hollywood, FL
Performance Date: April 21, 2018
Primary Language: English
Language: Spanish, Mandarin, and a little Hebrew

Collected privately in an empty hallway while his friends played a horror game in the other room, which he returned to after the interview. I began by simply asking, “Do you know any word-of-mouth secrets for video games?” Then I specified, “What do you know about the truck from Pokemon?”

The informant is well-versed in gaming culture, and knows a lot about Pokemon, but has never played some of the older games.
Informant: “So, uhh, rumor used to have it that you could get Mew in the first gen Pokemon games Red and Blue by walking up to a truck next to the, umm, next to the boat in Vermillion City. And I think y- you needed to get over a fence, and, like, press A on it, like, a hundred times, and then Mew would fight you. I think there’s also a version of it where you use Teleport at a Pokemon Center on a bike, and it teleports you to the truck, and Mew is there. There are a few different versions I’ve heard, but those are the two I remember.”

Interviewer: “Did you try any of them?”

Informant: “I never played Pokemon Red.”

Interviewer: “Do you know people who tried any of them?”

Informant: “Uhh, yeah.”

Interviewer: “But it didn’t work?”

Informant: “Didn’t work [laughs].”

Interviewer: “So it’s not real?”

Informant: “Not as far as I know? Maybe they were doing it wrong.”
This version of the truck myth has to do with finding Mew. The informant does not really believe the myth, but has no proof denying it. Like other versions, the truck is in Pokemon Red, but the informant includes all generation 1 Pokemon games.

Pokemon Truck

Nationality: Australian
Age: 21
Occupation: Student at The University of Sydney, majoring in IT (Computer Science) and Business Analytics
Residence: Sydney, Australia
Performance Date: April 21, 2018
Primary Language: English

Collected privately in an empty hallway while his friends played a horror game in the other room, which he returned to after the interview. The informant mentioned this myth while I was interviewing him about another video game myth.

The informant, as a child around 7 to 9, had unlimited Internet access, and spent much of his time on forums looking for cheat codes. He was the one who introduced his peers to Pokemon, as well as the supposed “cheat codes” within it.
Informant: “Yeah so I know the 99 master ball thing under the, um, under the truck. So the idea was that… like, you know this was back in, like, the age when everyone had all the cheat code websites and, you know, people were talking on the playground and sharing, like, ‘Oh if you do this then you get this, you can unlock, you know, Sonic in… in, you know, you know, Super Smash Bros Melee if you beat the game 500 times and don’t die’ and so on. So like, you know, I can see how they spread. But yeah, like, there was this rumor spread that you could, you could unlock, you could get 100 master balls in which – There was only one in the game; you couldn’t find them any other way unless you won. I don’t know if they had the, the ticket thing, like the lottery, um, if you – I forget what you exactly have to do, I think you use, like, Strength on the truck in a certain circumstance or something. And then you unlock, you know, you get the master balls.”

Interviewer: “Was it real?”

Informant: “Not, it’s not real.”

Interviewer: “Who’d you hear that from?”

Informant: “I… I think… I don’t know where, I think it was, like, I read it on Cheat Code Central when I was looking through the cheat list. And of course Pokemon doesn’t have any cheats, so there’s nothing on the list. Though obviously someone had put that in there, cause they were like, ‘Oh yeah you can do it.’ I was like, I think if you got all three red G’s and you went to this special spot, then you would unlock something in, like, Pokemon Ruby, I forgot what it was.”

Interviewer: “How old were you?”

Informant: “My first Pokemon game was Pokemon Ruby, and that came out in, like, 2006? I don’t know when it came out. No, it was 2003, I think. So I got it around then, so I would’ve been… I was born in ‘96, so that would’ve been, I would’ve been, like, 7, 8? 9?”

Interviewer: “Anything else to add?”

Informant: “I mean, I re- I remember, um, trying a bunch of those. I think, [sighs], I think it was the red G’s. I’m not sure if I’m confusing it with the actual method to unlock them, cause that was weird enough as it was; It was, like, you had to read, like, the braille and then you had to, like, go through all these stages and find these specific Pokemon and stuff. And I remember, I think there was something in those cheat codes I actually did try, cause I was a kid. And it didn’t work, so me and my sister were very disappointed, cause we played it together.”
This informant has some beliefs that differ from other accounts of the truck in Pokemon. First of all, he claims that the truck has to do with master balls, not Mew. Secondly, he does not name Pokemon Red, but only describes a different secret in Pokemon Ruby.

Clowning – The Internet Trend

Nationality: Mexican-American
Age: 16
Occupation: High School Student
Residence: Upland
Performance Date: 4/13/2018
Primary Language: English

The following informant is a 16-year-old high school student from Upland. Here he is explaining an internet trend and challenge called Clowning. This is a transcription of our conversation, she is identified as GR and I am identified as K:

GR: So, there is this thing on the internet, last year, that clown trend where everyone dresses up as clowns, it went viral. So, at our game that was broadcasted on TV, there where clowns that had weapons at our school during the football game, and I hopped the fence with my friends to go see and there were seven clowns chasing me so I ran out and got caught by the cops

K: I’m sorry, I am little confused, what is this clown trend

GR: Alright, so I don’t know who started it, but the clown thing or clowning, people were just dressing up as clowns and just like scarring people and all that, and people would take it to the extreme with like holding knives and stuff and um.. like it was just weird. And then you like take pictures or videos and post them on social media.

K: Was there a purpose, or do you have to accomplish something doing this trend.

GR: Not really, it was around the time they released the trailers from the rehash of the IT movie and around Halloween too.

K: Oh was it to promote the movie?

GR: No it was just around that time

K: So are there any rules, do you have to dress as a specific clown, or go to specific places?

GR: No there aren’t rules, well…other than dressing as any clown you want and walking around and scaring people, and if you want to post it, post it. Oh and it’s like mostly teenagers and like college people.

K: Okay, so just for my understanding, this Clowning trend was where people dressed up as any clown and went to a public place to scare people… with weapons, or without… and then post it to social media

GR: Yeah, pretty much, it was pretty viral around that time to, a lot of people were doing it.

K: Did you or your friends participate?

GR: No… I did not … but I knew some people … they were my friends, between 15 and 18

K: What did they do specifically?

GR: They dressed up as clowns and went to down town in Upland and the Colonies in Upland, and just walked up to people and scare them and walk around

K: And what was your opinion about this trend?

GR: Honestly I thought it was kind of stupid, there is no point, like you don’t do anything, but my friends liked it.

Context: While having dinner with my cousin, he overheard me talking about the Folklore collection project and chimed in with this story while we ate. It was actually quiet amusing, as he tried to explain this internet trend to a room full of adults and an interviewer who does not understand social media

Thoughts:

I really struggled with this piece of folklore. At first, I was not sure if it could be defined as folklore. But when you think about it, it has multiplicity and variation, because there are no specific rules and it’s a viral trend, as well as its arguably artistic communication and it is done in small groups.