Category Archives: Digital

Singles Day

Nationality: Chinese
Age: 20
Occupation: Student
Residence: China
Performance Date: 4/16/15
Primary Language: Chinese
Language: English, Japanese

Context: My informant first told me about Singles Day while we were walking home together after an outing with anime club that took place close to Black Friday. He introduced Singles Day, which takes place on November 11th (11/11), as both the Chinese equivalent of Black Friday and an anti-Valentine’s Day celebration for single people. I interviewed the informant about the holiday at an anime club meeting to obtain a transcript for collection purposes.

Interview Transcript:

Informant: Okay. So… What exactly do you want to know from the Singles Day?

Me: Well like… The way that it’s celebrated. How it came to be. What it means. Stuff like that.

Informant: Okay. So first of all, it’s called “Singles Day” only because the eleventh of November is all “ones,” and it’s single. It actually started probably like two or three years ago. Like there was a guy in a Chinese website. It was just on the Internet, and he made fun of this day. And he was the Amazon of China. It was called Taobao. And they found that this… That they can actually make money from this. Make it some kind of festival. And so they just decided to call it “Singles Day.” And for Singles Day they made it the Black Friday of China.

Me: What type of stuff do people buy?

Informant: Just everything!

Me: Like off the Internet? Or in stores?

Informant: No. Just mainly on the Internet. But… But one thing that’s pretty interesting about it is that the Chinese government doesn’t actually like the term “Singles Day.” So they banned websites who use that name. So now when… We still call it “Singles Day,” but all those Chinese websites and stores, when they are celebrating it, they have to use the term “Double 11.” And so they call it “Double 11 Shopping Festival.” But it’s mainly only like selling things. Last year it went really crazy. Like it even has some, like, some stores are even giving like free mailing between nations. Like because, like they are just earning that much from that single day. And, yeah. It’s pretty crazy.

Me: Um, like who usually participates?

Informant: Well, ironically… Most of them are, um, people in relationships. Like they… Well, basically just everybody, mainly young people. And though it’s called “Singles Day,” there are actually a lot of couples just buy things online, because, you know, discounts. Great discounts.

Analysis:

Singles Day is an example of a holiday that came into existence to mock another holiday. It is popular among the citizens of China despite its being censored by the government. Its celebration is also heavily dependent on Internet usage, as most of the shopping done on this day takes place online. The holiday has become so popular that, ironically, even people in relationships participate in it. The use of the term “Double 11” after websites got banned from using the term “Singles Day” is an example of a people’s continuing to observe a tradition despite interference from authorities.

Transmustache Infection

Nationality: American
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Residence: Brentwood, CA
Performance Date: 4/22/15
Primary Language: English

Informant: The informant in question was a sophomore screenwriting major at USC. White, female, and a Los Angeles native. She attended the Archer School, an upper-class girl’s private school in Brentwood.

Transcription:

Last year in Reality Starts Here, a class that all of the freshman film students had to take once a week for a lovely learning experience and hear from very important guest speakers. Two people had a conversation about whether or not girls would still look good with a mustache on. And then they photoshopped a picture of a girl in the class with a mustache onto her face. And during lecture everyone started photoshopping mustaches onto each other’s faces. And they called it the “transmustache infection” because we learned about something in class called “transmedia” which was a way of saying of learning ways to tie differing media practices together. Most of which don’t cater to screenwriters. Umm. What else? And then one day a guy came to class with a pack of thirty-something fake mustaches and passed them all around. And we gave one to the teacher and she wore it too. And I took a selfie with two other screenwriters with our mustaches and Instagrammed it. And it was a big deal because it was a cool picture with my cool college friends. (laughing)
Why was that significant to you?
Because it was teambuilding. And it was kind of a shared joke that spread among a lot of people and it was a fun way to get through class.

Analysis: This piece of folklore proves very interesting as something done my members of a particular class in a direct attempt to thwart the class itself. The primary purpose of the “transmustache infection” was to distract the students from the actual course material being presented. Because of the existence of social media, the “transmustache infection” was able to be disseminated with the teacher being none the wiser.

This folklore took a turn in its transformation between weeks from cyberlore to tangible folklore. By making the change into a physical format, the secrecy of the joke was lost. And ironically, what started as a rebellion against the authority of the professor wound up being adopted by the professor herself.

The Fighting Game Scrub

Nationality: American
Age: 20
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: 4/20/15
Primary Language: English

The competitive gaming community is the large community of people who play competitive games. This usually means that they either play MOBA (multilayer online battle arena) or fighting games online against other players. While this community has no physical location, they communicate and form their culture through online message boards and forums. Due to these forums, the competitive gaming community is able to foster a culture and communicate with one another without actually being in the same physical place. Some notable competitive gaming websites are Smashboards.com, Nadota.com, Joindota.com and Gosugamers.com. The fighting game community is a subculture of the larger competitive gaming community.

The word “scrub” has a very unique and specific meaning in the fighting game community. The definition is a variation of the word’s meaning of a person of insignificant size or standing. It is commonly used as an insult and as a way of placing someone below the speaker. However in the Fighting Game Community, which includes all people who socially play “fighting games” such as Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat, and BlazBlue online, the word has much more specific definition. In this community, a “scrub” is who frequently loses matches (in the game of their choice) and instead of practicing to get better they take to the forum and complain about the game. In this community, a scrub is not just someone who is below you, but it is also someone who is unwilling to improve himself. This has lead to many commonly used phrases such as “get good scrub” to try and emphasise that the problem with the scrub isn’t his lack of ability but rather is his lack of improvement.

The Informant that I interviewed is a somewhat successful member of the Fighting Game Community and is well known on the forums for the games BlazBlue and Mortal Kombat. He in the past has been on the leader-boards of many of these games and is familiar with this community both through the online forums and the in-person events often hosted for these games. Throughout his years in this community, he has both been a “scrub” and an experienced player who tells “scrubs” to get better at the game. He admitted that the use of the word if “often derogatory and the more bad mannered things you can say to a competitor,” however he also revealed that “almost everyone uses the word frequently, both while playing and on the online forums.” When asked about the origin of this use of the term the admitted that he did not know where it originated, but that “it is very universal across all fighting game communities” and that “[he] [has] never been a part of an online fighting game community that did not use the expression.” Because this use of the term is so widespread and accepted, it is safe to assume that it has been accepted by the larger fighting game culture for quite some time now.

However, despite the origin, what is truly interesting about this term is what it specifically means. Unlike the original use of the word scrub, the fighting game’s variant of this work places heavy emphasis on the scrub’s unwillingness to practice and get better. This illustrates that in this community hard work and dedication are very desirable traits. The informant made it very clear that the worst part about “scrubs is their willingness to complain about how the game is broken before actually trying to get better at the game.” It would seem that in this community, which is highly competitive, the worst thing you can be is non-competitive. As such, the word “scrub” isn’t an insult because it implies that someone is bad, but rather it is an insult because it implies that someone is non-competitive.

Ninja Looting

Nationality: Asian American
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: 4/27/2015
Primary Language: English

My informant used to play the massive multilayer online game World of Warcraft. In this game players are able to talk and play with one another in real time. In fact, group play is encouraged and is often essential to complete some of hte harder portions of the game. Because of this, there is a large online community of World of Warcraft players who interact with eachother regularly and have created their own customs, phrases and rituals.

My informant explained to me one such phrase that is commonly used in World of Warcraft. In order to understand it, however, you must know a little bit about the game. In World of Warcraft there are group encounters called dungeons. In these dungeons teams of five to twenty five players work together to defeat high level enemies and earn exceptional rewards (usually in the form of items to better equip your avatar). After you defeat a boss, they drop randomly generated loot that the players then divide up among themselves. Usually who gets which pieces of loot is determined before the boss dies to avoid confusion. If not, players often roll a virtual die and whoever gets the highest number gets the item. However, certain players, referred to as “ninjas” will simply take the loot quickly before his team has the time to figure out which items go to whom. This is called “ninja looting” and is very looked down upon in the community. On the subject of “ninja looters” my informant revealed that these people “can ruin the fun for the other players and are usually kicked out of the group.” When asked who started this phrase or why they are called that, she responded by saying that “I’m not sure where it came from, when I started playing the game back in 2007 it was already a very established term. As far as what it means goes I think its just like you are a ninja because you are sneaking in and taking something and then hopefully leaving before someone realizes.” She went on to say that “ninja looters” are very disliked by the general community and often will be blacklisted if they are caught multiple times.

This term reminds me of the term “pirate” which refers to people who illegally download media on the Internet. In this game a “ninja” isn’t a literal ninja, but is rather someone who breaks the looting rules and disrupts the order of the group. In this sense, I feel like the ninja is just a metaphor for someone who stealthily takes something from the larger community like a real ninja might have done.

Gamefaqs signature habits

Nationality: American
Age: 20
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: 4/20/15
Primary Language: English

The ritual:

Gamefaqs is a very popular gaming website and forum that people use as a communal portal for gamers. On this website, there is a sub-forum for essentially every game out on the market today. Each of these sub-forums has its own community with its own culture and cyber-rituals. My informant frequently posts on and reads the sub-forums dedicated to fighting games such as Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat, and BlazBlue. While all of these sub-forums reference different games, they are very similar games and as such these sub-forums contain similar communities. Because so many people post on these forums, it can be hard to establish a unique identity for yourself even if you are a frequent visitor and poster. However, there are two ways a poster (someone who posts on the online forums) can distinguish themselves from the pact: their avatar (a picture next to their profile) and their signature (a blurb of text shown after everything they post).

Gamefaqs users in particular place a lot of value on the signature. Users will often use their signature to show to the community who they are. As such, the creation of and transformation of a user’s signature is highly ritualized in the Gamefaqs fighting game sub-community. In these communities, the most respected and revered users have a picture of their favorite or best character from the game they play the most in their signature. For example, if someone played a lot of Blanca (a playable character) in the game Street Fighter he would put a picture of Blanca in his signature. The picture is often accompanied by a line of text saying something along the lines of “Gamefaq’s official (insert character here).”

While this seems like a fairly simple and non-confrontational thing to do, my informant, a Gamefaqs user of many years, revealed to me that members of this community take these signatures very seriously. Once someone has a character in their signature, nobody else is allowed to use that character in their signature. My informant told me that “if someone tries to put a character that has already been taken in their signature, they will be ignored or harassed until they change their signature to something else.” He continued to say that, “sometimes, when a user is completely unwilling to change their signature a moderator of the site will ban them from the forums temporary or forcefully change it.  This is something we take very seriously. Your signature is almost your entire identity on [Gamefaqs] so when someone challenges that of course the community is going to fight back.” However, if someone feels like they should be the true “owner” of a certain character’s signature, they may challenge the current “owner” to a best of three (sometimes best of five) match up to claim the title for themselves. Whoever wins gets to keep the signature.

 

Analysis:

Clearly identity is very important to the members of this community. Because it is one of the few ways to separate yourself, it makes sense that a user’s signature would be very important to him. The interesting thing here is how the entire community seems to respond when someone challenges the identity of a single user. This reveals that there is some form of a herd mentality in this community; if you mess with one member you mess with everyone. I believe this may be based on a fear of their system being challenged. If one person’s signature is taken freely, then anyones suddenly becomes up for grabs. In a community where anyone can join at any point by registering online, the old members can only secure their identity by helping each other keep the status quo.