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| '''Something Awful''' ('''SA''') is a [[comedy]] [[website]] housing a variety of content, including [[blog]] entries, [[Internet forum|forums]], feature articles, digitally edited pictures, and humorous media reviews. It was created by Richard "Lowtax" Kyanka in 1999 as a largely personal website, but as it grew, so did its contributors and content. The website has helped to perpetuate various [[Internet phenomenon|Internet phenomena]],<ref name="tourist guy">{{cite web|title=Tourist of Death|url=http://www.touristofdeath.com/|accessdate=November 24, 2006}}{{unreliable source?|date=January 2013}}</ref><ref name="ayb guardian">{{cite news|title=All your base...|url=https://www.theguardian.com/Archive/Article/0,4273,4143466,00.html|publisher=Guardian Unlimited|date=February 28, 2001|accessdate=November 24, 2006 | location=London | first=Rich | last=Johnston}}</ref><ref name="ayb frogstar">{{cite web|title=All Your Base Are Belong To Frogstar|url=http://frogstar.com/aybabtu/aa-history.asp|accessdate=November 24, 2006}}</ref> and it has been cited as an influence on [[Internet culture]].<ref name = "G4">{{cite video | people = David Thorpe, [[Kevin Pereira]] | title = Somethingawful.com, Pink Five, Chris Gore | medium = television | publisher = G4 television | location = |date=July 5, 2005}}</ref> In 2018, [[Gizmodo]] placed it as 89th on their list of "100 Websites That Shaped the Internet as We Know It".<ref>[https://gizmodo.com/100-websites-that-shaped-the-internet-as-we-know-it-1829634771 100 Websites That Shaped the Internet as We Know It]</ref> | | '''Something Awful''' ('''SA''') is a comedy website (allegedly) housing a variety of content, including blog entries, forums, feature articles, digitally edited pictures, and humorous media reviews. It was created by Richard "Lowtax" Kyanka (Rest in Power, King) in 1999 as a largely personal website, but as it grew, so did its contributors and content. The website has helped to perpetuate various Internet phenomena, and it has been cited as an influence on Internet culture. In 2018, Gizmodo placed it as 89th on their list of "100 Websites That Shaped the Internet as We Know It". |
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| The website has been involved in a number of notable events. These include a conflict with the [[Spam Prevention Early Warning System]], a [[Hurricane Katrina]] relief fund being caught in [[PayPal]]'s [[red tape]],<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.systemshock.co.za/forums/topic/1209-paypal-blocks-hurricane-relief-funds/|title=PayPal Blocks Hurricane Relief Funds|publisher=systemshock.co.za}}</ref> an exhibition boxing match between Kyanka and movie director [[Uwe Boll]], and the creation of the [[Slender Man]]. | | The website has been involved in a number of notable events outside of The WIDEVERSE. These include a conflict with the Spam Prevention Early Warning System, a Hurricane Katrina relief fund being caught in PayPal's red tape, an exhibition boxing match between Kyanka and movie director Uwe Boll, and the creation of the Slender Man. |
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| ==History== | | = History = |
| Something Awful was created by Richard "Lowtax" Kyanka,<ref>{{cite web | | |
| | last = Lynch
| | == Pre-WIDE == |
| | first = Steven G.
| | Something Awful was created by Richard "Lowtax" Kyanka, |
| | title = Rich "Lowtax" Kyanka
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| | url = http://www.hypothermia.us/interviews/interview_lowtax.html
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| | accessdate = May 10, 2007}}
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| </ref>
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| who controls the site and is supported by other contributing writers and administrators. | | who controls the site and is supported by other contributing writers and administrators. |
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| Kyanka started Something Awful several months before leaving his previous job, after using his "Cranky Steve" persona to write a comedic website update deriding the attitude and work performance of a fellow [[Planet Quake]] administrator. He moved the "Cranky Steve" personality he had created to the Something Awful site in 1999.<ref>{{cite web | | Kyanka started Something Awful several months before leaving his previous job, after using his "Cranky Steve" persona to write a comedic website update deriding the attitude and work performance of a fellow Planet Quake administrator. He moved the "Cranky Steve" personality he had created to the Something Awful site in 1999. In the years immediately following Something Awful's launch, several sponsors, including GameFan and eFront, failed to compensate Kyanka as promised for advertising on the site. |
| | last = Kyanka
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| | first = Richard
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| | title = Here's Mud In Your Eye, Batman
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| | url = http://www.somethingawful.com/d/daily-dirt/heres-mud-your.php
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| | date=May 10, 2005
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| | accessdate = May 10, 2007}}
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| </ref> In the years immediately following Something Awful's launch, several sponsors, including [[GameFan]] and [[eFront]], failed to compensate Kyanka as promised for advertising on the site.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://lowendmac.com/musings/express.html |title=Something Awful & Express.com |accessdate= |author=Dan Knight |authorlink= |date=October 11, 2000 |work=Low End Mac}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.thedukeofurl.org/reviews/misc/efront/ |title=eFront: What Went Wrong? |accessdate= |author=Tim Johnson |date=March 13, 2001 |work=The Duke of URL |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20020202083639/http://www.thedukeofurl.org/reviews/misc/efront/ |archivedate=February 2, 2002 }}</ref>
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| In 2001, the site began charging an activation fee (currently [[United States dollar|US$]]9.95) for forum access.<ref name="dgc">{{cite web | url=http://media.www.dailygamecock.com/media/storage/paper247/news/2006/01/23/TheMix/Something.Awfully.Funny-1492616.shtml | title=Something awfully funny | accessdate=2007-02-13 | author=Jeremy Turnage |date=2006-01-23}}{{unreliable source?|date=January 2013}}</ref> Only members can post messages or threads; to encourage new registrations, the forums are only intermittently viewable by unregistered users. The site and forums draw continuous income from fees for new accounts, forum upgrades such as custom avatars and access to the forum archives and search features, and merchandise sales.<ref name="dgc" />
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| ===Spam Prevention Early Warning System===
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| On July 20, 2003, the spam filtering organization [[Spam Prevention Early Warning System]] (SPEWS) added an entire class-B subnet with the [[Cogent Communications|Cogent]] ISP to their spammer list, since Cogent was hosting a known spammer that SPEWS found difficult to block.{{Citation needed|date=April 2010|reason=SPEWS was simply a list, not an ISP, therefore they couldn't block anyone else's traffic}} Something Awful was added to the list in the process, disrupting its ability to communicate with its customers who were using SPEWS. Upon appeal, SPEWS initially refused to delist SA. The Something Awful administrators responded by telling their users to post their support in the [[Usenet]] [[newsgroup]] ''news.admin.net-abuse.blocklisting''. However, that group and ''news.admin.net-abuse.email'' were flooded with off-topic posts and trolls from Something Awful users, incensing SPEWS advocates. The SA administrators claimed that SPEWS was attempting to hack the Something Awful server. Forum users responded by threatening to perform a [[distributed denial of service]] attack on SPEWS, although this type of behavior was strongly discouraged by Kyanka and assistant editor Zack Parsons.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.theregister.co.uk/2003/08/08/something_awful_going/|title=Something Awful going on with SPEWS|author=John Leyden|date=2003-08-08|work=The Register|publisher=Situation Publishing Ltd.}}</ref>
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| ===Hurricane Katrina charity===
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| As the website's servers were located in [[New Orleans]], the site temporarily went offline in August 2005 during the [[2005 levee failures in Greater New Orleans|flooding from Hurricane Katrina]]. After the site was brought to a semi-functional state, Kyanka set up a link to a [[PayPal]] account where people could donate money to the survivors of the hurricane via the [[International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement|Red Cross]]. Kyanka put in $3,000 of his own money,<ref name="cyrus">{{cite news
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| | last = Farivar
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| | first = Cyrus
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| | title = PayPal Freezes Out Katrina Aid
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| | url = https://www.wired.com/2005/09/paypal-freezes-out-katrina-aid/
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| | date = 2005-09-08
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| | accessdate = 2018-05-27
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| | work = Wired}}</ref>
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| and promised to give some free merchandise to anyone who donated more than $10.{{citation needed|reason=previous citation dead.|date=March 2015}}
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| PayPal froze the donation account, then stated that they would unfreeze the account once it was provided with proof of shipping from aggrieved buyers. Due to the nature of the collection, there were no actual "buyers", and it was impossible to provide proof of shipping for donation.<ref name="inquirer">{{cite news
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| | last = Demerjian
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| | first = Charlie
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| | title = All your donations are belong us
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| | url = https://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/1005868/paypal-freezes-something-awfuls-relief-fund
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| | date = 2005-09-04
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| | accessdate = 2018-05-27}}</ref> Eventually, Kyanka contacted a customer service representative over the phone, and asked to have PayPal donate all of the money to the [[American Red Cross|Red Cross]]. However, he was told that PayPal would only give the money to [[United Way of America]] due to their business affiliation; Kyanka initially agreed, but after receiving several emails from readers detailing alleged corruption and inefficiency within United Way, he changed his mind and told PayPal to refund all of the money to the individual donors. PayPal refunded the money, but did not refund exchange and handling fees for international donors.<ref name="cyrus"/>
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| ===Shooting deaths===
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| In 2005, William Freund sought advice in the Something Awful gun subforum about purchasing Hevi-Shot brand [[ammunition]]<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=1704519|title=Something Awful forum post}} {{subscription required}}</ref> several days before embarking on a "shooting rampage", during which he killed two people before committing suicide. Freund had stated in the thread, which was closed before the killing spree, along with his ability to post comments being revoked, that he intended to use the ammunition to defend his Halloween pumpkins from vandals.<ref>{{cite news|url=http://articles.latimes.com/2005/nov/06/local/me-cyberlife6/2|title=The Cyber World Shut Out O.C. Loner Too|newspaper=LA Times|date=6 November 2005|author=Kimi Yoshino}}</ref>
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| ===Uwe Boll fight===
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| {{see also|Uwe Boll#Critic boxing matches (Raging Boll)}}
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| In June 2006, Kyanka accepted an open challenge from German movie director [[Uwe Boll]], who had offered to fight critics of his movies in a series of 10-round boxing matches. Something Awful had posted a humorous review that was critical of one of his films.<ref>
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| {{cite news
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| | first = Ludwig
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| | last = Kietzmann
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| | title = Uwe Boll does something awful to another critic
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| | url = http://www.joystiq.com/2006/09/25/uwe-boll-does-something-awful-to-another-critic/
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| | publisher = joystiq
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| |date=2006-09-25
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| | accessdate = 2007-03-12}}</ref><ref>
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| {{cite news
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| | url = https://www.wired.com/wired/archive/14.12/ragingboll.html
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| | publisher = Wired
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| | author = Chris Baker
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| |date=2006-12-01
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| | accessdate = 2007-03-12
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| | title = Raging Boll
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| }}
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| </ref> The event took place in [[Vancouver]], [[British Columbia]] on September 23, 2006; after being knocked down several times and eventually forfeiting the fight in the first round, Kyanka claimed that he had been told by Boll, a trained amateur boxer, that the fight would be just for show. To that effect, Kyanka purportedly acted like a silent film comedy character during the fight rather than seriously attempting to fight Uwe Boll.<ref>
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| {{cite news
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| | last = Tillson
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| | first = Tamsen
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| | title = Boll K.O.'s crix in the ring
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| | url = http://www.variety.com/article/VR1117950633.html?categoryid=1011&cs=1
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| | publisher = Variety
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| |date=2006-09-24
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| | accessdate = 2007-05-10}}</ref>
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| ===Sean Smith death===
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| [[Sean_Smith_(diplomat)|Sean Smith]], a leading member of the Something Awful alliance in ''[[Eve Online]]'', was killed in the [[2012 Benghazi attack|attack]] on [[Benghazi]], Libya on September 11, 2012. Game players later paid respect to Smith by renaming space stations after him.<ref>
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| {{cite news
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| | first = Robert
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| | last = Beckhusen
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| | title = Diplomat Killed In Libya Told Fellow Gamers: Hope I 'Don't Die Tonight'
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| | url = https://www.wired.com/2012/09/vilerat/
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| | publisher = Wired
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| |date=2012-09-12
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| | accessdate = 2018-03-28}}</ref>
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| ==Site content==
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| The frontpage article series ''[[Golan the Insatiable]]'' is the basis of an animated series of the same name that premiered on [[Animation Domination]] on [[Fox Broadcasting Company|Fox]] on July 27, 2013.<ref name="ksitetv">{{cite web |first=Craig |last=Byrne |url=http://www.ksitetv.com/glee/fox-announces-season-finale-dates-summer-premieres/20207 |title=FOX Announces Season Finale Dates & Summer Premieres |work=[[Fox Broadcasting Company|FOX]] |publisher=KSiteTV |date=February 28, 2013 |accessdate=March 1, 2013}}</ref>
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| The [[Slender Man]] [[urban legend]] was created on a thread in the Something Awful forum.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/news/images-from-slender-man-stabbing-suspects-notebook-surface-20150219|title=Images From Slender Man Stabbing Suspect's Notebook Surface|last=Blistein|first=Jon|work=[[Rolling Stone]]|date=February 19, 2015|accessdate=March 8, 2015}}</ref>
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| ===Forums===
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| The site is home to a collection of [[Internet forum]]s running a highly customized version of [[vBulletin]], charging a one-time registration fee of US$9.95 for posting privileges and full access to the forums, with additional user account and forum features available for purchase at prices ranging from US$4.95 to US$29.95.<ref name="alberto">{{cite web | url=https://secure.somethingawful.com | title=Something Awful Secure Purchase System | accessdate=2009-04-18}}</ref>
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| The forums have spread several [[Internet memes]], such as [[all your base are belong to us]].<ref name="ayb guardian"/> The forum's users refer to themselves as "Goons". A weekly activity is "Photoshop Phriday", where users will modify existing images to create parodies through the use of image-editing software such as [[Adobe Photoshop]].<ref name="photoshop phriday">{{cite web | url = http://www.somethingawful.com/d/photoshop-phriday/ | title = Photoshop Phriday | publisher = Something Awful | accessdate = 2008-02-02}}</ref> The website also highlights some of what its administrators believe to be exceptional forum threads in the Comedy Goldmine feature.<ref>{{cite web | url = http://www.somethingawful.com/d/comedy-goldmine/ | title = Comedy Goldmine | publisher = Something Awful | accessdate = 2008-02-02}}</ref> A forum member also launched [[4chan]],<ref name="TheStar">{{cite news|url=https://www.thestar.com/living/article/257955|title=Funny how `stupid' site is addictive|publisher=''[[Toronto Star|The Toronto Star]]''|author=Jerry Langton|date=2007-09-22|accessdate=2008-07-16}}</ref> and the [[Let's Play (video gaming)|Let's Play]] phenomenon originated in posts on the Something Awful forums.
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| In 2014, the [[American Folklife Center]] announced that Something Awful was one of the sites it would be archiving as part of its efforts to compile a history of digital culture.<ref name=LoC>[http://blogs.loc.gov/folklife/2014/06/getting-serious-about-collecting-and-preserving-digital-culture/ Getting serious about collecting and preserving digital culture], by Nicole Saylor, at ''Folklife Today'' (at the [[Library of Congress]]); published June 5, 2014; retrieved December 15, 2014</ref>
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| The 2015 video game ''[[Dropsy (video game)|Dropsy]]'' originated as a 2008 [[Choose Your Own Adventure|CYOA]] thread on the Something Awful forums.
| | In 2001, the site began charging an activation fee (currently US$9.95) for forum access. Only members can post messages or threads; to encourage new registrations, the forums are only intermittently viewable by unregistered users. The site and forums draw continuous income from fees for new accounts, forum upgrades such as custom avatars and access to the forum archives and search features, and merchandise sales. |
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| == See also == | | == Early Days & BMW == |
| *[[List of Internet forums]]
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| *[[4chan]]
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| *[[Anonymous (group)]]
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| *[[Digg]]
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| *[[Fark.com]]
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| *[[News aggregator]]
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| *[[Reddit]]
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| *[[Slashdot]]
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| ==References== | | == Clown World War I == |
| {{reflist|30em}}
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| ==External links== | | ==External links== |
| *{{official website|http://www.somethingawful.com/}} | | *{{official website|http://www.somethingawful.com/}} |
| *[https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/fuck-you-and-die-an-oral-history-of-something-awful Fuck You And Die: An Oral History of Something Awful], a 2017 [[oral history]] conducted by [[Vice (magazine)#Website|''Vice'']] | | *[https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/fuck-you-and-die-an-oral-history-of-something-awful Fuck You And Die: An Oral History of Something Awful], a 2017 oral history conducted by ''Vice'' |
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| {{Template:Groups}} | | {{Template:Groups}} |
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