Anon Meme
| Synonyms: | |
| See also: | Kink Meme, anonymouse, Unpopular Fannish Opinion |
| Click here for related articles on Fanlore. | |
An anon meme is a journal community or post where nearly all comments are anonymous. It can be a kink meme, a commentfic fest that is entirely anonymous, or it can be for anonymous comment discussion. Like kink memes, anon memes were once as likely to refer to a single post,[1] but evolved into entire communities.
Discussion memes can be fandom-specific like spnpermanon or multifandom like fail_fandomanon. Some memes are defined more by the style of conversation and might be hate memes or love memes or capslock communities.
In some memes, thread titles are strongly encouraged so that readers can use flat view to see the responses as they come in, and changing thread titles is strongly discouraged for the convenience of tracking!nonnies[2] and flatviewers.
Anonymity
Anon memes may have become popular in part because their anonymity offered an antidote to certain problems with LiveJournal culture. In a 2009 discussion about a particular meme, one fan explained that "bandflesh sprung out of a place that was largely for fandom lurkers. The social pressures of livejournal fandom were circumvented and allowed us to share, create and be a member of a community without worrying about any kind of reputation or journal upkeep."[3] After RaceFail '09, there was also an increasing perception that the way fans were practicing social justice (calling each other out, dogpiling, etc.) was discouraging civil discourse and meta in namespace.
Downsides to anonymity include endless arguments on meme caused by anons misreading which anon held which opinion. Outsiders unfamiliar with anon memes fare even worse and tend to attribute any one comment they don't like to the meme as a whole. Finally, unmoderated anon memes tend to descend into endless wank and trolling. If unchecked, eventually the entire meme will consist of one troll replying to themselves because everyone else has left in disgust.
Terminology
See full page at Anon Meme Terminology.
List of anon memes
- Fanfic Haters Anonymous, created 12 June 2004
- lol_meme, created 11 August 2006
- bandflesh, created 5 June 2007
- spnpermanon (now defunct), active July 2009-October 2010, and its replacement spnanonhaven
- glee-anon, created 15 November 2009
- community-anon, created c. 2009 (deleted)
- Fail-Fandomanon, created 5 July 2010
- Yuletide Coal (now defunct), created 25 December 2010, and its replacement coaltide, created 2 October 2019
- anon_xoxo (Gossip Girl), created 23 June 2011
- rpanons, created 21 December 2011
- sherlock-rant, created 13 April 2012, and its replacement sherlock-rants, created 7 August 2014
- Avengers-anon (deleted)
- Kpop anon memes: kpopsecretmeme2, kpsm3, kpopficsmeme, kficanon, kpopficwank, kficrevolution
References
- ^ For example: Unpopular bandom opinions ahoy!, Archived version, livejournal post by untappedbeauty, 2007-12-28.
- ^ tracking!nonnies are anons who follow the meme via gmail, which threads responses according to thread title. tracking!nonnies can be very helpful in digging up links to parts of discussions in old posts when non-tracking anons request them.
- ^ comment by quettaser in arsenicjade's post I've got troubled thoughts, Archived version, 9 January 2009.