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{{:4chan Chronicle/Header}}

The '''4chan Chronicle''' is the latest incarnation in an ongoing effort by anons to build a well sourced history book about this ephemeral community, such that it's legacy shall not perish from this Earth. As of now, it includes a summary of the site's history down to it's foundation in October 1, 2003.

Currently this wikibook is in the process of consolidating these two efforts: (check them out in the meantime)

* [https://mega.co.nz/#!y4I12ZSI!n2mqaAXzrYKNYFxPbrQGMLliMoZNrkwCgx51HFXdhWw 4chan.doc v1.4.1] - asd fgh's great big well-sourced history book of 4chan, which the 4chan Chronicle is mostly built off of. Updated 2015/02.
* [https://github.com/bibanon/bibanon/wiki/4chan-Chronicle Bibliotheca Anonoma - 4chan Chronicle] - The original effort to create a more comprehensive history of 4chan's achievements and missteps.

== About the 4chan Chronicle ==

* [[History]] - The long history of the 4chan Chronicle. It's been passed down from wiki to wiki, 
* [[4chan Chronicle/Design|Design]] - How to write pages for this wikibook.
* [[4chan Chronicle/Styling Guide|Styling]] - How to do some advanced styling and templating.

== Timelines ==

* [http://tanasinn.info/wiki/Complete_History_of_4chan Complete 4chan History Timeline at Tanasinn.info] - This timeline is the collective effort of thousands of anons over the span of a decade, passed down from generation to generation, rescued from wiki to wiki. And it is still growing.
* [https://github.com/bibanon/bibanon/wiki/4chan-History-Timeline Board Addition Timeline] - Documents the dates when boards were introduced, and boards were closed.
** [[4chan Chronicle/Board Timeline|Board Timeline]] - The board timeline is in the process of being migrated here.
* [http://www.lurkmore.com/wiki/4chan_GET_Encyclopedia GET Encyclopedia] - An encyclopedia containing every major GET experienced on 4chan.
* [http://archiveteam.org/index.php?title=4chan 4chan Fuuka Archiver Listing] - A side project at the Archive Team Wiki to list out and document all known Fuuka archivers, past and present.

== Eras ==

=== Prehistory (1996-2003) ===

* '''The East''' - In Japan, the concept of anonymous textboards became popular for it's ability to freely depict a person's 本音, (true feelings), rather than their 建前 (public facade).
** [http://ayashiiworldhistory.blogspot.jp Ayashii World] - The first major Japanese anonymous textboard.
** [[2ch Chronicle|2channel]] - A Japanese general-purpose textboard which is the current largest forum in the world.
** [[2ch Chronicle/The Third Channel|Futaba Channel]] - A unique variant of 2ch with an added image posting function. It's strange images and memes were popular among ADTRW users, and were inherited by early 4chan.
* '''The West''' - On the English-language internet, account-based forums dominated, with all it's username vanity, omnipresent and restrictive moderation, and steep entry fees. But a few pioneering individuals... decided to try something different.
** Something Awful's ADTRW
** [http://world2ch.org world2ch] - The first English-language anonymous textboard, and one of the few places where Japanese and English-speakers mingled alike.
** Wakaba
** Raspberry Heaven IRC

=== Foundation (Oct. 1, 2003 - June 20, 2004) ===

4chan.net is announced by Moot at #raspberryheaven, bringing the unique experience of anonymous imageboards to the English language world. It instantly finds interest from users of Something Awful's ADTRW board, lightly amused at the prospect of a Futaba Channel of their own. 4chan would thus inherit its traditions and initial memes from both Futaba Channel, and Something Awful.

Moot constantly struggles to find a hosting provider that can accept 4chan traffic and controversial content, barely survives shutdowns, and and ends up adopting the modern 4chan.org domain.

* [[4chan Chronicle/Foundation|Foundation]] - How it all came to be, as discovered in early world2ch posts and primary sources from JonnyDigital, 0037, Shii, and of course, Moot.
* [[4chan Chronicle/Early 4chan|Early 4chan]] - Life in the early days of 4chan's /b/, as discovered from the [http://rx.vyrd.net Penfifteen archives.] It sure does explain why /s4s/ is Moot's favorite board. While 
* [[4chan Chronicle/The Fourth Shutdown|4chan Chronicle/The Fourth Shutdown]] - On June 20, 2004, after his hosting gets suspended [http://www.madman.com.au/madboards/viewtopic.php?t=13237&sid=54fb9c8391737dfe7d8a33f14b579ca4 for the fourth time], and his PayPal account with all donations was frozen, [https://web.archive.org/web/20040626024818/http://www.4chan.org/ Moot shuts 4chan down.]

=== The Meme Factory (Aug 2004 - Aug 2006) ===

4chan cultivates a powerful meme-based culture that stood out from the crowd, slowly eclipsing it's predecessors, especially as push came to shove at SA. One of the key's to 4chan's success was that it recreated a captivating ephermeral tradition built on reposting the best and forgetting the worst, (perhaps not seen since the invention of writing, as the Ancient Greeks note). In later interviews, Moot states that /s4s/ preserves some of this old whimsical, creative spirit.

Moot notes that this era waned as /b/ began to disproportionately grow in size and become uncontrollable.

* [[4chan Chronicle/The King in the Mountain|The King in the Mountain]] - On August 7, Moot does the impossible, and restores 4chan. And this time, he's backed by Team4chan, a task force of janitors and moderators including W. T. Snacks and Shii. It's a timely return in an era where Lowtax launched a crusade against the trend of ever-younger anime girls, and made mentioning "4chan" a bannable offense. Not surprisingly, an ever growing segment of users made 4chan their home, wherever they came from.
* [[4chan Chronicle/Mootocracy|Mootocracy]] - On October 30, Moot and Snacks have a long fight on the IRC, where Moot blames Snacks for being a "lazy coder". The next day, Moot takes server access privileges away W. T. Snacks.
* [[4chan Chronicle/Hackers on Steroids|Hackers on Steroids]] - On July 2006, in one of /b/'s fabled moments, anons come together to invade Habbo Hotel, dressing up as men in black with afros, and forming Swastikas to block entry to the pool. ''"Pool's Closed. Due to AIDS."'' /b/ then launches epic raids against Hal Turner, [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XMeWMFXpSiw Tom Green], [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c16wK-low4E Harry Potter fans] and even [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DkTScqHNm7Y Gamestop]. And within a month, FOX News creates [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DNO6G4ApJQY the legendary special report on Anonymous], solidifying /b/'s proud reputation as the "Internet Hate Machine".

=== /b/-day (Aug. 22, 2006) ===

* [[4chan Chronicle/Yiff in Hell|Yiff in Hell]] - On August 22, a splinter group of /b/tards went completely nuts and completely obliterated three sites from the face of earth, prompting anons to make threads urging /b/ to start a crusade against furfaggotry, and /b/ planned its Magnum Opus: A series of detailed, coordinated raids against the entirety of the furry fandom, including sites like WikiFur, Furaffinity, fchan and various forums. However, the next day proved to be somewhat different than planned. 
* [[4chan Chronicle//b/-day|/b/-day]] - Moot creates a sticky thread that imposes much tighter rules on the free-wheeling anons of /b/, banning much cherished traditions of jailbait and raids. This resulted in /b/-day, a mass riot by anons against the new rules. Even a few moderators joined the cause by deleting the thread, which kept being remade and constantly stickied and unstickied. Eventually, /b/tards begin to leave 4chan for dead and abandon en masse, as a declaration of independence written by exemplar /b/tard Captain_Cornflake establishes Anonymous as a separate group with its home anywhere but 4chan.
** [https://github.com/bibanon/bibanon/wiki/Three-Angled-Blue#epic-frustration EPIC FRUSTRATION] - EPIC FRUSTRATION is the Bayeux Tapestry of the tumultuous events of /b/day, where floods of anons from /b/ revolted against new rules imposed by the moderation team, and raided other 4chan boards, such as /trv/, and most of all, /v/. /v/ fought back.

=== The /i/nsurgency (2006 - 2009) ===

* [[4chan Chronicle/The /i/nsurgency|The /i/nsurgency]] - Refugees from /b/ create a community of competing anonymous imageboards (888chan /i/, 711chan) dedicated to raids, all day every day. Lulznet, Raidchan, The Partyvan Network and it's /i/nsurgency Wiki becomes prominent. The Encyclopedia Dramatica also functions as a rallying point, as well as a massive living record of their achievements.
* [http://taimapedia.org/index.php?title=Complete_history_of_420chan Taimapedia - Complete History of 420Chan] - A good source for this murky time in history, from the last surviving derivative *chan from /b/-day: 420Chan.
* [[4chan Chronicle/Subeta Raids|Subeta Raids]] - In one of the last great raids of this era, /i/nsurgents return to /b/ to recruit anons to take down a lame avatar community that attempted to sell a Longcat item.

By 2009, many of these /i/nsurgents had lost their fervor, met their undoing, or folded back into 4chan. But their legacy of impressive raids would become an inspirational creation myth for the next incarnations of Anonymous.

=== The Shithole of the Internet (Sept 2006 - Jul 2007) ===

{{Quotation|BAM TO BEHOLD, A PUBLIC BULLETIN BOARD, BUILT OF BOTH BRILLIANCE AND BARBARITY BY BASTARDS WITH BONERS. THIS BASTION, NO MERE BULWARK OF BOREDOM, IS A BRUTAL BARRAGE OF BLISTERING BULLSHIT, BARELY BENEVOLENT... BUT BEHIND THE BIGOTRY AND BOOBS, BEYOND THE BITTER BROADCASTS OF BRAGGING BUFFOONS: HERE BE THE BODY POLITIC. A BROTHERHOOD OF BLASPHEMY, BLESSED WITH MORE BALLS THAN BRAINS, BATTLING THE BLAND, THE BOGUS, THE BENIGN. BEDLAM? BRING IT ON. BUT I BABBLE... BETTER TO BE BRIEF. [http://www.lurkmore.com/wiki/V YOU MAY CALL ME /b/.]}}

/b/ is consumed by Cancer. Moot decides that forcing out users is not such a bad idea after all, and screws with it's CSS to unleashing flashing lights, music loops, and other horrors upon the unlucky survivors. But to no avail. For the refugees of /b/ may have left 4chan, but they brought their powerfully viral memes and warped sensibilities with them to an increasingly fascinated mainstream audience, bringing in a never ending flow of fresh blood from Gaia Online or whatnot that filled the void. [ The new /b/: The Shithole of the Internet], was born.

(On the other hand, 4chan's other boards begin to grow in population and develop their own unique subcultures in this era. Their histories begin to diverge, especially /a/ and /v/.)

=== Project Chanology (Jan. 2008 - Dec. 2008)===

=== The Boxxy Civil War (Jan. 2009) ===

Boxxy was an interesting woman who frequented Gaia Online, and posted YouTube videos about herself that few people looked at. However, years later, in January 2009 on 7chan's /b/, threads about Boxxy begin to flood the board, and it spills over into 4chan's /b/. 

Within a day, traffic rises significantly, the site is flooded with posts about Boxxy, and pro-Boxxy and anti-Boxxy groups duke it out in [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7sOT36CmUbk a crippling civil war across the internet.] Eventually, the CBCR managed to take Boxxy's IRL information hostage, but in response 4chan is brought to its knees by a severe DDoS. As a result, all Boxxy posters are banned.

=== Homecoming (2009-2011) ===

In a throwback to the legacy of 4chan (or more likely, the return of /i/nsurgents after the collapse of most of their websites), 4chan sees somewhat of a renaissance after the past few tumultuous years. 

* /b/ raided Jessi Slaughter, an underage camwhore with a serious case of unwarranted self-importance, to the point where his own father discovered her and threw a shitstorm over it, sparking the infamous phrases YOU DUN GOOFED and CONSEQUENCES WILL NEVER BE THE SAME.
* Time’s Most Influential Person of the Year raid, where hackers and /b/tards not only made moot the most voted name, but also arranged the runner ups to spell “Marblecake also the game”, a shootout to the Youtube Porn day. moot attended to the event, spawning even more memes.
* 2009 is characterized by the rise of Reddit, a major news and content aggregator that rose to power after the Digg Revolt, when a revamped hub led to an exodus from the site. Reddit's mainstream popularity and strong cultural influence from 4chan created a unique relationship between the two sites.

=== The Reactionary Era (Late 2011- Early 2012) ===

With all great memes comes great tribulation.

* The Payback Era - Anonymous gets right back in action in Operation Payback when Aiplex Software was found to have DDoSed torrent sites under orders of the MPAA. While they succeed in destroying the company, by 2010 the Wikileaks scandal greatly lengthens the operation, and the 2011 Arab Spring forces perpetual mobilization. Anonymous has become a force to be reckoned with, but it's former home 4chan, suspicious of their new face, motives, and organization, has long since disowned them.

=== Sedentarization (2012 - early 2014) ===

With the Internet in the mainstream, 4chan saw its population shift towards calmer, insular topic discussion and in house content rather than stepping in the toes of other websites.

General threads begin to pop up around this time, to the chagrin of Moot and many moderators, as they often form an insular culture unfriendly to outsiders. Unable to stop the rise of what are essentially subforums on /v/, they decide to contain them by building /vg/ for Video Games. This is the origin of Moot's "Water Cooler" analogy, where he tries to promote crossboarding, and speaks out against the insular nature of boards and even general threads: "C'mon, we're all 4chan users."

One of the greatest legacies of this age is the sheer amount of content and projects created by 4channers. This might actually be a one of the positive side effects of 4chan Fuuka Board archivers, which allow a sort of continuity for subcultures and collaboration, and give users significantly more time to dig for and discover interesting content.

=== The Breaking Point (2014) ===

A series of crippling scandals rocks 4chan, and the rest of the internet; forcing public and legal pressure against the website; from the general public, the media, legions of celebrity-funded lawyers, the FBI, even it's own anons. 

* The April /sp/ Uprising
* [https://github.com/bibanon/bibanon/wiki/FWG-Affair FWG Affair]
* [http://ogeeku.com/blog/2014/09/15/gamergate-quiet-4chan-front/ Gamergate]
* [https://github.com/bibanon/bibanon/wiki/4chan---The-Fappening The Fappening]
* [https://github.com/bibanon/bibanon/wiki/Mark-Alexander-Harding Mark Alexander Harding] - An /int/ shitposter who called himself ''Sheikh Suleiman al-Britani'' claimed to be a convert to ISIS, and made thousands of posts cheering them on and making threats. On October 3, /int/ anons undertook an operation to dox and report the funposting tripfag to Jersey Police. ''Takbir, motherfucker.''

=== The Moot Point (2015 - ) ===

* The Moot Point - On the 21st of January, moot announced his retirement as admin of 4chan, and handed over administration to 3 Senior Moderators. Moot made a farewell livestream, and opened a /qa/ board for anons to ask him questions or pay him homage. Farewell Moot. It's been an amazing 11 and a half years.

== People ==

While most 4chan users remain anonymous, there are a few known individuals that have defined it's history.

=== Team4chan === 

The admins, moderators, and janitors that make the website possible. They've been lauded and lambasted over the years, but as Moot said, "Look in the mirror, guys. The mods and janitors are you. And yes, ''they do it for free.''"

* [[4chan Chronicle/Moot|Moot]]
* [[4chan Chronicle/Snacks|W.T. Snacks]]
* [http://bibanon.org/everything-shii-knows/shii.org/knows/Everything_Shii_Knows.html Shii] -  A bridge between the English-language anonymous textboards of the past, and the anonymous imageboards of the future. Shii is a major primary source for 4chan's history thanks to his personal wiki, [http://bibanon.org/everything-shii-knows/shii.org/knows/Everything_Shii_Knows.html Everything Shii Knows], and was an admin for a while. Now he moderates Wikipedia articles.

=== Influential Figures ===

Critical players in 4chan's long history.

* [http://world2ch.org 0037] - Another veteran of the English-language anonymous textboards, who runs the [http://world2ch.org World2ch.org Historical Society].
* [http://bibanon.org/everything-shii-knows/www.jonnydigital.com/4chan-history.html JonnyDigital] - One of the first 4chan users who witnessed it's creation. A critical primary source for the Complete History Timeline on Tanasinn.info.
* [[4chan Chronicle/Captain Cornflake|Captain Cornflake]] - Wrote the Declaration of Independence during /b/-day, and was a key figure in the battles of Project Chanology.
* [[4chan Chronicle/SaveTheInternet|SaveTheInternet]] - The erratic, unpredictable, and hot-headed founder of 4chon.

=== Meeting Memes ===

People who have been the object of fascination... or disgust, of the users of 4chan.

* [[4chan Chronicle/Boxxy|Boxxy]]
* [[4chan Chronicle/Chris-chan|Chris-chan]]

=== Famed Users ===

Other 4chan users of interest.

* [http://jonrafman.com/ Jon Rafman] - A true artist whose works mock the absurdity of the modern condition. His art brings us the true horror of a digital cyberpunk hell that many people experience, but one where hardly anyone understands it's true nightmarish scale.
* [http://www.nuzlocke.com/ Nuzlocke Comics] - The Nuzlock Challenge was born from /v/, through these drama-loaded comics.

== Other *chans ==

4chan descendant websites that have played an important role in it's history.

* [[4chan Chronicle/AnonTalk|AnonTalk]] - Kimmo Alm's compact anonymous Imageboard. It would have remained just that, had Kimmo Alm not constantly spammed 4chan threads with advertisements for his site, for years. AnonTalk itself was a terrible dictatorship under Kimmo Alm, filled with summary bannings, insufferable drama, conspiracy theories, and piss-poor argument. And then he wondered why "nobody" was visiting the site, or "spreading the word". [http://bibanon.org/archives/kimmo/index.html Even Moot had to speak up publicly against his madness.]
** Eventually, when Kimmo Alm finally rused AT&T to block 4chan's entire IP range, this was the last straw for anons, and they throughly pulverized AnonTalk... Kimmo Alm's baby, into the dust. 
* [[4chan Chronicle/4chon|4chon]] - '''4chon''' was the birthplace of the culture and memes of /pol/, and kept /r9k/'s culture alive long enough for it's later reintegration. [[4chan Chronicle/SaveTheInternet|SaveTheInternet]] (STI) created 4chon.net to hold the /r9k/ and /new/ (news) boards after they were deleted by Moot in early 2011. The site had a fairly strong following of almost 20,000 posters at it's prime and several million posts in it's heyday, and STI's Tinyboard script was the basis of [http://8ch.net 8chan's code.] 
** However, STI was infamous for his strange money-making schemes, disinterest in 4chon, extreme right-wing beliefs, and obsessive harassment campaigns against anyone who even looked at him the wrong way. These character flaws became his own undoing, and led to 4chon's demise. Once Moot restored /r9k/ and created /pol/, anons began migrating back to 4chan. By 2013, 4chon dwindled to a few holdouts and tripfags. 4chon was shut down in December 2014, perhaps because STI had backtracked on his beliefs and had made 4chon a honeypot for law enforcement. STI's Tinyboard imageboard script was later used to create 8chan (to his chagrin), and the surviving community congregates at 8chan's [http://8ch.net/4chon/ /4chon/ board.]

== Sources ==

* [https://mega.co.nz/#!y4I12ZSI!n2mqaAXzrYKNYFxPbrQGMLliMoZNrkwCgx51HFXdhWw 4chan.doc v1.4.1] - asd fgh's great big well-sourced history book of 4chan, which the 4chan Chronicle is mostly built off of. 
* [https://github.com/bibanon/bibanon/wiki/4chan-Chronicle Bibliotheca Anonoma - 4chan Chronicle] - This original set of articles was migrated from the Bibliotheca Anonoma to Wikibooks.
* [LURKMOAR Wiki]

{{subjects|History}}
{{alphabetical}}
{{status|25%}}

== Styling Guide ==

=== The Basics ===

* [https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Help:Editing_pages Wikibooks Editing] - Learn how to edit a wiki, and how to read wikitext. It's pretty easy, don't be afraid.

=== Link Templates ===

Link templates are used to provide wikilinks for memes, esoteric language, or other topics of interest on other wikis. 

* [[Template:Bibanon|Bibliotheca Anonoma]] - Hosts stories, art, and literature from many different eras of 4chan's history.
* [[Template:kym|KnowYourMeme Wiki]] - Currently the most comprehensive, well researched wiki about memes around. Link to this for most references.
* [[Template:lmw|LURKMOAR Wiki]] - An important secondary source for most information about early 2006-2008 4chan history.
* [[Template:ED|Encyclopedia Dramatica]] - Another important record of 4chan history, memes, and raids. But many pages are total satire, and should be taken with a grain of salt.
* Featured Link templates - Special boxes that point to articles on other websites or wikis, with more information about a topic.
* [[Help:Template|Create your own]] - Here's how you create a Link Template.

=== Structural Template ===

* [https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Help:Extension:Translate Translate Extension] - MediaWiki has the powerful [https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:Translate Translate Extension] to facilitate page translation.
** [https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Help:Extension:Translate/Page_translation_example Page Translation Example] - Here's how you set it up on a page.
** High-priority languages are (in order): Japanese, Spanish, French, Russian, Chinese.

{{BookCat}}