4chan_b-day
Table of Contents
4chan /b/-day
“/b/-day” was a uproar about 4chan announcing, on August 23, 2006, that rules would be enforced on its “Random” (/b/) board.1) This changed very little, but the overreactions, the new websites, and the indirect creation of a hacktivist movement would make you think otherwise.
History
In 2006, 4chan was rapidly gaining traction, but it caused the “Random” (/b/) board to constantly cycle through child pornography (i.e. 'jailbait'), doxing, and website raiding.2) On Wednesday, August 23, 2006, Poole announced, with an image of Bob Ross's head,3) that the 4chan staff would be enforcing its global rules and ban users who intentionally engage with said content on the board around 2:53pm.4)
Policy Enforcement
Participating in a thread dealing with illegal content will get you globally banned for two weeks (thread starter is indefinitely banned). This means merely replying to it removes you from this site for a minimum of two weeks. This includes JB and any other “grey area” threads. Posting any piece of personal information or inciting/participating in an invasion of any sort will also get you, and anybody who replied to the thread globally banned. You have the option to either report or ignore (not reply to) threads that break the rules. Thanks!
Note: To clarify, this applies to THREADS breaking the rules, not REPLIES. If somebody breaks the rules in a REPLY the entire thread won't be banned. Again, exploiting this clause to break the rules will get you banned. These rules aren't anything new–we've just adopted a new way of enforcing them.
There is literally a “Ban thread” button now, so it isn't a chore to do. Abide by the rules and your own common sense.
This was met with a massive overreaction as people viewed this as an attack on the 'board culture' and a few were surprised that the board even had rules. At some point, Snyder intervened to clarify what Poole5) said, attempting to disprove theories of staff infiltration.6) Despite this, the enraged users would end up crashing the “img.4chan.org” server for two days,7) spilling into the following weekend.
There's been a lot of confusion and disapproval about the “new rules”, so I'd like to clear things up and revise the policy slightly. When you bump a thread in /b/, it takes longer for it to die. So if you bump a thread with illegal content, that illegal content stays on the board longer, and 4chan gets angry letters. Rather than relying on the moderators working around the clock on every board to delete things, we're asking for your help to make 4chan's system work.
To discourage participation in illegal threads, it's now against the rules to reply to a thread with illegal content. If you post in these threads, you will be banned for 2 weeks, regardless of whether you “contributed” to the thread or not. If you see a thread that breaks these rules, just report it and ignore it.
In addition, “Jailbait” threads, private forum/wiki invasions, and posting personal information are examples of things that aren't illegal but still open us to legal threats. We will not ban all replies to these threads, but we will delete them and issue bans to the thread starter or other major participants if necessary. The rules have not changed with regards to these borderline-legal threads.
Our goal is to keep 4chan fun and unrestrictive, so we hope that these common-sense rules won't be much of a burden.
P.S.: The previous sticky was written by moot, not “THE MODS”. This one was written by coda.
In the aftermath, alternative websites (e.g. 7chan, 420chan, AnonIB, Dvach, WAKAchan, WTFux, etc.) saw a significant surge in 4chan refugees. Some were welcoming, others were not, and some had set up a refuge that only non-English speakers would know about.8) At the end of the day, this would be cited as the event that started the hacktivist-affiliated “Invasion” (/i/) boards, but it also led to things like 12chan.
Notes
- “/b/-day” was a pun on "D-Day", similar to how everything had to be an “Operation” back then.
- There is an old screenshot of AnonIB's “Invasions” board where the WikiFur founder “GreenReaper” allegedly tried to bluff that the furries, the group that /b/ users were targeting, had infiltrated them. However, if you actually stopped to read the bluff, supposedly written by a 23-year-old furry at the time, it really makes the “Furfags own /b/” and “Proof” scrawls look incredibly silly.
External links
2)
"I'm glad for the new rule enforcement on /b/. It was loosing it's appeal by being just cp/jb, copy pasta, and stupid raids all the time." (August 23, 2006). Something Awful.
5)
At the time, “moot” was wordfiltered to “doug”. The exact thread was not archived since, allegedly, the staff kept messing with the stickied threads and the users kept spamming the board in protest.
7)
"Yeah, /b/'s server had a disk failure. I hope we actually backed up dis this time!" (August 24, 2006). Something Awful.
8)
Dvach would stealthily add the “Refuge” (Убежище, Ubezhishche) board at /rf/ for people who weren't interested in the recent infestation of at /b/. At some point, this later became a board for social outcasts, so it gained the name “Hikkach” (Хиккач) from Hikikomori. This no longer exists.
4chan_b-day.txt · Last modified: by namelessrumia