Operation Basement Dad: How 4Chan Could Beat CNN & Ashton Kutcher
While Ashton Kutcher and CNN are trying to be the first to hit 1 million followers on Twitter, Joseph Frieschel, an inconspicuous Australian MD, is quickly catching up. Frieschel only opened his Twitter account last night, but he already has over 200,000 followers. How can this be? Well, it looks like the anonymous members of the infamous 4chan imageboard didn't like the idea of either Kutcher or CNN breaking the 1 million follower barrier before they got a chance to make their presence felt.
4Chan Takes on Twitter
The choice of the fake user's "real" name, username, avatar, and bio are typical examples of the kind of crass and often tasteless humor that runs rampant on anonymous forums like 4chan. The new Twitter account clearly refers to Joseph Fritzl, the Austrian who, unknown to the rest of his family, imprisoned his daughter in his house's basement for 24 years until his double life finally unraveled last year.
Not all of the humor on 4chan is this crass, however. The site, after all, was also the breeding ground for popular Internet memes like Rickrolling and lolcats.
While the members of 4chan's 'random' board (often referred to as /b/) first tried to manipulate twitter with automated scripts that set up fake accounts, they weren't able to hack Twitter's captcha process, which is probably the reason why even the enterprising 4chan pranksters haven't been able to reach more than 200,000 followers for their fake account yet. Knowing 4chan, however, we don't expect them to give up anytime soon, and we wouldn't be surprised if they managed to break Twitter's captcha at some point as well.
If you would like to see how exactly this hack works, here are the instructions that one of 4chan's members created for the rest of the /b/ community.
Oprah Might Just Win this Race
However, given that Oprah is going to talk about Twitter on her show tomorrow, there is still a good chance that she will pass by Kutcher, CNN, and 4chan's BasementDad in no time.
Moot
The members of 4chan's /b/ board also made the news a bit earlier this week, when they manipulated a Time.com poll so that it featured the name of 4chan founder 'moot' as the most influential person in the world.
Where is Twitter?
Interestingly, Twitter, which should be aware of the sudden rash of fake accounts that all subscribe to only one user, hasn't closed this account yet.
Update: We just head from Twitter's Biz Stone. Twitter is aware of this situation and "and will react accordingly."
Note: we did not include a link to 4chan in this post, as a lot of the material there is NSFW (or worse). If you insist on going there, a quick Google search for 4chan will do the trick.
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this is the internets.. it's already decided who will win..
Google this... you can smell the fear. Blood in the water, my friends. The ancient Greeks taught that hubris was the deadliest sin - will Larry King and Ashton Kutcher have to learn the hard way that taking one's position at the top for granted brings swift punishment from the gods?
"Tasteless humour"
thats when i stopped reading
racist pigs
i frown upon you
LOL - You really called Oprah "The Dark Horse"? Good job, racists...
Do you mean Oprah will have people follow @o_magazine? @oprah doesn't have any updates.
Looking at this rough estimate: http://85.14.217.35/tr/ , @basementdad is neck-and-neck with @aplusk to reach 1 million in roughly 16 hours. What an epic battle!
Wow, way to be racist against Oprah. It will happen, believe it.
FUCK YOU RWW!!, watch your fingers or Anonymous is going to take it against you.
"Tasteless humour" you say?, then prove us wrong. Sure you can't do a thing, WE ARE LEGION.
And remember: ANONYMOUS NEVER FORGET, NEVER FORGIVE.
Fuck off.
We will take over.
And you will be sorry you ever crossed us.
yeah we're /b/ and this contest is the kind of stupid arrogance we can't stand.
They're acting like it's some kind of charity event but it's just a publicity stunt.
If 4chan wins, they should BOTH donate the 10,000 mosquito nets that they should have just given from the START even without this stupid promo crap.
CNN, Ashton, way to fail the save-the-world.
You're treading on thin ice RWW, don't fuck with anonymous let us do what we will for our amusement.
this article is pointless.
Has anyone really been far even as decided to use even go want to do look more like?
IN RUSSIA TWITTER HACKS YOU!!
This is the way we work, join us, or dont, we dont care, but if any of those 2 win, we lose
are you TRYING to get fritzl banned from twitter??
why do people always break rules #1 and #2
newfags...
^newfag
Anonymous - we actually think this is a great prank! The whole Kutcher/CNN race is just an example for how meaningless follower numbers on Twitter really are.
Why would twitter delete the basementdad account? It hasn't breached any terms of service.
we will win, if you damn newfags quit posting and get back to work
@puppy - i'm sure that if they wanted to delete it, they would have done so already - they must be aware of this
To be honest, I see nothing wrong with this. It's a Twitter account not the serious contest and I think that's what they're trying to show. If they get it, fair play to them.
Frederic, you truly were going on a edge here. invocate 4chan in a post?. i guess you have never seen what they have done to other sites. hope they will behave with RWW.
@avatar - so far so good :)
Ev and company must know and have already considered erasing it. but crossing 4chan would only cause the repercussions that followed when YouTube tried to manage the whole Anom vs Youknowwho that resulted in Anom winning and YouTube wasting resources for nothing....Anom working toggether could easily take down Twitter in no time if they wanted given the amount of script loaders they would be able to place in no time. tricky situation there.
These anon cats don't play around and it's kind of scary.
we didn't 'manipulate' the times.com poll.
some us of voted.
not all of us though, for we are legion.
I HAVE HAD IT WITH THESE MOTHERFUCKING SNAKES ON THIS MOTHERFUCKING PLAN. ALSO FUCK YOU RWW
Why can't Anonymous do anything nowadays without the media getting involved? Fox, TIME, Wikipedia, even Cracked, and now this bullshit. I'm starting to hate journalists.
Whatever, we're going to come out on top anyway.
sage
sage goes in the email field.
welcome to the interbutts....now get back to work newfags
also the game
I like how the 13 year olds come on here making threats and whatnot. Not how /b/ operates.
Basementdad for president!!!
We will prevail!
Rules 1 & 2, faggot.
yeah we're /b/ and this contest is the kind of stupid arrogance we can't stand.
They're acting like it's some kind of charity event but it's just a publicity stunt.
If 4chan wins, they should BOTH donate the 10,000 mosquito nets that they should have just given from the START even without this stupid promo crap.
CNN, Ashton, way to fail the save-the-world.
An hero plz
U LEIK TACO!?
Basement dad shall prevail
We do not forgive, we do not forget
/me makes some popcorn, sits back, and watches the show.
Rules 1 & 2 ffs
"If 4chan wins, they should BOTH donate the 10,000 mosquito nets"
just saying, but, donating the nets puts a manufacturer of nets out of work in that local market.
--anon-e-mouse
@ Avatar & Frederick
You two seem to know how we Anon work. It is true that if this failed due to Twitter, or anyone else, interfering, the legion would take down not only the person responsible, but all of twitter.
Anon knows it's stuff, and they aren't afraid of the consequences. Most of them are sitting behind "over 9000" proxies after all. Let's face it, we post child pornoography on the internet and don't afraid of anything.
We are legion.
We do not forget.
We do not forgive.
You are right to be afraid.
We ARE.. Internet super heroes. And we will win this war.
MOTHER FUCK YOU Frederic Lardinois
don't delete my posts
don't fuck with me
Omfg... Rule 1&2 are most important right now, wtf is wrong with you people
Clay, the guy meant for Asston and CNN to donate the nets.
As in to fund the whole process?
The manufacturers wouldn't suffer at all.
lrn2read properly
THE GAME
[bg=00FFFF]Rules 1&2?! Right now, the rules are void.
ANYTHING goes in this showdown, our motives have already been revealed. Whichever asshat did this, deserves all they get, but we need to win this race. Or all the intenet has ever been will be destroyed. /b/ SHALL PREVAIL!! [/bg]
I thinks 4chan is a pretty cool guy. eh wants to get 1 million followers and doesn't afraid of anything.
GIRUGAMESH
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