research-article

Just awful enough: the functional dysfunction of the something awful forums

Authors:

Jessica Annette Pater,

Elizabeth D. Mynatt,

Amy S. BruckmanAuthors Info & Claims

CHI '14: Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems

Pages 2407 - 2410

https://doi.org/10.1145/2556288.2557193

Published: 26 April 2014 Publication History

Abstract

The Something Awful Forums (SAF) is an online community comprised of a loosely connected federation of forums, united in a distinctive brand of humor with a focus on the quality of member contributions. In this case study we find that the site has sustained success while deviating from common conventions and norms of online communities. Humor and the quality of content contributed by SAF members foster practices that seem counterintuitive to the development of a stable and thriving community. In this case study we show how design decisions are contextual and inter-dependent and together these heuristics create a different kind of online third place that challenges common practices.

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Cited By

McKitrick BRogerson MGibbs MNansen B(2022)“What are you Bringing to the Table?”: The Something Awful Let’s Play Community as a Serious Leisure SubcultureGames and Culture10.1177/1555412022110131018:3(402-421)Online publication date: 16-May-2022
https://doi.org/10.1177/15554120221101310
Park JSeering JBernstein M(2022)Measuring the Prevalence of Anti-Social Behavior in Online CommunitiesProceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/35555526:CSCW2(1-29)Online publication date: 11-Nov-2022
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3555552
McKitrick BGibbs MRogerson MNansen BPierce C(2022)Let’s play something awful: a historical analysis of 14 years of threadsInternet Histories10.1080/24701475.2022.20848237:2(122-140)Online publication date: 9-Jun-2022
https://doi.org/10.1080/24701475.2022.2084823
Show More Cited By

Index Terms

Just awful enough: the functional dysfunction of the something awful forums
1. Human-centered computing
  1. Collaborative and social computing

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cover image ACM Conferences

CHI '14: Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems

April 2014

4206 pages

ISBN:9781450324731

DOI:10.1145/2556288

General Chairs:
Matt Jones
Swansea University, Wales, UK
,
Philippe Palanque
Université Paul Sabatier, France
,
Program Chairs:
Albrecht Schmidt
University of Stuttgart, Germany
,
Tovi Grossman
Autodesk Research, Canada

Copyright © 2014 ACM.

Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than the author(s) must be honored. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. Request permissions from [email protected].

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SIGCHI: ACM Special Interest Group on Computer-Human Interaction

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Published: 26 April 2014

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CHI '14: CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems

April 26 - May 1, 2014

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CHI '14 Paper Acceptance Rate 465 of 2,043 submissions, 23%;

Overall Acceptance Rate 6,199 of 26,314 submissions, 24%

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Cited By

McKitrick BRogerson MGibbs MNansen B(2022)“What are you Bringing to the Table?”: The Something Awful Let’s Play Community as a Serious Leisure SubcultureGames and Culture10.1177/1555412022110131018:3(402-421)Online publication date: 16-May-2022
https://doi.org/10.1177/15554120221101310
Park JSeering JBernstein M(2022)Measuring the Prevalence of Anti-Social Behavior in Online CommunitiesProceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/35555526:CSCW2(1-29)Online publication date: 11-Nov-2022
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3555552
McKitrick BGibbs MRogerson MNansen BPierce C(2022)Let’s play something awful: a historical analysis of 14 years of threadsInternet Histories10.1080/24701475.2022.20848237:2(122-140)Online publication date: 9-Jun-2022
https://doi.org/10.1080/24701475.2022.2084823
Fiesler CBruckman A(2019)Creativity, Copyright, and Close-Knit CommunitiesProceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/33611223:GROUP(1-24)Online publication date: 5-Dec-2019
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3361122
Chandrasekharan EGandhi CMustelier MGilbert E(2019)Crossmod: A Cross-Community Learning-based System to Assist Reddit ModeratorsProceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/33592763:CSCW(1-30)Online publication date: 7-Nov-2019
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3359276
Menking AErickson IPratt WBrewster SFitzpatrick GCox AKostakos V(2019)People Who Can Take ItProceedings of the 2019 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems10.1145/3290605.3300702(1-14)Online publication date: 2-May-2019
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Chandrasekharan ESamory MJhaver SCharvat HBruckman ALampe CEisenstein JGilbert E(2018)The Internet's Hidden RulesProceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/32743012:CSCW(1-25)Online publication date: 1-Nov-2018
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3274301
Chancellor SHu ADe Choudhury MMandryk RHancock MPerry MCox A(2018)Norms MatterProceedings of the 2018 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems10.1145/3173574.3174240(1-14)Online publication date: 21-Apr-2018
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3173574.3174240
Chandrasekharan EPavalanathan USrinivasan AGlynn AEisenstein JGilbert E(2017)You Can't Stay HereProceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/31346661:CSCW(1-22)Online publication date: 6-Dec-2017
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3134666
Schlesinger AChandrasekharan EMasden CBruckman AEdwards WGrinter RMark GFussell SLampe Cschraefel mHourcade JAppert CWigdor D(2017)Situated AnonymityProceedings of the 2017 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems10.1145/3025453.3025682(6912-6924)Online publication date: 2-May-2017
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3025453.3025682
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