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From: Scot J. Trudeau <scot@planetscot.com>
Newsgroups: alt.fan.karl-malden.nose
Subject: Re: "The One True History of Meow"
Date: Thu, 31 Jul 2003 08:07:51 -0400
Organization: atbnb Special Forces
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Figured I'd pass this around as a reminder to those new to these parts....All
Hail Raoul! Meow Meow.
In message <1ssfivkcjkhl6a5240nc8voa7gjc3640m3@secure-nntp-feed>,
KILLER14 <killer14@webtv.net> wrote:
>In message <3f2763d5_2@corp-news.newsgroups.com> "Tom Bishsop"
><aklsdjdf@054-here-39.nu> wrote:
>
>>the following article is found at the following URL on 2001-11.
>>http://member.newsguy.com/~shpxurnq/meow.html
>>
>>------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>The One True History of Meow
>>
>>By The 2-Belo
>>
>>
>>The Meow Wars The largest flame war in Usenet history, involving hundreds of
>>people from over 80 newsgroups, lasting over forty-five weeks. It was the
>>Usenet equivalent of World War II. It was The Flamewar to End All Flamewars.
>>
>>It was the best of times.The Meow Wars It all began innocently enough: a
>>small group of students at Harvard University - a band of future
>>bloodsucking ambulance-chasing lawyers, medical specialists who phone in
>>diagnoses from mobile phones on yachts, and caffeine-crazed computer
>>programmers with way too much time on their hands - began to use Usenet as a
>>local dorm room bulletin board/gossip clique area.
>>
>>The newsgroup they chose, apparently at random from among the hundreds of
>>empty Usenet joke-newsgroup wastelands: alt.fan.karl-malden.nose. [The
>>circumstances surrounding the birth of this newsgroup can now be told,
>>thanks to the location of the original newgroup control message.]
>>
>>This small group of posters set up their little regime in this forgotten
>>newsgroup, posting daily schedules and post count summaries, talking about
>>this class and that event and this and that and the other. Eventually, they
>>tired of posting articles about their immensely boring daily lives, so they
>>turned their attention to the computer network world around them. First they
>>tried their hand at penny-ante crossposting, branching out to claim other
>>empty newsgroups, such as alt.fan.ok-soda and alt.fan.pooh. This soon grew
>>stale as well, as each poster moved into a new group only to find the same
>>bored people he/she left behind.
>>
>>Apparently as a result of the Ivy-League uppity belief that all the world
>>should be like them (and also as a result of trying to avoid studying for
>>exams), one of the posters suggested that they "invade" a real, populated
>>newsgroup and "rile up the stupid people". When Matt Bruce, another of the
>>Harvard band, heard this, he wrote this response:
>>
>>"I suggest that we start either posting or crossposting to
>>alt.tv.beavis-n-butthead. I also suggest that we use big words and perfect
>>grammar, and refuse to write as the young ruffians in question speak.
>>
>>"This could lead to some interesting 'dialogue.' "
>>
>>This article was posted directly to alt.tv.beavis-n-butthead. The regulars
>>at that group, wondering what the world was coming to, scoffed at the notion
>>of a couple of stuck-up geeks from Harvard calling them "ruffians", and a
>>few unpleasantries were exchanged. This crosspost-tossing attracted the
>>attention of an unknown poster going by the name of Dontonio Wingfield.
>>He/she discovered that one of the Harvard posters, Chuck Truesdell, placed
>>"meow meow" (a reference to Henrietta Pussycat of Mr. Roger's Neighborhood
>>fame) in many of his posts as a sort of calling card, as his initials spell
>>"C.A.T.". Matt Bruce picked up on this practice for one post (the quote at
>>the top of this page), and someone, for some reason, took that article out
>>of afk-mn, crossposting it to a dozen newsgroups as a troll against the
>>"Nosers" (as the Harvard students called themselves). Dontonio Wingfield
>>either instigated this troll, or was the first to reply to it:
>>
>>"What the hell is this shite? Would you mind keeping it the hell out of
>>HERE?"
>>
>>The Dontonio Wingfield persona then, of course, vanished. The posters in the
>>targeted groups, noting the "meow meow" elements, began to retaliate against
>>the supposed original crossposter, Matt Bruce. These posters entered the
>>'Nose and found it full of other Harvard students like Matt, and the
>>counter-invaders flamed and spewed "meow" with vigor, In time, flames
>>containing the word "meow" would start popping up all over the place, aimed
>>mostly at areas where the high-class uppity Ivy-League snots were known to
>>congregate, such as alt.college.college-bowl. Other flames targeted snobbish
>>college kids who regularly huffed their freckled noses in newsgroups such as
>>alt.music.nin. Some of the more daring souls decided to forge articles in
>>Bruce's name, spreading the "meow" attacks to more and more groups,
>>including afk-mn, to add to the onslaught against him and his
>>"intellectually elite" cohorts.
>>
>>When the real Matt Bruce caught wind of the uproar, he and the other Harvard
>>students first tried to write his attack on atbnb as a "joke". When no one
>>bought his story, he attempted more forcefully to get the attackers to stop,
>>which only sounded like more condescending talk:
>>
>>"Please stop. Cease and desist. You are only making yourselves look silly."
>>
>>When this only fanned the flames further, he threatened to cancel all
>>articles containing the word "meow", and to netcop all the "meow" article
>>forgers. This "Cancellation Notice", posted about a month and a half after
>>the first "meow" troll, was apparently the proverbial last straw. A person
>>crossposting into 12 newsgroups, then claiming it a "joke", when he
>>obviously had no sense of humor? This pissed off the Usenet Performance
>>Artists to no end. it was time to teach Matt Bruce - and the rest of his
>>gang of snots - a lesson. Suddenly, afk-mn, alt.college.college-bowl, and
>>scores of other groups were flooded to the gills and beyond with hundreds
>>upon hundreds of huge meow articles from all corners of Usenet. Cascades,
>>ASCII cats, hundred-line "meow" hello-world-type flood posts, and more were
>>posted, reposted, munged, pureed, and regurgitated all over the servers of
>>the world. The Harvard kids' protests were quickly lost in the feline tidal
>>wave. Every post by a Harvard snot would result in fifty cascade follow-ups.
>>alt.college.college-bowl, a known regular haunt of Matt Bruce, was reduced
>>to a smoldering crater, so inundated with meows that its regulars could no
>>longer use it. After a couple of weeks of this, Usenet in general looked
>>like Chernobyl, or the Marina district of San Francisco after the 1989
>>earthquake, or downtown Nagasaki the day after the fall of the Fat Man.
>>
>>A number of the attackers, calling themselves the "MEOW MEOW ARMY", were
>>bent on taking over afk-mn and occupying it as their own. It soon was - the
>>Harvard students, seeing a fire raging out of control in their cyber Dunster
>>House, were compelled to escape to a local, non-propagated newsgroup on a
>>Harvard server.The meow hurricane, however,simply refused to die:
>>alt.college.college-bowl continued to be attacked until almost a year after
>>Matt Bruce's now infamous post, and the Meowers now in afk-mn began to
>>redecorate their new home (with the legendary Fluffy, formerly Matt Bruce's
>>pet, claiming ownership of all of Usenet), merging with the verbal abuse
>>powerhouse known as the Mighty Alt Dot FlameTM.
>>
>>Today, afk-mn remains as a sort of Usenet posting relay hub. The first- and
>>second- generation Meowers also became alt.flame regulars. Other bases of
>>Usenet Performance Art, such as alt.alien.vampire.flonk.flonk.flonk,
>>alt.non.sequitur, and alt.stupidity, long bases of Meow action, also traded
>>regulars with the Nose. These groups fused together to form what is now
>>known as the Empire of Meow.
>>
>>This empire is still growing as you read this, as in 1998 the groups
>>alt.flame.niggers and demon.local were recently annexed much in the same
>>fashion as the 'Nose. There are hundreds of groups throughout the alt.*
>>heirarchy who have at least heard of the Meow movement... every so often, a
>>troll warning will be posted to these groups, sometimes even warning the
>>inhabitants about elements that the Empire has nothing to do with:
>>
>>"You will be able to recognize a troll and an impending invasion from
>>alt.syntax.tactical by cascades, numerous appearances of the word 'meow',
>>and crossposts to alt.fan.karl-malden.nose..."
>>
>>Also, throughout its lifetime, the actions of the Empire have seemingly
>>become a convenient scapegoat for real Usenet abuses. In February of 1997,
>>several inhabitants of the 'Nose were placed under a Usenet Death Penalty,
>>or UDP, for over a week by a certain self-made Usenet "spam canceller". The
>>crime: cascades. Also, in 1998, Meow became the whipping boy for those
>>persons who wanted a UDP imposed on Altopia News Service, which many Meowers
>>use to post to Usenet, because of the few Altopia users who were committing
>>blatant acts of abuse such as mailbombing and post flooding. These accusers
>>were wont to include relatively harmless acts of off-topic crossposts and
>>cascades in with the real problems. Apparently, there will always be those,
>>like the Harvard kids, who will not tolerate the right that all Usenetters
>>have to act silly, or to have a sense of humor, or to have the view that
>>nothing should be taken too seriously. It should, however, be noted that
>>without the existence of tight-sphinctered conservative snots, there would
>>be no Meow in the first place. Hated or not, it would thus seem that the
>>phenomenon known as MEOW, and its practitioners known as MEOWERS, have
>>forever carved their place among the legends of Usenet, along with the likes
>>of Kibology and the first MMF chain letter. Clealy, sir, the Empire of
>>Meow's feline vocalizations will be heard forever more throughout Usenet
>>history.
>>
>>Meow.
>
>ime frum harvard, dood! an eye reclam tihs grope inta nam of amwp!
--
Scot J. Trudeau, Commander atbnb Special Forces; *Irrvmator Veritatis*
Dean of the Meow-Meow Academy of Postal Psychology
Meow Meow Campus @ http://www.planetscot.com
Join CAUCE and support the fight against UCE! --> http://www.cauce.org
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