This weeks blog can be found at http://failblog.org/
This blog displays funny pictures and videos that "FAIL", and readers can submit their own posts. There is a section for comments, but the main objective is to provide humor generally geared towards youth in their late teens. The layout is large, and pictures are the main focus. Each picture is accompanied by the trademark "FAIL" in white block letters. Failblog is in association with "Cheezburger" and links can be found both at the top and bottom of the page.
Consider:
What is this blog attempting to convey?
Are there social messages associated with this blog?
What does the addition of the Facebook, Twitter and Digg tabs seem to suggest about the use of this blog and its audience?
ENJOY!
This is interesting... I don't know where to start :O
ReplyDeleteWell, it's amazing how many views this blog is getting, compared to what we have been examining in this blog project. The political blogs especially, didn't have many comments at all. But here, there are at least few hundred "favoriting" the articles, which i guess is like 'liking' things on facebook. On one article where they have a picture of a hamburger with packaging number printed on it, has almost 4000 people who added this to their favorite, and 128 comments on top of that.
Maybe the casual atmosphere of this blog allows people to post how they feel about certain topics more easier than political blogs, which might intimidate people to feel like they have to know the material in order to voice their opinion, or comment. Failblog is a place people go to get a light laugh, and by having an inviting atmosphere that people can contribute, it is serving as a discussion board about materials people can laugh at from everyday lives.
I remember being told about this particular blog a couple of years ago and there were always funny pictures or videos to laugh at with friends. Unfortunately I don't think it is as funny now but that may be to the specific posts I was looking at. This could also imply a certain audience target (such as middle school/junior high school students). However please take that comment as lightly as possible because I do realize there is plenty of not so appropriate content and jokes for the blogs audience focus to solely be on early age teenagers. With the Fail Blog I visually notice how "loud" and "busy" it seems to be. There are seemingly endless amounts of advertisements and plenty of links to click on. After blog posts there are links that are connected that have been recommended as similar or things the reader may like. Overall it was an interesting site to revisit and provoked some old memories to rush back.. this blog kinda inspires me to call up some old friends and reminisce! If anything, I'd say thats personally a great benefit to this blog :)
ReplyDeleteThe identification one is really funny, he probably will be the largest squirrel in the world! And soon, i believe, there will come out some new staff, the biggest birds, and rabbits. Everyone will find an excuse to misshooting someone else without having any responsiblity. This funny piece does a great ironic job!
ReplyDeleteThis blog is clearly trying to provide humor. It does an effective job. The overall theme is just people making fools of themselves often with impending injury involved. I would say that the specific audience (teens) do not spend too much time on the site. The info is readily accessible, but is disorganized. There is no order in how it is presented, just oldest to newest.
ReplyDeleteI am really happy that those of you who have posted so far have such different opinions about the blog! Besides layout and content, I think there are so other interesting things to note about this site that you may want to think about when commenting:
ReplyDeleteLook at the advertisements on this site, what do these ads suggest about the people who view this site? Do you think the ads on this site match the demographic of the people who look at Failblog?
How do you think this site plays with the theme of borders?Does it cross any lines (propriety? social norms? etc.)
Would you ever put one of Failblog's posts on your social networking site or email?
Comment and let us know what you think! Personally, I think it's a hilarious site..so go ahead and get a few laughs! Enjoy :)
My first overall impression of this blog, just from casually scrolling down, is that its very unorganized and almost 'scattershot' with all the vidoes, ad, hotspots for facebook and other social networking sites and search engines. I understand why they're inserted where these links are, in order to get this blog more exposure through the use of twitter and people hitting the 'like' button on facebook of course. What I find to be most interesting/fascinating is the use of the "thumbs down" symbol when someone likes a particular blog post/video. In most cases like this, Example: Youtube, the website offers the individual website browser the chance to approve of a particular video by showing their sign of approval with a "thumbs up", but since this site is called 'Fail-Blog' it wants the site's visitors to show their approval by saying how each video "Fails" and fails miserably. That said, I did enjoy the various clips and videos and thought the site does an excellent job in selecting what videos they want to represent their blog as there are literally millions of clips for them to have used but chose not to.
ReplyDeleteThe blog clearly shows their attempt at humorous scenarios that happen in real life. The blog has a simple layout, with not a lot of distraction from advertisements and other items on the sides. While the blog appears to be attracting peoplep who enjoy comedy, I also feel like it is a site that is possibly made towards a younger audience, as in high school and maybe some middle school. Personally, when I look through this blog, there are some posts that are funny, but overall it is not amusing. With that being said, though clearly there is an older audience as well with the advertisement of Lopez Tonight. Not only do they promote other comedian shows on their blog, but another advertisment is for comical print t-shirts. The advertisments clearly coincide with the idea of practical jokes. The blog also takes an interesting approach to the idea of humor. Everything that is posted on this blog is only about funny failures. It gives the audience a perception that only funny things happen when people fail. Overall, this blog portrays in interesting view of humor in the society.
ReplyDeleteHey guys, here are a couple more questions to respond to...
ReplyDelete-What does this blog tell us about current pop culture in America?
-What common comedic tactics of other media outlets are also presented on this blog? (for example, offensive language, innapropriate refrences, etc?) And what does this say about our generation's sense of humor? How does it differ and relate to other time periods or cultures?
-What has made this blog so successful and why?
-If you don't like this blog, what specifcally are you disatisfied with and/or what would you change?
Keep posting your ideas!! :)
I find it interesting that this blog was chosen, being a fairly well-known blog to most college students. I really don't feel like there's any point to this blog. It's essentially a site to look at when you're bored, I've never had any deep philosophical revelations when viewing pictures of misspelled signs or products labels. I feel it's barely a step above 4chan in terms of sophistication of humor.
ReplyDeleteThis blog ironically "wins" as demonstrating failures. It relies heavily on visuals to entice the viewer. One word that is repetitive to the blog is "fail". It's theme is highly supported and one would believe any individual with a sense of humor would at some point come across this site. The blog seems to indicate that society has a tendency to make fun of failures. While I can see the humor of the images and articles, one has to wonder whether this blog would actually offend any individuals. This might be one of the few blogs that have advertisement links that are actually related to the blog (which is humor). A similar trend I have noticed is that; simplicity is key. In essence, this blog is blunt; it says fail and funny, and those are the images and articles that are found throughout the site.
ReplyDeleteI think this is a very fun,free-spirited blog composed of easy humor and a nice change from the past "serious political" blogs. Although I have never heard of this blog, it appears to be very popular and fun place to stop by when surfing the web. Its not too complex in any aspect, it has a very simple layout and the mission statement, although not stated, is direct. i think the reason this blog has been so successful is because it acts as a "facebook stop." a "facebook stop" is basically another way of saying that when one turns on their computer, they are bound to stop by facebook at one point in their internet excursion.
ReplyDeleteat a first glance this blog is pretty funny. It is amusing to see what amusing things the internet has to offer. the blog seems to be aimed at the younger generation, the ones with more free time on their hands. the blog doesn't really seem to convey and specific message, but a closer look at the comment section provides a better idea at the purpose of the blog. while many of the comments are in relation to the post, a portion of them are spam like comments: people trying to get in their 10 minutes of fame, or make inappropriate comments while hiding behind relative, well i cant think of the word, so, anonymous-ness. this site would appeal to a regular crowd. there seems to be many people who visit the site on a regular basis: some of the commenters appear on many posts. Overall, the blog conveys what it wants very easily, and still includes the typical ads and links to other sites. good choice guys, go bucks!
ReplyDeleteLike others have noticed, the humor presented by individual posts generally follow a theme. Most posts poke fun at someone else's blunder via a image or a video clip. There is usually only one change: captioning somewhere the word "Fail". Like Coco said, the strongest form of humor in this blog is simplicity and bluntness. Though posters can write a short footnote about the image, this forces blog posters to describe a joke with limited description, leaving it up to the viewers to interpret the jokes themselves. However, it seems quite obvious what particular thing is being made fun of that most of the time, we don't need to be reminded that it was a "fail". Perhaps this is what created the overall theme of this blog. There is a different kind of joke presented with each individual post, but fail theme puts them all on a similiar level. I suppose it's helpful since viewers can learn how to avoid these "fail"'s! The sources being made fun of remain anonymous. This allows viewers to poke fun without being personally insulting. Also, if a post is flagged as offensive, it will be removed. This plus the anonymity and simplicity of the humor gives off the casual, un-serious atmostphere of the blog.
ReplyDeletePretty intriguing! I must say it is a different twist to what we normally see. It is interesting to see how the images are great to look at and have a healthy laugh here and there. It is interesting how facebook is attached to this blog as it is definitely the type of material people our age would put up to spread the humor. Slightly off track, but in some form or way, because of the economics times and people having been more "negative" towards things, could this be a possible way to relieve the economics ties that people are being held back by? It sure seems to me Like something I would send to them if i know they were having a bad day!
ReplyDeleteThe blog as a whole speaks out to a particular audience just merely by the mention of its title. After all, there is a certain percentage of the community that refers to lapses in judgement and unsuccessful attempts at achieving something as a fail. Once you're on the page if you are not a person that regards the shortcomings of others as humorous the blog may not become something for which you return to in order to make you feel better about yourself but rather for you to feel saddened and empathetic. For others, the blog is exactly the latter people probably "failing" in life their own way come to the blog and realize they are not alone or worse off. People in general get joy from others pain as cliche as it sounds it is true. We enjoy the discomfort when it is not at our own loss. It makes us sound very sadistic as a society, but welcome to the world of comedy
ReplyDeleteThis blog have a lot of fun! Those contents posted on this blog are mostly pictures and videos. So people can catch the main idea of each one at the first glance. I like this blog not only because the interesting pictures but also the structure and how people can share their own opinion on this blog. You can find the word “fail” everywhere on this blog. In the title of every picture/video, there must have a “fail”, like “Clearing the gap Fail”, “through the hoop Fail”. And if you like this one, it is not a “this is great” dumb show like what on face book, but a fail dumb show. When you put your comment on it, you will become a “failures in communication”.
ReplyDelete